The Tragedy of Macbeth, Part II: The Seed of Banquo Read online

SCENE V

  Dunsinane.

  Malcolm, seated, with Macduff, Suitor, Suitor’s Father and Attendants.

  SUITOR’S FATHER My liege, my daughter would make the

  finest bride in all of Scotland. Her beauty is sung of—

  MALCOLM It is apparent.

  SUITOR’S FATHER Thank him.

  SUITOR Thank you, my lord.

  SUITOR’S FATHER My lord, she is a most obedient and de-

  voted subject, and would—

  MALCOLM Would you like to speak?

  SUITOR I am yours, my lord.

  MALCOLM Thank you for gracing us with your beauty and

  charm. We shall call on you.

  SUITOR’S FATHER My lord, ’twould be such an honor—

  MACDUFF We shall call on you.

  Exit Suitor and Suitor’s Father.

  MALCOLM What think you, Macduff?

  MACDUFF She’s fine of form,

  and her eyes shine with intelligence.

  She would make a fine bride for Scotland.

  MALCOLM I am not certain. If it were—

  Enter two Messengers, followed by Siward, Seyton, Lennox and Angus.

  MESSENGER ONE My king,

  your brother has breached our shores.

  MESSENGER TWO He doth approach

  with army fierce.

  SIWARD Traitor!

  SEYTON Villain!

  MALCOLM From whence?

  MESSENGER ONE Through the shades of Birnam Wood.

  MALCOM (aside) Thus comes

  the prophecy to pass. Yet I’ll be touched

  by none but Cawdor.

  MESSENGER TWO More, my lord. Ross rides at his side.

  MALCOLM What, Ross?

  ANGUS ’Tis not possible.

  SEYTON ’Tis treachery!

  LENNOX Rush not to judge. Ne’er was Ross’s honor

  held in doubt.

  MACDUFF Ross would not raise a hand

  against your throne. Perhaps they come in peace.

  SIWARD What? An army come in peace?

  SEYTON My lord,

  I have heard your errant brother means

  to petition for a title.

  MALCOLM Title? What title?

  SEYTON As you already claim that of king and hold

  no need for titles lesser, Donalbain aims

  to acquire “Cawdor.”

  MALCOLM (aside) Can it be? Is not

  all Ireland enough? Sisters: your riddles

  twist to life. Birnam Wood would mark

  the way. So it does. Only Cawdor

  can harm me. So he aspires. Is there no pause

  between prophecy and consequence?

  No gestation for augury?

  Is the world below more expedient?

  Or did my very summoning create

  the act? Would I had never visited

  that bog!

 

  MACDUFF My lord, I pray you, patience—

  SEYTON Patience? Whilst

  an army advances?

  MALCOLM Patience is a luxury

  not suited to every time. I summoned my brother

  for a private audience; I must

  then view his outward show of arms in but

  one light. I love my brother dearly—yet

  it seems that not all love is requited.

  The prince forgets, he is no seed of Banquo.

  He is but the second-loved brother,

  who must now be first to die. Forgive

  me, Father: to save one son, I must

  kill your other.

  Exeunt.

  SCENE VI

  Birnam Wood.

  Enter Donalbain, Ross, Soldiers.

  DONALBAIN How deeply this Scottish air stirs me. ‘Tis

  mighty strange.

  Never have I felt as content.

  SOLDIER ONE Nor I

  as lost. I can’t recall such ghastly fog.

  ROSS ’Tis like the very breath of hell.

  DONALBAIN I think

  we are in Birnam Wood, but know not for

  this vapor.

  SOLDIER ONE Sire, we are. See there? The fog

  begins to lift.

  SOLDIER TWO So it does.

  SOLDIER ONE And look!

  Now the sun.

  DONALBAIN Such a sudden shift

  of light I have not ever seen.

  ROSS Sire!

  Look there! Your brother.

  DONALBAIN So it is! May God

  be blessed. How it warms my heart to see

  my flesh again!

  Enter Malcolm, Siward, Macduff, Seyton, Lennox, Angus and Soldiers.

  The two armies stop before each other.

  Donalbain dismounts, as does Malcolm. The two brothers approach each

  other on foot. Donalbain reaches for a scroll.

  DONALBAIN Dear brother!

  Malcolm stabs him. Donalbain falls.

  DONALBAIN Alas! Am I slain by my self?

  Now I know why I felt contentment here:

  it is to be my resting place. What better

  place to die than at a brother’s side.

  If to be killed by a hand so close, ’tis safer

  not to live at all.

  Donalbain dies.

