MCBETH
ACT ONE
SCENE ONE (An alley. It is storming. Enter three women.)
WOMAN 1: When should we all meet again?
In thunder, lightning, or in rain?
WOMAN 2: When all the turmoil is done,
When the battle’s lost and won.
WOMAN 3: That is before the setting sun.
WOMAN 1: At what place?
WOMAN 2: Off of the street.
WOMAN 3: There we’ll meet with McBeth.
(The sounds of a cat and toad are heard)
WOMAN 1: Coming, gray kitten.
WOMAN 2: My toad calls.
WOMAN 3: Come on!
ALL: Fair is foul, and foul is fair.
Hover through the smog and filthy air.
(They vanish)
SCENE TWO (A corporate boardroom.
From the looks of his fright, the takeover’s
Latest update.
MALCOLM: He’s a manager
Who, like a good company man, battled
Against the takeover. Hello, friend.
Tell the chairman your knowledge of the brawl,
The way you left it.
MANAGER: Well, the whole thing stood,
Like two tired swimmers who cling to each other
And drown themselves. The relentless McDonald
(Worthy to be a usurper—because
The multiplying villainies of nature
Swarm all over him) from the western miles
Of banks and attorneys’ firms was supplied,
And fortune, on his damned takeover try,
Showed like a rebel’s whore. It was too weak,
‘Cause brave McBeth (he sure deserves the name),
Disdaining fortune, took a brand-new pen,
Which smoked with legal extensions,
Like valor’s servants,
Wrote out a passage, then he faced the knave;
Never shook hands, or said goodbye to him,
But he took him apart from top to bottom
And crushed his name under our letterhead.
MANAGER: From where the sun starts a reflection,
Shipwrecking storms and dreadful thunders break;
So from the place where comfort seemed to come,
Discomfort grows. Note, King of Wall Street, note:
No sooner than the law’s injunctions had
Compelled their attorneys to turn their heels,
Then the Northwestern Bank, seeing advantage,
With accountants and new law firms again,
Began a fresh assault.
Our board members McBeth and Banquo?
MANAGER: Yes,
Like sparrows eagles, or a hare the lion.
If I speak true, I must report they were
Like two men overburdened on their backs.
So they
Greatly increased attacks upon the foe.
Whether they meant to wade in sinking bonds,
Or memorize another Black Friday,
I cannot tell—
God, I feel faint; my nerves, they cry for help.
They smack of loyalty. –Go, get him a drink.
(Exit Manager with another; Ross is entering.)
Who comes here?
MALCOLM: The worthy Mister Ross.
When you speak of things strange.
(Ross has entered)
ROSS: God save you sir!
ROSS: Wall Street, Chairman;
Where the Northwestern banners mock the sky
And make our people cold.
The bank itself, with terrible numbers,
Assisted by our disloyal board member,
The vice-president, began a dismal conflict;
Until the god of commerce, through McBeth,
Confronted them with equal courage then,
Point against point, renegade man against man,
Curbing insolent spirits—so, to conclude,
The victory went to us.
ROSS: So now
The bank’s main director wants a settlement.
We did not let him bury all of his plan
‘Til he disbursed, at our headquarters,
Ten thousand dollars for our general use.
Our business interests. Announce his corporate death,
And with his former title greet McBeth.
ROSS: I’ll see it done.
SCENE THREE (
WOMAN 1: Where have you been, sister?
WOMAN 2: Killing swine.
WOMAN 3: How about you?
WOMAN 1: A sailor’s wife had beer nuts in her lap,
And munched, & munched, & munched: Give me, said I:
Get lost, you bitch! the fat-assed creature cries.
Her
husband’s gone to
But in a sieve I’ll go by sail,
And, like a rat without a tail,
I’ll do, I’ll do, and I’ll do.
WOMAN 2: I’ll give you a wind.
WOMAN 1: You are kind.
WOMAN 3: And I another.
WOMAN 1: I myself have all the others,
And the ports from which they blow—
The four quarters that they know
On the sailor’s chart.
I’ll drain him dry as hay:
He’ll get no rest night or day
Upon his sleep eyelids.
An uncursed life I’ll forbid.
Weary he will feel all the time;
He will dwindle, starve, and pine.
And his ship cannot be lost,
But it will be tempest-tossed.
Look what I have.
WOMAN 2: Show me, show me.
WOMAN 1: Here I have a captain’s thumb,
Wrecked, as homeward he did come.
(The sound of a drum is heard)
WOMAN 3: A drum, a drum!
McBeth has come.
ALL: The weird women, hand in hand,
Travelers of sea and land,
They do go about, about:
Three of yours, and three of mine,
And three again, to make up nine—
Peace!—the charm’s wound up.
(Enter McBeth and Banquo)
MCBETH: So foul and fair a day I’ve never seen.
BANQUO: How far is it to Wall Street? Who are these,
So withered, and so wild in their clothing,
Who don’t look like inhabitants of earth,
But are on it?—Alive? or are you such
That men may question? You seem to understand me,
By the way you lay your crooked fingers
Upon your skinny lips. You seem like women
And yet your looks will not let me interpret
That you are so.
MCBETH: Speak, if you can—who are you?
WOMAN 1: All hail, McBeth! Hail to you, board member!
WOMAN 2: All hail, McBeth! Hail to you, vice-president!
WOMAN 3: All hail, McBeth! You’ll be chairman soon after.
BANQUO: McBeth, why do you start; and seem to fear
Things that sound so damn fair? —Tell me the truth,
Are you imaginary, or indeed
What outwardly you show? My business partner
You greet with such good news and great predictions
Of power positions and wealthy hopes
That he seems enraptured. You don’t speak to me.
If you can look into the seeds of time,
And know which grain will grow, and which will not,
Then speak to me, who will not beg, or fear
Your favors, or your hate.
WOMAN 1: Hail!
WOMAN 2: Hail!
WOMAN 3: Hail!
WOMAN 1: Lesser than McBeth, and greater.
WOMAN 2: Not so happy, yet much happier.
WOMAN 3: You shall have heirs, though you’re not one:
So all hail, McBeth and Banquo!
WOMAN 1: Banquo and McBeth, all hail!
MCBETH: Stay, you incomplete speakers, tell me more.
By Father’s death I know I am on the board,
But vice-president? The vice-president lives,
A prosperous gentleman; and CEO
Stands outside of the prospect of belief,
Moreso than vice-president. Tell me where
You get this strange intelligence? or why
Here by this busy street you stop our way
With such prophetic greetings? —Speak, I warn you.
(The three women vanish)
BANQUO: The earth has bubbles, just like water has.
Those three are of them. So, where have they vanished?
MCBETH: Into air, and what seemed material
Melted like breath into the wind. I wish they’d stayed!
BANQUO: Were those women here that we speak about?
Or have we eaten too many mushrooms,
That take our reason prisoner?
MCBETH: Your children shall be rich.
BANQUO: And you chairman.
MCBETH: And vice-president too. Wasn’t it so?
BANQUO: To that very tune and words. Who’s here?
(Enter Ross and Angus)
ROSS: The chairman’s happily received, McBeth,
The news of your success; and when he sees
Your personal danger in the merger fight,
His wonders and his praises both contend
Over what’s yours or his. Silenced by that,
In looking over the rest of the day,
He finds you against the Northwestern Bank,
Not even scared of what you created—
Strange images of death. As thick as hail
Came fax and fax; and every one did swear
Your praises in the company’s defense.
We set them all before him.
ANGUS: We were sent
To give you, from the CEO, his thanks,
And then to usher you into his sight,
To pay you.
ROSS: And, for insurance of a greater honor,
He told me, from him, call you vice-president.
So congratulations, vice-president!
The title’s yours!
BANQUO: What, can the devil speak true?
MCBETH: The vice-president lives: why do you dress me
In borrowed robes?
ANGUS: He who was VP lives,
But under heavy judgment keeps the life
That he deserves to lose. Whether he was allied
With the Northwest Bank, or gave the takeover
Some hidden help and advantage, or with both
He worked on his company’s wreck, I don’t know,
But corporate treason, confessed and proved,
Has now undone him.
MCBETH: (aside) Board, and vice-president.
The greatest is behind. (To them) Thanks for your pains.
(To Banquo) Don’t you believe your children will be rich,
When those who gave this new position to me
Promised no less to them?
BANQUO: That, trusted here,
Might put you in the top man’s seat and crown,
After vice-presidency. But it’s strange,
How oftentimes to bring us to some harm,
The instruments of darkness tell us truths,
Convince us with trifles, to betray us
With deepest consequence.—
You guys, may I speak with you?
MCBETH (aside): Two truths are told,
A happy prologue to the coming fact
Of company chairmanship. –I thank you, gentlemen.
(Aside) This supernatural solicitation
Cannot be bad; cannot be good.
If bad, why did it give me assurance of success,
Beginning with a truth? I am vice-president.
If good, why do I yield to the suggestion
Whose horrid image unsettles me here,
And makes my beating heart pound at my ribs,
Against my normal nature? Current fears
Are less than horrible imaginings.
My thought, a murder that’s just imaginary,
Disturbs my peaceful state of mind; the real world
Is smothered in surmise; and nothing is
But what is not.
BANQUO: Look, how McBeth is rapt.
MCBETH: If chance will make me lead then chance promotes me,
Without my help.
BANQUO: New honors have come to him
And, like new clothes, don’t really fit ‘til old
And with the aid of use.
MCBETH: Well, come what may,
Seconds and hours run through the roughest day.
BANQUO: Mr. McBeth, we’re just waiting on you, sir.
MCBETH: Forgive me, Banquo: my dull brain was caught
On things forgotten. Well, gentlemen, your pains
Are registered where every day I turn
The page to read them. Okay, let’s get going
(To Banquo) Think about what happened. After more time,
And with your mind having weighted it, we can speak
More freely to each other.
BANQUO: Very gladly.
MCBETH: ‘Til then, enough. –Come, friends.
(They exit)
SCENE FOUR (Wall Street.
A boardroom in an office building.
Muzak is heard. Enter Duncan,
Malcolm, Donalbain,
those who were sent out come back?
MALCOM: No, sir,
They have not yet returned. But someone spoke
With one who saw him fired, and did report
That very frankly he admitted treason,
And begged for your forgiveness; then put forth
That he was sorry. Nothing in his life
Became him like his leaving did; he sighed
Like one who had studied his ev’ry breath,
And threw away the dearest thing he owned
As if it was a trifle.
To find the mind’s true make-up by the face—
He was a gentleman on whom I built
An absolute trust.
(Enter McBeth, Banquo, Ross, and Angus)
Ah, my company man!
The sin of my ingratitude was just now
Quite heavy on me. You were so quick before
That couriers with cash for you were slow
To overtake you. If you had not earned
It, the proportion of both thanks and payment
Might have been mine! So, all I have left to say—
Each one here owes you more than we can pay.
MCBETH: The service and the loyalty I owe,
In doing it, pays itself. The chairman’s part
Is to accept our duties, and our duties
Are to the corporation. We are servants
Who do just what they should, by doing everything
We can for profit and power.
I have begun to plant you, and will labor
To make you keep on growing. Mister Banquo,
You’re fame’s no less deserved. It must be known
What things you’ve done as well. Let me embrace you,
And hold you to my heart.
BANQUO: Then if I grow,
The harvest is your own.
And so much fullness, that I hide myself
In tears of sorrow. Board members, and friends,
And those of you who are my neighbors, know,
I will establish my estate upon
My eldest, Malcolm, whom I name hereafter
The heir of my office. This honor must
Not be invested in him and him only;
But signs of wealthiness, like stars, will shine
On all deserving. –Let’s go to McBeth’s place,
To bind us closer to you.
MCBETH: The rest is labor, which you are not used to:
I’ll go ahead with all the news and then prepare
The servants and my wife for your approach;
So now I take my leave.
