Vera; or, The Nihilists/Act II

Present: ,, , ,.
 * Council Chamber in the Emperor's Palace, hung with yellow tapestry. Table, with chair of State, set for the Czar, window behind, opening on to a balcony. As the scene progresses the light outside gets darker.

(slowly, after a pause): I want change of air. (smiling): A most revolutionary sentiment! Your Imperial father would highly disapprove of any reforms even with the thermometer in Russia. (bitterly): My Imperial father had kept me for six months in this dungeon of a palace. This morning he has me suddenly woke up to see some wretched Nihilists hung; it sickened me, the bloody butchery, though it was a noble thing to see how well these men can die. (shrugging his shoulders): Experience, the name men give to their mistakes. I never commit any. (bitterly): No; crimes are more in your line. (to the ): The Emperor was a good deal agitated about your late appearance at the ball last night, Prince. (laughing): I believe he thought the Nihilists had broken into the palace and carried you off. (bowing): You forget—or, how could they be? I manage your father's business. (bitterly): You mismanage my father's business, you mean! Evil genius of his life that you are! Before you came there was some love left in him. It is you who have embittered his nature poured into his ear the poison of treacherous council, made him hated by the whole people, made him what he is—a tyrant!
 * So our young scatter-brained Czarevitch has been forgiven at last, and is to take his seat here again.
 * Yes; if that is not meant as an extra punishment. For my own part, at least, I find these Cabinet Councils extremely tiring.
 * Naturally, you are always speaking.
 * No; I think it must be that I have to listen sometimes. It is so exhausting not to talk.
 * Still, anything is better than being kept in a sort of prison, like he was—never allowed to go out into the world.
 * My dear Count, for romantic young people like he is the world always looks best at a distance; and a prison where one's allowed to order one's own dinner is not at all a bad place. (Enter the . The courtiers rise.) Ah! Good afternoon, Prince. Your Highness is looking a little pale to-day.
 * When you are as old as I am, Prince, you will understand that there are few things easier than to live badly and to die well.
 * Easy to die well! A lesson experience cannot have taught you, much as you know of a bad life.
 * If they had you would have missed a charming dance.
 * And an excellent supper. Gringoire really excelled himself in his salad. Ah! you may laugh, Baron; but to cook a good salad is a much more difficult thing than cooking accounts. To make a good salad is to be a brilliant diplomatist—the problem is entirely the same in both cases. To know exactly how much oil one must put with one's vinegar.
 * A cook and a diplomatist! an excellent parallel. If I had a son who was a fool I'd make him one or the other.
 * I see your father did not hold the same opinion, Baron. But, believe me, you are wrong to run down cookery. Culture depends on cookery. For myself, the only immortality I desire is to invent a new sauce. I have never had time enough to think seriously about it, but I feel it is in me, I feel it is in me.
 * You have certainly missed your métier, Prince Paul; the cordon bleu of the kitchen would have suited you much better than the Grand Cross of Honour. But you know you could never have worn your white apron well; you would have soiled it too soon, your hands are not clean enough.

The courtiers look significantly at each other.

(calmly): I see your Highness does want change of air. But I have been an eldest son myself. (Lights a cigarette.) I know what it is when a father won't die to please one.

The  goes to the top of the stage, and leans against the window, looking out.

