[Scene I]
A black carriage rushing through the mountains of Carpathia.
The only passenger - the main character of this
drama.
Titan wood and haunted hill, vales in which the wolf doth kill...
Wisps that in the morass glow mounts with diadems of
snow...
Fog that swirls o'er moor and heath, the tawny owl sings from the trees...
From the ponds the old toad calls, this is where
our drapery falls...
Eight hooves that pound the midnight groove...
Over stock and stone a carriage that winds upward the
mountain pass, deep into the wild.
Crushing stone and shatt'ring bough under wooden wheel and moonlight breaks in spruce and fir and
paints the night unreal.
With ruthless hand and turbid eyes the coachman drives his brute that snarls and sniffs but rushes on to
escape that spook...
Six hours as the raven flies - still - to acquinted land...
Six hours till the sun wiil rise and morning shall
ascent.
- Sleep my dear, don't bother thee with the idle talk of curse and evil blood that runeth in thy veins...
- In the cabin
lies asleep unblessed by fevered dreams, traveller on his way home towards the sun's first beams...