MCBETH (aside): The heir of his office! That is a step
On which I must fall down, or else outleap,
‘Cause in my way it lies. Stars, hide your fires!
Don’t let light see my black and deep desires;
The eye wink at the hand; yet let it be,
What the eye fears, when it is done, to see.
(McBeth exits)
And with his commendations I am fed—
It is a banquet to me. Let’s go follow him,
Who went ahead preparing us a welcome—
He is a company man.
(They exit)
SCENE FIVE (A room at the McBeth’s house. Enter Mrs. McBeth, reading a text message on her cell phone)
MRS: MCB: “They met me on the day of success; and I have learned
by the most powerful report, they have more in them than
mortal knowledge. When I burned with desire to question
them further, they made themselves air, into which they
vanished. While I stood rapt in the wonder of it, there
came a message from the boss, who made me vice-president;
the title by which these three women had called me when
they greeted me and said of the coming time, ‘Hail, you’ll be
chairman!’ I thought this would be good to relate
to you, my dearest partner of greatness, that you might
not miss a good chance to rejoice, by being ignorant of
what greatness is promised you. Lay it to your heart,
and farewell.”
Board member, vice-president; and you’ll be
What you were promised. But I do fear your nature.
It is too full of the milk of human kindness
To take the easy way. You could be great.
You’re not without ambition, but without
Wickedness to attend to it. What you want greatly,
You would get honestly; would not play false,
And yet would wrongly win. You’d have it, McBeth,
That which cries, “This you must do,” if you want it;
And that which you are quite afraid to do
But wish to, will not be done. Hurry home, dear,
So I can pour my spirits in your ear,
And stop with words of valor from my tongue
All that keeps you from getting off the ground;
Bring fate that supernatural aid does seem
To have given to you.
(A servant enters)
What news do you bring?
SERVANT: The boss is here tonight.
MRS. MCB: You’re mad to say it:
Isn’t my McBeth with him, who, if true,
Would’ve warned us to prepare for him?
SERVANT: I swear to you, it’s true. McBeth is coming—
Another servant took a call from him;
Almost out of breath, he had just enough
To deliver a message.
MRS MCB: Go tell your friend
He brings great news.
(Servant exits) The raven itself is hoarse
That
croaks the fatal entrance of
Into our happy home. Come, you spirits
That see to mortal thoughts, give me balls here;
And fill me, from my head to my toe, chock-full
Of the worst cruelty, make thick my blood,
Close up the entrance and exit to remorse,
So no feelings of guilt can even occur
Against my purpose, or keep peace between
Purpose and end! Come to my woman’s breasts,
Infect my milk with bile, murdering ministers,
Wherever in spiritual substance
You wait to wreak your mischief! Come, thick night,
Enshroud me in the grayest smoke of hell,
So that my knife won’t see the wound it makes,
Or heaven peek through the blanket of the dark
To cry, “Stop. Stop.”
(Enter McBeth)
The board! Second in line!
Greater than both, based on words of the future.
Your text words have transported me beyond
This ignorant present, and I feel now
The future in this instant.
MCBETH: My dearest love,
Duncan’s coming tonight.
MRS. MCB: And he leaves when?
MCBETH: Tomorrow—so he proposes.
MRS. MCB: Not ever!
Tomorrow will not be!
Your face, my man, looks like a book where men
Might read strange matters. To fool all these guys,
Have a good time. Bear welcome in your eye,
Your hand, your tongue. Seem an innocent flower,
But be a snake beneath it. Mr. Duncan
Must be provided for; and you can put
Tonight’s great business into my dear hands;
Then soon in all our days and nights to come
We’ll see that you are master of someone.
MCBETH: We will speak further.
MRS. MCB: Just look at this clear:
To alter favor is to always fear:
Leave all the rest to me.
(They exit)
SCENE SIX (In front of the McBeth’s house. Enter Duncan, Malcolm, Donalbain, Banquo, Lennox, McDuff, Ross, Angus, servants, and others)
DUNCAN: This mansion is a pleasant treat. The air
here’s really sweet and recommends itself
To our more gentle senses.
BANQUO: This guest of summer,
The gentle purple martin, sure does prove
By loving home building, that the heaven’s breath
Smells quite good here—no protection, buttress,
Or great advantage, but this bird has made
His makeshift nest and little chicks’ cradle.
Where they most breed and hunt, I have observed,
The air is delicate.
(Enter Mrs. McBeth)
DUNCAN: Look there, our honored hostess.
(To her) The love that follows us sometimes is a trouble,
Which we still thank as love. Ma’am, I will show you
How to pray God rewards us for your pains
And thanks for your trouble.
MRS. MCB: All the service
That we did once, we did again, then doubled,
But it was still poor business, when compared
With all the honors deep and broad by which
The chairman has filled our house—for those of old,
And the most recent ones added to them,
We are your servants.
DUNCAN: Where’s the vice-president?
We followed in my Rolls, and had a desire
To be the caterer. But he drives well;
And his great love, sharp as a spur, has helped him
To his home before us. Fair and worthy Mrs.,
We are your guests tonight.
MRS: Your servants over
There should have what’s theirs, subject to account;
They should do audits when it is your pleasure.
So all of it goes home.
DUNCAN: Give me your hand.
And take me to my host: I love him highly,
And will continue my good will towards him.
Shall we go, Mrs.?
(Kisses her cheek; they exit)
SCENE SEVEN (In the house. Servants are running about with plates, etc.; McBeth enters)
MCBETH: If all were done when it’s done, then it’s well
To do it quickly. If assassination
Could shackle up the consequence, and catch
With his quick death, success; if just this blow
Might be the be-all and end-all here.
Then here, right in this room and house of mine,--
I’d risk the afterlife. But in these cases
We still are judged while here; we only teach
Bloody instructions, which once they’re taught, return
To plague the inventor. This even-handed justice
Offers the ingredients of my poisoned chalice
To my own lips. He’s here in all my trust:
First, as I am his employed and his servant—
They’re both against this deed. Then, as his host,
Who should against a murderer shut the door,
Not bear the knife myself. Besides, the chairman
Has run his company so well, has been
So clear in his great office, that his virtues
Will plead like angels, trumpeting against
The deep damnation of his being killed;
And pity, like a naked newborn babe
Riding the wind, or heaven’s cherubim, horsed
Upon the sightless couriers of the air
Will blow the horrid deed in every eye,
‘Til tears shall drown the wind.—I have no spur
To kick the sides of my intent, but only
Vaulting ambition, which outleaps itself,
And falls on the other—
(Enter Mrs. McBeth)
Hey now, what news?
MRS: He is almost done. Why did you leave the table?
MCBETH: Has he asked for me?
MRS: Don’t you know he has?
MCBETH: We can’t go any further in this business.
He has honored me of late; and I’ve gotten
Some good opinions from all sorts of people,
Which should be worn now in their newest gloss,
Not cast aside so soon.
MRS: Was the hope drunk
In which you dressed yourself? Has it slept since?
And does it wake, to look so hung over
At what it did so freely? From now on
That’s how I’ll see your love. Are you afraid
To be the same in deeds and acts and valor
As you are in desire? Would you have that
Which you believe the ornament of life,
And live a coward in your own esteem,
Letting, “I dare not” wait upon “I would,”
Like the poor cat that wants fish?
MCBETH: C’mon . . . please.
I will do all that may become a man.
One who dares more, is none.
MRS: What beast was it,
That made you share this idea with me?
When you first said it, then you were a man;
And, to be more than what you were, you would
Be so much more the man. No time or place
Was then in mind, and yet you wanted both.
They have both happened, and ‘cause they’re present now
It undoes you. I have given milk, and know
How sweet it feels to love that child that sucks me.
I would, while it was smiling in my face,
Have pulled my nipple from his toothless gums,
And beat the brains out, if I had sworn as you
Have sworn to this.
MCBETH: If we should fail?
MRS: We fail?
Just keep your courage in its rightful place,
And we won’t fail. When Duncan is asleep
(Where all the events and today’s hard journey
Soundly invite him) I’ll ply his yes men
With beer and wine and liquor to convince
The memory, the watchman of the brain,
That it’s a fool, and the concept of reason
Will transform wholly. When in dizzy sleep
Their drunken bodies lie as if in death,
What things can’t you and I then do upon
Unguarded Duncan, and then blame upon
His drunken officers, who will take the guilt
Of our great kill.
MCBETH: Give birth to sons, men only.
That kind of cold-bloodedness should conceive
Nothing but males. Will it not be figured,
When we have marked with blood the drunken pair
In his own bedroom, and used their very weapons,
That they’re the ones?
MRS: Who’d dare to guess another,
When we will make our grief and outcries roar
Upon his death?
MCBETH: I am settled, and tense up
Each bodily agent to this terrible feat.
Let’s go, and pass the time with fairest show—
False face must hide what the false heart does know.
(They exit; end of Act One)
ACT TWO
SCENE ONE (Outside the McBeth house; enter Banquo, preceded by Fleance with a flashlight)
BANQUO: How’s it going, son?
FLEANCE: The moon is down; I cannot see my watch.
BANQUO: Well it went down at twelve.
FLEANCE: I guess it’s past that then.
BANQUO: Here, hold my gun. There’s management in heaven;
The lights are all turned off—now take that too
(Hands Fleance ammo)
A great drowsiness lies like lead upon me,
And yet I cannot sleep. Merciful powers,
Restrain in me the cursed thoughts that nature
Gives way to when I rest. Give me my gun.
Who’s there?
(Enter McBeth and a servant with a flashlight)
MCBETH: A friend.
BANQUO: What, you’re not yet at rest? Duncan’s in bed.
He has been in unusual pleasure, and
Gave out great presents to your service staff.
A diamond he gave your wife to keep;
Said she was the kindest hostess; and now he’s
Entirely quite content.
MCBETH: Being unprepared
We could not celebrate the way we’d like,
With what little we’ve got.
BANQUO: Oh, well.
I dreamed last night of the three weird women.
To you they did show some truth.
MCBETH: I don’t think of them.
But, when we can both find an hour to spare,
We should spend it in some words about that business,
If you would grant the time.
BANQUO: When it’s your pleasure.
MCBETH: If you will stick with me, then when it’s time,
There will be honor for you.
BANQUO: No honor’s lost
In looking to add to it, but I’ll keep
Myself from guilt and all allegiance clear,
And then I’ll listen.
MCBETH: You take care meanwhile!
BANQUO: Thanks, sir; the same to you!
(Banquo and Fleance exit)
MCBETH: Go tell the Mrs., when my drink is ready,
To give my cell a call. Then get to bed.
(Exit servant)
Is this a knife I see here in front of me,
The handle toward my hand? Damn, let me touch it.
I don’t have it but I do see it still.
Isn’t this fatal vision sensible
To feeling just like sight?, or is it just
A dagger of the mind, a false creation,
Coming out of my feverish brain?
I see it still, in form as reachable
As the one I now draw.
But it moves the way that I was going;
And this is the weapon I was to use.
My eyes are made the fools of the other senses,
Or else worth all the rest. I see it still;
And on the blade and handle, spots of blood
That were not there before. There’s no such thing.
It is the bloody business that makes forms
Like this appear. Right now one half the world
In sleep seems dead, and wicked dreams deceive
The curtained sleep. Now witchcraft celebrates
Pale Hecate’s offerings; and the murderer—
Alarmed by his own sentinel, the wolf,
Whose howl’s his watch—he with his stealthy pace,
Like Hitler’s sneaky striding towards his design,
Howls like a ghost. You sure and steady earth,
Don’t hear my steps, which way they walk, for fear
The very stones blab of my whereabouts,
And take the current horror from the time,
That now sits with it. While I fret, he lives.
Words uttered about deeds a cold breath gives.