(to ): Foolish boy! He will be sent into exile, or worse, if he is not careful. (bowing): Perhaps I see more in her, Marquis. Your wife is really a charming woman, so full of esprit, and so satirical too; she talks continually of you when we are together. (looking at the clock): His Majesty is a little late to-day, is he not? (aside): True! Indifference is the revenge the world takes on mediocrities. (smiling): If my nature had been made to suit your comprehension rather than my own requirements, I am afraid I would have made a very poor figure in the world. (coming back from window): I don't think Prince Paul's nature is such a mystery. He would stab his best friend for the sake of writing an epigram on his tombstone. (bitterly): If to have enemies is a measure of greatness. then you must be a Colossus, indeed, Prince. (shrugging his shoulders): Heaven is a despotism. I shall be at home there. (excitedly): If they are common, illiterate, vulgar, no better than the beasts of the field, who made them so? (Enter .)
 * Yes. What a mistake it is to be sincere!
 * The only folly you never committed, Baron.
 * One has only one head, you know, Prince.
 * My dear Baron, your head is the last thing any one would wish to take from you. (Pulls out snuff-box and offers it to .)
 * Thanks, Prince! Thanks!
 * Very delicate, isn't it? I get it direct from Paris. But under this vulgar Republic everything has degenerated over there. Côtelettes à l'impěriale vanished of course with the Bonaparte, and omelettes went our with the Orleanists. La belle France is entirely ruined, Prince, through bad morals and worse cookery. (Enter the .) Ah! Marquis. I trust Madame la Marquise is well.
 * You ought to know better than I do, Prince Paul; you see more of her.
 * What has happened to you, my dear Petrovitch? You seem quite out of sorts. You haven't quarrelled with your cook, I hope? What a tragedy that would be for you; you would lose all your friends.
 * I fear I wouldn't be so fortunate as that. You forget I would still have my purse. But you are wrong for once; my chef and I are on excellent terms.
 * Then your creditors or Mademoiselle Vera Sabouroff have been writing to you? They compose more than half of my correspondents. But really you needn't be alarmed. I find the most violent proclamations from the Executive Committee, as they call it, left all over my house. I never read them; they are so badly spelt as a rule.
 * Wrong again, Prince; the Nihilists leave me alone for some reason or other.
 * I am bored with life, Prince. Since the opera season ended I have been a perpetual martyr to ennui.
 * The maladie du siècle! You want a new excitement, Prince. Let me see—you have been married twice already; suppose you try—falling in love for once.
 * I cannot understand your nature.
 * There seems to be nothing in life about which you would not jest.
 * Ah! my dear Count, life is much too important a thing ever to talk seriously about it.
 * Parbleu! I would sooner lose my best friend than my worst enemy. To have friends, you know, one need only be goodnatured; but when a man has no enemy left there must be something mean about him.
 * Yes, your Highness, I know I'm the most hated man in Russia, except your father, except your father of course. He doesn't seem to like it much, by the way; but I do, I assure you. (Bitterly.) I love to drive through the streets and see how the rabble scowl at me from every corner. It makes me feel I am a power in Russia one man against millions! Besides, I have no ambition to be a popular hero, to be crowned with laurels one year and pelted with stones the next; I prefer dying peaceably in my own bed.
 * And after death?
 * Do you ever think of the people and their rights?
 * The people and their rights bore me. I am sick of both. In these modern days to be vulgar, illiterate, common and vicious, seems to give a man a marvellous infinity of rights that his honest fathers never dreamed of. Believe me, Prince, in good democracy, every man should be an aristocrat, but these people in Russia who seek to thrust us out are no better than the animals in one's preserves, and made to be shot at, most of them.
 * His Imperial Majesty, the Emperor! ( looks at the , and smiles.)

Enter the , surrounded by his guard.

( rushing forward to meet him): Sire! (nervous and frightened): Don't come too near me, boy! Don't come too near me, I say! There is always something about an heir to a crown unwholesome to his father. Who is that man over there? I don't know him. What is he doing? Is he a conspirator? Have you searched him? Give him till to-morrow to confess, then hang him!—hang him!
 * Sire, you are anticipating history. This is Count Petouchof, your new Ambassador to Berlin. He is come to kiss hands on his appointment.
 * To kiss my hand? There is some plot in it. He wants to poison me. There, kiss my son's hand; it will do quite as well.

 signs to '' to leave the room. Exeunt  and the guards.  sinks down into his chair. The courtiers remain silent.''

