Part 28

TSUMU. Oh, those eunuchs!

HELENA [as she sits dreaming]. I wish, I wish---- [She stops short.]

TSUMU. You have but to speak your desire to the King.

HELENA [shocked]. Tsumu! How can you think of such a thing? I'm not a bad woman.

TSUMU. He would die for you.

HELENA [relieved]. Ah! Do you think so, Tsumu?

TSUMU. All Sparta knows that His Majesty is a lover of peace, and yet he would rush into battle to save you.

HELENA. I should love to have men fighting for me.

TSUMU [in high alarm]. May Zeus turn a deaf ear to your voice.

HELENA. Don't be impertinent, Tsumu. I've got to have some sort of amusement.

TSUMU. You've only to wait till next week, and you can see another of the priestesses sacrificed to Diana.

HELENA. That doesn't interest me any longer. The girls are positively beginning to like it. No! My mind is set on war.

TSUMU [terrified]. I have five fathers of my children to lose.

HELENA. War, or--or----

TSUMU [hopefully]. Have I been so long your slave that I no longer know your wish?

HELENA [very simply]. Well, I should like to have a lover.

TSUMU [springs up and rushes over in horror to draw the curtains across the door to the library. All of a tremble]. Gods grant they didn't hear you.

HELENA. Don't be alarmed, Tsumu. Analytikos is over eighty. [She bursts into a loud peal of laughter and MENELAUS rushes into the room.]

MENELAUS [in high irritation]. I wish you wouldn't make so much noise in here. A King might at least expect quiet in his own palace.

HELENA. Tsumu, see if my bath is ready. [TSUMU exits.] You used not speak like that to me, Moo Moo.

MENELAUS [in a temper]. How many times must I tell you that my name is Menelaus and that it isn't "Moo Moo?"

HELENA [sweetly]. I'll never do it again, Moo Moo. [She giggles.]

MENELAUS. Your laugh gets on my nerves. It's louder than it used to be.

HELENA. If you wish it, I'll never, never laugh again.

MENELAUS. You've promised that too often.

HELENA [sadly]. Things are not as they used to be.

MENELAUS. Are you going to start that again?

HELENA [with a tinge of melancholy]. I suppose you'd like me to be still and sad.