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The King of the Dark Chamber, a play by Rabindranath Tagore |
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SCENE XII |
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_ SCENE XII XII [Interior of the Palace] SUDARSHANA. Is the fight still going on? SURANGAMA. As fiercely as ever. SUDARSHANA. Before going out to the battle my father came to me and said, "You have come away from one King, but you have drawn seven Kings after you: I have a mind to cut you up into seven pieces and distribute them among the princes. It would have been well if he did so. Surangama! SURANGAMA. Yes? SUDARSHANA. If your King had the power to save me, could my present state have left him unmoved? SURANGAMA. My Queen, why do you ask me? Have I the power to answer for my King? I know my understanding is dark; that is why I never dare to judge him. SUDARSHANA. Who have joined in this fight? SURANGAMA. All the seven princes. SUDARSHANA. No one else? SURANGAMA. Suvarna attempted to escape--in secret before the fight began--but Kanchi has kept him a prisoner in his camps. SUDARSHANA. Oh, I should have been dead long ago! But, O King, my King, if you had come and helped my father, your fame would have been none the less! It would have become brighter and higher. Are you quite sure, Surangama, that he has not come? SURANGAMA. I know nothing for certain. SUDARSHANA. But since I came here I have felt suddenly many a time as if somebody were playing on a vina below my window. SURANGAMA. There is nothing impossible in the idea that somebody indulges his taste for music there. SUDARSHANA. There is a deep thicket below my window--I try to find out who it is every time I hear the music, but I can see nothing distinctly. SURANGAMA. Perhaps some wayfarer rests in the shade and plays on the instrument. SUDARSHANA. It may be so, but my old window in the palace comes back to my memory. I used to come after dressing in the evening and stand at my window, and out of the blank darkness of our lampless meeting-place used to stream forth strains and songs and melodies, dancing and vibrating in endless succession and overflowing profusion, like the passionate exuberance of a ceaseless fountain! SURANGAMA. O deep and sweet darkness! the profound and mystic darkness whose servant I was! SUDARSHANA. Why did you come away with me from that room? SURANGAMA. Because I knew he would follow us and take us back. SUDARSHANA. But no, he will not come--he has left us for good. Why should he not? SURANGAMA. If he can leave us like that, then we have no need of him. Then he does not exist for us: then that dark chamber is totally empty and void--no vina ever breathed its music there-- none called you or me in that chamber; then everything has been a delusion and an idle dream. [Enter the DOORKEEPER] SUDARSHANA. Who are you? DOORKEEPER. I am the porter of this palace. SUDARSHANA. Tell me quickly what you have got to say. DOORKEEPER. Our King has been taken prisoner. SUDARSHANA. Prisoner? O Mother Earth! [Faints.] _ |
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