Cyrano de Bergerac
And am I not free to turn at last to some use the sole thing that your
wretched scribblers of halting lines leave behind them by way of payment?
RAGUENEAU:
Groveling ant!. . .Insult not the divine grasshoppers, the sweet singers!
LISE:
Before you were the sworn comrade of all that crew, my friend, you did not
call your wife ant and Bacchante!
RAGUENEAU:
To turn fair verse to such a use!
LISE:
'Faith, 'tis all it's good for.
RAGUENEAU:
Pray then, madam, to what use would you degrade prose?
Scene 2.II.
The same. Two children, who have just trotted into the shop.
RAGUENEAU:
What would you, little ones?
FIRST CHILD:
Three pies.
RAGUENEAU (serving them):
See, hot and well browned.
SECOND CHILD:
If it please you, Sir, will you wrap them up for us?
RAGUENEAU (aside, distressed):
Alas! one of my bags!
(To the children):
What? Must I wrap them up?
(He takes a bag, and just as he is about to put in the pies, he reads):
'Ulysses thus, on leaving fair Penelope. . .'
Not that one!
(He puts it aside, and takes another, and as he is about to put in the pies,
he reads):
'The gold-locked Phoebus. . .'
Nay, nor that one!. . .
(Same play.)
LISE (impatiently):
What are you dallying for?
RAGUENEAU:
Here! here! here
(He chooses a third, resignedly):
The sonnet to Phillis!. . .but 'tis hard to part with it!
LISE:
By good luck he has made up his mind at last!
(Shrugging her shoulders):
Nicodemus!
(She mounts on a chair, and begins to range plates on a dresser.)
RAGUENEAU (taking advantage of the moment she turns her back, calls back the
children, who are already at the door):
Hist! children!. . .render me back the sonnet to Phillis, and you shall have
six pies instead of three.
(The children give him back the bag, seize the cakes quickly, and go out.)
RAGUENEAU (smoothing out the paper, begins to declaim):
'Phillis!. . .' On that sweet name a smear of butter! 'Phillis!. . .'
(Cyrano enters hurriedly.)
Scene 2.III.
Ragueneau, Lise, Cyrano, then the musketeer.
CYRANO:
What's o'clock?
RAGUENEAU (bowing low):
Six o'clock.
CYRANO (with emotion):
In one hour's time!
(He paces up and down the shop.)
RAGUENEAU (following him):
Bravo! I saw. . .
CYRANO:
Well, what saw you, then?
RAGUENEAU:
Your combat!. . .
CYRANO:
Which?
RAGUENEAU:
That in the Burgundy Hotel, 'faith!
CYRANO (contemptuously):
Ah!. . .the duel!
RAGUENEAU (admiringly):
Ay! the duel in verse!. . .
LISE:
He can talk of naught else!
CYRANO:
Well! Good! let be!
RAGUENEAU (making passes with a spit that he catches up):
'At the envoi's end, I touch!. . .At the envoi's end, I touch!'. . .'Tis
fine, fine!
(With increasing enthusiasm):
'At the envoi's end--'
CYRANO:
What hour is it now, Ragueneau?
RAGUENEAU (stopping short in the act of thrusting to look at the clock):
Five minutes after six!. . .'I touch!'
(He straightens himself):
. . .Oh! to write a ballade!
LISE (to Cyrano, who, as he passes by the counter, has absently shaken hands
with her):
What's wrong with your hand?
CYRANO:
Naught; a slight cut.
RAGUENEAU:
Have you been in some danger?
CYRANO:
None in the world.
LISE (shaking her finger at him):
Methinks you speak not the truth in saying that!
CYRANO:
Did you see my nose quiver when I spoke? 'Faith, it must have been a
monstrous lie that should move it!
(Changing his tone):
I wait some one here. Leave us alone, and disturb us for naught an it were
not for crack of doom!
RAGUENEAU:
But 'tis impossible; my poets are coming. . .
LISE (ironically):
Oh, ay, for their first meal o' the day!
CYRANO:
Prythee, take them aside when I shall make you sign to do so. . .What's
o'clock?