(His cell phone rings once)
I’ll go, and get it done; the cell invites me.
Don’t hear it Duncan, ‘cause it’s a cell
That summons you to heaven or to hell.
(Exits)
SCENE TWO (Same location; enter Mrs. McBeth)
MRS: The stuff that made them drunk has made me bold.
What has quenched them has given me fire.—Wait! Jeez!
It was an owl that shrieked, the fatal bellman,
Who gives the sternest good night. He is doing it.
The doors are open; and the two drunken bums
Mock the chairman with snores. I have drugged their goblets,
So death and nature both contend around them,
Whether they live or die.
MCBETH (off stage): Who’s there? What, no!
MRS: My God. I am afraid they’ve awakened,
And it’s not done. The attempt, and not the deed,
Confounds us. Damn! I laid their knives down right where
He could not miss them. If he hadn’t looked like
My father as he slept, I’d have done it. McBeth!
(McBeth enters)
MCBETH: I have done the deed. Didn’t you hear a noise?
MRS: I heard the owl scream and the crickets cry.
Didn’t you speak?
MCBETH: When?
MRS: Now?
MCBETH: As I descended?
MRS: Yes.
MCBETH: Wait!
Who’s in the second bedroom?
MRS: Donalbain.
MCBETH (looking at his hands): This is a sorry sight.
MRS: A foolish thought to say a sorry sight.
MCBETH: One of them laughed in sleep, and one cried “Murder!”
With that they woke each other. I stood and listened;
But then they said some prayers, and prepared once
Again to sleep.
MRS: There are two lodged together.
MCBETH: One cried, “God bless us!”, “Amen,” said the other,
As if they’d seen me with these hangman’s hands.
Hearing their fear, I could not say, “Amen,”
When they both said, “God bless us.”
MRS: Don’t consider it so deeply.
MCBETH: But how come I could not pronounce “Amen?”
I had the need of blessing, and “Amen”
Stuck in my throat.
MRS: These things must not be thought
Of in these ways, or it will make us mad.
MCBETH: I thought I heard a voice cry, “Sleep no more!
McBeth has murdered sleep,”—the innocent sleep;
Sleep that knits up the raveled sleeve of care,
The death of each day’s life, sore labor’s bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course,
Chief nourisher in life’s feast.
MRS: What do you mean?
MCBETH: Still it cried, “Sleep no more!” to all the house.
“McBeth has murdered sleep; and therefore McBeth
Will sleep no more, McBeth will sleep no more!”
MRS: Who did you hear that cried? Husband of mine,
Now you undo your noble strength, to think
So brainsickly of things. Go, get some water,
And wash this bloody witness from your hand.
Why did you bring these weapons from their place?
They must stay there. Go and take them, and smear
The passed out bums with blood.
MCBETH: I’ll do no more.
I am afraid to think of what I’ve done;
To look again, I dare not.
MRS: You have no real guts!
Give me the weapon. The sleeping and the dead
Are just like pictures; it’s the eye of childhood
That fears a painted devil. If there is blood,
I’ll smear the faces of the bums with it,
As it must seem their guilt.
(She exits; knocking)
MCBETH: Where is that knocking?
How can it be, that every noise appalls me?
What hands are these? God, they pluck out my eyes!
Can all the planet’s oceans wash this blood
Clean from my hand? No; instead my hands will turn
The multitudes of seas from natural green
Into oceans of red.
(Mrs. McBeth enters)
MRS: My hands are the same color; but I shame
To wear a heart so white.
(Knocking) I hear a knocking
At the south entrance. Let’s go now to our bedroom.
A little water clears us of this deed—
How easy it is then! Your set firmness
Has left you unattended.
(Knocking) There’s more knocking.
Get in your nightclothes, in case someone calls us,
And finds us to be watchers. Don’t be lost
So poorly in your thoughts.
MCBETH: Knowing me deed, I best not know myself.
(Knocking)
Wake Duncan with your knocking! I wish you could!
(They exit)
SCENE THREE (In the foyer of the McBeth house; a drunken Butler enters; knocking)
BUTLER: Here’s a knocking indeed! If a guy was doorman at hell’s gate, he would get old turning the key.
(Knocking) Knock, knock, knock. Who’s there, in the name of Beelzebub? Here’s a farmer who hanged himself on the expectation of plenty—come in time-pleaser! Have napkins enough about you; here you’ll sweat for it.
(Knocking) Knock, knock! Who’s there, in the other devil’s name? Damn, here’s an equivocator, who could swear in both the scales against each other, who committed treason enough for God’s sake, yet could not equivocate to heaven; oh, come in equivocator.
(Knocking) Knock, knock, knock! Who’s there! Damn, here’s an English tailor who’s come here for stealing out of a French hose. Come in, tailor, here you may roast your goose.
(Knocking) Knock, knock; it’s never quiet! What are you? But this place is too cold for hell. I’ll devil-doorman it no further. I had thought of letting in some of all professions that go the primrose path to the everlasting bonfire.
(Knocking) Coming, coming! I beg you, remember the doorman.
(He opens the door; enter McDuff & Lennox)
MCDUFF: Was it so late, friend, when you went to bed,
That you sleep in this late?
BUTLER: Well, sir, we were carousing til three o’clock; and drink, sir, is a great provoker of three things.
MCDUFF: What three things does drink especially provoke?
BUTLER: Listen, sir, nose-painting, sleep, and urine. Lechery, sir, it provokes and unprovokes—it provokes the desire, but it takes away the performance. Therefore, much drink may be said to be an equivocator with lechery—it makes him, and it mars him; it sets him on, and it takes him off; it persuades him, and disheartens him; makes him stand to, and not stand to; in conclusion, equivocates him into sleep, and, giving him the lie, leaves him.
MCDUFF: I believe drink gave you the lie last night.
BUTLER: Yes it did, sir, in the very throat of me. But I got even with him for it; and, I think, being too strong for him, though he fucked up my legs a few times, I made a try to beat him.
MCDUFF: So is McBeth stirring?
Our knocking has around him. Here he comes.
(Enter McBeth)
LENNOX: Good morning, my dear sir!
MCBETH: Good morning, both!
MCDUFF: Is Duncan stirring yet McBeth?
MCBETH: Not yet.
MCDUFF: He did command me to come and call on him.
I did almost miss the hour.
MCBETH; I’ll take you to him.
MCDUFF: I know this is a joyful trouble for you.
Still, it is one.
MCBETH: The labor we delight in can’t cause pain.
This is the door.
MCDUFF: I’ll be so bold to call.
It is my appointed service.
(McDuff exits)
LENNOX: Does Duncan leave today?
MCBETH: He does—at least he said so.
LENNOX: The night has been unruly. Where we stayed
The chimneys were blown down, and, as they say,
Lamentings heard in the air; strange screams of death;
And fortune telling, that talked of terrible
And dire explosion of confused events,
That brought a new, woeful time. Some obscure birds
Clamored the whole damn night. Some said the earth
Was feverish, and it shook.
MCBETH: Yeah, a rough night.
LENNOX: My young memories cannot remember
Another like it.
(McDuff enters)
MCDUFF: Oh, my God!, my God, my God! Tongue and heart
Cannot conceive or name it!
MCBETH & LENNOX: What’s the matter?
MCDUFF: Confusion has now made a masterpiece.
A sacrilegious murderer opened
Our chief’s anointed temple, and stole there
The life of the building.
MCBETH: What did you say? The life?
LENNOX: You mean Mr. Duncan?
MCDUFF: Approach the bedroom, and destroy your sight
With a new monster. Don’t ask me to speak.
See, and then speak yourselves.
(McBeth and Lennox exit)
Wake up, wake up!
Call a policeman! Murder and treason!
Banquo and Donalbain! Malcolm! Wake up!
Shake off your stupid sleep, death’s counterfeit,
And look on death itself! Up, up, and see
The great doom’s image! Malcolm! Banquo!
As if from graves get up, and walk like ghosts.
Take a look at this horror!
(Butler picks up phone to call 911; enter Mrs. McBeth)
MRS: What’s the business,
That such a hideous screaming tries to wake up
The sleepers of the house? Well, speak!
MCDUFF: Oh, my dear lady,
It’s not for you to hear what I can speak.
The repetition, in a woman’s ear,
Would murder as it fell.
(Enter Banquo)
Oh, Banquo, Banquo!
Our C. E. O. is murdered!
MRS: Oh my God!
What, in our house?
BANQUO: Too cruel anywhere.
McDuff, I beg you, contradict yourself,
And say it is not so.
(Enter McBeth and Lennox)
MCBETH: If I had died an hour before this chance,
I’d have lived a blessed life; no, from this instant,
There’s nothing serious in being alive.
All is just games. Renown and grace are dead.
The wine of life is gone, and only dregs
Are left around to brag of.
(Enter Malcolm and Donalbain)
DONALB: What is amiss?
MCBETH: You are, and don’t know it.
The spring, the head, the fountain of your blood
Has stopped. The very source of it has stopped.
MCDUFF: Your good old father’s murdered.
MALCOM: What, by whom?
LENNOX: Those in his bedroom, it would seem, did it.
Their hands and faces were all red with blood.
So were their own knives that, unwiped, we found
Upon their pillows. They stared, and were distracted.
No man’s life was to be trusted with them.
MCBETH: And now I do repent that in my fury
I went and killed them.
MCDUFF: Why did you do that?
MCBETH: Who can be wise, amazed, temperate, and furious,
Loyal and neutral, in one moment? No man;
It was self-defense, and my violent love
Outran any mere reason. Here lay Duncan,
His silver skin laced with his golden blood;
And his stab wounds looked like a breach in nature
For death’s wasteful entrance; there, the murderers,
Steeped in the colors of their deed, their weapons
Covered all over with gore; who could refrain
That had a heart to love, and in that heart
Courage to make love known?
MRS: Help me here now!
MCDUFF: Look to the lady.
MALCOLM: Why do we hold our tongues,
Who most may claim this argument for ours?
DONALB: What should be spoken here, where our fate
(aside to Hid in a little hold, might rush, and seize us?
Malcolm) Get away;
Our tears are not yet brewed.
MALCOM (aside to Donalbain): Or our great sorrow
Put into its own motion.
BANQUO: Look to the lady.
(Mrs. McBeth is carried out)
Now when we have all our frailties hidden
That suffer in exposure, let us meet,
And question this most bloody piece of work,
To know it further. Fears and scruples shake us;
In the great hand of God I stand; and then,
Against the undivulged pretense I fight
This poisonous malice.
MCDUFF: And so do I.
ALL: So all.
MCBETH: Let’s quickly put on all our manliness
And meet in the hall together.
ALL: Let’s defend him!
(Exit all but Malcolm and Donalbain)
MALCOLM: What should we do? Let’s not stay here with them;
To show an unfelt sorrow is a mere task
That the false man does easy. I’m off to Maine.
DONALB: To Canada; our separate locations
Will keep us a bit safer; where we are,
There are knives in men’s smiles; we’re near in blood,
And nearer bloody.
MALCOM: The poisonous arrow shot
Has not yet landed; and our safest way
Is to avoid the aim. Come on, let’s go;
Don’t let us be afraid of leave-taking,
But sneak away; there’s good advice in theft
That steals itself when there’s no mercy left.
SCENE FOUR (Outside the McBeth’s house; enter Ross and an old man)
OLD MAN: Seventy years I can remember well;
And in the whole span of that time I have seen
Hours dreadful and things strange; but this one night
Has surpassed all the others.
ROSS: Ah, good old man,
You see, the heavens are troubled with man’s act,
Threaten his bloody stage; by the clock, it’s day,
And yet dark night strangles the flashlights and lamps;
Is night predominant, or the day shamed,
That darkness covers the earth like a tomb,
When living light should kiss it?
