SCENE--Some months later. The courtyard of a Dominican monastery in Cuba. A crude little home-made fountain is in center. This is the only adornment of the quadrangle of bald, sun-baked earth, enclosed on the left and in the rear by a high white wall, on the right by the monastery building itself. The entrance to this is an arched doorway surmounted by a crucifix of carved wood. Two niches on either side of this door shelter primitive wooden figures of the Holy Family and Saint Dominic. In the wall, center, is another arched door with a cross above it. Beyond the wall nature can be seen and felt--vivid, colorful, burgeoning with the manifold, compelling life of the tropics. Palm trees lean over the wall casting their graceful shadows within. Vines in flower have climbed to the top and are starting to creep down inside.
A sunset sky of infinite depth glows with mysterious splendor.
As the curtain rises, Juan and the Father Superior are discovered. Juan is asleep, reclining on a sort of improvised invalid's chair, his cloak wrapped around him, facing the fountain. He is pale and emaciated but his wasted countenance has gained an entirely new quality, the calm of a deep spiritual serenity. The Father Superior is a portly monk with a simple round face, gray hair and beard. His large eyes have the opaque calm of a ruminating cow's. The door in the rear is opened and Luis enters. He closes the door carefully and tiptoes forward.
LUIS--(in a whisper) He is sleeping?
FATHER SUPERIOR--As you see, Father.
LUIS--(looking down at Juan) How calm his face is--as if he saw a vision of peace.
FATHER SUPERIOR--It is a blessed miracle he has lived so long.
LUIS--He has been waiting. (sadly) And now, I am afraid his desire is fulfilled--but not as he dreamed. Rather the cup of gall and wormwood--
FATHER SUPERIOR--(mystified) You mean the caravel brings him bad tidings?
LUIS--Yes; and I must wake him to prepare his mind.
FATHER SUPERIOR--I will leave you with him. It is near vesper time. (He turns and goes into the monastery.)
LUIS--(touching Juan on the arm--gently) Juan, awake. (Juan opens his eyes.) The caravel has anchored.
JUAN--From Porto Rico?
LUIS--Yes.
JUAN--(with an air of certainty--with exultant joy) Then Beatriz is here!
LUIS--(disturbed--evasively) There has been a frightful insurrection of the Indians. Diego was killed. (hastily) But I will not trouble you with that. (then slowly) Beatriz comes to nurse you--(with warning emphasis)--her second father, those were her words.
JUAN--(smiling) You need not emphasize. I know her heart. (then earnestly) But I must tell her my truth. (then with a sort of pleading for assurance) It is for that I have waited, to tell her of the love I bore her--now--as farewell--when she cannot misunderstand. (proudly) My love was no common thing. It was the one time Beauty touched my life. I wish to live in her memory as what she was to me. (sinking back--with a flickering smile, weakly) Come, old friend, are you grown so ascetic you deny my right to lay this Golden City--the only one I ever conquered--at the feet of Beauty?
LUIS--(kindly persuasive) Silence is better, Juan. You should renounce--
JUAN--(gently) All is renounced. But do you begrudge a traveler if he begs a flower from this earth, a last token of the world's grace, to lend farewell the solace of regret?
LUIS--(more and more troubled) Juan--I--I speak because--you have suffered--and now--I would not have you suffer more, dear friend. (then blurting out most brusquely) The caravel brings you a surprise. Your nephew, Juan, has arrived from Spain and comes from Porto Rico to greet you.
JUAN--(vaguely) My nephew? (The sound of voices comes from inside the monastery.) Beatriz! (The Father Superior appears in the doorway ushering in Beatriz and Juan's nephew. They are followed by the Duenna and the nephew's servant, who carries his master's cloak and a lute. During the following scene these two remain standing respectfully by the doorway for a time, then go back into the monastery, the servant leaving the cloak and lute on the ground beside the doorway. The Father Superior retires immediately. Luis, after a clasp of Juan's hand, also withdraws, exchanging greetings as he passes the nephew and Beatriz. Beatriz glows with fulfillment, is very apparently deeply in love. The nephew is a slender, graceful young cavalier. He is dressed richly.)