Christmas Eve in the pastor’s house. It is dark in the room. On the back wall, a door leading out; a window on one side of the stage, a door on the other. AGNES stands dressed in mourning at the window and stares out into the darkness.
AGNES: Another night. And still he’s not
returned. I’ve waited, my heart
heavy with cry upon cry.
And heavily, silently,
the snow falls. Thick and soft,
already it has roofed
and robed the old church in white.
Ah, what was that? The gate!
Footsteps, now, at the door!
Hurry, oh hurry!
[Goes to the door and opens it. BRAND enters, covered with snow, in travelling clothes, which he throws off during the following lines.]
My dear,
dear love, how long you’ve been!
O Brand, don’t ever leave me again!
I’m lonely; I can’t endure
this shadow-house when you’re
not with me. I’m so cold.
Comfort me!
BRAND lights a candle; it glimmers faintly in the room.
BRAND: My poor child,
how pale you look, so very pale
in the candlelight. Are you ill?
AGNES: No, no, not ill; but tired
and faint with watching. I feared
so much for you. Look, I’ve twined
the few evergreens I could find
as garlands for our tree.12 They seem
more like wreaths, though, for him …
for our son …
She begins to cry.
BRAND: He’s dead and buried,
Agnes. So let your tears be dried.
AGNES: Be patient with me. The hurt
I had was deep. It will smart
for a while. But pain
withers. I shall be quiet soon.
BRAND: Agnes! Agnes! Is this how
you keep Christmas – with sorrow?
AGNES: I beg you: bear with my grief.
My little son … he was all life …
and now … now …
BRAND: In his grave.
AGNES: Don’t taunt me, for the love
of God!
BRAND: It must be said.
The more you are afraid
the more you must hear
his knell, as waves toll on the shore.
AGNES: You suffer. Will you not admit
you suffer? Even now, the sweat
glistens on your forehead.
BRAND: It’s only spray from the fjord.
AGNES: That moisture on your cheek,
what will you say that is? A flake
of snow, melting? No, no, it
flows from your anguished heart.
BRAND: Agnes, my own, my wife, let us both
be steadfast, even unto death.
Out there I was a chosen man
indeed. I was God’s champion.
laboured, sea-drenched I fought.
The tiller strained in my hand
yet steadied as it strained.
Eight souls froze at the oars
like corpses on their biers.
The mast groaned, cordage clashed, flung
loose on the wind. Our seams were sprung.
The canvas blew to shreds,
whipped to leeward. The seabirds’
cries were drowned. Through darkness I saw
cliff-falls, cataracts of snow,
crash down upon the rocks.
And all this while, He who makes
storm and calm held me to His will.
Through sea-howl I heard Him call.
AGNES: How easy it is to wage war
on the elements, and to dare
all. How hard it seems to wait
as I must, so very quiet,
while life ticks by; and be at home
to all the visitings of time;
and hear the ceaseless sparrow-
flutterings of sorrow
in the eaves of the heart’s house.
I long to be of use
in the great world. I dare not
remember, cannot forget.
Know me for what I am.
BRAND: Agnes, for shame, for shame!
How can you think to scorn
your life’s work, its true crown:
my helpmate and my wife?
Listen, and I’ll reveal
strange mercies wrought from grief.
Sometimes, Agnes, my eyes fill
with tears of gratitude.
I think that I see God,
I greet Him face to face,
feel His fatherly care.
Then I desire to cast
myself on His breast,
weeping in His embrace.
AGNES: And may He always appear
so to you, Brand. Fathers forgive.
It is tyrants who rave.
BRAND: O Agnes, you must ever fear
to question Him. Never presume
to turn your face away from Him.
I am the servant of the Lord.
I am the warrior with the sword
of righteousness. Your gentle hands
shall soothe and heal my wounds.
Agnes, embrace your task!
AGNES: Everything that you ask
of me seems too heavy to bear.
I’m so weary I can scarcely hear
what you say. Thoughts ravel my mind
without beginning or end.
I gaze at my own life
almost with disbelief.
My dearest, let me grieve
and I may learn to live
and serve you, purged of sorrow
at last … I don’t know.
Brand, while you were away,
I saw my little boy
again, I saw him! He came
smiling into my room.
He looked, as once he did,
bright-eyed and rosy-cheeked.
He came towards my bed
as though to be cradled and rocked
in my arms. It made my blood run cold.
