Pirandello's Henry IV (9 page)

HENRY
   Yes, I'm really cured, (
to Belcredi
) But I haven't finished with you yet. (
aggressively
) Are you aware that in twenty years no one has dared to come into my presence dressed like you and this gentleman here?

Henry points to the Doctor.

BELCREDI
   Of course I am. For that matter, when I appeared before you this morning I came dressed—

HENRY
   —as a monk, of course!

BELCREDI
   You mistook me for Peter Damian, and the only reason I didn't laugh was—

HENRY
   You thought I was crazy. So, now that I'm sane, you can jeer at her to see her in costume? And yet, you might have reflected that, in my eyes, she looks . . . Oh, what does it matter? (
turning suddenly to the Doctor
) You're a doctor?

DOCTOR
   Er—yes. . .

HENRY
   So all this was your idea. Don't you realise you could have plunged my mind back onto the dark pit of madness . . . making pictures talk and leap out of their frames?

Henry observes Frida and Di Nolli, then Matilda, and lastly he looks at his own clothes.

HENRY
   (
cont.
) Double, double . . . Splendid, just what the doctor ordered for the lunatic . . . (
pointing at Belcredi
) To him it's just another game of dressing up. (
addressing Belcredi
) And now—off with the motley, eh?—so I can come along with you—do you think?

BELCREDI
   With me—with us . . .

HENRY
   Where should we go, then? How about the club? In best bib and tucker. Or shall we go home with the Countess, the two of us?

BELCREDI
   Whatever you like. Why not? You don't want to stay here—all alone and for evermore—keeping up a carnival joke that went wrong? It's amazing how you managed to keep it going once you'd recovered from the accident.

HENRY
   Ah, yes—but when the horse threw me and I hit my head, I actually did lose my mind, I'm not sure for how long.

DOCTOR
   Ah! Most interesting! How long roughly?

HENRY
   About twelve years. (
to Belcredi
) Yes—knowing nothing about what life had saved up for you and not for me, from the day of the carnival onwards . . . all the changes, friends who turned against me, or how my place was taken, in . . . let's say . . . the heart of a woman I loved . . . not knowing who'd died, who'd gone away . . . all that, you know, was no joke.

BELCREDI
   That's not what I said—I was talking about later when . . .

HENRY
   Oh—later! Well, one day . . . Are you listening, Doctor?—I'm a very interesting case, you should take notes . . . Well, one day . . . all by itself, God knows how, the damage here (
He touches his forehead.
) . . . mended itself . . . I open my eyes slowly, to begin with I'm not sure if I'm asleep or awake—and then, yes, I'm awake, I touch things, the fog is clearing . . . I'm cured . . . And now—just as he says (
pointing to Belcredi
)—yes, throw off the masquerade! Shake off the nightmare! Open the doors and windows!
Breathe in the air! Quick! Away! (
more calmly
) But where? For what? For everybody to point a furtive finger?—“There goes Henry IV!” And not as you see me now, but out in the world, arm in arm with you, my dear friends!

BELCREDI
   It wouldn't be like that.

MATILDA
   Who'd ever . . .? It's unthinkable. It was an accident.

HENRY
   They used to say I was cuckoo before I had the accident. (
to Belcredi
) You know that better than anyone—anybody who stuck up for me had you to deal with.

BELCREDI
   Oh, come on, it was all in good heart.

HENRY
   And there's my hair—look.

BELCREDI
   But mine's going grey too.

HENRY
   Yes, but there's a difference. I turned grey in here, as Henry IV. Can you understand what that means? I didn't realise!—I just noticed it one day, it was something of a shock, because I knew at once it wasn't just my hair.
I
was going grey, I was rotting away. I was done, I'd missed the feast.

BELCREDI
   You weren't left abandoned . . .

HENRY
   I know. They longed for me to get better. Even the one who was right behind me and jabbed my horse till the blood ran . . .

DI NOLLI
   What?

HENRY
   . . . jabbed it to make it rear up, till it threw me.

MATILDA
   My God! It's the first I've heard of this!

HENRY
   Was that in good heart, too, do you suppose?

MATILDA
   Who? Who was behind us?

HENRY
   What does it matter? It could as well have been any of those who went on to the banquet and would have saved me their meagre leftovers of sympathy, a few bones of contrition on the edge of their plates. Thank you very much!

