Three Plays: Six Characters in Search of an Author, Henry IV, The Mountain Giants (Oxford World's Classics) (18 page)

LADY MATILDA
. They started ragging him.

BELCREDI
. And then—he was armed, like a king—then he drew his sword and assaulted two or three of us. Everyone was terrified.

LADY MATILDA
. I shall never forget that scene, with all our faces masked, distorted, amazed, facing his terrible mask which was no longer a mask at all, but sheer madness!

BELCREDI
. There he was, Henry IV! Henry IV in person, and in a fit of fury!

LADY MATILDA
. I say he must have been affected by his obsession with that pageant, doctor, an obsession that he’d been nursing for over a month. It kept coming into whatever he did.

BELCREDI
. And all his research in preparation! Down to the smallest details … the most minute …

DOCTOR
. Ah, that’s quite straightforward. What had been a transitory obsession became a fixation with the fall and the blow to the back of his head that caused the brain damage. It became fixed, self-generating. It can make a man a halfwit, or it can make him mad.

BELCREDI
[
to
FRIDA
and
DI NOLLI
]. You see how strangely things turn out, my dears. [
To
DI NOLLI
] You were four or five; [
to
FRIDA
] your mother thinks you’ve taken her place in that portrait there, though at the time she had no idea she’d bring you into the world: I’ve already gone grey. But
him
, there he is [
indicating the portrait
]—bang! a knock on the head—and from then on he hasn’t budged: Henry IV.

DOCTOR
[
emerging from a meditative pause, opens his hands before his face as if to concentrate the attention of the others and prepares to deliver his scientific explanation
]. Well then, well then, ladies and gentlemen; it is precisely this …

But suddenly the first door on the right, the one nearer to the footlights, opens to admit an alarmed-looking
BERTHOLD
.

BERTHOLD
[
bursting in like someone who can stand it no longer
]. May I? I beg your pardon … [
He stops short, seeing the sudden confusion that his entrance has created
].

FRIDA
[
with a scream of fear, shrinking back
]. Oh God! Here he is!

LADY MATILDA
[
shrinking back in dismay, with one arm raised so as not to see him
]. Is it him? Is it him?

DI NOLLI
[
promptly
]. No, no. Calm down.

DOCTOR
[
stunned
]. Who is it then?

BELCREDI
. Some survivor of our pageant.

DI NOLLI
. He’s one of the four young men we keep here to humour his madness.

BERTHOLD
. I beg your pardon, my lord …

DI NOLLI
. My pardon, be damned! I ordered that the doors should be locked and that nobody be allowed in here.

BERTHOLD
. Yessir, but I can’t take it any more. I’m asking permission to leave.

DI NOLLI
. Ah, you’re the one who was to start service this morning?

BERTHOLD
. Yessir, and I’m saying that I can’t stand it.

LADY MATILDA
[
very anxious, to
DI NOLLI
]. So he’s not as calm as you said?

BERTHOLD
[
quickly
]. No, no, my lady. It’s not him. It’s the three others who work with me. You say ‘humour him’, my lord? Well, if that’s ‘humouring’! They’re not humouring anyone. They’re the real madmen! I come in here for the first time, and instead of helping me, my lord …

LANDOLPH
and
HAROLD
enter through the same downstage right door as
BERTHOLD
;
though anxious and in haste, they hesitate at the door before coming forward
.

LANDOLPH
. Excuse me.

HAROLD
. Excuse us, my lord.

DI NOLLI
. Come in. What is it now? What are you doing?

FRIDA
. Oh God, I’m going to run away, get away from here: I’m scared. [
She makes towards the door on the left
]

DI NOLLI
[
holding her back
]. No, Frida.

LANDOLPH
. My lord, this idiot … [
Pointing to
BERTHOLD
]

BERTHOLD
[
protesting
]. Ah no, thanks very much, my friends. I won’t take it, not like that. I won’t take it!

LANDOLPH
. What do you mean, you won’t take it?

HAROLD
. He’s ruined everything, my lord, by rushing off here.

LANDOLPH
. He’s driven him absolutely furious. We can’t hold him back there. He’s given orders for his arrest and he wants to ‘deliver judgement’ from the throne right now!—What can we do?

DI NOLLI
. Close the door. Go and close that door. [
LANDOLPH
goes to close the door
]

HAROLD
. Ordulph won’t be able to hold him back all on his own.

LANDOLPH
. My lord, perhaps if we could announce your visit straightaway, it might at least distract him. If you ladies and gentlemen have already thought of what roles to assume …

DI NOLLI
. Yes, yes, we’ve thought of everything. [
To the
DOCTOR
] Doctor, if you think you could examine him right now …

FRIDA
. Not me, not me, Carlo! I’m leaving. And you too, Mother, for heaven’s sake, come away, come away with me.

DOCTOR
. I say … he’s not still armed, is he?

DI NOLLI
. Armed, doctor? Of course not. [
To
FRIDA
] Forgive me, Frida, but this fear of yours is really childish. It was you who wanted to come.

FRIDA
. Oh no, it wasn’t. It was Mother.

LADY MATILDA
[
firmly
]. And I’m ready for it. So now what must we do?

BELCREDI
. Now look, do we really have to dress up in some costume?

LANDOLPH
. Indispensable. Indispensable, sir. Unfortunately, he sees us this way [
showing his costume
], and there’d be real trouble if he saw you gentlemen like that, in modern clothes.

HAROLD
. He’d think it was some diabolical disguise.

DI NOLLI
. Just as they seem disguised to you, so we would appear disguised to him, dressed in our normal clothes.

LANDOLPH
. And maybe it wouldn’t matter, my lord, if he didn’t think it was all the doing of his mortal enemy.