BRAND: Agnes!
AGNES: I knew that he’d turned
to ice, out there in the icy ground.
BRAND: Believe me, Agnes, our child
has been gathered to God,
he is in Paradise.
It is a corpse that lies
out there under the snow.
AGNES [shrinking away from him]:
Why do you tear and prod
at the wound, make the blood flow?
The body and the soul
go down into the soil
together. Together they rise up
out of our mortal sleep.
I cannot discriminate
like you; I cannot tell them apart.
To me they are as one,
soul, body … my son.
BRAND: Many an old wound shall
bleed to make you well.
AGNES: Stay by me in my need,
Brand; for I’ll not be led
against my will. Please try
to be gentle; speak gently.
Your voice is like a storm
when you drive a soul to choose
its own poor martyrdom.
Is there no gentler voice
that says to pain, ‘Be still,’
no song that greets the light,
no gentleness at all?
Your God, I see Him sit
just like some grim seigneur
in His stronghold. I fear
to irritate His gaze
with my weak woman’s cries.
BRAND: It seems, then, you’d prefer
the God you knew before.
AGNES: Einar’s mild God? Never!
Yet I feel as if I were drawn
by a longing for clear, pure air
where it’s drawing towards dawn.
Your visions, your new realms,
your calling, your iron will,
everything looms, overwhelms,
threatens me, like the cliff
that would bury us if it fell
or the fjord that cuts us off
from the world. Brand! Brand! Such
pain! And for what? Your little church
that crouches under the rock
like a mouse from a hawk?
BRAND [struck]:
Again, again, that thought,
like a tremor of air. What
makes you speak so? Why do you say
the church is too small?
AGNES [shaking her head sorrowfully]:
How can I
give reasons? How do I know?
How do the winds blow,
how does a scent travel
on the air? Must I unravel
everything that goes through my mind?
It is enough that I understand.
Call it instinct, if you will.
Brand, your church is too small.
BRAND: ‘The young shall see visions and the old
dream dreams.’13 What mysteries unfold,
my Agnes! Even she I met
wandering on the mountain height
in madness froze me with that call:
‘The church is hideous and small, small.’
Whether she knew of what she spoke
I cannot tell; but the womenfolk
echo her, murmuring all the time,
as though possessed of the same dream,
visionary things, things yet unknown,
strange intimations of new Zion.14
Dear angel of my destiny,
you bless and guide me on my way.
The church is small, I see it now.
It shall be built anew,
and the Lord God shall enter in
to His own temple once again.
AGNES: From this time forward, let it seem
as if a wide deserted sea
lay blank between my grief and me.
I shall decide upon a tomb
and bury the dead hopes of life;
and make each mirrored citadel
vanish as in a fairy tale.
I’ll be your consecrated wife.
BRAND: Agnes, the road leads on.
AGNES: You sound so cold and stern,
even now.
BRAND: It is God
who speaks, not I.
AGNES: You’ve said
that He is merciful
to those who faint and fall,
if they’ll but persevere.
She turns to leave.
BRAND: Agnes, must you go?
AGNES [smiling]:
It’s Christmas Eve, my dear,
and I have things to do.
Last Christmas you chided me
a little for my extravagance:
a lit candle in every sconce,
and shining glass and greenery,
the room alive with laughter’s song
and all the gifts that love could bring.
The candles shall be lit again;
we’ll deck the tree; do what we can
to keep our Christmas, and rejoice
inwardly in the silent house.
If God should stare into this room
tonight, Brand, I need feel no shame.
I’ve watched and prayed, wiped every trace
of grief, each tear smudge, from my face,
you see; all gone now! I would meet
Him with a truly chastened heart.
BRAND pulls her towards him in an embrace; then abruptly lets her go.
BRAND: Go, light the candles. There, hush!
AGNES [smiling sorrowfully]:
And let the church be built all new
and bright by the spring thaw.
Let us make that our Christmas wish!
Exit.
BRAND [gazing after her]:
Help me, O help me, God,
to spare her more agony.
It’s like watching her die
in martyrdom’s slow flame.
What else must I perform
that Your law may be satisfied,
lex talionis,15 Your hawk
that will swoop down and take
the heart out of her?
Let me be the martyr,
not her. Dear God! Haven’t I faith
and strength, and will, enough for both?
Let her devoted love suffice.
