..
Everything ... Pay Gormflaith ...
[Her head falls back over GONERIL'S shoulder and she dies.]
Goneril (laying Hygd down in bed again):
Send horsemen to the marshes for the leech,
And let them bind him on a horse's back
And bring him swiftlier than an old man rides.
Merryn:
This is no leech's work: she's a dead woman.
I'd best be finding if the wisdom-women
Have come from Brita's child-bed to their drinking
By the cook's fire, for soon she'll be past handling.
Goneril:
This is not death: death could not be like this.
She is quite warm--though nothing moves in her.
I did not know death could come all at once:
If life is so ill-seated no one is safe.
Cannot we leave her like herself awhile?
Wait awhile, Merryn ... No, no, no; not yet!
Merryn:
Child, she is gone and will not come again
However we cover our faces and pretend
She will be there if we uncover them.
I must be hasty, or she'll be as stiff
As a straw mattress is.
[She hurries out by the door near the bed.]
Goneril (throwing the whole length of her body along Hygd's body, and
embracing it):
Come back, come back; the things I have not done
Beat in upon my brain from every side:
I know not where to put myself to bear them:
If I could have you now I could act well.
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