BELCREDI
. Pope Gregory VII?

LANDOLPH
. Exactly. He says he was ‘a pagan’.

BELCREDI
. The Pope? Not bad!

LANDOLPH
. Yessir. And that he conjures up the dead. He accuses him of all the diabolical arts. He’s terribly frightened of him.

DOCTOR
. Persecution mania.

HAROLD
. He’d be furious.

DI NOLLI
[
to
BELCREDI
]. But you don’t have to be there. We shall all go into the other room. It’s enough for the doctor to see him.

DOCTOR
. You mean … by myself?

DI NOLLI
. But they’ll be here. [
Indicating the three young men
]

DOCTOR
. No, no … I mean, if the Marchesa …

LADY MATILDA
. Oh yes, I want to be here as well. I want to be here. I want to see him again.

FRIDA
. But why, Mother? I beg you. Come with us.

LADY MATILDA
[
imperiously
]. Leave me alone! This is what I’ve come for. [
To
LANDOLPH
] I shall be Adelaide, the mother.
^*

LANDOLPH
. Right. Very good. The mother of Empress Bertha, splendid! It should be enough for your ladyship to wear a ducal
coronet and a cloak that covers you completely. [
To
HAROLD
] Off you go, Harold.

HAROLD
. Wait. What about the gentleman? [
Indicating the
DOCTOR
]

DOCTOR
. Ah, yes … I think we said the bishop, Bishop Hugh of Cluny.

HAROLD
. Would you be meaning the Abbot, sir? Very well, Hugh of Cluny.
^*

LANDOLPH
. He’s already been here so often.

DOCTOR
[
puzzled
]. Been here already?

LANDOLPH
. Don’t worry. I mean that since it’s such an easy disguise …

HAROLD
. We’ve used it on other occasions.

DOCTOR
. But …

LANDOLPH
. There’s no risk of him remembering. He looks more at the costume than at the person.

LADY MATILDA
. That’s good for me as well, then.

DI NOLLI
. We’ll leave them, Frida. Come on, Tito, come with us.

BELCREDI
. Oh no. If she’s staying [
indicating the
MARCHESA
], I stay too.

LADY MATILDA
. But I really don’t need you.

BELCREDI
. I’m not saying you need me. I’d like to see him again too. Isn’t that allowed?

LANDOLPH
. Well, after all, it might be better if there were three of you.

HAROLD
. And so the gentleman?

BELCREDI
. Just see if you can find some simple disguise for me as well.

LANDOLPH
[
to
HAROLD
]. Hold on, I’ve got it: a Cluniac.

BELCREDI
. A Cluniac? Meaning what?

LANDOLPH
. The habit of a Benedictine monk of the Abbey of Cluny. You’ll be one of the Abbot’s retinue. [
To
HAROLD
] Off you go. Go! [
To
BERTHOLD
] And you too, out! And stay out of sight for the rest of the day. [
But as soon as he sees them leaving
] Wait! [
To
BERTHOLD
] You bring here the clothes that he gives you. [
To
HAROLD
] And you go immediately to announce the arrival of ‘the Duchess Adelaide’ and ‘Monsignor Hugh of Cluny’. Understood?

HAROLD
and
BERTHOLD
exit by the first door on the right
.

DI NOLLI
. Then we’ll withdraw. [
He exits with
FRIDA
by the door on the left
]

DOCTOR
. Since I’m here as Hugh of Cluny, I should think he’ll be glad to see me.

LANDOLPH
. Very glad. Rest assured. Monsignor has always been received here with great respect. And you too, my lady, may rest assured. He always remembers that when he’d been waiting in the snow for two days, almost frozen to death, it was only thanks to the intercession of you two that he was finally admitted to the castle of Canossa and to the presence of Gregory VII who had refused to receive him.

BELCREDI
. And what about me?

LANDOLPH
. You stand respectfully to one side.

LADY MATILDA
[
irritated, very nervous
]. You’d do well to clear off.

BELCREDI
[
in a low voice, annoyed
]. You’re very worked up.

LADY MATILDA
[
haughtily
]. I’m the way I am. Leave me in peace!

BERTHOLD
returns with the costumes
.

LANDOLPH
[
seeing him
]. Ah, here are the clothes. This cloak for my lady.

LADY MATILDA
. Wait while I take off my hat. [
She does so and hands it
to
BERTHOLD
]

LANDOLPH
. Take it into the other room. [
Then to the
MARCHESA
as he prepares to set the coronet on her head
] Allow me.

LADY MATILDA
. For heaven’s sake, don’t we have a mirror here?

LANDOLPH
. There are mirrors through there. [
Indicating door on the left
] If my lady would prefer to do it herself.

LADY MATILDA
. Yes, yes, that would be better. Give it here. I’ll do it right away.

She takes back her hat and goes out with
BERTHOLD
who carries the cloak and the coronet. In the meantime the
DOCTOR
and
BELCREDI
are left to don their Benedictine habits as best they can
.

BELCREDI
. Honestly, this dressing up as a Benedictine is something I would never have expected. But I say, this is a madness that costs a mint of money.

DOCTOR
. Well, so do a lot of other madnesses, frankly …

BELCREDI
. When you’ve got a fortune to back them up.

LANDOLPH
. Yes, sir. We have an entire wardrobe back there, all period costumes, perfectly copied from models of the time. This is my special responsibility: I buy from very reliable theatrical suppliers. We spend a lot.

LADY MATILDA
returns decked in her cloak and coronet
.

BELCREDI
[
at once, lost in admiration
]. Magnificent! Truly regal!

LADY MATILDA
[
seeing
BELCREDI
and bursting into laughter
]. Good God! No. Get yourself out of here. You’re impossible. You look like an ostrich dressed up as a monk.