Remit, O Lord, remit the sacrifice.
There is a knock at the door. The MAYOR enters.
MAYOR: Well, here I am, d’you see,
come to eat humble pie!
Sir, I’m a beaten man,
beaten and trampled on!
BRAND: You, mayor?
I tried to send you packing.
I admit, I said at the time,
I said, there isn’t room
for both of us. I was right,
no shadow of a doubt,
no doubt at all. Yet here
I am with my white flag.
My friend, I come to beg.
There’s a new spirit abroad
in the region, praise God;
suddenly it’s everywhere,
but not mine: yours,
pastor. The war’s
over. Stop the fight.
Now, let’s shake hands on that!
BRAND: Between the two of us
the strife can never cease;
for spiritual war
is endless, must be waged
however bruised and scourged
and desolate we are.
MAYOR: Don’t try to win a fight
if it pays you to lose:
I call that compromise.
BRAND: Though you deride God’s law,
nothing can make black white!
MAYOR: My dear man, you can holler,
‘White as the driven snow,’
till you’re blue in the face.
If our wise populace
prefers snow to be black,
then black it is. Hard luck!
BRAND: And what’s your favourite colour?
MAYOR: Mine’s a nice in-between
delicate shade of grey.
I’ve told you, I’m humane.
I meet people halfway.
against opinion.
I let the crowd decide,
run with the multitude.
You’re the crowd’s candidate,
it seems; so here’s my vote.
I’ve had to shelve my plans
for new ditches and drains,
for new jetties and roads,
and Lord knows what besides.
Still, if that’s the game,
I’ll play it. ‘Bide your time,’
I tell myself, ‘and smile.
Hang on to fortune’s wheel
like the grim death. Your turn
always comes round again.’
BRAND: There speaks the ‘public spirit’
in essence, mayor. It
seems, then, that greed, if shrewd,
can pass as zeal-for-good.
MAYOR: That’s not how it is at all!
I’ve lived a life of real
self-sacrificing labour,
a man who’s served his neighbour
more than he’s served himself.
I spit on this world’s pelf.
But surely, surely, it’s fair,
isn’t it, minister,
that honesty and good sense
should gain some recompense?
When all’s been said you can’t
let your own kith and kin
go hungry. I’ve got daughters.
I must think of their futures.
You know what that can mean.
Chewing on the ideal
won’t get you a square meal
and it won’t pay the rent.
doesn’t know what life is!
BRAND: What will you do now?
MAYOR: Build.
BRAND: Did you say build?
MAYOR: I did.
I’ll serve the nation’s need
as I served it of old.
I’ll dazzle people’s eyes
with some great enterprise.
I’ll be cock of the roost,
I’ll strut upon my post.
By God, you’ll hear me crow
pro bono publico!16
My new election cry
is ‘Banish poverty!’
BRAND: And how will you do that?
MAYOR: I’ve given it some thought.
Well, come on, use your wits!
What am I planning? It’s
my ‘hygienic edifice’,
and cheap at the price!
A workhouse and a gaol
under the same roof;
perfectly clean and safe
and economical.
Then, having made a start,
I’ll add an extra wing
built to accommodate
wassail, that sort of thing,
banquets and lantern-slide
lectures, what you will:
the Patriots’ Pledge hall.
BRAND: There may be some need
for the things you name –
but there is one thing more,
with a far higher claim.
MAYOR: A madhouse, to be sure!
BRAND: Well, if you need to house
your madmen, why not use
the Patriots’ Pledge hall?
It would be suitable.
MAYOR [delighted]:
The Patriots’ Pledge hall
a madhouse all the time –
O pastor, what a scheme!
How could it ever fail?
We’ll soon have crime and sin
and madness all crammed in;
then we’ll cram in the poor
and lock and bolt the door.
BRAND: You’ve come begging, you said.
MAYOR: I think that puts the case
fairly enough. Indeed,
cash for a worthy cause
seems very hard to find.
A well-placed word or two
from ‘t’People’s’ Pastor Brand
would turn the tide. You know
I shan’t forget a friend.
BRAND: I know I’m being bribed.
MAYOR: Couldn’t it be described
as the best way of healing
old wounds, and that sad breach
between us, from which each
of us, I know, has suffered,
since we’re both men of feeling.
BRAND: Suffered, did you say?
MAYOR: Of course, of course, the boy …
I trust that you’ll accept
condolences as offered.