  ROSS Shadow of Macbeth! What vile act

  is this? Your noble brother approached in peace,

  and you met his embrace with murder.

  MALCOLM He reached

  for his sword; I answered with mine.

  ROSS He reached

  for a scroll!

  Ross dismounts, and takes a scroll from

  Donalbain’s hand and hands it to Malcolm.

  ROSS He brought you news of Norway’s attack. He brought

  you men to help defend it!

  Malcolm reads, and sinks to his knees beside Donalbain.

  ROSS You have killed

  the better half of Duncan.

  Ross remounts.

  ROSS You have won

  the day, but not the time. You now outrank

  this friendly group, but Donalbain shall be

  avenged. On that day you will earn his blood.

  Lennox, with Soldiers, rides to Ross’s side.

  LENNOX I am with Ross!

  Angus, with Soldiers, rides to Ross’s side.

  ANGUS And I!

  Exeunt Ross, Lennox, Angus and all their Soldiers.

  SIWARD My liege, they flee! We must pursue!

  SEYTON We must

  strike now, before their army multiplies!

  MALCOLM What a cruel and callous butcher am I.

  Dear, dear brother. How I missed your face

  e’en as I struck; I watched my hand perform

  the deed e’en as I wished it wouldn’t. O, Donalbain!

  SEYTON My lord, the fog returns. We must pursue!

  MALCOLM The sisters thus speak true. Donalbain

  has vanquished Malcolm, worse than a thousand Norways.

  SIWARD My lord—

  MALCOLM Peace! There will be no more death

  on this day. More days will follow, if none

  with any worth.

  Exeunt.

  SCENE VII

  A graveyard.

  Enter Malcolm, who sits beside the corpse of Donalbain.

  Enter Woman.

  MALCOLM Nothing now can harm you further. Not

  the slings of fortune, not the touch of a brother’s

  love. I will have you borne to Colmekill

  upon a thousand gilded horses; no place

  more befits, for more a king are you

  than I. I, a coward who wears a crown,

  a crown planted in haste, loosed by our father’s

  death. On him it should have stayed; then,

  on you. For what grants me the right? Being
r />   firstborn? What virtue lies in that? What hand

  had I in that? We ’magine that by this custom

  a second brother is the lesser; yet this day

  proves otherwise.

  “I to England.” “And to Ireland I.”

  If only we’d switched paths that fateful day.

  You would now be Scotland, and these hands, so tainted,

  could be free of fratricide. If only

  we’d avenged our Duncan while in restless

  death he lay; if only we’d looked more deeply

  into the bloody deed. But we forsook

  our father’s lonely corpse, and on ourselves

  drew suspicion. “Our separated

  fortune shall keep us both the safer.” Not safe

  enough from a brother’s embrace. “Where we

  are, there’s daggers in men’s smiles.” Would

  I had greeted you with such a smile.

  Throws his sword.

  What’s there? A phantom? The ghost of my mother, come

  to rebuke? No, it is too serene….

  Sirrah!

  Enter Attendant.

  Inquire what lady stands thither.

  ATTENDANT Yes, my lord.

  Attendant rushes off, and returns.

  ATTENDANT She would not give her name.

  MALCOLM Would not?

  ATTENDANT “’Tis a name not to be given,”

  is what she said.

  MALCOLM Not to be given? What sort

  of mystery is this? Who dares not give

  what at birth was given free? Inquire

  whom she mourns.

  ATTENDANT Yes, sire.

  Exit Attendant.

  MALCOLM Uncanny sight. Such beauty in such a place.

  Such beauty anywhere!

  Enter Attendant.

 

  ATTENDANT My lord, she would not tell.

  MALCOLM Not tell?

  ATTENDANT She said,

  “It is a private matter.”

  MALCOLM Private? Whose death

  can be so private? Are we not all catalogued

  in that great book of heaven and hell? Is not

  one’s absence on this globe so duly noted

  that privacy ’scapes even the most unloved

  of souls? Cryptic woman! So beautiful.

  So solemn. Such a mix I have ne’er seen.

  Perchance she is a seraph, dispatched to test

  my welcome. Then, as Abraham, I shall

  not delay.

  Malcolm approaches.

  MALCOLM My lady, I beg, why

  do you speak so?

  WOMAN Why do you inquire

  of what is no concern to you?

  MALCOLM Death

  concerns us all.

  WOMAN Some more than others.

  MALCOLM How does

  it you?

  WOMAN It did not until some threescore weeks

  ago. ’Twas then I was informed of both

  my parents’ deaths, and have come here to mourn

  for them.

  MALCOLM What, the death of them both?

  WOMAN On this very day.