OLD MAN: It’s unnatural,
Just like the murder that’s done. On Tuesday last,
A falcon, towering in her nesting place,
Was hawked at by a mousing owl and killed.
ROSS: And Duncan’s horses.—a thing most strange and certain,—
Beauteous and swift, the idols of their race,
Turned wild in nature, broke their stalls, flung out,
Intent against obedience, like they would make
War with mankind.
OLD MAN: It’s said they ate each other.
ROSS: They did, too; to the amazement of my eyes.
I watched it. Here comes the good McDuff.
(Enter McDuff)
How are things going now?
MCDUFF: Why, can’t you see?
ROSS: Is it known who did this horrible deed?
MCDUFF: Those that McBeth has slain.
ROSS: Pity the day!
What good could it do them?
MCDUFF: They were hired;
Malcolm and Donalbain, Duncan’s two sons,
Have snuck away and fled; which puts upon them
Suspicion of the deed.
ROSS: Not natural;
Gutless ambition, it will prey upon
Your own life’s means!—It’s most likely
The chairmanship will fall upon McBeth.
MCDUFF: He is already named, and on the phone
To check investments.
ROSS: Where is Duncan’s body?
MCDUFF: Carried to Colme Hill,
The cemetery of all his ancestors,
And guardian of their bones.
ROSS: Where will you go?
MCDUFF: Oh, cousin, to my wife.
ROSS: I’ll go to McBeth.
MCDUFF: Well, may you see things well done there,—adieu!—
For fear that old robes fit better than our new!
ROSS: Goodbye, old man.
OLD MAN: May God’s blessings go with you; and with those
That would make good of bad, and friends of foes!
(They exit; end of Act Two)
ACT THREE
SCENE ONE (An office on Wall Street; Banquo enters)
BANQUO: You have it now,—chair, vice-president, all
That those weird women promised; and, I fear,
You played most foul for it; yet it was said
It would not stand in your posterity;
But instead I should be the root and father
Of many heirs. If there is truth from them,—
The way for you, McBeth, their speeches shine,—
Then, by the promises for you made good
Couldn’t they be my oracles as well,
And set me up in hope? Silence, no more.
(Enter the McBeths, Lennox, Ross, et. al.)
MCBETH: Here’s our chief guest.
MRS: If he had been forgotten,
It would have been a gap in our great feast,
And badly unbecoming.
MCBETH: Tonight we host a solemn supper, sir,
And I request your presence.
BANQUO: Let the chairman
Command me to go; you know that our duties
Are knotted with an indissoluble tie
Forever knit.
MCBETH: Leaving this afternoon?
BANQUO: Yes, sir, chairman.
MCBETH: If not, we’d have looked for your good advice,—
Which has still been both grave and suspicious,—
In today’s meeting; but we’ll talk tomorrow.
How far the ride?
BANQUO: As far, chairman, as will fill up the time
From now til supper: my car will not do better.
I will become a traveler in the night,
For one dark hour or two.
MCBETH: Don’t miss our feast.
BANQUO: Chairman, I will not.
MCBETH: We heard that Duncan’s children are laid low
Up in Maine and Canada, not confessing
Their cruel patricide, filling listeners
With strange pretensions; more of that tomorrow;
When there will be a whole slew of matters
Wanting us jointly. Go get your car; adieu,
Til you return tonight. Fleance going too?
BANQUO: Yes, sir, chairman; the time does call on us.
MCBETH: I hope your car is swift and all in tune;
And so I command you to its axles.
Farewell.—
(Banquo exits)
Let everyone be keeper of his time
Til seven tonight; to make society
A sweeter welcome, we will keep ourselves
Alone til suppertime; til then, God be with you!
(Exit Mrs. McBeth and others)
You, sir, a word with you. Are the men here
I sent for?
LACKEY: They are, chairman, outside the building’s gate.
MCBETH: Bring them up to me.
(Lackey exits)
To be this is nothing;
But to be safely this: my fear of Banquo
Runs deep; and in his nobility of nature
Lies that which should be feared; it’s much he dares;
And, with that dauntless temper of his mind,
He has a wisdom that does guide his valor
To act in safety. There is none but he
Whose being I do fear; and, under him,
My genius is kept down; as, it is said,
Marc Antony’s was be Caesar. He scolded those hags
When they first put the name chairman upon me,
And asked they speak to him; then, prophet-like,
They hailed him father to line of heirs;
Upon my head they placed a fruitless crown,
And put a barren scepter in my grip,
There to be wrenched by an unlineal hand,
No son of mine succeeding. If it’s so,
For Banquo’s children I’ve defiled my mind;
For them the gracious Duncan I have murdered;
Put hatred in my mind instead of peace
Only for them; and my eternal jewel
Given to the common enemy of man,
To make them lead, the seed of Banquo lead!
Instead of this, come, fate, onto the field,
And champion me to the utterance!—Who’s there?—
(Enter Lackey, with two hit men)
You go to the door, and stay there til I call.
(Lackey exits)
Wasn’t it yesterday we spoke together?
1ST MAN: Yes it was, Mr. Chairman.
MCBETH: Well then, how
Have you considered the way I spoke? Know
That it was he, in the times past, who kept you
Without a fortune; which you thought had been
The fault of yourselves; this I know I told you
In our last conference, when I proved to both of you,
How you were kept in line; how crossed; the instruments;
Who beat you down; ev’rything else, which might,
To half a soul, or to a mind that’s crazed,
Say, “This did Banquo.”
1ST MAN: You made it know to us.
MCBETH: So I did; and went further, which is now
The point of this new meeting. Do you find
Your patience so predominant in your nature,
That you can let this go? Are you so Christian
You’d pray for this good man and for his children,
Whose heavy hand has bowed you to the grave,
And robbed your kids forever?
1ST MAN: We are men, chairman.
MCBETH: Yes, in classification you are men;
As hounds, and greyhounds, mongrels, spaniels, curs,
Shaggies, and pugs, and half-wolves are all called
By the one name of dog; the science file
Distinguishes the swift, the slow, the subtle,
The housekeeper, the hunter, every one
According to the gift that bounteous nature
Has given it; from nature it receives
Particular attributes, from the bill
That writes them all alike; the same with men.
Now, if you have a place in the great file,
And not in the worst rank of manhood, say it;
Then I will put the business in your bosoms,
Whose execution takes your enemy off;
It wrestles with the heart and love of us,
Who wear our health so sickly while he lives,
But with his death would be well.
2ND MAN: I am one, chairman,
Whom the vile blows and buffets of the world
Have so incensed that I don’t care much what
I do to spite the world.
1ST MAN: And I another,
So weary with disasters, and misfortune
That I would bet my life on any chance;
To mend it, or to end it.
MCBETH: Both of you
Know Banquo is your enemy.
BOTH: True, chairman.
MCBETH: And he is mine; and in such bloody distance,
That every minute of his being thrusts
Against my dear old life; and though I could
With my great power sweep him from my sight,
And have my will vouch for it, I just cannot,
‘Cause certain friends that are both his and mine,
Whose loves I cannot drop, would wail his fall,
That I myself brought down; and so it is
That to your assistance I do make love;
Masking the business from the common eye
For many weighty reasons.
2ND MAN: We will, chairman,
Perform what you have asked us.
1ST MAN: Though our lives—
MCBETH: Your spirits shine through you. Within an hour, at most,
I will advise you where to plant yourselves,
Acquaint you with the perfect spy of this time,
The time of it; it must be done tonight,
And far away from my place; I have thought
That I require a clearness; and with him,—
To leave no flubs or botches in the work,—
Fleance, his son, who keeps him company,
Whose absence is no less material to me
Than is his father’s, must embrace the fate
Of that dark hour. Now take yourselves away;
I will come to you soon.
BOTH: We are resolved, chairman.
MCBETH: I’ll call upon you soon: wait in my room.
(They exit)
It is concluded: —Banquo, your soul’s flight,
If it finds heaven, must find it out tonight.
(Exits)
SCENE TWO (Another office in the same building on Wall Street; enter Mrs. McBeth and a servant)
MRS: Did Banquo take the Ford?
SERVANT: Yes, madam, but returns again tonight.
MRS: Tell the chairman, that I’d like him to come here
For a few words.
SERVANT: Yes, I will.
(Servant exits)
MRS: Nothing’s had, all’s spent,
Where our desire’s gotten without content:
It’s safer to be that which we destroy,
Than, by destruction, dwell in doubtful joy.
(Enter McBeth)
What now, McBeth! why do you stay alone
And make companions out of your sorry fancies;
Using the thoughts that should have also died
With what they think on? Things without a remedy
Should be without regard; what’s done is done.
MCBETH: We have scratched the snake, not killed it.
She’ll heal, and be herself; while our poor malice
Remains in danger of her former tooth.
But let the frame of things disjoint,
Both the worlds suffer.
Before we eat our meal in fear, and sleep
With the affliction of these terrible dreams
That shake us nightly: we’re better with the dead,
Whom we, to gain our place, have sent to peace,
Than on the torture of the mind to lie
In restless ecstasy. Duncan is in his grave;
After life’s fitful fever he sleeps well;
Treason has done its worst: no steel , or poison,
Malice, domestic, foreign levy, nothing
Can touch him further.
MRS: Come on;
Gently now, sleek over your rugged looks;
Be bright and jolly among your guests tonight.
MCBETH: Oh, I will, love; and so, I ask, you too:
Let your remembrance apply to Banquo;
Let’s make him eminent, both with eye and tongue:
Unsafe the same time, we
Must wash our honors in these flattering streams;
And change our faces to masks of our hearts,
Disguising what they are.
MRS: You must leave this.
MCBETH: So full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife!
You know that Banquo, and son Fleance, live.
MRS: In them nature’s copy’s not eternal.
MCBETH: There’s comfort yet; they are assailable.
So you be cheerful: before the bats have flown
Their nightly flight; before black Hecate’s summons
To the dark June bug, with its drowsy hums,
Has run night’s yawning bell, there will be done
A deed of dreadful note.
MRS: What’s to be done?
MCBETH: Be innocent of the knowledge, dearest one,
Til you applaud the deed. Come, blinding night,
Cover the tender eye of pitiful day;
And with your bloody and invisible hand
Cancel and tear to pieces that great bond
That keeps me pale!—Light thickens; and the crow
Takes wing to the dark bird’s woods:
Good things of day begin to droop and drowse;
While night’s black agents to their prey are roused,—
You marvel at my words: but please hold still;
Things begun bad make themselves strong by ill;
Anyway, come with me.
(They exit)
SCENE THREE (On a street near the McBeth’s house)
1ST MAN: But who asked you to join with us?
3RD MAN: McBeth.
2ND MAN: He needs to not mistrust; since he delivers
All our orders, and what we have to do;
The directions are just.
1ST MAN: Then stay with us.
The west still glimmers with some streaks of day:
Here come some late travelers at a pace
To reach the nearest inn; and now approaches
The subject of our watch.
3RD MAN: Shhh. I hear a car.
(The sound of a car pulling up and a door opening and closing; we hear Banquo off stage)
BANQUO: Give me a light there now.
2ND MAN: Then it is him, the rest
Who are within the range of expectation
Are already in the house.
1ST MAN: He parked it and got out.
3RD MAN: Almost a mile; but he does usually
Like most men do. From there to the house’s gate
They often walk.
2ND MAN: A light, a light!
3RD MAN: It’s him.
1ST MAN: Stand by.
(Enter Banquo and Fleance with a flashlight)
BANQUO: There will be rain tonight.
1ST MAN: Let it come down.
(Assaults Banquo)
BANQUO: Oh, my dear God! Go, go Fleance, fly, fly, fly!
You can avenge. — Oh, shit!
(He dies; Fleance escapes)
3RD MAN: So who put out the light?
