Act 3 — SCENE XI.
Charles Renauld translation
CYRANO, GUICHE.
GUICHE (masked, and hesitating in the dark).
What can this infernal monk be doing?
CYRANO.
By the way—my voice?—He might recognise it!
(He loosens a hand and makes the motion of turning a key.)
Cric! Crac!
(Solemnly) Now, Cyrano, resume the accent of Bergerac!
GUICHE (looking at the house).
Here's the house!
(He is about to enter, but Cyrano springs from the balcony while holding on to the branch; the latter bends and lets him down between Guiche and the door. He affects to fall heavily, as if from a great height, remaining crushed and dazed. Guiche jumps back.)
What is this?
(When Guiche recovers from his astonishment the branch has sprung up again, so that Cyrano appears to have fallen from the sky.)
From where did this man drop?
CYRANO (speaking with a Gascon's accent).
From the moon!
GUICHE.
The moon!....
CYRANO (as if dazed).
What time is it? What country is this? What month? What day?
GUICHE.
But, my dear Sir....
CYRANO.
I feel quite dizzy.—Like a bombshell, I have just dropped from the moon!
GUICHE (out of patience).
Look here, Sir!....
CYRANO (rising, and in thundering tone).
I say that I dropped!
GUICHE (falling back).
So be it, then! You dropped!.... (aside) He is no doubt insane!
CYRANO (walking toward him).
And my drop is not metaphorical!.... One hundred years, or one minute ago—I cannot tell how long I was on the way—I was up in that saffron-coloured ball!
GUICHE (shrugging his shoulders).
Quite so! But allow me to pass!
CYRANO (stopping him).
Be frank now! Where am I? Where have I fallen like a meteorite?
GUICHE.
Zounds, Sir!....
CYRANO.
During my fall, I could make no selection as to my point of arrival. Is it upon a moon or an earth that my dead weight has just landed?
GUICHE.
But I repeat to you, Sir!....
CYRANO (with a cry of horror that causes Guiche to fall back).
Good Heavens!.... In this country are people's faces black? Am I in Algiers, and are you a native?
GUICHE (touching his mask).
No doubt, this mask....
CYRANO (seemingly less frightened).
Oh! then, it's Venice.... or Genoa!
GUICHE (trying to pass).
A lady is waiting for me!...
CYRANO (completely reassured).
Then I must be in Paris!
GUICHE (reluctantly smiling).
The rascal is amusing!
CYRANO.
You are laughing.
GUICHE.
Yes,—but I must pass.
CYRANO (apparently overjoyed).
So I have dropped in Paris!....
(Quite at his ease, laughing, dusting himself, and bowing.)
I have just arrived—pardon me—by the last cyclone, and I must brush off the ether that is still on me. I've travelled! My eyes are still full of astral dust, and my spurs have caught planet hairs.
(picking something off his sleeve).
Here, on my doublet, is one from a comet!....
(He blows, as if to cast off the hair.)
GUICHE (enraged).
Now, look here, Sir!....
(As Guiche is going to pass, Cyrano stretches out his leg as if to show something that is on it.)
CYRANO.
In the calf of this leg, Sir, I have a tooth of the Great Bear,—and, as nearing the Trident, I managed to avoid its three lances, I fell in a lump upon the Balance—where my weight up there is still registered!
(preventing Guiche from passing and holding him by one of his buttons).
If you were to press my nose, Sir, you would cause a flow of milk!....
GUICHE.
Milk, indeed!
CYRANO.
Yes, Sir.... from the Milky Way!
GUICHE.
Oh! by Satan!....
CYRANO.
No! I dropped from heaven! (crossing his arms). Would you believe it? I noticed it as I was going by there: Sirius, at night actually wears a turban! (confidentially) The other Bear, the little one, is still too small to bite! (laughing) As I was passing through the Lyre, I broke one of its strings! (proudly) But I intend to write a book on the subject; and the golden stars that I gathered into my scorched cloak, regardless of peril, shall be used by my printer for asterisks!
GUICHE.
Once more, I must insist....