(approaching): Sire! will your Majesty—— (bowing very low): Sire, 'tis enough for me to have your confidence. (Aside) I was afraid he was going to revenge himself, and give me another decoration. (returning to his chair): Well, gentlemen. (looking at ): She should have blessed me for having rid her of her children. Send her to prison. (to ): I won't open it. There may be something in it. (to ): It must be some sad news. I know that smile too well. (hurriedly): Sire, I am unfit for this post. (to the ): Start to-night, Sire? ( whispers to the .) (to ): I should be more alarmed for myself. (in frightened whisper, to ): What does he mean? Do you trust him? His prison hasn't cured him yet. Shall I banish him? Shall I (whispers)—? The Emperor Paul did it. The Empress Catherine there (points to picture on the wall) did it. Why shouldn't I? (hurriedly): I promise your Majesty to crush every Nihilist in Russia in six months if you sign this proclamation; every Nihilist in Russia. (points on paper): Here, Sire. (starts up and puts his hands on the paper): Stay! I tell you, stay! The priests have taken heaven from the people, and you would take the earth away too. (hurriedly): We have no time, Prince, now. This boy will ruin everything. The pen, Sire. (somewhat moved): Those men are dead. What have I to do with them? (leaping up): Devil! Assassin! Why do you beard me thus to my face? (sinks into his chair with his eyes fixed on the ): O God! My own son against me, my own flesh and blood against me; but I am rid of them all now. (to ): In that case you and I must learn how to swim. (bitterly): Your brothers, the people, Prince, are not content with their own lives, they always want to take their neighbours' too. (standing up): I am tired of being afraid. I have done with terror now. From this day I proclaim war against the people—war to their annihilation. As they have dealt with me, so shall I deal with them. I shall grind them to powder, and strew their dust upon the air. There shall be a spy in every man's house, a traitor on every hearth, a hangman in every village, a gibbet in every square. Plague, leprosy, or fever shall be less deadly than my wrath; I will make every frontier a graveyard, every province a lazar-house, and cure the sick by the sword. I shall have peace in Russia, though it be the peace of the dead. Who said I was a coward? Who said I was afraid? See, thus shall I crush this people beneath my feet! (Takes up sword of  off table and tramples on it.) (looking at his watch): The dinner is sure to be spoiled. How annoying politics are; and eldest sons! (outside, in the street): God save the people! ( is shot, and staggers back into the room.) (breaking from the guards, and rushing over): Father!
 * What do you startle me for like that? No, I won't. (Watches the courtiers nervously.) Why are you clattering your sword, sir? (To ) Take it off. I shall have no man wear a sword in my presence (looking at ), least of all my son. (to ) You are not angry with me, Prince? You won't desert me, will you? Say you won't desert me. What do you want? You can have anything—anything.
 * Sire, I have the honour to present to you a loyal address from your subjects in the Province of Archangel, expressing their horror at the last attempt on your Majesty's life.
 * The last attempt but two, you ought to have said, Marquis. Don't you see it is dated three weeks back?
 * They are good people in the Province of Archangel—honest, loyal people. They love me very much—simple, loyal people; give them a new saint, it costs nothing. Well, Alexis (turning to the )—how many traitors were hung this morning?
 * There were three men strangled, Sire.
 * There should have been three thousand. I would to God that this people had but one neck that I might strangle them with one noose! Did they tell anything? Whom did they implicate? What did they confess?
 * Nothing, Sire.
 * They should have been tortured then; why weren't they tortured? Must I always be fighting in the dark? Am I never to know from what root these traitors spring?
 * What root should there be of discontent among the people but tyranny and injustice amongst their rulers?
 * What did you say, boy? tyranny! tyranny! Am I a tyrant? I'm not. I love the people. I'm their father. I'm called so in every official proclamation. Have a care, boy; have a care. You don't seem to be cured yet of your foolish tongue. (Goes over to  and puts his hand on his shoulder.) Prince Paul, tell me, were there many people there this morning to see the Nihilists hung?
 * Hanging is of course a good deal less of a novelty in Russia now, Sire, than it was three or four years ago; and you know how easily the people get tired even of their best amusements. But the square and the tops of the houses were really quite crowded, were they not, Prince? (To the , who takes no notice.)
 * That's right; all loyal citizens should be there. It shows them what to look forward to. Did you arrest any one in the crowd?
 * Yes, Sire; a woman, for cursing your name. (The  starts anxiously.) She was the mother of two of the criminals.
 * The prisons of Russia are too full already, Sire. There is no room in them for any more victims.
 * They don't die fast enough, then. You should put more of them into one cell at once. You don't keep them long enough in the mines. If you do they're sure to die; but you're all too merciful. I'm too merciful myself. Send her to Siberia. She is sure to die on the way. (Enter an .) Who's that? Who's that?
 * A letter for his Imperial Majesty.
 * It would be a very disappointing letter, Sire, it there wasn't. (Takes letter himself, and reads it.)
 * From the Chief of the Police at Archangel, Sire. "The Governor of the province was shot this morning by a woman as he was entering the courtyard of his own house. The assassin has been seized."
