60 Plays: The George Bernard Shaw Edition (Illustrated). GEORGE BERNARD SHAW

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СКАЧАТЬ What strange lady?

      GIUSEPPE (with a shrug). Who knows? She arrived here half an hour before you in a hired carriage belonging to the Golden Eagle at Borghetto. Actually by herself, excellency. No servants. A dressing bag and a trunk: that is all. The postillion says she left a horse — a charger, with military trappings, at the Golden Eagle.

      NAPOLEON. A woman with a charger! That’s extraordinary.

      THE LADY’S VOICE (the two final notes now making a peremptory descending interval). Giuseppe!

      NAPOLEON (rising to listen). That’s an interesting voice.

      GIUSEPPE. She is an interesting lady, excellency. (Calling.) Coming, lady, coming. (He makes for the inner door.)

      NAPOLEON (arresting him with a strong hand on his shoulder). Stop. Let her come.

      VOICE. Giuseppe!! (Impatiently.)

      GIUSEPPE (pleadingly). Let me go, excellency. It is my point of honor as an innkeeper to come when I am called. I appeal to you as a soldier.

      A MAN’s VOICE (outside, at the inn door, shouting). Here, someone. Hello! Landlord. Where are you? (Somebody raps vigorously with a whip handle on a bench in the passage.)

      NAPOLEON (suddenly becoming the commanding officer again and throwing Giuseppe off). There he is at last. (Pointing to the inner door.) Go. Attend to your business: the lady is calling you. (He goes to the fireplace and stands with his back to it with a determined military air.)

      GIUSEPPE (with bated breath, snatching up his tray). Certainly, excellency. (He hurries out by the inner door.)

      THE MAN’s VOICE (impatiently). Are you all asleep here? (The door opposite the fireplace is kicked rudely open; and a dusty sub-lieutenant bursts into the room. He is a chuckle-headed young man of 24, with the fair, delicate, clear skin of a man of rank, and a self-assurance on that ground which the French Revolution has failed to shake in the smallest degree. He has a thick silly lip, an eager credulous eye, an obstinate nose, and a loud confident voice. A young man without fear, without reverence, without imagination, without sense, hopelessly insusceptible to the Napoleonic or any other idea, stupendously egotistical, eminently qualified to rush in where angels fear to tread, yet of a vigorous babbling vitality which bustles him into the thick of things. He is just now boiling with vexation, attributable by a superficial observer to his impatience at not being promptly attended to by the staff of the inn, but in which a more discerning eye can perceive a certain moral depth, indicating a more permanent and momentous grievance. On seeing Napoleon, he is sufficiently taken aback to check himself and salute; but he does not betray by his manner any of that prophetic consciousness of Marengo and Austerlitz, Waterloo and St. Helena, or the Napoleonic pictures of Delaroche and Meissonier, which modern culture will instinctively expect from him.)

      NAPOLEON (sharply). Well, sir, here you are at last. Your instructions were that I should arrive here at six, and that I was to find you waiting for me with my mail from Paris and with despatches. It is now twenty minutes to eight. You were sent on this service as a hard rider with the fastest horse in the camp. You arrive a hundred minutes late, on foot. Where is your horse!

      THE LIEUTENANT (moodily pulling off his gloves and dashing them with his cap and whip on the table). Ah! where indeed? That’s just what I should like to know, General. (With emotion.) You don’t know how fond I was of that horse.

      NAPOLEON (angrily sarcastic). Indeed! (With sudden misgiving.) Where are the letters and despatches?

      THE LIEUTENANT (importantly, rather pleased than otherwise at having some remarkable news). I don’t know.

      NAPOLEON (unable to believe his ears). You don’t know!

      LIEUTENANT. No more than you do, General. Now I suppose I shall be courtmartialled. Well, I don’t mind being courtmartialled; but (with solemn determination) I tell you, General, if ever I catch that innocent looking youth, I’ll spoil his beauty, the slimy little liar! I’ll make a picture of him. I’ll —

      NAPOLEON (advancing from the hearth to the table). What innocent looking youth? Pull yourself together, sir, will you; and give an account of yourself.

      LIEUTENANT (facing him at the opposite side of the table, leaning on it with his fists). Oh, I’m all right, General: I’m perfectly ready to give an account of myself. I shall make the courtmartial thoroughly understand that the fault was not mine. Advantage has been taken of the better side of my nature; and I’m not ashamed of it. But with all respect to you as my commanding officer, General, I say again that if ever I set eyes on that son of Satan, I’ll —

      NAPOLEON (angrily). So you said before.

      LIEUTENANT (drawing himself upright). I say it again, just wait until I catch him. Just wait: that’s all. (He folds his arms resolutely, and breathes hard, with compressed lips.)

      NAPOLEON. I AM waiting, sir — for your explanation.

      LIEUTENANT (confidently). You’ll change your tone, General, when you hear what has happened to me.

      NAPOLEON. Nothing has happened to you, sir: you are alive and not disabled. Where are the papers entrusted to you?

      LIEUTENANT. Nothing! Nothing!! Oho! Well, we’ll see. (Posing himself to overwhelm Napoleon with his news.) He swore eternal brotherhood with me. Was that nothing? He said my eyes reminded him of his sister’s eyes. Was that nothing? He cried — actually cried — over the story of my separation from Angelica. Was that nothing? He paid for both bottles of wine, though he only ate bread and grapes himself. Perhaps you call that nothing! He gave me his pistols and his horse and his despatches — most important despatches — and let me go away with them. (Triumphantly, seeing that he has reduced Napoleon to blank stupefaction.) Was THAT nothing?

      NAPOLEON (enfeebled by astonishment). What did he do that for?

      LIEUTENANT (as if the reason were obvious). To show his confidence in me. (Napoleon’s jaw does not exactly drop; but its hinges become nerveless. The Lieutenant proceeds with honest indignation.) And I was worthy of his confidence: I brought them all back honorably. But would you believe it? — when I trusted him with MY pistols, and MY horse, and MY despatches —

      NAPOLEON (enraged). What the devil did you do that for?

      LIEUTENANT. Why, to show my confidence in him, of course. And he betrayed it — abused it — never came back. The thief! the swindler! the heartless, treacherous little blackguard! You call that nothing, I suppose. But look here, General: (again resorting to the table with his fist for greater emphasis) YOU may put up with this outrage from the Austrians if you like; but speaking for myself personally, I tell you that if ever I catch —

      NAPOLEON (turning on his heel in disgust and irritably resuming his march to and fro). Yes: you have said that more than once already.

      LIEUTENANT (excitedly). More than once! I’ll say it fifty times; and what’s more, I’ll do it. You’ll see, General. I’ll show my confidence in him, so I will. I’ll —

      NAPOLEON. Yes, yes, sir: no doubt you will. What kind of man was he?

      LIEUTENANT. Well, I should think you ought to be able to tell from his conduct the sort of man he was.

      NAPOLEON. Psh! What was he like?

      LIEUTENANT. Like! He’s like — well, you ought СКАЧАТЬ