Chapter 2Scene 2

Hertha, Aslaug. ASLAUG Hertha, we dance before the man tonight. Why not tonight? HERTHA Because I will not act Lifting in vain a rash frustrated hand. When all is certain, I will strike. ASLAUG To near, To strike while all posterity applauds! For Norway’s poets to the end of time Shall sing in phrases noble as the theme Of Aslaug’s dance and Aslaug’s dagger. HERTHA Yes, If we succeed, but who will sing the praise Of foiled assassins? Shall we risk defeat? While we sleep flung in a dishonoured tomb, And Swegn of Norway roams until the end The desperate snows and forest silences Hopeless, proscribed, alone? ASLAUG No more defeat! Too often, too deeply have we drunk that cup!

Eric HERTHA The man we come to slay, — ASLAUG A mighty man! He has the face and figure of a god, A marble emperor with brilliant eyes. How came the usurper by a face like that? HERTHA His father was a son of Odin’s stock. ASLAUG His fable since he rose! A pauper house Of one poor vessel and a narrow fiord And some bare pine-trees possessor, — this was he, The root he sprang from. HERTHA But from this to tower In three swift summers undisputed lord Of Norway, before years had put their growth Upon his chin! If not of Odin’s race, Odin is for him. Are you not afraid, You who see Fate even in a sparrow’s flight, When Odin is for him? ASLAUG Aslaug is against. He has a strength, an iron strength, and Thor Strikes hammerlike in his uplifted sword. But Fate alone decides when all is said, Not Thor, nor Odin. I will try my fate. HERTHA He is a pure usurper, is he not? Norway’s election made him king, men say.

Act I, Scene 2 ASLAUG Left Olaf Sigualdson no heirs behind? Was his chair vacant? HERTHA Of Trondhjem; but they cried, The inland and the north were free to choose. ASLAUG As rebels are. HERTHA Discord was seated there. To the South rejoicing in her golden gains, Crying, “I am Norway”, all the rude-lipped North Blew bronze refusal and its free stark head To breathe cold heaven was lifted like its hills. We sought the arbitration of the sword, That sharp blind last appeal. The sword has judged Against our claim. ASLAUG The dagger overrides. HERTHA When it is keen and swift enough! O yet, If kindly peace even now were possible! The suzerainty? it is his. We fought for it, We have lost it. Let it rest where it has fallen. ASLAUG Better our barren empire of the snows! Better with reindeer herding to survive, Or else a free and miserable death Together!

Eric HERTHA It is well to be resolved. Therefore I flung the doubt before your mind, To strike more surely. Aslaug, did you see The eyes of Eric on you? ASLAUG (indifferently) I am fair. Men look upon me. HERTHA You see nothing more? ASLAUG (disdainfully) What is it to me how he looks? He is My human obstacle and that is all. HERTHA No, Aslaug, there’s much more. Alone with you, Absorbed, — you see it, — suddenly you strike And strike again, swift great exultant blows. ASLAUG It is too base! HERTHA Unlulled, he could not perish. Have you not seen his large and wakeful gaze? This is our chance. Must not Swegn mount his throne? ASLAUG So that I have not to degrade myself, Arrange it as you will. You own a swift, Contriving, careful brain I cannot match. To dare, to act was always Aslaug’s part.

Act I, Scene 2 HERTHA You will not shrink? ASLAUG I sprang not from the earth To bound my actions by the common rule. I claim my kin with those whom Heaven’s gaze Moulded supreme, Swegn’s sister, Olaf’s child, Aslaug of Norway. HERTHA Then it must be done. ASLAUG Hertha, I will not know the plots you weave: But when I see your signal, I will strike. HERTHA (alone) Pride violent! loftiness intolerable! The grandiose kingdom-breaking blow is hers, The baseness, the deception are for me. It was this, the assumption, the magnificence, Made Swegn her tool. To me his lover, counsellor, Wife, worshipper, his ears were coldly deaf. But, lioness of Norway, thy loud bruit And leap gigantic are ensnared at last In my compelling toils. She must be trapped! She is the fuel for my husband’s soul To burn itself on a disastrous pyre. Remove its cause, the flame will sink to rest, — And we in Trondhjem shall live peacefully Till Eric dies, as some day die he must, In battle or by a revolting sword, And leaves the spacious world unoccupied. Then other men may feel the sun once more. Always she talks of Fate: does she not see, This man was born beneath exultant stars,

Eric Had gods to rock his cradle? He must possess His date, his strong and unresisted time When Fate herself runs on his feet. Then comes, — All things too great end soon, — death, overthrow, The slow revenges of the jealous gods. Submitting we shall save ourselves alive For a late summer when cold spring is past.