1ST MAN: Wasn’t it the way?
3RD MAN: There’s just one down! the son has fled.
2ND MAN: We’ve lost the best half of our affair.
1ST MAN: Well, let us go, and say how much is done.
SCENE FOUR (The McBeth’s house; a dining room. Enter the McBeths, Ross, Lennox, businessmen, servants, etc.)
MCBETH: You know your own places, sit down: I’ll first
Extend a hearty welcome.
OTHERS: Thanks to the C. E. O.
MCBETH: Myself, I’ll mingle with society,
And play the humble host.
Our hostess keeps her place; but, in due time,
We will require her welcome.
MRS: Pronounce it for me, dear, to all our friends;
My heart tells me they are welcome.
MCBETH: See, they encounter you with their hearts’ thanks,—
Both sides are even; here, I’ll take the middle:
(1st Man comes to the door; McBeth sees him and goes to him)
Have a lot of fun; soon we’ll drink a measure
The table ‘round. — There’s blood upon your face.
1ST MAN: It’s Banquo’s then.
MCBETH: It’s better on you than Banquo’s within.
Is he now dead?
1ST MAN: Chairman, his throat is cut; that I did for him.
MCBETH: You are the best of the cutthroats: but he’s good
Who did the same for Fleance; if you did it
You are unparalleled.
1ST MAN: Mr. McBeth,
Fleance escaped.
MCBETH: Then my fit comes again: It would have been perfect;
Whole as the marble, solid as a rock;
As broad and general as the blowing air;
But now I am cabined, cramped, confined, bound in
By many doubts and fears. But Banquo’s safe?
1ST MAN: Yes, sir chairman; safe in a ditch he lies,
With twenty deep gashes on his head;
The least a death to be sure.
MCBETH: Thanks for that:
There the grown serpent lies; the worm who’s fled
Has a mind that in time will breed venom,
No teeth for the present. — Get going; tomorrow
We’ll meet and talk again.
(Exit 1st Man)
MRS: My dear husband,
You are not filled with cheer; the feast is bland
That’s not so much as touched, while it’s all making,
It’s given with welcome; it’s best to host at home:
From there the sauce to meat is ceremony;
Meetings are bare without it.
MCBETH: A sweet reminder! —
Now, good digestion waits on appetites,
And health to both!
LENNOX: Sir, would you like to sit?
(The ghost of Banquo rises and sits in McBeth’s place)
MCBETH: We would have had our company honored
If the great person, our Banquo, was present;
Who I must challenge for his unkindness
Than pity for mischance.
ROSS: His absence, sir,
Can be blamed on his promise. Would you now please
Grace us with your most esteemed company?
MCBETH: The table’s full.
LENNOX: Here’s a place reserved, sir.
MCBETH: Where?
LENNOX: Here, chairman. What is it that moves you so?
MCBETH: Which of you have done this?
MEN: Done what, chairman?
MCBETH: You cannot say I did it; never shake
Your gory locks at me.
ROSS: Gentlemen, rise. The chairman is not well.
MRS: Sit, worthy friends: —McBeth is often such,
And has been from his youth; please, stay seated;
The fit is temporary; after a thought
He will again be well; if you stare at him
You will offend him, and prolong his passion;
Eat, pay no attention. — Are you a man?
MCBETH: Yes, and a bold one, who dares look on that
Which might appall the devil.
MRS: Such stupid stuff!
This is only the painting of your fear:
It’s like the air-drawn dagger which, you said,
Led you to Duncan. God, these flaws, and starts,—
Impostors to true fear,—would well become
A woman’s story at a winter’s fire,
Authorized by her grandma. Shame itself!
Why do you make such faces? When all’s done,
You’re looking at a chair.
MCBETH: Darling, see there! behold! Look! Now! Speak, will you?!—
What do I care? If you can nod, speak too.—
If funeral homes and our graves must send
Those that we bury back, our monuments
Will be the guts of hawks.
(Ghost disappears)
MRS: What, I ask, is this folly?
MCBETH: If I stand here, I saw him.
MRS: Just your shame.
MCBETH: Blood has been shed before, in the olden days,
Before man’s statues purged the gentle state;
Yes, and since too, murders have been performed
Too terrible for the ear; the time have been
That, when the brain has stopped, the man would die,
And there’s an end; but now they rise again,
With twenty mortal gashes on their heads,
And push us from our seats; this is more strange
Than such a murder is.
MRS: My dear McBeth,
Your noble friends do want you.
MCBETH: I do forget: —
Please don’t stare at me, my most worthy friends;
I have a strange infirmity, which is nothing
To those who know me. Come, love and health to all;
Then I’ll sit down. — Give me some wine, fill full, —
I drink to the general joy of the whole table,
And to our dear friend Banquo, who we miss;
Wish he were here! to all, and him, I toast.
And all to all.
MEN: Our duties, and the pledge.
(Ghost rises again)
MCBETH: Away! Out of my sight! Let the earth hide you!
Your bones are marrowless, your blood is cold;
You have no speculation in the eyes
That you do glare with!
MRS: Think of this, good peers,
Just as a thing of custom: it’s no other;
Except it spoils the pleasurable time.
MCBETH: What men dare, I dare:
Approach me like a rugged grizzly bear,
A horned rhinoceros, or a Bengal tiger;
Take any shape but that, and my firm nerves
Will never tremble: or be alive again
And dare me to a duel with your sword;
And, if I’m still trembling then, you can call me
A baby or a girl. Leave horrible shadow!
Unreal mockery, leave!
(Ghost disappears)
And so;—being gone,
I am a man again. — Please men, sit still.
MRS: You have displace the mirth; broke up the meeting
With alarming disorder.
MCBETH: Can such things be,
And overcome us like a summer’s cloud,
Without our special wonder? You say I’m strange
Even to the disposition that I own.
I wonder how you can look on such sights
And keep the natural ruby of your cheeks,
When mine are white with fear.
ROSS: What sights, McBeth?
MRS: I beg you, don’t speak; he grows worse and worse;
Questions enrage him: right now, good night;—
Don’t stand up on the order of your going,
Just go at once.
LENNOX: Good night; and better health
To you, Mr. McBeth!
MRS: A kind good night to all!
(They exit)
MCBETH: It will have blood; they say, blood will have blood:
Stones have been known to move, and trees to speak;
Omens, and understood relations, by
Black magpies, ravens, and crows, have brought out
The secret man of blood. — Is it still night?
MRS: Night is at odds with morning. Which is which?
MCBETH: what do you say about McDuff not coming
On invitation?
MRS: Did you send for him then?
MCBETH: I heard another way; but I will send:
There’s not a one of them who’s in his house
Who’s not a spy for me. I’ll go tomorrow
(And early I’ll go) to the weird women:
They will say more; ‘cause now I do have to know,
By the worst means, the worst. For my own good,
All causes must give way; I am in blood,
So steeped in it that, should I wade no more
The return’s as tiring as going over.
Strange things I have in mind, that go to hand;
Which must be done before they can be scanned.
MRS: You lack one thing from Mother Nature—sleep.
MCBETH: Let’s go to sleep. My strange and self-abuse
Is the initial fear, that lacks much use: —
We are still quite young in deed.
(They exit)
SCENE FIVE (Wall Street. The boardroom. Enter Lennox and another board member)
LENNOX: What I said before has just touched your thoughts;
You can interpret further; except, I say,
Things have been strangely done. The gracious Duncan
Was pitied by McBeth:—by God, he was dead:—
And the righteous, good man Banquo walked too late;
He, you might say, if you want, Fleance killed,
‘Cause Fleance fled. Men must not walk too late.
Who cannot just wonder how monstrous
It was for Malcolm and for Donalbain
To kill their gracious father? Damned fact!
And it did grieve McBeth! Didn’t he kill,
In pious rage, the two delinquents there,
Who were the slaves of drink and bonds of sleep?
Wasn’t that nobly done? Yes, and wisely, too;
It would have angered any heart alive,
To hear them deny it. So I do say
He has held up quite well; and I do think
If he had Duncan’s sons under his key,—
And thank heaven that he shall not,—they would find
What it meant to kill their dad; so would Fleance.
There’s more!—‘cause of big words, and ‘cause he failed
To show up at the tyrant’s feast, I hear
McDuff lives in disgrace. Sir, can you tell
Where he has housed himself?
MAN: The son of Duncan
From whom this tyrant holds what’s due from birth,
Went to upstate New York; he was received
There by his old friend, Edward, with such grace
That even the recent misfortune and things
Can’t take away respect; and there McDuff
Has gone to ask of Mr. King, a little aid
To wake Northumberland, and warlike Seward:
That, with the help of these,—with God above
To ratify the work,—we may again
Give to ourselves some meat, sleep during night;
Free our feasts and banquets from bloody knives;
Give loyal respect, and receive free honors,—
All that we ache for now: and this report
Has so exasperated McBeth he
Prepares for some attempt of war.
LENNOX: He
sent for McDuff/
MAN: He did: and with an absolute, Sir, not I,
The chairman of the board then turned his back,
And hummed, as if to say, Regret the time
That blocks me with his answer.
LENNOX: And that might well
Advise McDuff to caution, to keep what distance
His wisdom can provide. You should have someone
Fly to the place in upstate, deliver
These words before he comes; that a swift blessing
May soon return to our suffering company
Under a hand accursed.
MAN: I’ll send my prayers with him.
(They exit; end of Act Three)
ACT FOUR
SCENE ONE (A dark alley or perhaps a location under a bridge; a boiling pot is in the middle. Thunder; enter the three women)
WOMAN 1: Three times the spotted cat mewed.
WOMAN 2: Three times; once the hedgehog whined.
WOMAN 3: The harpy cries: — it’s time, it’s time.
WOMAN 1: Round about the kettle go;
Now the poisoned entrails, throw,—
Toad that has spent thirty-one
Days and nights under cold stone;
Oozed venom your sleeping got,
You boil first in the charmed pot!
ALL: Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire, burn; and cauldron, bubble.
WOMAN 2: Filet of a garter snake—
In the cauldron, boil and bake;
Eye of newt, and toe of frog,
Hair of bat, and tongue of dog,
Adder’s tongue, and lizard’s sting,
Lizard’s leg, and owlet’s wing,—
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.
WOMAN 3: Scale of reptile, tooth of wolf,
Witches’ mummy, jaw and gut
Of the devoured great white shark,
Root of hemlock dug in the dark,
Liver of blasphemer too,
Bile of goat, and slips of yew
Slivered in the moon’s eclipse,
Nose of one, another’s lips,
Finger of a stillborn babe,
Ditch-delivered in a cab,—
Make it thick as a slab:
Add to this a tiger’s entrails,
For the ingredients of our big pail.
ALL: Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire, burn; and cauldron, bubble.
WOMAN 2: Cool it with a baboon’s blood,
Then the charm if firm and good.
ALL (singing):Black spirits and white, red spirits and grey;
Mingle, mingle, mingle, mingle you that may.
WOMAN 2: By the pricking of my thumbs,
Something wicked this way comes:—
Open, locks, whoever knocks!
(Enter McBeth)
MCBETH: Hey now, you secret, dark, and ugly hags!
What do you do!
ALL: A deed without a name.
MCBETH: I beg of you, by that which you profess,—
However you come to know it,—tell me:
Though you unleash the winds, and let them fight
Against the churches; though the crashing waves
Confound and swallow navigation up;
Though ears of corn be lodged, and trees blown down;
Though houses topple on their owner’s heads
Though palaces and pyramids all slope
Their tops to their foundations; though the treasure
Of nature’s sprouters tumble altogether;
Even though destruction quickens,—answer me
That which I ask you.
WOMAN 1: Speak.
WOMAN 2: Demand.
WOMAN 3: We’ll answer.
WOMAN 1: Say if you’d rather hear it from our mouths
Or from our masters?
