Part 62

Bright is the day--the air with glory teems-- And eagles wanton in the smile of Jove: Can these things be, and Marlowe live no more! O Heywood! Heywood! I had a world of hopes About that woman--now in my heart they rise Confused, as flames from my life's coloured map, That burns until with wrinkling agony Its ashes flatten, separate, and drift Through gusty darkness. Hold me fast by the arm! A little aid will save me:--See! she's here! I clasp thy form--I feel thy breath, my love-- And know thee for a sweet saint come to save me! Save!--is it death I feel--it cannot be death?

JACCONOT (half aside.)

Marry, but it can!--or else your sword's a foolish dog that dar'n't bite his owner.

MARLOWE.

O friends--dear friends--this is a sorry end-- A most unworthy end! To think--O God!-- To think that I should fall by the hand of one Whose office, like his nature, is all baseness, Gives Death ten thousand stings, and to the Grave A damning victory! Fame sinks with life! A galling--shameful--ignominious end! (sinks down). O mighty heart! O full and orbed heart, Flee to thy kindred sun, rolling on high! Or let the hoary and eternal sea Sweep me away, and swallow body and soul!

JACCONOT.

There'll be no "encore" to either, I wot; for thou'st led an ill life, Master Marlowe; and so the sweet Saint thou spok'st of, will remain my fair game--behind the scenes.

MARLOWE.

Liar! slave! sla---- Kind Master Heywood, You will not see me die thus!--thus by the hand And maddening tongue of such a beast as that! Haste, if you love me--fetch a leech to help me-- Here--Middleton--sweet friend--a bandage here-- I cannot die by such a hand--I will not-- I say I will not die by that vile hand! Go bring Cecilia to me--bring the leech-- Close--close this wound--you know I did it myself-- Bring sweet Cecilia--haste--haste--instantly-- Bring life and time--bring heaven!--Oh, I am dying!-- Some water--stay beside me--maddening death, By such a hand! O villain! from the grave I constantly will rise--to curse! curse! curse thee! (Rises--and falls dead.)

MIDDLETON.

Terrible end!

HEYWOOD.

O God!--he is quite gone!

JACCONOT (aghast.)

'Twas dreadful--'twas! Christ help us! and lull him to sleep in's grave. I stand up for mine own nature none the less. (Voices without) What noise is that?

Enter OFFICERS.

CHIEF OFFICER.

This is our man--ha! murder has been here! You are our prisoner--the gallows waits you!

JACCONOT.

What have I done to be hung up like a miracle? The hemp's not sown nor the ladder-wood grown, that shall help fools to finish me! He did it himself! He said so with his last words!--there stands his friends and brother players--put them to their Testament if he said not he did it himself?

CHIEF OFFICER.

Who is it lies here?--methinks that I should know him, But for the fierce distortion of his face!

MIDDLETON.

He who erewhile wrote with a brand of fire, Now, in his passionate blood, floats tow'rds the grave! The present time is ever ignorant-- We lack clear vision in our self-love's maze; But Marlowe in the future will stand great, Whom this--the lowest caitiff in the world-- A nothing, save in grossness, hath destroy'd.

JACCONOT.

"Caitiff" back again in your throat! and "gross nothing" to boot--may you have it to live upon for a month, and die mad and starving! Would'st swear my life away so lightly? Tut! who was he? I could always find the soundings of a quart tankard, or empty a pasty in half his time, and swear as rare oaths between whiles--who was he? I too ha' write my odes and Pindar jigs with the twinkling of a bedpost, to the sound of the harp and hurdygurdy, while Capricornus wagged his fiery beard; I ha' sung songs to the faint moon's echoes at daybreak and danced here away and there away, like the lightning through a forest! As to your sword and dagger play, I've got the trick o' the eye and wrist--who was he? What's all his gods--his goddesses and lies?--the first a'nt worth a word; and for the two last, I was always a prince of both! "Caitiff!" and "beast!" and "nothing!"--who was he?

CHIEF OFFICER.

You're ours, for sundry villanies committed, Sufficient each to bring your vice to an end; The law hath got you safely in its grasp!