For Love of the King | Page 5

Enter MOUNG PHO MHIN and U. RAI GYAN THOO, accompanied
by the Court Physicians and Astrologers.
"The King cannot live beyond the night," the Physicians say. The
sudden, mysterious illness that has attacked him defies their skill.
The Astrologers declare that the stars in their courses fight against his
recovery; unless a miracle should happen, the new day will see him

dead.
The Ministers regard each other in consternation; then walk the terrace
with bent heads.
The peacock on the wall spreads its tail and utters a melancholy cry of
poignant pain.
The listeners start in superstitious horror.
The peacock folds its tail and resumes its meditations.
"That bird is not as other birds," one astrologer declares. "I have
watched it for years past--it is ever alone--the others all avoid it. I think
it has a soul."
"You mistake," replies his colleague; "it is but an evil Nat. {32}
Observe its eyes: they are not those of a bird; they are those of a spirit
in prison."
They pass on in the wake of the ministers.
The peacock closes its eyes.
Enter the two young PRINCES, accompanied by two great Pegu
hounds. They converse in subdued tones, strolling slowly. They are
followed by pages of honour, carrying grain, which the young men
proceed to distribute amongst the birds as they rapidly approach them.
The peacock on the wall never stirs; she watches the young men always.
Then the elder one comes with a handful of food and proffers it, but the
peacock does not eat.
"I shall never understand you, Queen of the Kingdom of Birds," he says,
and strokes her feathers. At his touch the plumage scintillates with a
brighter, a more exquisite sheen.
He murmurs to the bird in soft tones and mythical words. He tells it
that the fear of everyone is that the King is mortally stricken, for he lies
yonder in most strange and evil agony; that the hearts of himself and

his brother are numb with the sorrow that knows no language. The bird
listens eagerly. And if the King should go, he, the speaker, will reign in
his stead. The prospect fills him with fear. He desires, as also his
brother, if the King must die, to return to dwell in the forest with the
mother who he knows awaits them there.
The peacock spreads its wings as if for flight, then crouches down once
more, and over it watches the young prince.
The sun envelops them both in a sudden shaft of rose and purple and
gold. A servant descends and comes across the grass. He shikoes
profoundly to the two young men, lifting up his hands in the deepest
reverence of Burmah.
"The Lord of the Earth and the Sky desires his sons; he nears the Great
Unknown."
CURTAIN

SCENE IV
The retreat of HIP LOONG, the Wizard.
Time: the same night.
The curtain discovers MAH PHRU, who has returned to human form,
and the Wizard together.
He tells her that he has restored her to her former state only because
she has implored him to do so; that her life is measured by hours as a
consequence of such insensate folly in breaking the vow of five years
back.
"But the King will live," she murmurs.
"The King will live. He will find happiness with someone fairer than
you. That is well. Your life for his. It is the price."

"The price is nothing. Have I not looked on my heart's beloved one for
five years--looked on his face--heard his voice--trembled with joy at his
footsteps? Have I not waited and watched? Have I not gazed on my
sons and seen their royal bearing, and known their touch?"
"You are, then, content?"
"You are a Wizard--you can read that I am."
"It is not I that am a Wizard--it is Love. That is the only Wizard this
world knows."
CURTAIN

SCENE V
The bed-chamber of the King--vast and shadowy. On heaped-up
cushions and covers of yellow and blue, under a pearl-sewn creamy
velvet baldaquin, embroidered with peacocks, lies MENG BENG,
mortally stricken; his face bears the ashen pallor that only dark skins
know. The ministers, the servants, the courtiers, the countless motley
gathering of an Eastern Court are scattered in anxious groups,
watching, waiting, murmuring. Only the space near the couch is clear.
Without, the dawn breaks over the sea, and, stealing through the
opening, makes the great chamber flush till it looks like porphyry.
The tolling of a deep gong and the voices of a myriad birds invade the
throbbing silence of the Palace.
"He passes," murmur the physicians. Everyone's gaze turns to the dying
man.
"Yet his star is in the ascendant," say the astrologers. The risen sun
touches him with its light like a caress. He opens his