So, Doctor—see if I'm not a first in the annals of lunacy! I decided to stay mad, finding everything I needed here for a completely new form of amusement, to live as a madman of sound mind. Maybe it was to get my own back on the paving stone that cracked my head. What I saw when I came round was desolation, bleak and empty, and I decided to deck it out in all the colours and splendour of that long-gone carnival day when you . . . oh, there you are, my lady . . . when you had your triumph . . . and to make everyone who came here continue—this time for my diversion—that celebrated masquerade which had been—for you if not for me—-just the whim of a day . . . to make it last forever, not as make-believe now but as the real thing, the genuine mad article: the right clothes, the throne room, the four Privy Counsellors—all of them traitors, I gather—(
turning to them
) I'd like to know what you think you've gained by it? If I'm cured, you're out of a job. I must have been mad to confide in you. But now it's my turn. Guess what? They were thinking we could carry on this charade behind your backs!

Henry begins to laugh. The others, with the exception of Matilda, laugh too.

HENRY
   (
cont.
) Don't blame them. (
shaking his clothes
) We are what we wear. Look, this is an obvious, deliberate caricature of that other charade which is the life we live as puppets . . . so you have to forgive them, they don't realise it's only their frocks. (
to Belcredi
) You soon enter into the
spirit of it. You start behaving as if you're in some tragedy, like this . . . (
He demonstrates.
) I'm cured, gentlemen, because I've woken up to my madness. So I'm calm. Your problem is you haven't woken up to yours, so you toss and turn your whole lives through.

BELCREDI
   Oh, so in the end, we're the madmen, are we?

HENRY
   Well, if you weren't crazy, would you have shown up here with her?

BELCREDI
   I might if I thought you were crazy.

HENRY
   And what about her?

BELCREDI
   Ah, her . . . I don't know about her. She's hanging on to your every word, she seems quite entranced by your sane-as-a hatter emergence. (
to Matilda
) Since you're dressed for the part, Countess, why don't you join him?

MATILDA
   Damn your insolence!

HENRY
   Take no notice!—he can't help provoking me, though the Doctor warned him. (
to Belcredi
) Why should I care about what happened between us?—the part you played in my unlucky love . . . (
indicating Belcredi to Matilda
) . . . the part he now plays in your life! My life has been this one here. I wasn't there when you got old. Was that what you wanted to tell me, to show me, by dressing up, stooping to this—on doctor's orders? Nice one, Doctor. “Before” and “After,” eh? But unfortunately for you, I'm not that crazy. I knew damn well he wasn't Henry IV. Because I'm Henry IV. I've been Henry IV for years . . . stuck behind my mask, while she's lived life and enjoyed herself for twenty years . . . and become—look at her there—someone I don't know anymore . . . because I know her like this . . . (
pointing at Frida and moving closer to
her
) to me this will always be her. Now you look like little children ready to jump out of your skins. (
to Frida
) And you were frightened, weren't you, my sweet, by the game they tricked you into playing. How could you know it wasn't the game they thought it was? Oh, what a marvellous terror!—the dream that comes to life, never more alive than in you. You were only an image but they made you flesh . . . blood . . . breath. You're mine—mine!—mine by right!

Henry takes her in his arms, laughing insanely, while everybody shrieks in terror; but when they rush to pull Frida away from him he becomes menacing and shouts to his four Counsellors.

HENRY
   (
cont.
) Hold them off! Hold them! I order you!

The four Counsellors, stunned, fascinated, automatically try to restrain Di Nolli, the Doctor, and Belcredi.

BELCREDI
   Let go of her! Let go! You're no madman!

Henry takes Di Nolli's sword.

HENRY
   Oh no? (
He runs Belcredi through.
) Are you sure?

Belcredi screams. Everyone rushes to Belcredi's aid, shouting in confusion.

DI NOLLI
   Is it bad?

BERTOLD
   Right in the guts!

DOCTOR
   I warned you! Didn't I tell you?

FRIDA
   Oh my God!

DI NOLLI
   Frida, stay by me.

MATILDA
   He's mad!—Mad!

DI NOLLI
   Hold him down!

BELCREDI
   (
protesting fiercely
) Oh no . . . there's nothing crazy about you! He's not mad! He isn't mad!

They take Belcredi, continuing to yell, out. Among the cries there is a more piercing one from Matilda, followed by silence.

Henry remains onstage, between Landolf, Harold, and Ordulf, with his eyes wide open, in astonishment.

HENRY
   Now . . . yes . . . no two ways about it . . . Together again . . . Henry the Fourth, now and forever.

THE END