Page:Pelléas and Melisande.djvu/31

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They are my doves, Pelléas.—Let us go, leave me; they would not return…

Why would they not return?

They will be lost in the obscurity… Let me lift my head… I hear a noise of footsteps… Leave me!—It is Golaud… I think it is Golaud… He has heard us…

Wait, wait!… Your hair is around the branches… It has got caught in the darkness. Wait, wait!…It is black…

(Golaud enters by the watch path.)

What are you doing here?

What I am doing here?… I…

You are two children… Melisande, do not lean that way from the window, you will fall… You do not know it is late?—It is nearly midnight.—Do not play thus in the dark.—You are two children. (Laughing nervously.) What children, what children!…

(He goes out with Pelléas.)

Take care: this way, this way.—You have never been in these vaults?

Yes, once, a while ago; but it is a long time.

Well, then, here is the stagnant water of which I spoke to you…Do you smell the odor of death that rises? Let us go to the end of this rock that overlooks it and lean over a little. It will come and strike you in the face. Lean over; do not be afraid… I will hold you…give me…no, no, not your hand…it might slip…your arm… Do you see the abyss? Pelléas, Pelléas?…

Yes, I think I see the bottom of the abyss… Is it the light that trembles in that way?…You…

Yes; it is the lantern… See, I was swinging it to light up the walls.

I suffocate here… Let us go out.

Yes, let us go out…

(They leave in silence.)