Triptych and Iphigenia by Edna O’Brien Page B

neck”
twice.
    AGAMEMNON    I will.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    Who will slit it?
    Echo of
“Who will slit it”
once.
    AGAMEMNON    I will.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    Who will hold the cup for the … torrent of blood?
    AGAMEMNON    I will.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    The blade will fall from your hand.
    AGAMEMNON    Others will raise it up.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    Others. Lesser men. Menials. Stand up to them, show courage, or are you so eager to parade your scepter and play the general.
    AGAMEMNON    I do not count her wise, a wife, who when her husband is on the rack goads him further. Think what I have been through, think of how I have suffered, tossed from love to duty and back again, like a puppet.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    I will not let this happen.
    Defy Artemis.
    AGAMEMNON    Defy her and risk her greater wrath … murder for all of us … you, me, Iphigenia, the baby …. it is out of my hands, even though my hand will be the doer of it.
    Clytemnestra realizes that he is serious and rounds on him now, striking him.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    You killed the child I bore from Tantalus, you tore it from my breast and dashed it to the ground, murderer …
    AGAMEMNON    A murderer’s accomplice—you came with me, your tresses unbound.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    I did it for my poor aged father’s sake—he whom you tricked with your honeyed words, the way you tricked me.
    AGAMEMNON    Sister of Helen, daughter of Leda, sisters in lust.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    You dare lump me in with Helen! I grew temperate in Aphrodite’s realm, a blameless wife toward you and your household … I bore you children … Iphigenia, her sisters, and little Orestes, who is in there now with her, two children believing themselves to be safe in their parents’ quarters, under their parents’ tutelage.
    AGAMEMNON    From the moment I received the oracle I have been mad, mad. Phantom females dripping with blood visit me in my sleep.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    Huh. Phantom females.
    AGAMEMNON    I love my child as much and more than any father could.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    What prayers will you utter after she is dead. Do you think when you come home to Argos your other children will embrace you, your wife will welcome you back—God forbid it.
    AGAMEMNON    Be my companion in this … help me.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    Let Helen’s daughter Hermione be sacrificed, it is only right, she too is young and fair, tell Menelaus to send for her and let her be swapped for our darling girl.
    AGAMEMNON    Iphigenia was named as being the most pure, the one marked for godhead.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    Then Achilles must save her.
    AGAMEMNON    Achilles must not know of this.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    He knows. He was here when the message was relayed to me, not by one … but by more than one … he smarted at being used as a foil … a mockery of his standing … but he gave me his word that Iphigenia will be saved.
    AGAMEMNON    Would that she could.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    Let us flee now, as a family, call the children. Let us outwit them … arrange for the carriage. Do it.
    AGAMEMNON    It’s no use.
    CLYTEMNESTRA    You speak as if the deed is already done.
    AGAMEMNON    It is.
    From his back pocket he takes out a bloodied knife and she screams repeatedly.
    AGAMEMNON    (
cont
.) I slew a lamb in preparation.
    Iphigenia runs out at hearing her mother’s scream.
    IPHIGENIA    Mother! Why are you screaming? Are you and father arguing … but why, I am so happy … be happy with me …. don’t spoil it … I have been hearing about my husband … his feet are like the wind and he races on the shore against a four-horse chariot, lap after lap, day after day. O Mother, O Father, I thank you for giving me life, for being always so loving and so gentle with me … I