You seemed, though, so imbued
with Christian fortitude
I took it that the worst
excess of grief had passed.
BRAND: You’ve hoped and schemed in vain.
I also plan to build.
MAYOR: To steal my master plan –
well, I must say, that’s bold!
BRAND: You say so? Look out there –
[Points out of the window.]
no, there; what do you see?
MAYOR: Not much, if you ask me!
That old barn on the tilt?
Look, I don’t understand …
BRAND: The church. Mayor, I intend
the church shall be rebuilt
on a grander scale.
MAYOR: I’m master builder here.
Just leave things as they are,
I’ll make it worth your while.
Why pull the old place down?
BRAND: I have said: it is small.
MAYOR: Small? But I’ve never seen
it more than half-full.
BRAND: There’s no space, no air,
for the spirit to soar!
MAYOR [aside]:
If he goes on like this,
he’ll need the services
of the madhouse himself.
[Aloud]
Pastor, take my advice,
leave the church to the mice,
I beg you, on behalf
of the whole neighbourhood.
I rise to the defence
of our inheritance.
An architectural gem
destroyed for a mere whim?
No, it can’t be allowed!
BRAND: I’ll build God’s house with my
every last farthing-bit
out of my legacy.
MAYOR: Well! I’m thunderstruck!
I can’t believe our luck,
I can’t, truly, I can’t!
Riches without stint,
a great gold, glittering stream –
tell me it’s not a dream!
BRAND: I made up my mind,
long ago, to renounce
that cursed inheritance.
MAYOR: I’m with you heart and soul,
I’m filled with purest zeal.
How’s that for a surprise?
Onward then! Hand in hand!
Together, to the end.
Here’s to our enterprise!
I dare to think that fate
has brought me here tonight.
I even dare to think
that you have me to thank
and that your miracle
is mine after all.
BRAND: Destroy that ‘hallowed fane’
out there? Why, it’s a shrine!
MAYOR: H’m, that’s as may be.
I must say, viewed from here
now that the moon’s so bright,
it’s exceedingly shabby.
The weathercock and the spire,
they’re in a dreadful state!
And the roof and the walls,
ugly beyond belief,
a mere hotchpotch of styles.
Is that moss on the roof?
BRAND: And if the populace
cried out, as with one voice,
‘Leave the old church alone!’,
MAYOR: I’ll show you what I’d do.
I know a trick or two
for rousing the nation.
I’ll canvass, agitate,
start a petition.
If that doesn’t succeed
in whipping up the crowd,
I’ll tear the place apart
myself; and I’ll be brisk
about it, even if
I have to set my wife
and daughters to the task
of demolition.
BRAND: Well, mayor, you’ve changed your tune,
slightly, since we began!
MAYOR: A liberal education
rids one of prejudice.
Good heavens, how time flies!
I must be on my way,
I must indeed. Goodbye,
Pastor, goodbye.
[Takes his hat.]
I’m
hot in pursuit of crime.
BRAND: What crime?
MAYOR: Early today
right on the parish bounds,
a gypsy tribe – such fiends
they are! I took the lot.
What do you think of that?
They’re all snugly tied up
and under lock and key.
Well, not all. Two or three
managed to escape.
BRAND: And this is the season
MAYOR: All the more reason
to clap them in gaol;
they bring trouble and strife.
And yet, they’ve cause enough.
In an odd sort of way
they belong to the parish;
to you, even; though ‘Perish
the thought,’ I hear you say.
Look here, do you like
riddles? Here’s a joke.
Decipher this rune:
Not of your kith nor kin
but of your origin.
Why were we born?
BRAND: Where is the answer?
MAYOR: Not too hard,
surely? You must have heard
many and many a time,
about that lad who came
from yonder, from the West;
as clever as a priest
or four priests put together.
This lad loved your mother.
She’d property of her own,
a few acres of stone,
wouldn’t be wooed nor wed,
not she. Showed him the door,
she did. And that put paid
to his hopes. He went half
out of his mind with grief,
half out of his mind.
But there it is. In the end
he took another lass,
a gypsy she was,
and fathered a whole brood
out of her gypsy blood.
Those imps of sin and shame,
Oh yes, we pay the fine
for his fine goings-on.
Why, one of his brats
even gets clothed and fed
out of the parish rates!
BRAND: Of course …
MAYOR: That troll-wench, Gerd.