 * I never trusted the people in Archangel. It's a nest of Nihilists and conspirators. Take away their saints; they don't deserve them.
 * Your Highness would punish them more severely by giving them an extra one. Three governors shot in two months! (Smiles to himself.) Sire, permit me to recommend your loyal subject, the Marquis de Poivrard, as the new governor of your Province of Archangel.
 * Marquis, you are too modest. Believe me, there is no man in Russia I would sooner see Governor of Archangel than yourself. (Whispers to .)
 * Quite right, Prince Paul; you are always right. See that the Marquis's letters are made out at once.
 * He can start to-night, Sire. I shall really miss you very much, Marquis. I always liked your taste in wine and wives extremely.
 * Yes, Marquis, to-night; it is better to go at once.
 * I shall see that Madame la Marquise is not too lonely while you are away; so you need not be alarmed for her.
 * The Governor of Archangel shot in his own courtyard by a woman! I'm not safe here. I'm not safe anywhere, with that she-devil of the revolution, Vera Sabouroff, here in Moscow. Prince Paul, is that woman still here?
 * They tell me she was at the Grand Duke's ball last night. I can hardly believe that, but she certainly had intended to leave for Novgorod to-day, Sire. The police were watching every train for her; but, for some reason or other, she did not go. Some traitor must have warned her. But I shall catch her yet. A chase after a beautiful woman is always exciting.
 * You must hunt her down with bloodhounds, and when she is taken I shall hew her limb from limb. I shall stretch her on the rack till her pale white body is twisted and curled like paper in the fire.
 * Oh, we shall have another hunt immediately, for her, Sire! Prince Alexis will assist us, I am sure.
 * You never require any assistance to ruin a woman, Prince Paul.
 * Vera, the Nihilist, in Moscow! O God, were it not better to die at once the dog's death they plot for me than to live as I live now! Never to sleep, or, if I do, to dream such horrid dreams that hell itself were peace when matched with them. To trust none but those I have bought, to buy none worth trusting! To see a traitor in every smile, poison in every dish, a dagger in every hand! To lie awake at night, listening from hour to hour for the stealthy creeping of the murderer, for the laying of the damned mine! You are all spies! You are all spies! You worst of all—you, my own son! Which of you is it who hides these bloody proclamations under my own pillow, or at the table where I sit? Which of ye all is the Judas who betrays me? O God! O God! methinks there was a time once, in our war with England, when nothing could make me afraid. (This with more calm and pathos.) I have ridden into the crimson heart of war, and borne back an eagle which those wild islanders had taken from us. Men said I was brave then. My father gave me the Iron Cross of Valour. Oh, could he see me now, with this coward's livery ever in my cheek! (Sinks into his chair.) I never knew any love when I was a boy. I was ruled by terror myself how else should I rule now? (Starts up.) But I will have revenge; I will have revenge. For every hour I have lain awake at night, waiting for the noose or the dagger, they shall pass years in Siberia, centuries in the mines! Ay! I shall have revenge.
 * Father! have mercy on the people. Give them what they ask.
 * And begin, Sire, with your own head; they have a particular liking for that.
 * The people! the people! A tiger which I have let loose on myself; but I will fight with it to the death. I am done with half treasures. I shall crush these Nihilists at a blow. There shall not be a man of them, no, nor a woman either, left alive in Russia. Am I Emperor for nothing, that a woman should hold me at bay? Vera Sabouroff shall be in my power, I swear it, before a week is ended, though I burn my whole city to find her. She shall be flogged by the knout, stifled in the fortress, strangled in the square!
 * O God!
 * For two years her hands have been clutching at my throat; for two years she has made my life a hell; but I shall have revenge. Martial law, Prince, martial law over the whole Empire that will give me revenge. A good measure, Prince, eh? a good measure.
 * And an economical one too, Sire. It will carry off your surplus population in six months, and save you any expense in courts of justice; they will not be needed now.
 * Quite right. There are too many people in Russia, too much money spent on them, too much money on courts of justice. I'll shut them up.
 * Sire, reflect before——
 * When can you have the proclamations ready, Prince Paul?
 * They have been printed for the last six months Sire. I knew you would need them.
 * That's good! That's very good! Let us begin at once. Ah, Prince, if every king in Europe had a minister like you——
 * There would be less kings in Europe than there are.
 * Your Majesty, there is no need for alarm. The Prince is a very ingenuous young man. He pretends to be devoted to the people, and lives in a palace; preaches socialism, and draws a salary that would support a province. Some day he'll find out that the best cure for Republicism is the Imperial crown, and will cut up the red cap of liberty to make decorations for his Prime Minister.
 * You are right. If he really loved the people, he could not be my son.
 * If he lived with the people for a fortnight, their bad dinners would soon cure him of his democracy. Shall we begin, Sire?
 * At once. Read the proclamation. Gentlemen, be seated. Alexis, Alexis, I say, come and hear it! It will be good practice for you; you will be doing it yourself some day.
