The Force of Destiny, Act IV, scene II
DON CARLO (off-stage)
I am dying! Confession! Save my soul!
DON ALAVARO (entering with drawn sword)
This, too, is the blood of a Vargas.
DON CARLO
Confession! –
DON ALVARO (throwing down his sword)
I am damned;
but nearby there is a hermitage…
(Alvaro runs to the cave and knocks.)
Come quickly, to console a dying man…
LEONORA (within)
I cannot.
DON ALVARO
Brother! in the Saviour’s name!
LEONORA
I cannot.
DON ALVARO (knocking harder)
You must.
LEONORA (within, ringing the bell)
Help! Help!
DON ALVARO
Ah, come!
(Leonora appears at the door.)
LEONORA
Rash man, flee from the wrath of Heaven!
DON ALVARO
A woman! This voice!
Ah no, a ghost –
LEONORA (recognising Don Alvaro)
What do I see!
DON ALVARO
You – Leonora –
LEONORA
It is really he…
I see you once again –
DON ALVARO
Do not come near me – these hands
are drenched with blood. Away!
LEONORA
What are you saying?
DON ALVARO (pointing to the grove)
There a man lies dead.
LEONORA
You killed him?
DON ALVARO
I did all I could to avoid fighting.
I had left the world for the cloister.
He found me, insulted me, I killed him.
LEONORA
And who was he?
DON ALVARO
Your brother!
LEONORA
O God!
(She runs towards the grove.)
DON ALVARO
Cruel destiny, how you mock at me!
Leonora is alive, and I must find her
only when I have split her brother’s blood!
LEONORA (crying out, from off-stage)
Ah!
DON ALVARO
What a cry! What has happened?
(Leonora, wounded, enters supported by Father
Guardiano.)
She – wounded!
LEONORA (dying)
Even in his last hour, he could not forgive.
And he avenged our shame with my blood.
DON ALVARO
Not even with his death was the vengeance of God
satisfied! Curses!
GUARDIANO
Do not curse; humble yourself
before Him who is holy and just,
who leads us to eternal joys
over a road of tears.
Do not speak a word
of blasphemous wrath and fury.
while this angel is leaving us,
flying to the throne of God.
LEONORA
Yes, weep – and pray.
I promise you God’s pardon.
DON ALVARO
An outcast, a damned soul am I.
A flood of blood surges between us.
LEONORA
Weep and pray!
GUARDIANO
Kneel!
LEONORA
I promise you God’s pardon. Pray!
DON ALVARO
I cannot resist this voice any longer.
(He throws himself at her feet.)
GUARDIANO
Kneel!
DON ALVARO
Leonora, I am redeemed –
Heaven has pardoned me, has pardoned me!
LEONORA and GUARDIANO
Praise be to thee, o Lord.
LEONORA (to Don Alvaro)
Joyfully now I go before you,
into the Promised Land.
There, this strife cannot follow us,
and holiness will bless our love.
DON ALVARO
You condemn me to live on
abandoning me here on earth!
Only the guilty one, I see,
will escape punishment!
GUARDIANO
Made blessed through her martyrdom,
may she now rise to the Lord,
and may her death teach you to know
what faith means!
LEONORA
I wait for you in heaven. Goodbye!
DON ALVARO
Ah, do not leave me, Leonora, do not leave me…
GUARDIANO
And may her death, etc.
LEONORA
Ah… I go before you…Alvaro…Ah…Alvar…Ah!
(She dies.)
DON ALVARO
Dead!
GUARDIANO
She has ascended to God!