BRAND: Now I begin to see …
MAYOR: A right riddle-me-ree.
Who’d believe it? A lad
goes silly in the head
because of your mother,
how many years ago?
Now here you are. And I’ve
to waste all Christmas Eve
chasing his sons and daughters
for miles across the snow
in this foul weather.
BRAND: But whips and fetters …!
MAYOR: Pastor, don’t waste your time.
They’re sunk in sin and crime.
Shove them behind bars.
Let charity go shares
with Satan in this world.
Keep Old Nick from the cold.
BRAND: Surely you had a plan
to house the destitute?
MAYOR: My plan has been withdrawn
in favour of your own.
BRAND: If you had my support …
MAYOR [smiling]:
Well, you have changed your tune!
[Pats his shoulder.]
What’s done can’t be undone.
Life has its rewards.
And now I must be off.
Merry Christmas. Regards
Exit.
BRAND [a brooding silence; then]:
Atonement without end,
guilt with guilt intertwined,
deadly contagion
of sin breeding with sin;
deed issuing from deed
hideously inbred.
Right ceasing to be right
even as one stares at it!
[Goes to the window and looks out for a long while.]
The innocent must atone.
Therefore God took my son.
And the hurt soul of Gerd
pays for my mother’s greed.
And it was Gerd’s voice
that drove me to my choice.
Each generation
of us hunted down
by that just God, who is
terrible to praise.
The sacrificial will
is what redeems man’s soul!
Even in those darkest days
when grief and dread possessed
me; and I saw that our child slept
too deeply ever to be kissed
awake; even then my prayers
never ceased. Even then,
amid all that pain,
I was held, still and rapt,
as though by some serene
music, steadily drawing near,
carried upon the air.
But was I then restored?
Did I speak with God?
on this grief-stricken house?
The ‘efficacy of prayer’ –
what does that mean:
that prayer is a talisman
fingered by rich and poor,
a superstitious fear
that goes justly unheard,
an indiscriminate
battering at the gate
of the silent Word?
O Agnes, it’s so dark!
AGNES opens the door and enters with the lighted candles in festive holders; a clear radiance suffuses the room.
AGNES: The Christmas candles, look!
BRAND: Ah! How the candles gleam!
AGNES: Have I been long?
BRAND: No, no.
AGNES: It’s like ice in this room.
You must be frozen, too.
BRAND: No.
AGNES: Why are you too proud
to show me that you need
comfort? Why, my dear?
She puts wood in the stove.
BRAND: Too proud?
He walks up and down.
AGNES [softly to herself as she decorates the room]:
The candles here,
so. He sat in his chair
and laughed, and tried to touch,
and said it was the sun.
The sun! He was such
a happy little boy.
[Moves a candlestick slightly.]
And a whole year has gone;
and the candle shines clear
And he can see us
if he chooses to come
and gaze in, quietly,
at the still candle-flame.
But now the window blurs
with breath-mist, like tears.
She wipes the window.
BRAND [slowly, following her with his eyes]:
When will the sea of grief
subside and let her rest?
AGNES [to herself]:
How clear it is; as if
this room had opened out;
as if the earth were not
iron-hard and icy cold
but soft, warm as a nest
where our sleeping child
can lie snug and secure.
BRAND: What are you doing there?
AGNES: Why, a dream; it was
a dream.
BRAND: Snares are laid
cruelly, in dreams, Agnes.
Close the shutters.
AGNES: Brand,
I beg you, don’t be hard.
BRAND: Close them.
AGNES: There. It’s done.
[Pulls the shutters to.]
My dreams will never offend
God, of that I’m sure.
He’ll not grudge me a mere
blessing in desolation.
BRAND: Grudge? Of course He’ll not grudge!
He’s a lenient judge
if you bow down to Him
and if you grease His palm,
a little, on the sly.
AGNES [bursting into tears]:
How much … oh how much more
will you make me endure?
BRAND: I have said: if you give
less than everything,
you may as well fling
your gift into the sea.
AGNES: All that I had, I gave.
There’s nothing left of me.
BRAND: I have said: there’s no end
to what God can demand
of us.
AGNES: I’m destitute,
so I’ve nothing to fear.
BRAND: Every sinful desire,
each longing, each regret …
AGNES: You’ve forgotten my heart’s root!
Sacrifice that as well!
Rip that out! Rip it out!
