Act Three Lyrics - Hammill Peter

(Immediately afterwards, Madeline Usher enters, in a trance) 

MADELINE Carriages at seven 

I shall wear the flower he gave me 

It's so cold here 

deep beneath the lapping water... 

The water 

The water 

My love 

Head against his shoulder, 

'cross the lawn I hear the music... 

Silent blackness, 

In the lake I'm sinking slowly... 

Oh, how lovely, 

nothing could be more becoming... 

Underwater, 

floating in the icy darkness... 

Count the candles 

'May I dance with you this evening?'... 

On the surface 

Swans are feeding high above me... 

Hold him tightly 

round and round the floor we're spinning 

Breathing water 

I am drowning 

Watch the sun rise 

driving home across the meadows... 

All is darkness 

I can feel myself dissolving 

The water 

The water 

The darkness 

The darkness 

My love 

Head against his shoulder 

Floating in the icy darkness 

Hold him tightly 

I can feel myself dissolving 

Oh how lovely 

Deep beneath the lapping water 

Count the candles 

I am drowning I am drowning 

Count the candles 

Floating in the icy darkness 

Hold him tightly 

I can feel myself dissolving 

Oh how lovely 

Deep beneath the lapping water 

Count the candles 

I am drowning 

Oh how lovely 

I am drowning I am drowning 

Oh how lovely 

Oh how lovely 

Oh how lovely 

MONTRESOR Stop, Madeline, look at me! 

My god, man, what is wrong with her? 

USHER Yes, it's right you should know, 

She is dying! 

I have not dared to speak of it. 

A chronic catalepsy had drained her of her youth. 

I have watched her waste away and could do nothing! 

A period of health is followed by sudden coma, 

death-like sleep. 

It can last a full day or more, 

no movement, no colour, no flame in the cheeks. 

MONTRESOR What, then of these dreaming visions? 

USHER The recovery, ah, this is even worse! 

She rises and moves about the house 

but her mind still sleeps... 

You see her now a mindless ghost: 

Beautiful, dead eyes stare in sleep, unrecognising. 

She speaks in dreams, sees only dreams, 

she haunts the house in hideous sleepwalking 

and may not be restrained, for like some automaton 

she tirelessly thrusts and tears herself 

against her fetters, 

heedless of injury. 

And so she walks and then she wakes, 

remembering nothing, so week that she can 

barely build up strength before she is struck down again. 

Month after month each attack worse than the last. 

Death will not wait long. 

Her final days are flickering past. 

Dear God, 

helpless, 

helpless! 

MONTRESOR But what is the word from her doctors? 

Do they hold out no hope, nor offer any treatment? 

USHER MONTRESOR CHORUS 

They do not understand 

her case 

and cannot treat a case 

they do not understand 

He does not understand 

You're dealing with a case 

Who is her doctor, 

a specialist I trust? 

Yes indeed, one of 

the foremost rank 

You're dealing 

with a case 

Then he will help her, 

Montresor oh, yes, 

no more of this he surely must You do not understand 

now 

no more talk He does not 

of cures, please, understand 

Or of doctor. 

I bless you concern, 

but know that she 

will walk no more tonight. 

When she wakes soon 

she will need my care. 

I must be there, so, 

dear friend, goodnight. 

(Usher exits with Madeline, leaving Montresor alone. The Herbalist enters) 

THE HERBALIST Good evening, sir. 

And you must be the friend of Mister Usher. 

I'm so pleased to meet you, sir, 

but have little time to spare 

for knowledge such as mine is wanted everywhere. 

In poor dwellings, yes, but some as great as Usher's. 

My card... 

MONTRESOR 'J. Ducrow, Esq. Herbalist, 

Doctor of Natural Medicine'... 

HERBALIST At you service, and it could be, sir, 

that you have need of my panaceas now... 

I have Mandrake juice that will slake any fever, 

cures to convince you though you be an unbeliever now... 

Laugh - would you? - at these seeds of mine. 

You question the cure's causes, 

but Logic and Reason do not answer, 

and Nature runs her courses. 

I have purest poppy for the soundest of sleeps; 

a pure cake of hemp plant 

that's a warranted surcease of worldly sorrow. 

Lying words will be believed 

if perfumed by this pastil, 

or my elixir's guaranteed 

to bend the will of fairest womankind. 

Scheme, would you, for a worldly gain? 

Lust after a frigid virgin? 

My herbs can grant your secret cravings 

and my price is modest! 

MONTRESOR No! No! 

HERBALIST And my price is modest... 

MONTRESOR No, thank you! No! 

HERBALIST Oh it's very modest... 

MONTRESOR No, no thank you! 

No! 

No thank you, 

No! 

HERBALIST Perhaps a poultice of Toadbane 

for weakness of the manly parts, 

caused by too much wine or age, 

perhaps by over-frequent natural indulgence... 

Applied with skill, it will 

revive the fleshy passions of a corpse... 

...of a corpse 

MONTRESOR I said no 

I meant no! 

HERBALIST Well then, Good-day... 

MONTRESOR So that is Usher's idea of a doctor! 

That wretched mountebank can't help them. 

I confront madness face to face! 

And whatever it's cause, it lies within this place 

I breathe an atmosphere of sorrow; 

an alien despair makes my courage fail, 

like the collapse of an opium vision, 

the hideous dropping of the veil 

CHORUS Tormented by a thousand doubts and fancies, 

he will not sleep tonight. 

Chilled by the gloom of his surroundings, 

mortal, half-dead mortar. 

MONTRESOR CHORUS 

He will not sleep! 

I see simple solutions 

He will not sleep! 

State them laud and clear, 

but the echoes of the House He will not sleep! 

shout 'Unreason!' 

The one thing that I fear. 

The evil that is done 

cannot be undone. 

The evil that will come 

cannot be prevented. 

The evil that is done 

Yet somehow I must help 

these two tormented souls, 

cannot be undone. 

for if I cannot, who will? 

The evil that will come 

These are the friends 

I've loved so dearly... 

cannot be prevented 

Leave! 

No! What a monstrous thought! 

Depart! 

How could I even think of it! 

Go! 

Abandon those who have need of me! 

Leave! 

Oh, but what a temptation, 

Depart! 

to run like a thief in the night, 

Go! 

And yet now I cannot 

because it is too late Before it is too late, 

I feel myself bound up in before you are bound up in 

the web of fear and pain, the web of fear and pain, 

the evil that surrounds me. the evil that surrounds you. 

It cannot be undone. 

It cannot be undone. 

The evil that will come 

cannot be prevented. 

End of Act Three