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Now the receiver night by night, when sleep
Blesses the inmates of her father's house,
--I say, the soft sly wanton that receives
Her guilt's accomplice 'neath this roof which holds
You, Guendolen, you, Austin, and has held
A thousand Treshams--never one like her!
No lighter of the signal-lamp her quick
Foul breath near quenches in hot eagerness
To mix with breath as foul! no loosener
O' the lattice, practised in the stealthy tread,
The low voice and the noiseless come-and-go!
Not one composer of the bacchant's mien
Into--what you thought Mildred's, in a word!
Know her!
GUENDOLEN. Oh, Mildred, look to me, at least!
Thorold--she's dead, I'd say, but that she stands
Rigid as stone and whiter!
TRESHAM. You have heard...
GUENDOLEN. Too much! You must proceed no further.
MILDRED. Yes--
Proceed! All's truth. Go from me!
TRESHAM. All is truth,
She tells you! Well, you know, or ought to know,
All this I would forgive in her. I'd con
Each precept the harsh world enjoins, I'd take
Our ancestors' stern verdicts one by one,
I'd bind myself before then to exact
The prescribed vengeance--and one word of hers,
The sight of her, the bare least memory
Of Mildred, my one sister, my heart's pride
Above all prides, my all in all so long,
Would scatter every trace of my resolve.
What were it silently to waste away
And see her waste away from this day forth,
Two scathed things with leisure to repent,
And grow acquainted with the grave, and die
Tired out if not at peace, and be forgotten?
It were not so impossible to bear.
But this--that, fresh from last night's pledge renewed
Of love with the successful gallant there,
She calmly bids me help her to entice,
Inveigle an unconscious trusting youth
Who thinks her all that's chaste and good and pure,
--Invites me to betray him... who so fit
As honour's self to cover shame's arch-deed?
--That she'