32
WHY JESUS WEPT
ANGELA.
Now let him find it! This will puzzle him.
When Limburger replaces Patchouli,
Why—moonrise !
[Sir Percy, radiant, reaches the land-
ing stage, moors his boat and
mounts. He sees a pink note on
the wharf.
Sir PERCY.
Ah! she has dropped this!
A cruel fool am I;
I took an honied kiss ;
I revelled in true bliss ;
Yet never thought to try
A keepsake to obtain
To wear my heart upon.
Now God is great and gracious;
Iere’s medicine for my pain.
She has left it; she has gone!
How sweet the air and spacious !
I am happy—let me see!
I guess some verse inspired
By all her soul desired,
Purity, love, well-being—ay ! and me:
[He opens the note, reads :—
‘To love you, Love, is all my happiness ;
To kill you with my kisses ; to devour
Your whole ripe beauty in the perfect hour
That mingles us in one supreme caress—”’!
Why, here is love articulate, vital! I
thought that only poets, not lovers, could
so speak. And that poets, poor devils,
speaking, could never know.
‘©So Percy to his Angela’s distress—”
Then it is not my Molly that writes this
—who is this Percy >—not me, at all events,
for there is no Angela that loves me. (A
sound of sobbing in the trees.) Whom have
we here? (Advances.) ’Fore God, the most
beautiful woman in the world, except my
Molly! And her scent ! O she is like some
intimate tropical plant, luring and deadly!
1 See above, ‘‘’The Temple of the Holy
Crhost,” vol. i. p. 181,
—I am afraid. (He discovers ANGELA,)
Madam, can I aid you?
ANGELA.
Leave me! Leave me! I am the wretched-
est girl on the wide earth.
SiR PERCY.
The comeliest, mademoiselle,
(Aside.) I see this is a woman of the
world. To her with speeches fit for such,
then.
ANGELA,
I have seen all. Pity me!
is a sword in my heart !
Your flattery
Sir PErRcy,
Seen ?
ANGELA,
Your love—you call it so!
SIR PERCY.
Have you, then—
ANGELA.
I saw all. Ah me!
Poor Angela!
SIR PERCY.
Angela is your name?
ANGELA.
My name.
Sir PERCY.
A lovely name.
tion runs parallel.
No doubt your disposi-
ANGELA.
Meets never? You are no courtier, sir !
Sir PERcY.
‘sir !”
Do not say ‘