Malta, 1809

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B: Sweet suffering Jesus! - these plaguy stairs! be damned to them!! (kicks stairs) - ah well - at the top I shall bend mine eyes upon the fair Florence!

H: Let us rest awhile, Mrs. Spencer Smith can wait, phew! (H &B place jackets on the hot stones) - if thou art wise, Byron, with that much-travelled lady, e'en tenderness, you must disguise 

B(ruefully): Fear not, Hobby - I am wiser than I once was, re. the fairer sex (sighs) but, ah! my new Calypso - in truth, 'tis she whom but to see is to admire - and, oh! forgive the word - to desperately love! 

H: She is certainly a very extraordinary woman - but you must keep your powder dry - her marito is the resident minister at Constantinople 

B: Pfft! - she has quarrelled with that dog, as all women of genius and romance do with their husbands (plucks an orange) - so naturally took to rambling all over the Continent - somewhat like ourselves, Hobby - albeit hindered by frocks and French maids (admires view of harbour) - ah! what woman wouldn't rather be a schoolboy than a queen - when it comes to travel, that is

H(snarkily): Ever the friend of beauty in distress! (rolls eyes) - zooks Byron - you sigh to all you see! We're but two months into our pilgrimage and yet you've declared yourself unfathomably in love twice; in lust - more than Pearson's can remedy; amorous scrapes necessitating balconies and bribery? - innumerable!

B(somewhat inattentive): My dear Hobby, think on't - the inestimable Mrs. Smith has run after the French, ran from the French, fled with an adventurer - one ‘Marquis de Salvo' humph! - from some prison or other - has been a public victim to the security of the continent - and believes herself to be an object of peculiar horror to Napoleon - and not yet five and twenty!

H: These fertile incidents would appear improbable in fiction 

B: I will embalm her in my first foreign verses - she has been shipwrecked - I could definitely use that

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H and B reach the top of the curséd stairs and prepare for another dull evening of indifferent opera, overstuffed officers and corked wine​

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​SCENE 2

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​Twilight at the British Consulate - F and B are chastely canoodling on a balcony

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F: My Lord, I much marvel that a youth so raw nor feels, nor feigns at least, the oft-told flames, which, though sometimes they frown, rarely anger dames 

B: Little know thee - sweet Florence - my seeming marble heart, now masked by silence or withheld by pride, is not unskilful in the spoiler's art - and has spread its snares licentious far and wide (F is somewhat surprised - suppresses a guffaw)

F: And whilst you dote on my eyes so blue, please never join the lover's whining crew!

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F and B admire the moon 

 

F: Mein Byron - I embarks soon in a ship of war bound for England (weeps) to join Sir Spencer - mein Byron, our love cannot die on this stair-bedraggled island! (weeps) you must save me from my husband and the humdrum, langweilig life of a Consulate's wife! (F 's bosom is ardent) - mein Byron, we shall meet here - in Malta - exactly a year hence to commence a life of love and adventure mit each other,  ja?

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B wavers in the lustre of F's gaze (instructs himself: do proper homage to thine idol's eyes, but not too humbly, or she will despise)

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B: Sweet Florence! Could another ever share this wayward, loveless heart, it would be thine - but - check’d by every tie - also a potential crim.con and martial persecution - I may not dare to cast a worthless offering at thy shrine, nor ask so dear a breast to feel one pang for mine

F: I do pang - pang very much - my life is in danger from Buonaparte - as we speak he is even now so incensed against me

B: Buonaparte! my pagod of choice! - I wonder has he read my poesy?

F: I had no time to ask meine liebe, as I was descending on a rope from my prison cell the last time we met

B: Florence! whom I will love as well as ever yet was said or sung - since Orpheus sang his spouse from hell (F is busy out-glowing the moon - stunning B into action) - the devil be in it! a life of outlawed love and adventure it is!

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The moon itself is momentarily eclipsed by a military gentleman

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CC(snorts): Byron, is it?