BRAND: And if you grieve at all,
if you begrudge your loss,
then God will refuse
everything you have given.
AGNES [shuddering]:
Is this your way to heaven?
It’s hard and desolate.
BRAND: Steep, narrow and straight;
and the will is able!
AGNES: But Mercy’s path …?
BRAND: Is hewn
from sacrificial stone.
AGNES [staring in front of her, shaken]:
Now I know what the Bible
means; now I can fathom,
as never before, those grim
words.
AGNES: ‘He who sees
Jehovah’s face, dies.’
BRAND [throwing his arms around her and pressing her close]:
Hide your eyes!
AGNES: Hide me!
BRAND [letting her go]:
No.
AGNES: You are in torment too.
BRAND: I love you.
AGNES: Your love is hard.
BRAND: Too hard?
AGNES: Don’t ask me that.
I follow where you lead.
BRAND: You think I drew you out
of Einar’s trivial dance
unthinkingly, or by chance?
Or that for nothing
I broke every plaything?
Or that for less than all
I bound you to obey
the unconditional
demand for sacrifice?
Woe befall us, I say,
if ever that were so!
Agnes, you were called
by God to be my wife.
And I dare to demand
your all, even your life.
AGNES: I am yours; I am bound.
Ask of me what you will,
but don’t, don’t go away.
BRAND: My dear one, I must.
I must find rest and peace.
And soon I shall build
my great church.
AGNES: My little
church crumbled to dust.
must be so destroyed!
[Embraces her as if in agony.]
Peace be with you, for then
peace is with me and mine.
AGNES: May I move the shutter aside,
just a little? Let me, Brand, let me.
BRAND [in the doorway]:
No.
He goes into his room.
AGNES: Shut out, everything shut
away. Where is my hope of Heaven?
I cannot seek oblivion;
or touch his hand and weep;
or rend my body to escape
from breathing this fierce air.
There’s no release from fear,
the solitude that we call God.
[Listens at BRAND’s door.]
His voice moves on; so loud
he cannot hear, and never will.
High above grief the lords of Yule
bring tidings to another world
than mine. Even the Holy Child
has turned away. He smiles on those
with the most cause to sing His praise,
fortune’s good children, who enjoy
His love like any longed-for toy.
[Approaches the window cautiously.]
But if I disobeyed
Brand, if I opened wide
the shutters, all this light,
flooding the darkness, might
comfort my little son
out there under the stone.
No, no, he’s not dead.
Tonight the child is freed,
for this is the Child’s feast.
What if I now do wrong?
O little one, take wing!
This house of ours is sealed
against you, my own child.
Your father turned the lock
against you. Love, go back,
go back to Heaven and play.
I dare not disobey
Brand. Say that you saw
your father’s sorrow –
how can you understand,
my darling? Let’s pretend
it was his grief that made
this wreath out of leaves,
so pretty! Tell them, ‘He grieves.’
[Listens, considers and shakes her head.]
No! You are locked outside,
my dear, by stronger powers
than doors or shutter bars.
Fierce spiritual flame
is needed to consume
their strength, make the vaults crack
open, the barriers break,
and the great prison door
swing loose upon the air.
I must purge the whole world
with my own sacrifice, child,
before I see you again.
And I shall become stone
myself, struggling to fill
the bottomless pit
of Brand’s Absolute.
There’s still a little time,
though; time for festival;
and though it’s far removed
from Christmas as it was,
I’ll be glad of what is,
the treasures that I saved
from the wreck of my life’s good,
all of them, all of them!
She kneels down by the chest of drawers, opens a drawer and takes out various things. At the same moment BRAND opens the door and is about to speak to her but when he sees what she is doing he stops and remains standing there. AGNES does not see him.
BRAND [softly]:
This hovering over the grave,
this playing in the garden of the dead!
AGNES: Here are the robe and shawl
he wore to his christening;
and here’s a bundle full
of baby things. Dear heaven,
every pretty thing
he was ever given!
Oh, and I dressed him
in these mittens and scarf,
and this little coat,
to keep him warm and safe
when he went out
in spring for the first time.
And the things I prepared
all ready for the road,
that journey of his life
which was never begun.
And when I took them off
him, and put them away,
I felt so utterly
weary and full of pain.
BRAND [clenching his hands in pain]:
O God, spare me this!
How can I condemn
these last idolatries
of hers? She clings to them.