MCBETH: Call ‘em, let me see ‘em.
WOMAN 1: Pour in sow’s blood, that has eaten
Her own furrow; grease that’s sweetened
On the murderer’s gallows throw
Into the flame.
ALL: Come high or low;
Yourself and office deftly show!
(Thunder; an apparition of an armed head appears)
MCBETH: Tell me, you unknown power,—
WOMAN 1: He knows your thoughts:
Hear him speak, but you speak not.
HEAD: McBeth! McBeth! McBeth! beware McDuff;
Beware this board member.—Dismiss me:—Enough.
(The apparition disappears)
MCBETH: Whatever you are, for your caution, thanks;
You have uttered my fear right; but one word more—,
WOMAN 1: He will not be commanded: here’s another,
More potent than the first.
(Thunder. An apparition of a bloody child appears)
CHILD: McBeth! McBeth! McBeth!—
MCBETH: Had I no ears, I’d hear you.
CHILD: Be bloody, bold, and resolute; laugh and scorn
The powerful man, ‘cause none of woman born
Will harm McBeth.
(The apparition disappears)
MCBETH: Then live McDuff: I have no fear of you!
But still I’ll make assurance double sure,
And make a bond with fate: you shall not live;
So I can tell pale-hearted fear it lies,
And sleep in spite of thunder.—What is this,
(Thunder. An apparition of a crowned child, with a tree in its hand, appears)
That rises like the child of a king
And wears upon his baby brow a crown,
The sign of sovereignty?
ALL: Listen; don’t speak to it.
2ND CHILD: Be lion-hearted, proud, and take no care
Who chafes, who frets, or where conspirers are:
McBeth shall never be vanquished, until
His forest comes up his property’s hill
To fight against him.
(The apparition disappears)
MCBETH: That will never be:
Who can pressure the forest; ask the trees
To move their earth-bound roots? Sweet omens! Good!
Rebellion’s head will not rise, til the woods
Near my house rise, and the high-placed McBeth
Will live til he’s quite mature, give his breath
To time and mortal custom.—Still me heart
Throbs to know one thing: tell me,—if your art
Can tell so much,—will Banquo’s children ever
Run the company?
ALL: Seek to know no more.
MCBETH: I will be satisfied: deny me this,
And an eternal curse falls on you! Let me know:—
(Cauldron disappears; music of oboes)
Where is the cauldron? and what noise is this?
WOMAN 1: Show!
WOMAN 2: Show!
WOMAN 3: Show!
ALL: Show his eyes and grieve his heart;
Come like shadows, and depart!
(Eight figures appear, and pass over in order, the last with a glass in his hand, Banquo following)
MCBETH: You’re too much like the spirit of Banquo; down!
This sight does burn my eyeballs: and the hair,
The second golden brow is like the first:—
The third is like the second.—Filthy hags!
Why do you show me this?—A fourth?—My eyes!
What! Will the line stretch out to the end of time?
Another yet?—A seventh?—I’ll see no more:—
And now an eighth appears, who holds a glass
That shows me many more; and some I see
That two great names and triple holdings carry.
Horrible sight!—Now, I see, it’s true;
Now the blood-covered Banquo smiles upon me,
And points them out as his.—What! is this so?
WOMAN 1: Yes, sir, all this is so: but why
Do you stand so amazedly?—
Come, ladies, cheer up his spirits,
And show the best of our delights;
I’ll charm the air to make a sound,
You perform an antic around;
So this great man may kindly say
Our duties we did do today.
(Music; the women dance, then vanish)
MCBETH: Where are they? Gone?—Let this pernicious hour
Stand as if cursed in the calendar!—
Come here, you out there.
(Enter Lennox)
LENNOX: What’s your gracious will?
MCBETH: Did you see those women?
LENNOX: I didn’t.
MCBETH: Didn’t they pass by?
LENNOX: No, they didn’t, sir.
MCBETH: Infected be the air on which they ride;
And damned all those who trust them!—I did hear
The sound of a car: who was it came by?
LENNOX: It’s two or three, chairman, who bring you word
McDuff has fled to upstate.
MCBETH: Fled to upstate!
LENNOX: Yes, my word, boss.
MCBETH: Time, you anticipated my exploits:
The dreamy purpose is never surpassed
Unless the deed goes with it: from this moment
The first ideas of my heart will be
The actions of my hands. And even now,
To crown my thoughts with acts, make it thought and done:
The mansion of McDuff I will surprise;
A siege on it; give to the edge of the sword
His wife, his kids, and all unfortunate souls
That follow in his line. No boasting like a fool;
This I will do before the purpose cools:
But no more sight!—Where are these gentlemen?
Well, take me where they are.
(They exit)
SCENE TWO (McDuff’s living room; Enter Mrs. McDuff, her son, and Ross)
MRS. MCD: What has he done, that he’d go on the lam?
ROSS: You must have patience, madam.
MRS. MCD: He had none:
His flight was madness: when our actions do not
Our fears do make us traitors.
ROSS: You don’t know
Whether it was his wisdom or his fear.
MRS. MCD: Wisdom! to leave his wife, to leave his kids,
His mansion, and his title, in a place
From which he quickly flies? He fails in love:
He lacks the natural touch; take the poor wren,
The most diminutive of birds—she’ll fight
With young ones in her nest against the owl.
ROSS: My dearest cuz,
I beg you, calm yourself: as for your husband,
He is noble, wise, judicious, and best knows
The fits of the season. I cannot speak much further:
But the times are cruel, when we are traitors,
And do not know ourselves; when we tell rumors
About our fears, but don’t know what we fear;
We float upon a wild and violent sea
Each time we move.—I must go away from you:
It won’t be long before I’m back again:
At the worst it will end, or else go back to
The way things were before.—My pretty cousin,
Blessings upon you!
MRS. MCD: He has a dad, and yet he’s fatherless.
ROSS: I’d really be a fool, if I stayed longer;
It would be my disgrace and your discomfort:
I must leave now at once.
(He exits)
MRS. MCD: My son, your father’s dead.
And what will you do now? How will you live?
SON: Like birds do, mother.
MRS. MCD: What, with worms and flies?
SON: With what I get, I mean; and so do they.
MRS. MCD: Poor bird! you’d never fear the nets or snares,
The pitfalls or the traps.
SON: Why should I, Mother? They are not set for poor birds.
My father is not dead, for all your saying.
MRS. MCD: Yes, he is dead: what will you do for a father?
SON: No, what will you do for a husband?
MRS. MCD: Why, I can buy me twenty at any market.
SON: Then you’ll buy them to sell them again.
MRS. MCD: You speak with all your wit, and yet, in faith,
With wit enough for you.
SON: Was my father a traitor, Mother?
MRS. MCD: Yes, that he was.
SON: What is a traitor?
MRS MCD: Well, one who swears and lies.
SON: They are all traitors who do so?
MRS. MCD: Everyone who does so is a traitor, and should be hanged.
SON: And should all those who swear and lie be hanged?
MRS. MCD: Every one.
SON: Who would hang them?
MRS. MCD: Why, the honest men.
SON: Then the liars and swearers are fools: ‘cause there are liars and swearers enough to beat the honest men, and hang them up.
MRS. MCD: Now, God help you, poor monkey! But what will you do for a father?
SON: If he was dead, you’d cry for him: if you didn’t, it would be a sign that I would quickly have a new father.
MRS. MCD: Poor prattler! How you talk.
(Enter a messenger)
MESSGR: Bless you, madam! I am not known to you,
Though in your state of honor I am perfect.
I think some degree of danger approaches you nearby:
If you will take a humble man’s advice,
Don’t be found here; go, with your little ones.
To scare you so, I think, I am too savage;
To do worse to you would be cruelty,
Which is too near your person. Heaven preserve you!
I can’t stay any longer.
(Messenger exits)
MRS. MCD: So where should I fly?
I have done no harm. But I remember now
I am on this earthly world; where to do harm
Is often laudable; to do good, sometimes
Counts as a dangerous folly: why then, at last,
Do I put up a womanly defense,
To say I have done no harm?—Who are these people?
(Enter murderers)
KILLER 1: Where is your husband?
MRS MC.D: I hope in no place so unsanctified
That men like you could find him.
KILLER 1: He’s a traitor.
SON: You lie, you long-haired hellion.
(Killer 1 stabs the son)
KILLER 1: What, you pig?
Little son of a bitch!
SON: He has killed me, Mother:
Run away, I beg you!
(Son dies; exit Mrs. McDuff, crying murder; pursued by the murderers)
SCENE THREE (Upstate New York. At Edward’s place; Enter Malcolm and McDuff)
MALCOM: Let us search out some desolate shade, and there
Cry our sad bosoms empty.
MCDUFF: I would rather
We held a mortal sword, and, like good men
Walk in our down-fallen home: each morning
New widows bawl; new orphans cry; new sadness
Slaps heaven in the face, til it resounds
Like it was the company, and yells out
A syllable of sorrow.
MALCOM: What I believe, I’ll tell;
What I know, believe; what I can redress,
And I will find the time to, friend, I will.
What you have said, it may be so by chance.
This tyrant, whose one name blisters our tongues,
Was once thought honest; you have loved him well;
He has not touched you yet. I am young; whatever
You have coming from him, use me, have wisdom
To offer up a weak, poor, innocent lamb
To appease an angry god.
MCDUFF: I am not treacherous.
MALCOM: But McBeth is.
A good and virtuous nature might recoil
From an executive charge. But I will beg your pardon
That which you are, my thoughts cannot transpose;
Angels are bright still, though the brightest fell:
Though foul things would all wear the brows of grace,
Grace must still look like this.
MCDUFF: I have lost my hopes.
MALCOM: It might even be there where I found my doubts.
Why did you, I ask, leave your wife and child,—
Those precious motives, those strong knots of love,—
Without a goodbye? — I beg you,
Don’t let my jealousies be your dishonors,
But my own safeties: you may be rightly just,
Whatever I might think.
MCDUFF: Bleed, poor company.
Great tyranny, lay down your basis sure,
‘Cause goodness dares not check you; and wear your wrongs,
Your title is afraid. — Farewell, Malcolm:
I could not be the villain that you think
For the whole corporation in his grasp
And the rich east to boot.
MALCOLM: Don’t be offended:
I don’t speak because of just the fear of you.
I think the company will sink to broke;
It weeps, it bleeds; and each new day a gash
Is added to its wounds: I think, perhaps,
There would be hands lifted up for my rights;
And here, from upstate New York, I have offers
Of many thousands: but, despite this,
When I have stepped upon the tyrant’s head,
Or cut it off with my sword, then the company
Would have more vices than it had before;
More will suffer, and by more ways than ever,
By he who will succeed.
MCDUFF: Who should it be?
MALCOLM: It is myself I mean: in whom I know
All the particulars of vice so grafted
That, when they shall be known, dark McBeth
Will seem as pure as snow; and the board may
Then see him as a lamb, being compared
With my unconfined harms.
MCDUFF: Not in the legions
Of horrid hell can there be a man more damned
In evil than our McBeth.
MALCOLM: He is quite bloody,
And indulgent, avaricious, false, deceitful,
Hasty, malicious, smacking of every sin
That has a name: but there’s no bottom, none,
To my lust and horniness: your wives, your daughters,
Your mothers, and your maids, could not fill up
The cistern of my lust; and my desire
Would not bear any of the impediments
Of those against my will: better McBeth
Than one like me in charge.
MCDUFF: This immoderation
In you can be a tyranny; it has been
The untimely ending of many happy homes,
Not good for anything. But do not fear
To claim for yourself what is yours: you can
Enjoy your pleasures, and you can have plenty,
But still seem cold; the whole time you can hoodwink.
