Scene 4

The stage is now bare except for Mestra and Solones. They turn lower their masks.

S: Mestra my darling? (cautiously )

M: (with enthusiasm ) Solones, here!

Father’s in town - -there’s nothing to fear.

S: You know when I come here I must always be wary,

M: But, Solones, listen: Papa’s letting us marry!

S: He’s letting us marry? Well, that’s a new tune!

When did he tell you?

M: This past afternoon!

S: He knows about us?

M: Well, I haven’t quite told him.

S: So what did you say then?

M: Just a little to hold him,

I said nothing I thought might arouse his suspicion

It’s better that way – Trust my intuition.

But he promised to build a new palace for us.

Isn’t it wonderful? (pause )

S: (pause, then, hesitantly, ) No.

M: Why the fuss?

S: It’s just that I heard an odd rumor in town

That your father has ordered our groves be cut down.

M: Our groves? Cere’s grove? Where we first met? (S. nodes and um-hmps agreement )

But they can’t!

S: Well, they’re going to.

M; We can’t stand by and let

Them destroy it! All those trees are so ancient!

S: They’re cutting tomorrow, your father’s impatient.

M: Perhaps we could stop them!

S: I don’t see quite how!

M: We must think of a way!

S: Well, there’s not much time now.

S: You could speak to your father-

M: No I can’t! I don’t dare!

I could never oppose him. He might think I don’t care,

That I don’t like his gifts, that I don’t want his love.

S: But we can’t simply let him just butcher the grove.

That leaves only one option, and it won’t involve you:

I’ll go myself.

M: But what will you do?

S: Your father’s no fool, he will listen to reason,

I will try to persuade him not to cut down the wood.

Perhaps I can only delay him a season,

But then, maybe he’ll give up the project for good.

I’ll go up there tomorrow, I’ll go straight to the grove

Engaging your father with some reas’nable words.

I’m sure it won’t be very hard just to prove

That the forest has value to more than some birds.

You’ve become such a part of that place now to me,

Like the nightengale singing her songs to us there.

Perched high in the limbs of an ancient oak tree,

With her beautiful voice floating sweet through the air

Remember when we’d meet up there

Within the sacred grove?

Our eyes and hearts met joyously

Entwined in raptur’ous love.

M: And nightingale would fill the air

Singing sweetly from her nest

When beneath the mighty oak we kissed

And our love was there by blessed.

S: The bird and tree have now become

Two symbols of our life

The tree is to the nightingale

As husband is to wife

For like the tree I wait for you

My branches open wide

In hopes that you, my nightingale,

Will join me at my side.

M and S: We sing praises to the nightingale

We give thanks unto the tree

That the two of us shall soon be wed:

Wife and husband we shall be. (They kiss and exit, leaving the stage barren. )