Ragueneau, Lise, the musketeer. Cyrano at the little table writing. The poets, dressed in black, their stockings ungartered, and covered with mud.
LISE (entering, to Ragueneau): Here they come, your mud-bespattered friends!
FIRST POET (entering, to Ragueneau): Brother in art!. . .
SECOND POET (to Ragueneau, shaking his hands): Dear brother!
THIRD POET: High soaring eagle among pastry-cooks! (He sniffs): Marry! it smells good here in your eyrie!
FOURTH POET: 'Tis at Phoebus' own rays that thy roasts turn!
FIFTH POET: Apollo among master-cooks--
RAGUENEAU (whom they surround and embrace): Ah! how quick a man feels at his ease with them!. . .
FIRST POET: We were stayed by the mob; they are crowded all round the Porte de Nesle!. . .
SECOND POET: Eight bleeding brigand carcasses strew the pavements there--all slit open with sword-gashes!
CYRANO (raising his head a minute): Eight?. . .hold, methought seven.
(He goes on writing.)
RAGUENEAU (to Cyrano): Know you who might be the hero of the fray?
CYRANO (carelessly): Not I.
LISE (to the musketeer): And you? Know you?
THE MUSKETEER (twirling his mustache): Maybe!
CYRANO (writing a little way off:--he is heard murmuring a word from time to time): 'I love thee!'
FIRST POET: 'Twas one man, say they all, ay, swear to it, one man who, single-handed, put the whole band to the rout!
SECOND POET: 'Twas a strange sight!--pikes and cudgels strewed thick upon the ground.
CYRANO (writing): . . .'Thine eyes'. . .
THIRD POET: And they were picking up hats all the way to the Quai d'Orfevres!
FIRST POET: Sapristi! but he must have been a ferocious. . .
CYRANO (same play): . . .'Thy lips'. . .
FIRST POET: 'Twas a parlous fearsome giant that was the author of such exploits!
CYRANO (same play): . . .'And when I see thee come, I faint for fear.'
SECOND POET (filching a cake): What hast rhymed of late, Ragueneau?
CYRANO (same play): . . .'Who worships thee'. . . (He stops, just as he is about to sign, and gets up, slipping the letter into his doublet): No need I sign, since I give it her myself.
RAGUENEAU (to second poet): I have put a recipe into verse.
THIRD POET (seating himself by a plate of cream-puffs): Go to! Let us hear these verses!
FOURTH POET (looking at a cake which he has taken): Its cap is all a' one side!
(He makes one bite of the top.)
FIRST POET: See how this gingerbread woos the famished rhymer with its almond eyes, and its eyebrows of angelica!
(He takes it.)
SECOND POET: We listen.
THIRD POET (squeezing a cream-puff gently): How it laughs! Till its very cream runs over!
SECOND POET (biting a bit off the great lyre of pastry): This is the first time in my life that ever I drew any means of nourishing me from the lyre!
RAGUENEAU (who has put himself ready for reciting, cleared his throat, settled his cap, struck an attitude): A recipe in verse!. . .
SECOND POET (to first, nudging him): You are breakfasting?
FIRST POET (to second): And you dining, methinks.
RAGUENEAU: How almond tartlets are made.
Beat your eggs up, light and quick; Froth them thick; Mingle with them while you beat Juice of lemon, essence fine; Then combine The burst milk of almonds sweet.
Circle with a custard paste The slim waist Of your tartlet-molds; the top With a skillful finger print, Nick and dint, Round their edge, then, drop by drop, In its little dainty bed Your cream shed: In the oven place each mold: Reappearing, softly browned, The renowned Almond tartlets you behold!
THE POETS (with mouths crammed full): Exquisite! Delicious!
A POET (choking): Homph!
(They go up, eating.)
CYRANO (who has been watching, goes toward Ragueneau): Lulled by your voice, did you see how they were stuffing themselves?
RAGUENEAU (in a low voice, smiling): Oh, ay! I see well enough, but I never will seem to look, fearing to distress them; thus I gain a double pleasure when I recite to them my poems; for I leave those poor fellows who have not breakfasted free to eat, even while I gratify my own dearest foible, see you?
CYRANO (clapping him on the shoulder): Friend, I like you right well!. . . (Ragueneau goes after his friends. Cyrano follows him with his eyes, then, rather sharply): Ho there! Lise! (Lise, who is talking tenderly to the musketeer, starts, and comes down toward Cyrano): So this fine captain is laying siege to you?
LISE (offended): One haughty glance of my eye can conquer any man that should dare venture aught 'gainst my virtue.
CYRANO: Pooh! Conquering eyes, methinks, are oft conquered eyes.
LISE (choking with anger): But--
CYRANO (incisively): I like Ragueneau well, and so--mark me, Dame Lise--I permit not that he be rendered a laughing-stock by any. . .
LISE: But. . .
CYRANO (who has raised his voice so as to be heard by the gallant): A word to the wise. . .
(He bows to the musketeer, and goes to the doorway to watch, after looking at the clock.)
LISE (to the musketeer, who has merely bowed in answer to Cyrano's bow): How now? Is this your courage?. . .Why turn you not a jest on his nose?
THE MUSKETEER: On his nose?. . .ay, ay. . .his nose.
(He goes quickly farther away; Lise follows him.)
CYRANO (from the doorway, signing to Ragueneau to draw the poets away): Hist!. . .
RAGUENEAU (showing them the door on the right): We shall be more private there. . .
CYRANO (impatiently): Hist! Hist!. . .
RAGUENEAU (drawing them farther): To read poetry, 'tis better here. . .
FIRST POET (despairingly, with his mouth full): What! leave the cakes?. . .
SECOND POET: Never! Let's take them with us!
(They all follow Ragueneau in procession, after sweeping all the cakes off the trays.)
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