Keikou walked out onto the balcony and walked up to the handrail. She sighed and rested her head on her hand, and her elbow on the handrail.

     "But soft, what light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Keikou is the Sun." he sighed and gazed up at her. "It is my lady; O it is my love…" he watched as Keikou stared up at the stars. "If only she knew she were." Just then, Keikou started to mumble something indiscernible from Touya’s hidden position on the ground. "She speaks, and yet says nothing. What of that?" Keikou glanced down. "Her eye discourses; I will answer it." He began to step forward, but stopped and hid back in the tree’s shadow when he saw Keikou look back up at the stars.

     "It is not to me she speaks. Two of the fairest stars in all the sky, having some business, do entreat her eyes to sparkle in their spheres. What if they were in her head? The brightness of her cheeks would shame those stars. As daylight does to a lamp.

     "See how she leans her cheek upon her hand. If only I were a glove on that hand, that I may touch that cheek…"

     "Ay me…" Keikou sighed.

     "Oh, speak again, bright angel, for you are as glorious to this night, as is a winged messenger of heaven onto the white-upturned wondering eyes of mortals that fall back to gaze on him when he bestrides the lazy puffing clouds."

     Keikou pushed herself off the hand rail and started pacing along the balcony. "Oh Touya, Touya, why are you Touya?" ("I’m sorry! I was an accident!") Keikou stopped, thinking she had heard something, but then continued. "Deny your father, and refuse your name, or, if you will not, be but sworn my love, and I’ll no longer be a Capulet." She stopped and looked up at the sky again.

     "Shall I hear more, or speak at this?" Touya asked himself.

     "It is only your name that is my enemy. You would still be yourself even if you were not called Montague. What’s Montague? It is neither hand, nor foot, nor arm, nor face, nor any other part belonging to a man." Touya raised his eyebrow at this. "Oh, be some other name! What’s in a name? That which we call a rose, by any other name, would smell as sweet. So Touya would, were he not called Touya, retain that dear perfection which he owns without that title." Keikou placed her head in her hands and leaned against the handrail again. "Touya, forget your name, which is no part of you, and in return for you name, take all of myself." She sighed.

     Touya stepped out of the shadows and called up to Keikou. "I take you at your word. Call me but love, and I’ll be new named. Henceforth, I never will be Touya."

     Keikou jumped and had started to run inside, but she stopped and looked down at Touya. "What man are you that, concealed by night, has stumbled on my secrets?"

     "By a name," Touya sighed. "I do not know how to tell you who I am. My name, dear beauty, is hateful to myself because it is your enemy. If I had it written, I would tear the word."

     Keikou closed her eyes and smiled. "My ears have not yet heard a hundred words of your tongue’s uttering, yet I know the sound." She opened her eyes and smiled down at Touya, resting her head on the handrail. "Are you not Touya, and a Montague?"

     "Neither, fair maiden, if either displeases you."

     "How did you come here, tell me, and why?" She leaned over the handrail. "The orchard walls are high and hard to climb, and the place mortally dangerous, considering who you are, if any of my kinsmen find you here." She said with worry.

     Touya only smiled. "With love’s wings did I fly over these walls, for stony limits cannot hold love out, and love dares to attempt whatever it is possible for love to do, therefore, your kinsmen are no stop to me."

     "If they see you here, they will kill you!"

     "Alack, there lies more peril in your eye, than in twenty of their swords. Look you but sweet, and I am invulnerably armed against their enmity."

      "I would not for the world they saw you here!"

      Touya realized telling Keikou that he could fight off the Capulets wasn’t enough. "I have night’s cloak to hide me from their eyes, and, unless you love me, let them find me here, my life is better ended by their hate, than death differed, lacking your love."

      Keikou sighed in relief. "By whose direction did you find this place?" She asked curiously.

      "By love, that first did prompt me to inquire." He replied. "He lent me counsel, and I lent him eyes, I am no pilot; yet, were you as far as that vast shore washed with the farthest sea, I should adventure for such merchandise."

     Keikou turned red. "You know the mask of night is on my face, otherwise you would see me blushing a deep red, for that which you have heard me speak tonight…" She held her face in her hands and closed her eyes. "I would gladly follow the proper formalities; fain, fain deny what I have spoken." She opened her eyes and leaned over the handrail to look at Touya again. "But farewell observance of ceremony. Do you love me?" Touya began to speak but she continued. "I know you would say ‘Ay’, and I will take your word. Yet, if you swear, you may prove false. At lovers’ perjuries, they say, Jove laughs." She sighed and gazed down at Touya. "Oh gentle Touya, if you think I am too quickly won, I’ll frown and be perverse and say to you no, so that you will woo, but else for the world. In truth, fair Montague, I am too much in love, and therefore you may think my behavior immodest." She smiled. "but trust me, gentleman, I’ll prove more true than those that have more affection of shyness to be distant, I should have been more distant, I must confess, but you then you overheard, while I was unaware, my true-love passion, therefore, pardon me, and not impute this yielding to frivolous love, which the dark night has so revealed."