RAGUENEAU:
Ten minutes after six.
CYRANO (nervously seating himself at Ragueneau's table, and drawing some paper
toward him):
A pen!. . .
RAGUENEAU (giving him the one from behind his ear):
Here--a swan's quill.
A MUSKETEER (with fierce mustache, enters, and in a stentorian voice):
Good-day!
(Lise goes up to him quickly.)
CYRANO (turning round):
Who's that?
RAGUENEAU:
'Tis a friend of my wife--a terrible warrior--at least so says he himself.
CYRANO (taking up the pen, and motioning Ragueneau away):
Hush!
(To himself):
I will write, fold it, give it her, and fly!
(Throws down the pen):
Coward!. . .But strike me dead if I dare to speak to her,. . .ay, even one
single word!
(To Ragueneau):
What time is it?
RAGUENEAU:
A quarter after six!. . .
CYRANO (striking his breast):
Ay--a single word of all those here! here! But writing, 'tis easier done. .
.
(He takes up the pen):
Go to, I will write it, that love-letter! Oh! I have writ it and rewrit it
in my own mind so oft that it lies there ready for pen and ink; and if I lay
but my soul by my letter-sheet, 'tis naught to do but to copy from it.
(He writes. Through the glass of the door the silhouettes of their figures
move uncertainly and hesitatingly.)
Scene 2.IV.
Ragueneau, Lise, the musketeer. Cyrano at the little table writing. The
poets, dressed in black, their stockings ungartered, and covered with mud.
LISE (entering, to Ragueneau):
Here they come, your mud-bespattered friends!
FIRST POET (entering, to Ragueneau):
Brother in art!. . .
SECOND POET (to Ragueneau, shaking his hands):
Dear brother!
THIRD POET:
High soaring eagle among pastry-cooks!
(He sniffs):
Marry! it smells good here in your eyrie!
FOURTH POET:
'Tis at Phoebus' own rays that thy roasts turn!
FIFTH POET:
Apollo among master-cooks--
RAGUENEAU (whom they surround and embrace):
Ah! how quick a man feels at his ease with them!. . .
FIRST POET:
We were stayed by the mob; they are crowded all round the Porte de Nesle!. .
.
SECOND POET:
Eight bleeding brigand carcasses strew the pavements there--all slit open
with sword-gashes!
CYRANO (raising his head a minute):
Eight?. . .hold, methought seven.
(He goes on writing.)
RAGUENEAU (to Cyrano):
Know you who might be the hero of the fray?
CYRANO (carelessly):
Not I.
LISE (to the musketeer):
And you? Know you?
THE MUSKETEER (twirling his mustache):
Maybe!
CYRANO (writing a little way off:--he is heard murmuring a word from time to
time):
'I love thee!'
FIRST POET:
'Twas one man, say they all, ay, swear to it, one man who, single-handed,
put the whole band to the rout!
SECOND POET:
'Twas a strange sight!--pikes and cudgels strewed thick upon the ground.
CYRANO (writing):
. . .'Thine eyes'. . .
THIRD POET:
And they were picking up hats all the way to the Quai d'Orfevres!
FIRST POET:
Sapristi! but he must have been a ferocious. . .
CYRANO (same play):
. . .'Thy lips'. . .
FIRST POET:
'Twas a parlous fearsome giant that was the author of such exploits!
CYRANO (same play):
. . .'And when I see thee come, I faint for fear.'
SECOND POET (filching a cake):
What hast rhymed of late, Ragueneau?
CYRANO (same play):
. . .'Who worships thee'. . .
(He stops, just as he is about to sign, and gets up, slipping the letter into
his doublet):
No need I sign, since I give it her myself.
RAGUENEAU (to second poet):
I have put a recipe into verse.
THIRD POET (seating himself by a plate of cream-puffs):
Go to! Let us hear these verses!
FOURTH POET (looking at a cake which he has taken):
Its cap is all a' one side!
(He makes one bite of the top.)
FIRST POET:
See how this gingerbread woos the famished rhymer with its almond eyes, and
its eyebrows of angelica!
(He takes it.)