 * I have heard too much of it already. (Takes his seat at the table.  whispers to him.)
 * What are you whispering about there, Count Rouvaloff?
 * I was giving his Royal Highness some good advice, your Majesty.
 * Count Rouvaloff is the typical spendthrift, Sire; he is always giving away what he needs most. (Lays papers before the .) I think, Sire, you will approve of this:—'Love of the people,' 'Father of his people,' 'Martial law,' and the usual allusions to Providence in the last line. All it requires now is your Imperial Majesty's signature.
 * Sire!
 * Say that again! To crush every Nihilist in Russia; to crush this woman, their leader, who makes war upon me in my own city. Prince Paul Maraloffski, I create you Maréchal of the whole Russian Empire to help you to carry out martial law. Give me the proclamation. I will sign it at once.
 * What! is it so small a thing to strangle a nation, to murder a kingdom, to wreck an empire? Who are we who dare lay this ban of terror on a people? Have we less vices than they have, that we bring them to the bar of judgment before us?
 * What a Communist the Prince is! He would have an equal distribution of sin as well as of property.
 * Warmed by the same sun, nurtured by the same air, fashioned of flesh and blood like to our own, wherein are they different to us, save that they starve while we surfeit, that they toil while we idle, that they sicken while we poison, that they die while we——
 * How dare——?
 * I dare all for the people; but you would rob them of common rights of men.
 * The people have no rights.
 * Then they have great wrongs. Father, they have won your battles for you; from the pine forests of the Baltic to the palms of India they have ridden on victory's mighty wings! Boy as I am in years, I have seen wave after wave of living men sweep up the heights of battle to their death; ay, and snatch perilous conquest from the scales of war when the bloody crescent seemed to shake above our eagles.
 * Nothing! The dead are safe; you cannot harm them now. They sleep their last long sleep. Some in Turkish waters, others by the wind-swept heights of Norway and the Dane! But these, the living, our brothers, what have you done for them? They asked you for bread, you gave them a stone. They sought for freedom, you scourged them with scorpions. You have sown the seeds of this revolution yourself——!
 * And are we not cutting down the harvest?
 * Oh, my brothers! better far that ye had died in the iron hail and screaming shell of battle than to come back to such a doom as this! The beasts of the forest have their lairs, and the wild beasts their caverns, but the people of Russia, conquerors of the world have not where to lay their heads.
 * They have the headsman's block.
 * The block! Ay! you have killed their souls at your pleasure, you would kill their bodies now.
 * Insolent boy! Have you forgotten who is Emperor of Russia?
 * No! The people reign now, by the grace of God. You should have been their shepherd, you have fled away like the hireling, and let the wolves in upon them.
 * Take him away! Take him away, Prince Paul!
 * God hath given his people tongues to speak with; you would cut them out that they may be dumb in their agony, silent in their torture! But, He hath given them hands to smite with, and they shall smite! Ay! from the sick and labouring womb of this unhappy land some revolution, like a bloody child, may rise up and slay you.
 * Because I am a Nihilist! (The ministers start to their feet; there is a dead silence for a few minutes.)
 * A Nihilist! a Nihilist! Viper whom I have nurtured, traitor whom I have fondled, is this your bloody secret? Prince Paul Maraloffski, Maréchal of the Russian Empire, arrest the Czarevitch!
 * Arrest the Czarevitch!
 * A Nihilist! If you have sown with them, you shall reap with them! If you have talked with them, you shall rot with them! If you have lived with them, with them you shall die!
 * Die!
 * A plague on all sons, I say! There should be no more marriages in Russia when one can breed such Serpents as you are! Arrest the Czarevitch, I say!
 * Czarevitch! by order of the Emperor, I demand your sword. ( gives up sword;  places it on the table.)
 * You will find it unstained by blood.
 * Foolish boy! you are not made for a conspirator; you have not learned to hold your tongue. Heroics are out of place in a palace.
 * The mighty brotherhood to which I belong has a thousand such as I am, ten thousand better still! (The  starts in his seat.) The star of freedom is risen already, and far off I hear the mighty wave Democracy break on these cursed shores.
 * Father, Emperor, Imperial Master, I plead not for my own life, but for the lives of my brothers, the people.
 * Father, beware, the sword you tread on may turn and wound you. The people suffer long, but vengeance comes at last, vengeance with red hands and silent feet.
 * Bah! the people are bad shots; they always miss one.
 * There are times when the people are the instruments of God.
 * Ay! and when kings are God's scourges for the people. Take him away! Take him away! Bring in my guards. (Enter the Imperial Guard. ' points to ', who stands alone at the side of the stage.) We will bring him to prison ourselves: prison! I trust no prison. He would escape and kill me. I will have him shot here, here in the open square by the soldiers. Let me never see his face again. ( is being led out.) No, no, leave him! I don't trust guards. They are all Nihilists! (to ) I trust you, you have no mercy. (Throws window open and goes out on balcony.)
 * If I am to die for the people I am ready. One Nihilist more or less in Russia, what does that matter?
 * Murderer! Murderer! You did it! Murderer! (Dies.)