AGNES: Tear stains, here and here …
relic. I see the halo
of inescapable choice
shine now, terribly clear.
This robe of sacrifice
was his and is mine.
I am a rich woman.
There is a sharp knock on the house door. AGNES turns round with a cry and, in doing so, sees BRAND. The door is flung open, and a GYPSY WOMAN, in ragged clothes, comes in with a child in her arms.
GYPSY WOMAN: Share them with me, you rich lady!
AGNES: But you are richer than I.
GYPSY WOMAN: Mouthfuls of pretty words.
Rich folk, you’re all the same.
Show us some good deeds!
BRAND: Tell me, why have you come?
GYPSY WOMAN: Tell you? Not I! Talk to a pastor?
I’d as lief walk the storm again
as hear your ranting about sin,
and how us curs’d folk have no rest here.
I’d as lief run until I die
or leave my bones out on the skerry
as look you in the eye, you black
priest full of hell-fire talk!
BRAND [softly]:
That voice, that face … the woman
stands there like an omen,
like a visitor from the dead.
AGNES: Rest, rest. If you are cold,
come to the fire. If the child
is hungry, he shall be fed.
GYPSY WOMAN: Can’t stay, lady; can’t rest.
House and home, they’re for the likes
of you, not for us gypsies’ sakes.
Folk long since turned us out-o’-door
for a bit lodging on the moor
or in the woods, as best we can,
bedded on rock and the rough whin.
We come and go, and we go fast,
wi’ lawyer-men, just like dogs,
howling and snapping at our legs.
Won’t let us rest, yon lawyer-men,
clinking up close wi’ whip and chain.
BRAND: Be quiet, woman. Here, you’re safe.
GYPSY WOMAN: Safe? Here? Crammed in wi’ walls and roof?
Nay, master, nay; we’re better far
to wander through the bitter air.
But gi’e us something for the brat.
His own brother stole the clout
o’ rags that he was swaddled in.
Look, lady, look, his naked skin
all white wi’ frost and blue wi’ cold!
BRAND: Woman, I beg you, set this child
free from the path of death-in-life.
He shall be cherished; every stain
of blood and guilt shall be washed off.
GYPSY WOMAN: Why, it was you folk cast him out,
it was, and now I curse you for it.
Where do you think, then, he was born?
Not in a bed! His mother took
bad at the bottom of a syke.
Christened he was, wi’ a dab o’ slush
and a charcoal stick out of the ash;
a swig o’ gin his comforter.
And when we lugged him out of her,
who cursed him and his puny whine?
His fathers – ay, he’d more than one?
BRAND: Agnes?
AGNES: Yes.
BRAND: What must you do?
AGNES: Give them to her? O Brand! No!
GYPSY WOMAN: Oh yes, rich lady, all you have!
Ragged sark or silken weave,
nowt’s too rotten or too good
if I can wrap it round his hide.
Like as not he’ll soon be dead.
At least he’ll die wi’ his limbs thawed.
BRAND: The choice, Agnes! Hear the call,
harsh and inescapable!
GYPSY WOMAN: You’ve plenty. You could dress your bairn
ten times over. Look at mine!
Spare us a shroud, for pity’s sake!
BRAND: The demand, Agnes! Hear it speak,
absolute and imperative!
GYPSY WOMAN: Gi’e us that, lady, gi’e us that!
AGNES: Don’t you dare, gypsy! Desecrate,
would you, my babe, my love,
and all these pretty things?
BRAND: Hush, child.
He’s dead. I say: he died in vain
if you lose faith. Then the road leads
nowhere but to the threshold
of the grave.
AGNES [brokenly]:
Thy will be done.
With my last strength I’ll tear out
my heart, trample it underfoot.
Share, then! Put my ‘superfluous
riches’ to some better use.
GYPSY WOMAN: Give it here! Give it here!
BRAND: Agnes, did you say ‘share’?
AGNES: Yes. I beg you, let me be killed
now, and not be made to yield
any more. Give her what she needs,
half, even. Let me keep the rest.
BRAND: Then half would have sufficed,
would it not, for your own son?
AGNES: Here, gypsy, take the christening-
robe, and the scarf, and the silken
bonnet; take everything
that will keep out the cold.
GYPSY WOMAN: Gi’e us, then.
that’s all?
AGNES: Here’s the shirt he wore
on the day he died. I called
it his robe of martyrdom.
