Plays of Near Far | Page 9

follow the Queen.
OOMUZ: Mighty Highness.
ZOON: Yes, good Oomuz.
OOMUZ: In other times once princes followed a queen and came back boasting. Master, the workers were angry. Be warned, Master, because you and I went together once to the hoard beyond the marshes. Be warned. They were angry, Master.
ZOON: I care not for the workers.
OOMUZ: Master, be warned. It was long ago and they say they were very angry.
ZOON: I care not, Oomuz. I come not boasting back from the hills under Aether Mountain. I shall not halt till I have told the Queen my love. I shall wed with her who is less only than Fate, if less she be. I am not as those, Oomuz. Who weds the Queen is more than the servant of Fate.
OOMUZ: Master----
[He stretches out his hands towards ZOON imploringly.
ZOON: Well, Oomuz?
OOMUZ: Master. There is a doom about the Queen.
ZOON: What doom, Oomuz?
OOMUZ: We know not, Master. We are simple people and we know not that. But we know from of old there is a doom about her. We know it, Master; we have been told from of old.
ZOON: Yes, there could well be a doom about the Queen.
OOMUZ: Follow not after, Master, when she goes to Aether Mountain. There is surely a doom about her. A doom was with her mother upon that very peak.
ZOON: Yes, Oomuz, a doom well becomes her.
OOMUZ: Doubt it not, Master; there is a doom about her.
ZOON: Oomuz, I doubt not. For there is something wonderful about the Queen, beyond all earthly wonders. Something like thunder beyond far clouds or hail hurling from heaven; there should be indeed a terrible doom about her.
OOMUZ: Master, I have warned you for the sake of the days when we raided the golden hoard beyond the marshes.
ZOON (taking his hand): Thank you, good Oomuz.
[He goes towards door after the others.
OOMUZ: But where go you, Master?
ZOON: I wait to follow the Queen when she goes to Aether Mountain.
[Exit. OOMUZ weeps silently on to the Queen's Treasure.
CURTAIN.

SCENE II
The Palace of Zoorm: the Hall of Queen Zoomzoomarma.
Time: Same as Scene I.
THE QUEEN: Is none worthy to kiss my hand, Oozizi; none?
LADY OOZIZI: Lady, none.
[The QUEEN sighs.
You should not sigh, great lady.
QUEEN: Why should I not sigh, Oozizi?
OOZIZI: Great lady, because such things as sighs pertain only to love.
QUEEN: Love is a joy, Oozizi; love is a glow. Love makes them dance so lightly along rays of the sunlight. It is made of sunlight and gladness. It is like flowers in twilight. How should they sigh?
OOZIZI: Lady! Great lady! Say not such things of love!
QUEEN: Say not such things, Oozizi? Are they not true?
OOZIZI: True? Yes, great lady, true. But love is a toy of the humble; love is a common thing that the lowly use; love is ... Great lady, had any overheard you speaking then they might have thought, they might have madly dreamed ...
QUEEN: Dreamed what, Oozizi?
OOZIZI: Incredible things.
QUEEN (meditatively): I must not love, Oozizi.
OOZIZI: Lady! The common people love.
[She points to door.
Lady, the green fields going from here to the blueness, and bending towards it, and going wandering on, and the rivers they meet and the woods that shade the rivers, all own you for their sovereign. Lady, a million lime-trees mellow your realm. The golden hoards are yours. Yours are the deep fields and the iris marshes. Yours are the roads of wandering and all ways home. The common delights of love your mere soldiers know. Lady, you may not love.
[The QUEEN sighs. OOZIZI continues her knitting.
QUEEN: My mother loved, Oozizi.
OOZIZI: Lady, for a day. For one day, mighty lady, As one might stoop in idleness to a broken toy and pick it up and throw it again away, so she loved for a day. That idle fancy of an afternoon tarnished no pinnacle that shone from her exalted station. But to love for more than a day--(QUEEN'S face lights up)--that were to place your high unequalled glory below a vulgar pastime. One alone may sit in the golden palace to reign over the green fields; but all may love.
QUEEN: Do all love but I, Oozizi?
OOZIZI: Wondrous many, lady.
QUEEN: How know you, Oozizi?
OOZIZI: The common shouts that come up at evening, the clamour of the lanes; they are but from love.
QUEEN: What is love, Oozizi?
OOZIZI: Love is a foolish thing.
QUEEN: How know you, Oozizi?
OOZIZI: They came tittering to me once; but I saw the foolishness of it.
QUEEN (a little sadly): And they came no more?
OOZIZI (a little sadly too): No more.
[Both look thoughtfully out into dreams, the QUEEN on her throne, chin on hand.
[Suddenly a stir is heard from the Hall of the Hundred Princes.
QUEEN (alarmed): Hark! What was that?
OOZIZI (rises, listening anxiously): It sounded ... to come from the Hall ... of the Hundred Princes.
QUEEN: They were never heard here before.
OOZIZI: Lady,