HERZEN Oh—thank you! Thank you! And what was your life before I took you from it in the clothes you stood up in?
NATALIE It was wretched. You’re right. I gave it to you joyfully, it belongs to you to do what you want with, so kill me all at once and not little by little!
Natalie collapses sobbing. Herzen sits next to her and takes her hands, his fury spent.
HERZEN And you forgot to bring your hat. (He gives way to tears, embracing her.) Forgive me, too—forgive everything I said. They are not things I believe. I have lost something I hardly gave a thought to. My existence. My purchase on my life.
Emma enters.
EMMA George wants you to kill him.
Herzen laughs.
HERZEN Can’t he ask me himself?
EMMA This is a calamity for both of us, but compare your behaviour with mine. Let Natalie go away with him.
HERZEN Of course! If she wants to.
Emma goes to Natalie and kneels by her.
EMMA Save him.
NATALIE I can’t. What strength I have, I need for Alexander. I will go wherever he goes.
HERZEN It’s him who’s going. (to Emma) I’ll pay your fares to Genoa provided you leave in the morning.
Emma gets up.
EMMA We can’t leave. There are tradesmen’s accounts we have to settle.
HERZEN It will be my pleasure.
Emma runs back to Natalie and flings herself down in desperation.
EMMA If you won’t go with George, ask him to take me when he goes!—Ask him not to abandon me!
HERZEN You’re asking my wife to plead for you …?
EMMA Will you?
Natalie nods. Emma gets up to go.
EMMA (cont.) (to Herzen) Egoist!
HERZEN But you’ve made yourself a slave, and this is where it’s got you.
Emma leaves.
HERZEN (cont.) Of course I’m an egoist! How strange people are!—taking pride in humility … in servitude to others … and the whole system of duties designed by authority to keep us quiet and as little different from each other as possible … Why should we damp down everything in us which is our uniqueness, the salt of our personality … the tiny furnace which needs to be constantly fed with selfesteem to keep us warm and vital and, yes, of use to our brothers and neighbours? Egoism isn’t an acquired vice. It’s not an acquired virtue either. It’s just part of what comes with being human, to keep us free, to create our own destiny, and our values. It’s not the enemy of love! It’s what love feeds on. That’s why without you I’d be destroyed.
Herzen’s self-assurance collapses. Natalie comforts him. She is altered back, and speaks as one who is dry-eyed.
NATALIE No … no … You wouldn’t be destroyed, Alexander. I’m only a little part of your … your sense of worth. I can’t give it back to you. But it’s not lost between us. It passes to me. I’ll never leave you. But think what I have lost, too … the ideal of a love which is greater the more it includes, instead of more hurtful, squalid and ridiculous.
Rocca is heard—and then seen—singing. He is laying the table and making the verandah festive.
NOVEMBER 1851
Herzen is working on the verandah. Rocca, singing, is making the verandah and dining table festive, helped by a Maid. Rocca leaves and returns.
ROCCA Principe!
Rocca admits a man who is the Russian Consul. The CONSUL bows. Rocca leaves.
CONSUL Leonty Vasilevich Ibayev. I am addressing Alexander Ivanovich Herzen, of course.
HERZEN You are.
CONSUL I am the Russian Consul in Nice.
HERZEN Good heavens.
CONSUL I have a communication to make to you.
HERZEN From whom?
CONSUL From Count Orlov.
HERZEN Ah. Last time it was good news. Please sit down.
CONSUL Thank you.
The Consul sits down and takes a document from his pocket. He reads it out.
CONSUL (cont) ‘Adjutant-General Count Orlov has notified Count Nesselrode, Minister of Foreign Affairs, that—(He rises to his feet, inclining his head.)—His Imperial Majesty—(He sits again.)—has been graciously pleased to order that Alexander Ivanovich Herzen shall return to Russia at once—of which he is to be informed, accepting from him no reasons for delay and granting him no postponement under any circumstances.’ (He folds the document and puts it in his pocket.) What am I to answer?
HERZEN That I’m not going.
CONSUL How do you mean, ‘not going’?
HERZEN Just that. Not going. Remaining. Staying put.
CONSUL You don’t understand. His Imperial—(He stands, bows his head and sits.)—Majesty is ordering you …
HERZEN Yes, and I’m not going.
CONSUL You mean you are humbly requesting a delay in the execution of the will of His Imperial—
HERZEN No, no, I can’t make myself any clearer. I’m not asking for a delay. I’m not going at any time.
CONSUL An indefinite delay, you mean? You are ill, perhaps, too ill to travel. There would be precedents for that.
HERZEN One of us is mad. I’m in excellent health, especially mental health, so it must be you. Do you really think I would hold out my wrists for the handcuffs on the say-so of His Imperial—sit down, for God’s sake!
CONSUL But what am I to do? Look on it from my position. If I were to be the intermediary for an act of disobedience to the will of His Imp—(He starts to rise but checks himself.)—Majesty, it would call attention to my name in a most unfavourable context. It might even look as if I’m giving myself airs … being privy to something so inimicable to His Majesty’s dignity, so incommensurable with the vastness of his anger, before which nations tremble.
HERZEN (amused now) I see what you mean.
CONSUL Thank you.
HERZEN But it would be Count Orlov to whom you’d be giving the bad news.
CONSUL It’s the same thing. Count Orlov would never forget my name.
HERZEN But you’re only the messenger.
CONSUL There’s a streak of the Cleopatra in him.
HERZEN We’d better have a drink. Rocca! Vino.
Rocca interrupts an aria to serve the wine.
HERZEN (cont.) Why don’t I write personally to Count Orlov? Then you wouldn’t know what I’ve said.
CONSUL Would you do that? I’d be immensely grateful.
Herzen starts writing. The wine is served.
CONSUL (cont.) Are you having a celebration?