GYPSY WOMAN: It’ll do. Is that the lot,
lady? Right, then; I’ll flit –
after I’ve seen to him.
Exit.
AGNES: Demand on top of demand –
is it reasonable, Brand?
BRAND: Did you give with heart and soul,
without bitterness at all?
AGNES: No!
BRAND: No? Then you have flung away
your gifts, and you are still not free.
He prepares to leave.
AGNES: Brand!
BRAND: Yes?
AGNES: Oh, Brand, I lied!
Forgive me, for I hid
the last, my very last
relic. Hadn’t you guessed?
BRAND: Well?
AGNES [taking a folded child’s cap from her bosom]:
Look, one thing remains.
BRAND: His cap?
AGNES: Marked with the stains
of my tears, and his cold fever sweat;
and kept close-hidden at my heart!
BRAND: Worship your idols, then.
He prepares to leave.
AGNES: No, wait!
BRAND: For what?
AGNES: You know for what.
She holds out the cap.
BRAND [coming towards her without taking it]:
AGNES: Without regret!
BRAND: Very well, then. His cap,
give it to me. The woman
is still there, sitting on the step.
Exit.
AGNES: Everything’s gone now, everything’s lost.
[AGNES stands for some moments completely still; gradually the expression on her face is transformed into pure radiant joy. BRAND returns; she goes exultantly to meet him, throws her arms around his neck and cries out.]
O Brand, O Brand, at last I’m free
of everything that drew me to the dust!
BRAND: Agnes!
AGNES: The darkness has gone,
and the ghosts, and the nightmares,
the leaden fears that weighed me down.
And I know that victory
is certain, if the will endures.
The mists have all dispersed
and all the clouds have passed
away; and at the end of night
I see the first faint rosy light
of dawn. And I’ll not be afraid,
or hurt, or weep to hear the word
‘death’, or the sound of my child’s name.
I know that heaven is his home.
I have overcome grief,
and even the grave itself
yields, and our little Alf
shines in his immortality,
his face radiant with joy
just as it was in life.
If my strength were a thousandfold,
if my voice were like that
of a great choir, if I could
be heard in Heaven, I’d not
plead, now, for his return.
how infinite His resource
in making His ways known
to men. Through the sacrifice
of my child, through the command
‘Atone, and again, atone!’,
my soul has been restored.
God gives, takes back, His own.
I was purged by ordeal,
You guided my hand,
you battled for my soul,
though your grim silent heart
cried out even as you fought.
Now it is you who stand
in the valley of the choice,
you who must bear the cross,
the terrible birthing
of all or nothing.
BRAND: You speak in riddles, Agnes. It
is finished, all that agony.
AGNES: Beloved, you forget:
‘Whoever looks on God shall die.’17
BRAND [shrinking back]:
Dearest! What terrors wake
in my heart when you speak
like that! Be strong!
I could let all things go,
every earthly good; everything,
everything but you!
AGNES: Choose. You stand where the roads cross.
Quench this light new-lit in me,
choke the springs of divine grace,
allow me my idolatry.
The gypsy woman, call her back,
give me back the things she took.
Let me clutch them, weak and craven,
blindly ignorant of heaven.
Clip the wing-feathers of my soul,
with the constraints of each bleak day,
and then I’ll be as I once was,
a prisoner of mortality.
Choose. You stand where the roads cross.
BRAND: All would be lost if I
weakened, if I chose the way
you point to … but … far from this place,
beyond the memories
of all this bitter grief,
my Agnes, we shall find that life
and light are one.
AGNES: But you are bound,
by your own choice and His demand.
You must remain; must be the guide
of many souls in their great need.
Choose. You stand where the roads cross.
BRAND: No choice … I have no choice.
AGNES [throwing her arms round his neck]:
I give you thanks for all I have,
and for your own dear love
to me, poor, weary, stumbling one.
My eyes are heavy, and the mist
gathers, and I must rest.
BRAND: Beloved, sleep. Your work is done.
AGNES: Yes, the day labour, the soul’s fight,
are finished. Now the night-
candle shall burn with steady flame
as my thoughts rest on Him
from whom we came.
Exit.
BRAND [clenching his hands against his breast]:
Be steadfast, O my soul,
For in the loss of all
This world’s good lies our gain.
We, at the end, are blest
And all that we have lost
Is ours for evermore. Amen.