ooking sadly at her_): Girl--child--

HELENA: Why do
You call me so with struggle on your breast?

FULVIA: You're very fair.

HELENA: And was so free I thought
The world brimmed up with my full happiness.

FULVIA: But find it is a sieve to all but grief?

HELENA: Is it then grief? I have not any tears,
Yet seem girt by an emptiness that aches,
Surrounds and whispers, what I dare not think
Or, shapened, see.

FULVIA: It stains too as a shroud
The morrow's face?

HELENA: You look at me--I think
You look at me, as if----?

FULVIA: No child.

HELENA: Why am
I in this place? You fear for me?

FULVIA: Fear?

HELENA: Yes!
A dumb dread trembles from you sufferingly.

FULVIA: It is not fear. Or--no!--has vanished quite,
Ashamed of its too naked idleness.

HELENA (_shuddering_): He cannot, will not!--Yet you feared!

FULVIA: Be calm:
Beauty is better so.

HELENA: Ah, you are cold!
See a great shadow reach and wrap at me,
Yet lend no light! By gentleness I pray you,
What said he?

FULVIA: Child----

HELENA: Child!--Ah, a moment's dread
Brings age on us!--If not by gentleness,
Then by that love that women bear to men,
By happiness too fleeting to tread earth,
I pray you tell the fear your heart so hides!

FULVIA: You are the guest of Charles di Tocca.

HELENA: Guest?
Ah, guests are bidden, not commanded.--Where,
Where can Antonio be gone. All day
No token, quieting!

FULVIA: Antonio, girl?
Antonio?--Is it true?

_Re-enter CHARLES._

CHARLES: So eager?--Truth
Has brewed more tears than lies. But, Fulvia,
Why doth it mated with Antonio's name
Wring thus your troubled hands?

FULVIA: My lord----

CHARLES: You falter?
No matter--now. (_To HELENA._) But you, my fair one, put
More merriment upon your lips and lids,
And this (_giving pearls_) upon the lustre of your throat.
Hither our guests come soon. Be with us then,
And at your beauty's best. Now; trembling so?--
Yet is the lily lovelier in the wind!
(_He looks after, musingly, as