B(angrily - stands): LORD Byron - whom, may I ask, shall I have the honour of Mantoning tomorrow?

CC: Yet another challenge is it my Lord? What is your tally now - four? five? (laughs) I am Captain Cary - aide de camp to General Spooney - and I have observed you - Sir - overpraising the Consul and humiliating the rest of us first-raters here resident in Malta with your many challenges and misappropriation of mistresses

B: I have passed over your (sneers insultingly) coxcombical raillery out of respect to said General - now, however (glaring) I shall..

CC: Shall what?! your notorious temper, and exaggerated notions of what's due to you as a minor nobleman, cause your fellow countrymen mortification when amongst the more established of shopkeepers and opera managers of this island - either you depart sharpish - or I shall indeed meet you at dawn

B: How amusing you are (lights cigar) - to judge by your tailoring I suspect your weaponry is equally outdated - I shall wear a very large feathered hat if that would make things easier for you (blows smoke-rings)

C(fuming): Tomorrow morning at 6 it is! - our officers and gentlemen settle these affairs 'twixt the leper colony and the graveyard

B: Very well - as the vessel in which I am to embark must conveniently sail at the first change of wind, be sure to enjoy what's left of your spoiled wine - and your wife and mistress - one last time 

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Cary strides off  - plucks an orange and gazes forlornly at his frogging​​​​​​

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​SCENE 3

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Dawn - Florence's ship awaits departure to Cadiz 

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B: Fear not, I am a crack shot my love - also, an apology will be forthcoming from that poltroon's superior, I will swear on't

F: You will not forget our arrangement, my Lord? 

B: Whilst thou art fair and I am young - Sweet Florence - though Fate may forbids such things to be - yet, by thine eyes and ringlets curl’d, I cannot lose a world for thee - but would not lose thee for a world (passionately clasps F's hand)

F: Oh zat's nice - but I need a token by which to remember thee, mein lieber Engländer

B: I have a packet about me somewhere (pads jacket) oons, I usually carry a few pre-packaged locks of my hair about my person (muses: have I really distributed them all already?! zounds)

F: mmm - perhaps that enormous yellow diamond ring would suffice

B(irritated but grudgingly gallant): Yes? really? - with your colouring? but, of course (slides ring onto F's finger)

F: Ah! we have the same long tapered fingers, mein Byron - but now, farewell for a twelvemonth

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Ship departs - the glint of a yellow diamond can be seen several miles offshore - Hobhouse arrives in haste with guns and brandy - Fletcher arrives with six donkeys carrying B's luggage

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H(puffing): I just heard about Captain Cary - why did you not ask for a second? - here are your Mantons - though this damned, fetid isle has dampened your powder (panicking) - have you any swords/gloves/harsh wit and sarcasm/ready money which could answer?

B: Cool your boots Hobby - that costermongering blackguard will not attend

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​A letter is delivered

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B: As I suspected (smirks) - a note from General Spooney apologising for Cary's presumption (pales and sits) - mein Gott! - 'twould seem Cary is no more!

H(takes letter):  “Captain Cary, whilst venturing out to target practice near the leper colony, appears to have been dazzled momentarily by a bright yellow light, lost his footing on a discarded orange, and fell into the less salubrious section of said colony. A Mass will be said in both his honour and that of the sardine fleet which simultaneously crashed upon the rocks." Good lord, Byron - a massacre is avoided! 

B(astounded): Florence! - surely not? Oons! (looks to disappearing ship) - and I, for shame, suspected lapidary cupidity! she but sought to prevent an ignoble demise from sub-optimal gunpowder! Through cloudless skies, in silvery sheen - I shall await my heart, my queen!

 

Fletcher hauls luggage onboard the brig ‘Spider’ - the lads set sail towards the Levant

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​B(muses to self): While I wander through each broken path, o’er brake and craggy brow - while elements exhaust their wrath - Sweet Florence, I shall dream - ‘where art thou?’​

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END