We have enough willing women; there can’t be
So much lust in you, you’d devour as many
As will dedicated themselves to greatness,
Finding them so inclined.
MALCOM: With this there is
In my wretched personality, such
A quenchless avarice, that, if in charge,
I would cut off stockholders for their land;
Desire one’s jewels, and another’s house:
And my having more would be like a sauce
To make me hunger more; then I would start
Unjust quarrels against the good and loyal,
Destroying them for wealth.
MCDUFF: This greediness
Lies deeper; grows with more pernicious root
Than summer-seeming lust; and it has been
The sword of slain leaders: still, do not fear;
The board has millions to fill up your till,
All of your own: all these are portable,
With other things weighed.
MALCOLM: But I have none of a C. E. O.’s graces,
Like justice, truthfulness, temperance, stableness,
Drive, generosity, mercy, humbleness,
Devotion, patience, courage, fortitude,
I’ve no appetite for them; but abound
In the division of my every crime,
Doing it many ways. No, if I had power, I’d
Pour the sweet milk of accord into hell,
Upset the universal peace, confound
All unity on earth.
MCDUFF: Oh my God, my God!
MALCOLM: If one like me is fit to preside, speak:
I am just like I said.
MCDUFF: Fit to preside.
No, not to live!—miserable company,
With an untitled tyrant all blood-covered,
When will you see your wholesome days again,
Now that the truest heir of the top seat,
By his own condemnation, stands accursed,
And shames his family? Your good old father
Was a most sainted man, the mom who held you
More often upon her knees than on her feet,
Died every day she lived. So farewell!
The evils you repeat about yourself
Have banished me from the board.—I need a rest,
My hope ends here!
MALCOLM: McDuff, this noble passion
Child of integrity, has taken all
The black from my soul, reconciled my thoughts
To you good truth and honor. Devilish McBeth,
By many of these things, has sought to win me
Into his power; a little wisdom kept me
From over-credulous haste: but God above
Dealt between you and me!, ‘cause even now
I place myself under your direction,
Take back my own detraction; and take back
The taints and sins I laid down on myself.
They’re strangers to my nature. I’m still a
Virgin with women; I have never sworn,
Have coveted nothing but what I own,
Never broke with my faith; would not betray
The devil to his fellow; and delight
No less in truth than life: My first lie ever
Was this about myself: — what I am truly,
Is yours, and the company’s, to command:
It was, in fact, before the near approach
Of Seward, with ten thousand of his men,
Before the point that they had set forth:
Let’s work together; and the chance of goodness
Will be our reason to quarrel. Why are you silent?
MCDUFF: Such welcome and unwelcome things at once
Are hard to reconcile. Look, who comes here?
MALCOLM: A company man; but I don’t know him.
(Enter Ross)
MCDUFF: My every-gentle cousin, welcome to you.
MALCOLM: I know him now. Dear God, in time remove
The means that make us strangers!
ROSS: Yeah, amen.
MCDUFF: Do things stand as they did?
ROSS: Yes, poor company,—
Almost afraid to know itself! It cannot
Be called our mother, but our grave: where no one,
And I mean no one, is once seen to smile;
Where sighs, and groans, and shrieks, that split the air,
Are made, not marked; where violent sorrow seems
A modern ecstasy; funeral bells
Ring—no one asks for who; and good men’s lives
Expire before the flowers in their caps,
Dying before they sicken.
MCDUFF: Ross, my cousin,
Too nice, and yet too true!
MALCOLM: What’s the newest grief?
ROSS: That from an hour past does not mean a thing;
Each minute there’s a new one.
MCDUFF: How is my wife?
ROSS: Why, well.
MCDUFF: And all my children?
ROSS: Well too.
MCDUFF: The tyrant has not gotten at their peace?
ROSS: No; they were all at peace there when I left them.
MCDUFF: Don’t be stingy with your speech. How goes it?
ROSS: When I came out here to bring you all the news,
Which has been heavily borne, there was a rumor
That many worthy fighters were out
And the truth of this I witnessed in the way
In which I saw the tyrant’s power afoot:
Now is the time to help; having you back home
Would create battlers, make our women fight,
To end their dire distresses.
MALCOLM: To their comfort
We are coming back soon: gracious Edward has
Loaned us old Seward, and ten thousand men.
There’s no older or a better fighter
In all of Christendom.
ROSS: If I could answer
This comfort with the same! But I have words
That should be howled out in the desert air,
Where hearing could not catch them.
MCDUFF: So what are they?
The general cause? Or is it a lone grief
For someone’s single breast?
ROSS: No mind that’s honest
Could fail to share the woe; though the main part
Pertains to you alone.
MCDUFF: If it is mine,
Don’t keep it from me; quickly, let me have it.
ROSS: Don’t let your ears despise my tongue forever,
Which shall present them with the heaviest sound
That they have ever heard.
MCDUFF: Hmm. I can guess it.
ROSS: Your house has been surprised; your wife and kids
Savagely slaughtered: to relate the matter,
In addition to all those murdered dears,
They were to kill you too.
MALCOLM: Merciful heaven!—
Don’t man; don’t pull your hat down on your brows:
Give sorrow word: the grief that does not speak
Whispers the wrought heart, and begs it to break.
MCDUFF: My children too?
ROSS: Wife, children, servants, all
That could be found.
MCDUFF: And I am gone from there!
My wife killed too?
ROSS: I have said.
MALCOLM: Be comforted.
Let us make medicines from our great revenge,
To cure this deadly grief.
MCDUFF: He has no children.—All my pretty ones?
Did you say all? —Oh hell-kite! — All?
What, all my pretty children and their mom
At one fell swoop?
MALCOLM: Dispute it like a man.
MCDUFF: I will do so;
But I must also feel it like a man:
I can’t help but think that there were no things
That were more precious to me.—Did heaven look on,
And then not help them out? Sinful McDuff,
They were all slain for me!, jerk that I am.
Not for their own demerits, but for mine,
Slaughter fell on their souls: heaven rest them now!
MALCOLM: Let this be your call to anger; let grief
Convert to anger; don’t blunt the heart, enrage it.
MCDUFF: Oh, I could ply the teardrops from my eyes,
And brag on with my tongue! —But, gentle heavens,
Cut short intermission, face to face
Bring the chairman of the board and myself;
Put him within an arm’s length; if he lives,
Heaven forgive him too!
MALCOLM: This sounds more manly.
Quick, let’s go to Edward; our power is ready;
Our lack is only our leaving; McBeth
Is ripe for taking, and the powers above
Put on their armaments. Receive what cheer you may:
The night is long that never finds the day.
(They exit; end of Act Four)
ACT FIVE
SCENE ONE (McBeth’s house. A room. Enter a doctor and a maid)
DOCTOR: For two nights I’ve watched with you, but I can see no truth in your report. When did she last sleepwalk?
MAID: Since the chairman went out to the field, I have seen her rise from her bed, put her nightgown upon her, unlock her closet, take out paper, fold it, write something down, read, afterwards seal it, and again return to bed, and all the while in most deep sleep.
DOCTOR: A great agitation from nature,—to get at one time the benefit of sleep, and also be able to watch!—In this slumbery state of hers, besides her walking and other actual performances, what, at any time, have you heard her say?
MAID: That, sir, which I will not tattle about her.
DOCTOR: You may to me; and it’s proper you should.
MAID: Not to you or to anyone; having no witness to confirm my words. So look, here she comes!
(Enter Mrs. McBeth with a candle or flashlight)
This is the way it goes; and, I swear to God, fast asleep. Observe her; stand close.
DOCTOR: Where did she get that light?
MAID: Well, it stays by her; she has light by her continually; it’s her command.
DOCTOR: You see, her eyes are open.
MAID: Yes, their sense is shut.
DOCTOR: What’s she doing now? Look, how she rubs her hands.
MAID: It’s the customary action with her, to look as if washing hands: I’ve known her to continue in this a quarter of an hour.
MRS: And here’s a spot.
DOCTOR: Wait! she speaks: I’ll just get down what she says, to satisfy my memory a bit more strongly.
(The doctor can do this with a notepad, tape device, cell phone, etc.)
MRS: Out, damned spot! out, I say!—One, two: why, it’s time to do it: Hell is murky! Shame, my man, shame!, a soldier, and afraid? Why do we fear who knows it, when none can call our power to account? — Yet who would have thought the old man would have had so much blood in him?
DOCTOR: Did you hear that?
MRS: The board member had a wife; where is she now?— Will these hands never be clean, never be clean?— No more of that, McBeth, no more of that: you ruin things with this starting.
DOCTOR: Get out, get out; you have known what you should not.
MAID: She has said what she should not, I am sure of that; heaven knows what she has known.
MRS: Here’s the smell of the blood still: all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh, oh, oh!
DOCTOR: What a sigh that is! Her heart is sorely charged.
MAID: I would not have such a heart in my bosom for the dignity of the whole body.
DOCTOR: Well, well, well,—
MAID: Pray God it is, sir.
DOCTOR: This disease is beyond my practice: but I have known those who have walked in their sleep who have died quite holy in their beds.
MRS: Wash your hands, put on your nightclothes; don’t look so pale: —I tell you once again, Banquo’s buried; he can’t come out of his grave.
DOCTOR: Even so?
MRS: To bed, to bed; there’s knocking at the door: come, come, come, come, give me your hand: what’s done cannot be undone: to bed, to bed, to bed.
(Mrs. McBeth exits)
DOCTOR: Will she go to bed now?
MAID: Directly.
DOCTOR: Foul whisperings are abroad, unnatural deeds
Will breed unnatural troubles: infected minds
With their deaf pillows will tell all their secrets.
She needs the divine more than a physician.—
God, God forgive us all! — Look after her.
Remove from her all the means of annoyance,
But still keep your eyes on her: —so, good night:
My mind she’s confounded, and amazed my sight:
I think, but dare not speak.
MAID: Good night, good doctor.
(They exit)
SCENE TWO (The countryside a short distance from McBeth’s estate. Enter Menteith, Caithness, Angus, Lennox, and others; they are playing music)
MENTEITH: Our Edward’s power is near, led on by Malcolm,
His uncle, Seward, and Mister McDuff.
Revenge burns all through them; and their dear causes
Would to the bleeding and the grim alarm
Excite even a shamed man.
ANGUS: Near McBeth’s woods
We will meet them all; that’s the way they’re coming.
CAITHNESS: Who knows if Donalbain is with his brother?
LENNOX: I’m certain that he is not; I have a file
Of all the fighters: there is Seward’s son,
And many softened youths, who even now
Protest this test of manhood.
MENTEITH: What about McBeth?
CAITHNESS: His household he has strongly fortified:
Some say he’s mad; others, who don’t yet hate him,
Call his acts valiant fury: but, it’s certain
He can’t stick to his disastrous course
Without losing his rule.
ANGUS: And does he feel
His secret murders stabbing at this hands;
Now many small revolts scold him for his breach;
Those he commands move only on command,
Not out of love: Now he feels like his title
Hangs loose around him, like a giant’s robe
Worn by a dwarfish thief.
MENTEITH: Who, then, could blame
The troubled senses that jump back and start,
When all that is inside his heart condemns
Itself for being there?
CAITHNESS: Well, let’s move on,
To be obedient where it’s truly owed:
Let us make medicine for the sickly world
And so we pour, in our company’s name,
Each drop of us.
LENNOX: Or as much as it needs,
To water the proper flower, and drown the weeds.
Let’s make our march towards the woods.
(They exit)
SCENE THREE (McBeth’s house; a room. Enter McBeth, doctor, and others)
MCBETH: Bring me no more reports; that goes for all:
Til my own woods move up to my own home
I cannot live in fear. What’s the boy, Malcolm?