     "Lady, by yonder blessed moon I vow, that tips with silver all these fruit-tree tops-"

     "Oh, don’t swear by the moon!" Keikou interrupted. "The inconstant moon, that monthly changes in her circled cycle, unless that your love proves likewise variable."

     Touya titled his head. "Then what shall I swear by?"

     Keikou thought for a second. "Do not swear at all. Or, if you will, swear by your gracious self, which is the god of my idolatry, and I’ll believe you." She laid her head on her arm, on the handrail, and gazed at him.

     "If my heart’s dear love-"

     "Well, do not swear." Keikou leaned over the handrail, nearly falling off. "Although I am happy you are here, I have no joy in this contract tonight. It is too rash, too ill-considered, too sudden, too like lightening, which does cease to be ere one can say ‘It lightens.’ Sweet, good night, this bud of love, by summer’s ripening breath, may prove a beauteous flower when next we meet." She raised her fingers to her lips and kissed them, then waved her hand toward Touya. "Good night, good night. As sweet repose and rest come to your heart as that within my breast." She started to walk inside, but Touya started to speak again.

     "Oh, will you leave me so unsatisfied?" He asked eagerly.

     Keikou leaned over the handrail again. "What satisfaction can you have tonight?"

     "The exchange of your faithful vow for mine." He said with a smile.

     Keikou shook her head and gazed lovingly down at him. "I gave you mine before you did request it, and yet I would it were in my possession to give again."

     "Would you withdraw it? For what purpose, love?"

     Keikou smiled. "But to be lavish and give it to you again." She replied hyperly. "And yet, I wish only for the thing I have. My bounty is as boundless as the sea, my love as deep. The more I give to you, the more I have, for both are infinite." Keikou glanced back inside as Nurse Michi called to her. "I hear some noise within. Dear love, adieu." She turned back. "Anon, good Nurse!" She called to Nurse Michi. "Sweet Montague, be true. Stay but a little; I will come again." She picked up her skirt and ran back into her room.

     Touya leaned against the tree, and closed his eyes, smiling. "Oh, blessed, blessed night! I am afraid, being night, all this is a dream, too flattering sweet to be real."

     Keikou ran back onto the balcony above him, and leaned over the handrail. "Touya!" Touya opened his eyes and gazed up at her again. "Three words, dear Touya, and good night indeed. If the intention of your love be honorable, your purpose marriage, send me word tomorrow, by one that I’ll procure to come to you, where and what time you will perform the rite, and I’ll lay all my fortunes at your feet, and follow you as my lord throughout the world."

     Nurse Michi walked to the door. "Madam."

     Keikou turned back. "I come anon!" She looked down at Touya and whispered "But if you do not mean well, I do beseech you-"

     "Madam."

     "Immediately, I come! –to cease your efforts and leave me to my grief. Tomorrow I will send."

     "So thrive my soul-" Touya tried to say, but, again, Keikou cut him off.

     "A thousand times good night." She hurried off back inside.

     Touya sighed. "A thousand times the worst to lack your light." He just leaned against the tree, gazing up at the balcony. "Love goes toward love, as school boys go away from their books. But love goes away from love, as school boys go toward school with gloomy looks." He pushed himself off the tree and started to walk away.

     "Hist, Touya, hist!" Keikou called as she leaned over the handrail, once again on the balcony. "Oh, for a falconer’s voice to lure this falcon back again!" She glanced around. "I am still under my father’s rule, and must keep my desires secret and whisper; else I would tear the cave where Echo lies and make her airy tongue more hoarse than mine with repetition of ‘My Touya!’"

     "It is my soul that calls upon my name." he stood in the lights reflected on the ground from the balcony doorway. "How silver-sweet sound lovers’ tongues by night, like softest music to listening ears."

      Keikou reached her hand down toward him. "Touya."

     Touya reached his hand up. "My dear."

     "What time tomorrow shall I send to you?" She asked.

     "By the hour of nine."

     Keikou stood up straight. "I will not fail. It seems twenty years until then." She laid her head on her arms and gazed at him. "I have forgotten why I called you back."

     Touya smiled. "Let me stand here until you remember it."

     Keikou smiled. "I shall forget, to have you still stand there, remembering how I love your company."

     "And I’ll still stay, to have you still forget, forgetting any other home but this."

     Keikou looked up toward the east. "It is almost morning…" She said gloomily. "I would have you leave, and yet no farther than a spoiled child’s bird, that lets it hop a little from his hand, like a poor prisoner in his twisted leg chains, and with a silken thread, plucks it back again, so loving-jealous of his liberty."

     "I would, if I were your bird."

     "Sweet, so would I. yet I should kill you with too much cherishing. Good night, good night." She again blew Touya a kiss. "Parting is such sweet sorrow. That I shall say ‘Good night.’ until it be tomorrow." She gazed at him for a second, and then walked back inside her room, and the lights were turned off.