SECOND POET:
We listen.
THIRD POET (squeezing a cream-puff gently):
How it laughs! Till its very cream runs over!
SECOND POET (biting a bit off the great lyre of pastry):
This is the first time in my life that ever I drew any means of nourishing
me from the lyre!
RAGUENEAU (who has put himself ready for reciting, cleared his throat, settled
his cap, struck an attitude):
A recipe in verse!. . .
SECOND POET (to first, nudging him):
You are breakfasting?
FIRST POET (to second):
And you dining, methinks.
RAGUENEAU:
How almond tartlets are made.
Beat your eggs up, light and quick;
Froth them thick;
Mingle with them while you beat
Juice of lemon, essence fine;
Then combine
The burst milk of almonds sweet.
Circle with a custard paste
The slim waist
Of your tartlet-molds; the top
With a skillful finger print,
Nick and dint,
Round their edge, then, drop by drop,
In its little dainty bed
Your cream shed:
In the oven place each mold:
Reappearing, softly browned,
The renowned
Almond tartlets you behold!
THE POETS (with mouths crammed full):
Exquisite! Delicious!
A POET (choking):
Homph!
(They go up, eating.)
CYRANO (who has been watching, goes toward Ragueneau):
Lulled by your voice, did you see how they were stuffing themselves?
RAGUENEAU (in a low voice, smiling):
Oh, ay! I see well enough, but I never will seem to look, fearing to
distress them; thus I gain a double pleasure when I recite to them my poems;
for I leave those poor fellows who have not breakfasted free to eat, even
while I gratify my own dearest foible, see you?
CYRANO (clapping him on the shoulder):
Friend, I like you right well!. . .
(Ragueneau goes after his friends. Cyrano follows him with his eyes, then,
rather sharply):
Ho there! Lise!
(Lise, who is talking tenderly to the musketeer, starts, and comes down toward
Cyrano):
So this fine captain is laying siege to you?
LISE (offended):
One haughty glance of my eye can conquer any man that should dare venture
aught 'gainst my virtue.
CYRANO:
Pooh! Conquering eyes, methinks, are oft conquered eyes.
LISE (choking with anger):
But--
CYRANO (incisively):
I like Ragueneau well, and so--mark me, Dame Lise--I permit not that he be
rendered a laughing-stock by any. . .
LISE:
But. . .
CYRANO (who has raised his voice so as to be heard by the gallant):
A word to the wise. . .
(He bows to the musketeer, and goes to the doorway to watch, after looking at
the clock.)
LISE (to the musketeer, who has merely bowed in answer to Cyrano's bow):
How now? Is this your courage?. . .Why turn you not a jest on his nose?
THE MUSKETEER:
On his nose?. . .ay, ay. . .his nose.
(He goes quickly farther away; Lise follows him.)
CYRANO (from the doorway, signing to Ragueneau to draw the poets away):
Hist!. . .
RAGUENEAU (showing them the door on the right):
We shall be more private there. . .
CYRANO (impatiently):
Hist! Hist!. . .
RAGUENEAU (drawing them farther):
To read poetry, 'tis better here. . .
FIRST POET (despairingly, with his mouth full):
What! leave the cakes?. . .
SECOND POET:
Never! Let's take them with us!
(They all follow Ragueneau in procession, after sweeping all the cakes off the
trays.)
Scene 2.V.
Cyrano, Roxane, the duenna.
CYRANO:
Ah! if I see but the faint glimmer of hope, then I draw out my letter!
(Roxane, masked, followed by the duenna, appears at the glass pane of the
door. He opens quickly):
Enter!. . .
(Walking up to the duenna):
Two words with you, Duenna.
THE DUENNA:
Four, Sir, an it like you.
CYRANO:
Are you fond of sweet things?
THE DUENNA:
Ay, I could eat myself sick on them!
CYRANO (catching up some of the paper bags from the counter):
Good. See you these two sonnets of Monsieur Beuserade. . .
THE DUENNA:
Hey?
CYRANO:
. . .Which I fill for you with cream cakes!
THE DUENNA (changing her expression):
Ha.
CYRANO: