LADY PLYANT. Oh, Mr. Careless, Mr. Careless, I’m ruined, I’m undone.
CARE. What’s the matter, madam?
LADY PLYANT. Oh, the unluckiest accident, I’m afraid I shan’t live to tell it you.
CARE. Heaven forbid! What is it?
LADY PLYANT. I’m in such a fright; the strangest quandary and premunire! I’m all over in a universal agitation; I dare swear every circumstance of me trembles. O your letter, your letter! By an unfortunate mistake I have given Sir Paul your letter instead of his own.
CARE. That was unlucky.
LADY PLYANT. Oh, yonder he comes reading of it; for heaven’s sake step in here and advise me quickly before he sees.
SCENE IX.
Sir Paul with the Letter.
SIR PAUL. O Providence, what a conspiracy have I discovered. But let me see to make an end on’t. [Reads.] Hum — After supper in the wardrobe by the gallery. If Sir Paul should surprise us, I have a commission from him to treat with you about the very matter of fact. Matter of fact! Very pretty; it seems that I am conducting to my own cuckoldom. Why, this is the very traitorous position of taking up arms by my authority, against my person! Well, let me see. Till then I languish in expectation of my adored charmer. — Dying Ned Careless. Gads-bud, would that were matter of fact too. Die and be damned for a Judas Maccabeus and Iscariot both. O friendship! what art thou but a name? Henceforward let no man make a friend that would not be a cuckold: for whomsoever he receives into his bosom will find the way to his bed, and there return his caresses with interest to his wife. Have I for this been pinioned, night after night for three years past? Have I been swathed in blankets till I have been even deprived of motion? Have I approached the marriage bed with reverence as to a sacred shrine, and denied myself the enjoyment of lawful domestic pleasures to preserve its purity, and must I now find it polluted by foreign iniquity? O my Lady Plyant, you were chaste as ice, but you are melted now, and false as water. But Providence has been constant to me in discovering this conspiracy; still, I am beholden to Providence. If it were not for Providence, sure, poor Sir Paul, thy heart would break.
SCENE X.
[To him] Lady Plyant.
LADY PLYANT. So, sir, I see you have read the letter. Well, now, Sir Paul, what do you think of your friend Careless? Has he been treacherous, or did you give his insolence a licence to make trial of your wife’s suspected virtue? D’ye see here? [Snatches the letter as in anger.] Look, read it. Gads my life, if I thought it were so, I would this moment renounce all communication with you. Ungrateful monster! He? is it so? Ay, I see it, a plot upon my honour; your guilty cheeks confess it. Oh, where shall wronged virtue fly for reparation? I’ll be divorced this instant.
SIR PAUL. Gads-bud, what shall I say? This is the strangest surprise. Why, I don’t know anything at all, nor I don’t know whether there be anything at all in the world, or no.
LADY PLYANT. I thought I should try you, false man. I, that never dissembled in my life, yet to make trial of you, pretended to like that monster of iniquity, Careless, and found out that contrivance to let you see this letter, which now I find was of your own inditing — I do, heathen, I do. See my face no more; I’ll be divorced presently.
SIR PAUL. O strange, what will become of me? I’m so amazed, and so overjoyed, so afraid, and so sorry. But did you give me this letter on purpose, he? Did you?
LADY PLYANT. Did I? Do you doubt me, Turk, Saracen? I have a cousin that’s a proctor in the Commons; I’ll go to him instantly.
SIR PAUL. Hold, stay, I beseech your ladyship. I’m so overjoyed, stay, I’ll confess all.
LADY PLYANT. What will you confess, Jew?
SIR PAUL. Why, now, as I hope to be saved, I had no hand in this letter — nay, hear me, I beseech your ladyship. The devil take me now if he did not go beyond my commission. If I desired him to do any more than speak a good word only just for me; gads-bud, only for poor Sir Paul, I’m an Anabaptist, or a Jew, or what you please to call me.
LADY PLYANT. Why, is not here matter of fact?
SIR PAUL. Ay, but by your own virtue and continency that matter of fact is all his own doing. I confess I had a great desire to have some honours conferred upon me, which lie all in your ladyship’s breast, and he being a well-spoken man, I desired him to intercede for me.
LADY PLYANT. Did you so? presumption! Oh, he comes, the Tarquin comes; I cannot bear his sight.
SCENE XI.
Careless, Sir Paul.
CARE. Sir Paul, I’m glad I’ve met with you, ‘gad, I have said all I could, but can’t prevail. Then my friendship to you has carried me a little farther in this matter.
SIR PAUL. Indeed; well sir, I’ll dissemble with him a little. [Aside.]
CARE. Why, faith I have in my time known honest gentlemen abused by a pretended coyness in their wives, and I had a mind to try my lady’s virtue. And when I could not prevail for you, gad, I pretended to be in love myself; but all in vain, she would not hear a word upon that subject. Then I writ a letter to her; I don’t know what effects that will have, but I’ll be sure to tell you when I do, though by this light I believe her virtue is impregnable.
SIR PAUL. O Providence! Providence! What discoveries are here made? Why, this is better and more miraculous than the rest.
CARE. What do you mean?
SIR PAUL. I can’t tell you, I’m so overjoyed; come along with me to my lady, I can’t contain myself; come, my dear friend.
CARE. So, so, so, this difficulty’s over. [Aside.]
SCENE XII.
Mellefont, Maskwell, from different doors.
MEL. Maskwell! I have been looking for you— ’tis within a quarter of eight.
MASK. My lady is just gone into my lord’s closet, you had best steal into her chamber before she comes, and lie concealed there, otherwise she may lock the door when we are together, and you not easily get in to surprise us.
MEL. He? You say true.
MASK. You had best make haste, for after she has made some apology to the company for her own and my lord’s absence all this while, she’ll retire to her chamber instantly.