Wasn’t he born of woman? The spirits that know
All deadly consequences told me in these words,—
Don’t fear, McBeth; no man who’s born of woman
Can ever overpower you. — Then go, false ones,
And mingle with old Edward’s epicures:
The mind I rule with, and the heart I wear
Will never quake with doubt or shake with fear.
(Enter a servant)
The devil damn you black, you white-faced loon!
Why do you have that look?
SERVANT: There are ten thousand—
MCBETH: Geese, villain?
SERVANT: Fighters, sir.
MCBETH: Go, prick your face, and overcome your fear,
You yellow-bellied boy. What fighters, fool?
Death of your soul! those ashen cheeks of yours
Are certain signs of fear. What fighters, white-face?
SERVANT: Edward’s fighters, I tell you.
MCBETH: Get that face out.
(Servant exits)
Seyton!—I am sick at heart,
When I look at—Seyton, I say!—This push
Will keep me chairman, or unseat me now.
I have lived long enough: my way of life
Has all but disappeared, the yellow leaf;
And that which should accompany old age,
Like honor, love, obedience, lots of friends,
I will not ever have; I’ll have instead
Curses not loud but deep, lip service, breath
That the heart would gladly deny, but dares not.
Seyton!—
SEYTON: What is your gracious pleasure?
MCBETH: Any more?
SEYTON: All is confirmed, chairman, that was reported.
MCBETH: I’ll fight until my bones and flesh are hacked.
Get my bulletproof.
SEYTON: It’s not needed yet.
MCBETH: I’ll put it on.
Send out more cronies; search the land around;
Kill those who talk of fear. —Give me my vest now.—
How is your patient, doctor?
DOCTOR: Not so sick, chairman,
As she is troubled with discomforting fancies
That keep her from rest.
MCBETH: Cure her of that:
Why can’t you minister to a mind diseased;
Take from the memory a planted sorrow;
Erase the written troubles of the brain;
And with some sweet oblivious antidote
Clean out the bosom of the dangerous stuff
That weighs upon the heart?
DOCTOR: For that the patient
Must minister to herself.
MCBETH: Throw healing to the dogs,—I don’t want it.—
Come, put my vest on now; give me my gun:—
Seyton, head out.—Doctor, they all run from me.—
Go on, hurry.—If you could, Doctor, drain
The water on my land, find her disease,
And bring it to a sound and pristine health,
I would applaud you to the return echo
When it applauds again.—Do it, I say.—
What new herb, fauna, or what purgative drug,
Would get usurpers out? You heard of them?
DOCTOR: Yes, my good sir; your noisy preparation
Made us hear something.
MCBETH: Bring it to me.
I will not be afraid of death or war,
Til my own forest comes to my front door.
(Exit all but doctor)
DOCTOR: If I lived in this house, I would get clear.
Profit and gain would hardly draw me near.
(Doctor exits)
SCENE FOUR (The countryside; forest in view. Enter Malcolm, Seward Sr. and Jr., McDuff, Menteith, Caithness, Angus, Lennox, Ross, and others, with music, etc.)
MALCOLM: My friends, I hope the days are close at hand
That we all will be safe.
MENTEITH: We don’t doubt a thing.
SEWARD SR: What woods are these before us?
MENTEITH: The woods of McBeth.
MALCOLM: Let every one of you cut down a bough,
And hold it near him; that way we will cover
The numbers of our group, and let those who spy
Think there are more of us.
FIGHTER: It will be done.
SEWARD SR: We know no one else but the confident tyrant
Will stay in his mansion; they won’t endure
Us knocking down the door.
MALCOLM: It’s his main hope:
That where there is advantage to be given
Both more and less have given him the revolt;
And none work for him but bonded thugs
Whose hearts are absent too.
MCDUFF: Let our just and sure
Cause beat this event, and let’s put on
Industrious comradeship.
SEWARD SR: The time approaches
That will, with the decision, make us know
What we now say we have, and what we owe
Speculative thought relate their unsure hopes;
But certain things are decided by strokes:
Toward that, let’s go to war.
(They exit
SCENE FIVE (Inside McBeth’s house. Enter McBeth, Seyton, and others)
MCBETH: Hang out our banners on the outside walls;
The cry is still, They come: my mansion’s strength
Will laugh siege to scorn: here they can lie
Til famine and disease eat them up:
If they weren’t joined with those who should be ours,
We might have met them up front, face to face,
And beat them back to home.
(A cry of women from another room)
What is that noise?
SEYTON: It is the cry of women, my good sir.
(Seyton exits)
MCBETH: I’d almost forgotten the taste of fears:
There was a time my senses would have cooled
To hear a night shriek; and my head of hair
Would rouse and stir at a scary story
As if alive: I have dined full with horrors;
Direness, familiar to slaughterous thoughts,
Cannot once scare me.
(Seyton reenters)
So what was that cry?
SEYTON: Mrs. McBeth is dead.
MCBETH: She should have died after this;
There would have been a time for such a thing,—
Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow
Creeps at this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lit for fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow; a poor player,
Who struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
(Enter a messenger)
If you have to say something, say it quickly.
MSSGR: Sorry, chairman,
I should report that which I think I saw,
But don’t know how to do it.
MCBETH: Well, say it.
MSSGR: As I was standing watch up on the hill,
I looked toward the woods; before long, I thought
The woods began to move.
MCBETH: Liar, and knave!
(McBeth strikes the messenger)
MSSGR: Let me endure your wrath, if it’s not so.
For about three miles you can see it coming;
I swear, a moving grove.
MCBETH: If you speak false,
Upon the next tree you will hang alive,
Til famine claims you: If your words are true,
I don’t care if you do as much for me.—
I tug at resolution; and begin
To doubt the equivocation of the fiends
That lie like truth: Don’t fear, til your own woods
Come up to your own home; —and now the woods
Come up to my mansion. —Arm, arm, and out!—
If this thing that he swears on appears,
There is no escaping or delaying here.
I begin to grow weary of the sun,
And wish that the end of the world was now to come.
Ring the alarm bell! Blow, wind!, come wreck!
At least we’ll die with weapons on our backs.
(They exit)
SCENE SIX (McBeth estate; a field. Enter Malcolm, Seward Sr., McDuff, and others)
MALCOLM: We’re close enough; the camouflage is done;
Now act like who you are. —You, worthy uncle,
Will, with my cousin, your so noble son,
Lead our first battle: worthy McDuff and me
Will take whatever else remains to do,
According to our orders.
SEWARD SR: So do well.—
If we just find the tyrant’s power tonight,
Let us be beaten, if we cannot fight.
MCDUFF: Make all our actions speak; give them all breath,
The clamorous harbingers of blood and death.
SCENE SEVEN (Another part of the field. Enter McBeth)
MCBETH: They have tied me to a stake; I cannot run,
But, bear-like, I must fight the force.—What’s he
Who was not born of woman? That’s the one
I am to fear, or none.
(Enter Seward, Jr.)
SEWARD JR: What is your name?
MCBETH: You’d be afraid to hear it.
SEWARD JR: No; though you call yourself a hotter name
Than any that’s in hell.
MCBETH: My name’s McBeth.
SEWARD JR: The devil himself could not pronounce a title
More hateful to my ear.
MCBETH: No, or more fearful.
SEWARD JR: You lie, hated tyrant; with my knife
I’ll prove the lie you speak.
(They fight; Seward, Jr. is killed)
MCBETH: You were born of woman—
But knives I smile at, weapons laugh to scorn,
Carried by man that’s of a woman born.
(Exits. Enter McDuff)
MCDUFF: That way the noise is. —Tyrant, show your face!
If you are killed, and with a stroke not mine,
My wife and children’s ghosts will haunt me still.
I cannot strike at wretched pawns, whose guns
Are hired, and act like slaves; either you, McBeth,
Or else my knife, with an unbuttered edge,
I’ll keep, as if unneeded. There you should be;
Near all the clatter, one of greatest note
Seems suited. Let me find him, fortune!
I beg for no more.
(Exits. Enter Malcolm and Seward, Sr.)
SEWARD SR: This way, Malcolm; the mansion’s near surrender:
The tyrant’s people fight on both sides now;
The board members are brave in a turf war;
The day itself is almost fully yours,
And little’s left to do.
MALCOLM: We have met with foes
That come beside us.
SEWARD DR: Enter, sir, the mansion.
(They exit)
SCENE EIGHT (Another part of the field. Enter McBeth)
MCBETH: What, should I play the Roman fool, and die
On my own knife? while I see lives, the gashes
Look better on them.
(Enter McDuff)
MCDUFF: Turn, hell-hound, turn.
MCBETH: Of all men here I have avoided you.
But move on back; my soul is too much charged
With blood of yours already.
MCDUFF: I have no words,—
My voice is in my knife: a bloodier villain
Than words can talk about!
(They fight)
MCBETH: You waste your labor.
It would be as easy to kill air
With your knife’s keen sharpness, as make be bleed:
Let your blade fall on vulnerable chests;
I have a charmed life, which will not yield
To one of woman born.
MCDUFF: Then damn your charm;
And let the angel who you will not serve
Tell you, McDuff was taken from the womb
By C-section.
MCBETH: Let it be cursed, the tongue that tells me so,
‘Cause it has scared the hell out of me!
And so these juggling fiends I can’t believe,
Who fiddle with us in a double sense;
Who keep their word and promise to our ears,
And break it to our hope! I won’t fight with you.
MCDUFF: Then give up coward,
And live to be the circus show of all time.
We’ll have you, like some rarer monsters are,
Strung up on a pole, and underwritten,
Here you may see the tyrant.
MCBETH: I will not yield,
To kiss the ground before young Malcolm’s feet,
And to be bait for the common man’s curse.
Tough my own woods have come to my mansion,
And opposing you, not technically born,
I will still try to the last. Before my body
I throw a warlike shield: come on, McDuff;
And damned is the one who cries, Stop! Enough!
(They exit, fight. Enter Malcolm, Seward, Sr., Ross, Lennox, and others)
MALCOLM: I wish the friends we miss had all arrived.
SEWARD SR: Some must die off; and yet, by this I see
So great a day as this is cheaply bought.
MALCOLM: McDuff is missing, and your noble son.
ROSS: Your son, Seward, has paid a fighter’s debt:
He only lived until he was a man;
I hear as soon as his prowess was confirmed
There in the gutsy station where he fought
That like a man he died.
SEWARD SR: Then he is dead?
ROSS: Yes, and brought from the field: your cause of sorrow
Must not be measured by his worth, because
It has no end.
SEWARD SR: Had he been hurt before?
ROSS: Yes, in the front.
SEWARD SR: Well, then, God’s soldier was he!
If I had fathered more sons than I have hairs,
I could not wish them to a better death:
And so the bell has tolled.
MALCOLM: He’s worth more sorrow
And that I’ll spend for him.
SEWARD SR: He’s worth no more:
They say he parted well, and paid his score:
And so, God be with him!—Here comes other comfort.
(Enter McDuff, with McBeth’s head)
MCDUFF: Hail, chairman!, so you are: behold, here stands
The usurper’s cursed head: the time is free:
I see you circled with your boardroom’s pearls
Who speak my salutation in their minds;
Whose voices I desire aloud with mine,—
Chairman of the Board!
ALL: Chairman of the Board!
MALCOLM: We will not spend a large amount of time
Before we make up for your several loves
And make things even with you. My stockholders,
You will be heard, the first time the company
Has ever played this game. What’s more to do,
That would be planted freshly in due time,—
But calling home our exiled friends abroad,
Who fled the snares of watchful tyranny;
Thus allowing the cruel ministers
Of this dead butcher, and his fiendish wife,
Who, it is thought, by her own violent hands,
Took her own life,—this, and whatever else
That calls out to us, by the grace of Grace,
We will perform in pleasure, time, and place:
So, thanks to all at once, and to each one,
You’re all invited to the seat we’ve won.
(Exit)
(End)