thrown Eastern carpets, rugs, embroideries.
The world is sun-soaked. The surrounding trees stand sentinel-like in the burning light. Burmese servants squat motionless, smoking on the broad white steps that lead from the house to the garden. The crows croak drowsily at intervals. Parrots scream intermittently. The sound of a guitar playing a Venetian love-song can be heard coming from the interior. Otherwise life apparently sleeps. Two elderly retainers break the silence.
“When will the Thakin tire of this?” one asks the other in kindly contempt.
“The end is already at hand. I read it at dawn to-day.”
“Whence will it come?”
“I know not. It is written that one heart will break.”
“He will leave her?”
“He will leave her. He will have no choice—who can war with Fate?”
The sun shifts a little; a light breeze kisses the motionless palm leaves—they quiver gracefully. Attendants appear R. and L. bearing a great Shamiana (tent), silver poles, carved chairs, foot supports, fruit, flowers, embroidered fans. Three musicians in semi-Venetian-Burmese costume follow with their instruments. The tent erected, enter (C.) meng beng and mah phru, followed by two Burmese women carrying two tiny children in Burmese fashion on their hips.
The servants retire to a distance. meng beng and mah phru seat themselves on carven chairs; the children are placed at their feet and given coloured glass balls to play with. meng beng and mah phru gaze at them with deep affection and then at each other.
The musicians play light, zephyr-like airs. meng beng and mah phru talk together. meng beng smokes a cigar, mah phru has one of the big yellow cheroots affected by Burmese women to-day.
“It wants but two days to the two years,” he tells her sadly.
“And you are happy?”
“As a god.”
She smiles radiantly. She suspects nothing. She is more beautiful than before. Her dress is of the richest Mandalay silks. She wears big nadoungs of rubies in her ears.
Presently meng bengarranges a set of ivory chessmen on a low table between them. The sun sinks slowly. The sound of approaching wheels is heard.
Enter (C.) u. rai gyan thoo, preceded by two servants. meng beng looks up in surprise—in alarm. He rises, etc., and goes forward. u. rai gyan thoo presents a letter written on palm leaves. meng beng does not open it.
The curtains at the opening of the tent are, Oriental fashion, dropped. The music ceases.
meng beng and the grand vizier converse apart. The Minister explains that the Princess of Ceylon’s ship and its great convoy have already been sighted. The Court and city wait in eager expectancy. The King has worshipped long enough at the Pagoda of Golden Flowers—his subjects and his bride call to him. u. rai gyan thoo has come to take him to them.
meng beng is terribly distressed.
“You can return one day,” the Vizier tells him. “The Pagoda will remain. I also, once, in years long dead, Lord of the Sea and Moon, worshipped at a Pagoda.”
meng beng seeks mah phru to explain that he goes on urgent affairs, that he will come back to her and to his sons, perhaps before the waning of the new moon. Their parting is sad with the pensive sadness of look and gesture peculiar to Eastern people.
meng beng goes (C.) with u. rai gyan thoo. mah phru mounts to the verandah to watch them go from behind the curtains. Then, slowly sinking across the heaped-up cushions, she faints.
The sun has set. The music ceases. The melancholy cry of the peacocks fills the silence.
ACT DROP
ACT III
SCENE I
Seven years have elapsed.
The same scene.
Curtain discovers mah phru seated on a high verandah. A clearance has been made in the surrounding trees to give a full view of the road beyond. She is watching, always watching. With her are two beautiful little boys.
“To-day, perhaps,” she murmurs. “Perhaps to-morrow; but without fail—one day.”
“Look!” she cries. “At last my lord returns!”
Coming up the jungle road, in view of the audience, are a bevy of horsemen.
mah phru, wondering, descends to greet them. Enter u. rai gyan thoo. He is dressed all in white, which is Burmese mourning. mah phru sinks back—she fears the worst. The old man reassures her. He tells her that meng beng has sent for his sons—that the Queen is dead, and there is no heir.
“Queen? What Queen?” demands mah phru.
“The Queen of Burmah.”
So mah phru learns for the first time that her lover is the ruler of the country, supreme master of and dictator to everyone.
Weeping, but not daring to disobey, she summons the children to her; then, sinking on her knees, entreats in moving and pathetic words to be permitted to go with them, in the lowest most menial capacity. u. rai gyan thoo refuses. There is no place for her in the greatness of the world yonder. “Even Kings forget,” he says. “It is the command of the supreme Lord of the Earth and of the Sky that she remain where she is.”
Then he orders his followers to make the necessary arrangements for the safe journey of their future king and his brother.
The children stand passive in their gay dress, but are bewildered and afraid.
mah phru has risen to her feet. She appears as if turned to bronze—a model of restraint and dignity, blent with colour and beauty and infinite grace.
the curtain descends slowly
SCENE II
The same night.
The home of the Chinese Wizard, hip loong, by the river—a place fitted with Chinese things: Dragons of gold with eyes of jade gleaming from out dim corners, Buddhas of gigantic size fashioned of priceless metals with heads that move, swinging banners with fringes of many-coloured stones, lanterns with glass slides on which are painted grotesque figures. The air is full of the scent of joss sticks. The Wizard reclines on a divan, inhaling opium slowly, clothed with the subdued gorgeousness of China—blue and tomato-red predominate. He has the appearance of a wrinkled walnut. His forehead is a lattice-work of wrinkles. His pigtail, braided with red, is twisted round his head. His hands are as claws. The effect is weird, unearthly.
Enter mah phru.
The Wizard silently motions her to some