  MALCOLM Bloody anniversary!

  But how did you not know sooner?

  WOMAN My home

  is a monastery, far from the news

  of the world, and from these parents I never

  met.

  MALCOLM Never! Alas! But this should make

  their death the slighter.

  WOMAN Or heavier. Sometimes

  ’tis better to know a thing than to wonder

  what’s been missed.

  MALCOLM (aside) This lady’s words distract.

  Forgive me, Donalbain; my heart, so filled

  with grief, now wells with something else.

  (to Lady) Whence

  came you?

  WOMAN From the black church. On the isle

  of Iona.

  MALCOLM Black? How so?

  WOMAN So named for the

  garments of our nuns. It is thought

  to be God’s chosen color.

  MALCOLM You rebuke me with

  the mention.

  WOMAN Of God? How so? ’Tis a blessing,

  not a rebuke—unless you have rebuked

  Him.

  MALCOLM O! I have. There lies the corpse

  that was my brother, rendered thus by

  this very hand.

  WOMAN O! Most horrible Cain!

  MALCOLM I knew not he came in peace.

  WOMAN How could

  a brother come otherwise? How heavy a sin

  you have committed. You must atone.

  MALCOLM I desire

  nothing more. But, lady, I do not espy

  the graves of your parents. Perhaps we were

  acquainted.

  WOMAN I pray not.

  MALCOLM Pray not? Wherefore?

  WOMAN I’ve been told that it was safer to be

  from them distant.

  MALCOLM Safer? How so?

  WOMAN My lord,

  press no further. I have come to grieve

  in silence.

  MALCOLM Art thou an apparition come

  to rebuke? I spy no graves here, save for that

  crooked cross marking the pit of the Macbeths.

  WOMAN I have spoken, my lord.

  MALCOLM Tell me at least

  your name.

  WOMAN For what purpose?

  MALCOLM Purpose? Need I

  purpose? Know you not that I am king

  of all this land?

  WOMAN Titles do not sway

  me. There sits a greater king than you.

  MALCOLM Greater than me? Who? England? Ireland?

  WOMAN The Lord who has made you.

  MALCOLM (aside) Her piety pierces my soul, rubbing salt

  on a heart freshly torn. O bitter

  physic! I should leave her; and yet I cannot

  tear away.

  (to her) Lady, I must know your name.

  WOMAN It is

  a name I cannot speak. For so uttered,

  it would split the air asunder.

  MALCOLM Then write it.

  WOMAN The letters spelt would burn the parchment.

  MALCOLM What name

  could do such harm when it doth name so beauteous

  a thing?

  WOMAN I pray you, good day, my lord.

  MALCOLM Stay!

  As king, I command.

  WOMAN I am not your subject.

  MALCOLM You tread on my soil.

  WOMAN A cemetery

  belongs to the dead. Are you king of the dead?

  MALCOLM Answer! Answer I say!!

  He shakes her.

  WOMAN You have already

  pronounced.

  MALCOLM Pronounced? I? How? Do not

  speak in riddles!

  WOMAN Pronounce again, so please

  you. The crooked cross stares back.

  MALCOLM Macbeth?

  How does this concern you?

  WOMAN I am their issue.

  ATTENDANT What! Ho!

  Attendant rushes off.

  MALCOLM A child? Of Macbeth?

  WOMAN I wish that it were other.

  Enter Seyton, Siward, Macduff, various Nobles, Guards,

  Attendants, and a Crowd.

  SEYTON Can it be?

  SIWARD Another Macbeth?

  CROWD 2 She’s much too beautiful.

  CROWD 3 Far too humble.

  CROWD 4 Yet her age is right.

  CROWD 5 I spot Cawdor in her eyes.

  CROWD 6 Is’t true?!

  ALL CROWD We demand to be satisfied! Speak!

  MALCOLM Speak, my lady. Is it true?

  MACBETH It is.
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br />   I have been branded with a name in which

  there is no hope for penance.

  NOBLES Cursed seed!

  CROWD 1 Stone her where she stands!

  Malcolm draws.

  MALCOLM Back! All of you! You’ll take no action

  but by my command.

  MACDUFF My lord, we must

  at least imprison. She is an enemy

  to the state. If we do not, this mob,

  or some other, will tear her apart.

  SEYTON He speaks wisely, my lord.

  MALCOLM Take her to Dunsinane. Secure her in the tower.

  The Guards carry her off, and the crowd cheers.

  Exeunt all but Malcolm.

  MALCOLM Imprison her, I shall, but only that she

  not flee. My wife have I found, another

  Macbeth or no.

  Exit Malcolm.

  ACT II