CYRANO.
Oh! Sir, I know what you desire!
GUICHE.
You do?....
CYRANO.
Yes. You desire to hear from me how the moon is made, and if any one inhabits the rotundity of this cucurbit![22]
GUICHE (very loud).
No! No! I desire....
CYRANO.
To learn how I got up there? Easily. Through an invention of mine.
GUICHE (discouraged).
A madman, certainly!
CYRANO (disdainfully).
I copied not the stupid eagle of Regiomontanus, or the timid pigeon of Archytas!....
GUICHE.
A madman—but a learned one.
CYRANO.
No, Sir. I imitated nothing ever done.
(Guiche, having managed to pass, is nearing Roxane's door, but Cyrano follows, ready to seize him.)
I invented six different ways of assaulting the virgin blue!
GUICHE (turning).
Six?
CYRANO (with increased fluency).
I could, with body as bare as a taper, have comparisoned it with crystal phials o'erflowing with tears from the morning skies, and my person, then, if exposed in the sun, would have been aspirated by the luminary along with the dew!
GUICHE (astonished, goes toward Cyrano).
True! That is one way!
CYRANO (backing, so as to draw him further away).
Again, I could have created a powerful gust of wind, to lift me, if I had rarefied the air in a cedar box, by means of heated mirrors forming an icosahedron!
GUICHE (following Cyrano).
Two ways!
CYRANO (still backing).
Or else, being both a machinist and an artificer, have straddled a steel-legged grasshopper, and caused myself, through successive explosions of saltpetre, to be projected into the azure fields where the stars are wont to graze!
GUICHE (still following him, and counting on his fingers).
That is three!
CYRANO.
Since smoke persists in rising, I might have blown into a globe enough of it to carry me up!
GUICHE (more and more astonished).
Four!
CYRANO.
Since Phœbe, when her bow is the thinnest, loves to draw, O beeves! your marrow,.... anoint myself with the same!
GUICHE (stupefied).
Five!
CYRANO (who has managed, while talking, to press Guiche over to the other side of the square, near a bench).
Last: I could have placed myself upon an iron plate, taken a magnet and thrown it up into the air! This is a capital way. As soon as the magnet starts, the iron rushes in pursuit of it. The magnet is thrown up again; the iron plate follows—and, Cadedis! there is nothing to prevent the ascension from lasting indefinitely.
GUICHE.
Six!—All excellent systems. And, tell me, Sir, which one of the six did you adopt?
CYRANO.
A seventh one!
GUICHE.
Astonishing! And what was it, please?
CYRANO.
You would never dream of it!....
GUICHE (aside).
The fellow is really interesting!
CYRANO (very mysterious and imitating the sound of waves on a beach).
Houüh! Houüh!
GUICHE.
What's that?
CYRANO.
You cannot imagine?
GUICHE.
No!
CYRANO.
The tide!.... As it was running out, in obedience to the attraction of the moon, I lay on the sands—head foremost, so that my hair—hair, you know, does not dry fast—so that my hair was kept bathed in the receding waves. And, thus I was, by the moon's attraction, drawn up, up, erect, like an angel. And up I went, gently, without an effort, until suddenly, I felt a shock!.... Then!....
GUICHE (interested, takes a seat on the bench).
Then?....
CYRANO.
Then.... (resuming his natural tone). The fifteen minutes have elapsed, Sir, and now I grant you your freedom. The marriage is accomplished!
GUICHE (jumping up).
Am I intoxicated?.... That voice!
(The door of Roxane's house opens; lackeys come out with lighted candelabra. Cyrano takes off his hat that he had kept well down over his face.)
And that nose!.... Cyrano!
CYRANO (bowing).
In person.... Cyrano! They have just exchanged their marriage rings.
GUICHE.
They!.... Who?
(He turns. Tableau. Behind the lackeys, Roxane and Christian holding each other by the hand. The Monk, smiling, follows them. Ragueneau is behind, also holding a light. And last is the Duenna, bewildered, half dressed, as if she had been hurried out of bed.)
Merciful heavens!