MEL. I go this moment. Now, fortune, I defy thee.
SCENE XIII.
Maskwell alone.
MASK. I confess you may be allowed to be secure in your own opinion; the appearance is very fair, but I have an after-game to play that shall turn the tables, and here comes the man that I must manage.
SCENE XIV.
[To him] Lord Touchwood.
LORD TOUCH. Maskwell, you are the man I wished to meet.
MASK. I am happy to be in the way of your lordship’s commands.
LORD TOUCH. I have always found you prudent and careful in anything that has concerned me or my family.
MASK. I were a villain else. I am bound by duty and gratitude, and my own inclination, to be ever your lordship’s servant.
LORD TOUCH. Enough. You are my friend; I know it. Yet there has been a thing in your knowledge, which has concerned me nearly, that you have concealed from me.
MASK. My lord!
LORD TOUCH. Nay, I excuse your friendship to my unnatural nephew thus far. But I know you have been privy to his impious designs upon my wife. This evening she has told me all. Her good nature concealed it as long as was possible; but he perseveres so in villainy, that she has told me even you were weary of dissuading him, though you have once actually hindered him from forcing her.
MASK. I am sorry, my lord, I can’t make you an answer; this is an occasion in which I would not willing be silent.
LORD TOUCH. I know you would excuse him — and I know as well that you can’t.
MASK. Indeed I was in hopes it had been a youthful heat that might have soon boiled over; but —
LORD TOUCH. Say on.
MASK. I have nothing more to say, my lord; but to express my concern; for I think his frenzy increases daily.
LORD TOUCH. How! Give me but proof of it, ocular proof, that I may justify my dealing with him to the world, and share
my fortunes.
MASK. O my lord! consider; that is hard. Besides, time may work upon him. Then, for me to do it! I have professed an everlasting friendship to him.
LORD TOUCH. He is your friend; and what am I?
MASK. I am answered.
LORD TOUCH. Fear not his displeasure; I will put you out of his, and fortune’s power, and for that thou art scrupulously honest, I will secure thy fidelity to him, and give my honour never to own any discovery that you shall make me. Can you give me a demonstrative proof? Speak.
MASK. I wish I could not. To be plain, my lord, I intended this evening to have tried all arguments to dissuade him from a design which I suspect; and if I had not succeeded, to have informed your lordship of what I knew.
LORD TOUCH. I thank you. What is the villain’s purpose?
MASK. He has owned nothing to me of late, and what I mean now, is only a bare suspicion of my own. If your lordship will meet me a quarter of an hour hence there, in that lobby by my lady’s bed-chamber, I shall be able to tell you more.
LORD TOUCH. I will.
MASK. My duty to your lordship makes me do a severe piece of justice.
LORD TOUCH. I will be secret, and reward your honesty beyond your hopes.
SCENE XV.
Scene opening, shows Lady Touchwood’s chamber.
Mellefont solus.
MEL. Pray heaven my aunt keep touch with her assignation. O that her lord were but sweating behind this hanging, with the expectation of what I shall see. Hist, she comes. Little does she think what a mine is just ready to spring under her feet. But to my post. [Goes behind the hangings.]
SCENE XVI.
Lady Touchwood.
LADY TOUCH. ’Tis eight o’clock; methinks I should have found him here. Who does not prevent the hour of love, outstays the time; for to be dully punctual is too slow. I was accusing you of neglect.
SCENE XVII.
Lady Touchwood, Maskwell, Mellefont absconding.
MASK. I confess you do reproach me when I see you here before me; but ’tis fit I should be still behindhand, still to be more and more indebted to your goodness.
LADY TOUCH. You can excuse a fault too well, not to have been to blame. A ready answer shows you were prepared.
MASK. Guilt is ever at a loss, and confusion waits upon it; when innocence and bold truth are always ready for expression.
LADY TOUCH. Not in love: words are the weak support of cold indifference; love has no language to be heard.
MASK. Excess of joy has made me stupid! Thus may my lips be ever closed. [Kisses her.] And thus — O who would not lose his speech, upon condition to have joys above it?
LADY TOUCH. Hold, let me lock the door first. [Goes to the door.]
MASK. [Aside.] That I believed; ’twas well I left the private passage open.
LADY TOUCH. So, that’s safe.
MASK. And so may all your pleasures be, and secret as this kiss —
MEL. And may all treachery be thus discovered. [Leaps out.]
LADY TOUCH. Ah! [Shrieks.]
MEL. Villain! [Offers to draw.]
MASK. Nay, then, there’s but one way. [Runs out.]
SCENE XVIII.
Lady Touchwood, Mellefont.
MEL. Say you so, were you provided for an escape? Hold, madam, you have no more holes to your burrow; I’ll stand between you and this sally-port.
LADY TOUCH. Thunder strike thee dead for this deceit, immediate lightning blast thee, me, and the whole world! Oh! I could rack myself, play the vulture to my own heart, and gnaw it piecemeal, for not boding to me this misfortune.
MEL. Be patient.
LADY TOUCH. Be damned.
MEL. Consider, I have you on the hook; you will but flounder yourself a-weary, and be nevertheless my prisoner.
LADY TOUCH. I’ll hold my breath and die, but I’ll be free.
MEL. O madam, have a care of dying unprepared, I doubt you have some unrepented sins that may hang heavy, and retard your flight.
LADY TOUCH. O! what shall I do? say? Whither shall I turn? Has hell no remedy?
MEL. None; hell has served you even as heaven has done, left you to yourself. — You’re in a kind of Erasmus paradise, yet if you please you may make it a purgatory; and with a little penance and my absolution all this may turn to good account.
LADY TOUCH. [Aside.] Hold in my passion, and fall, fall a little, thou swelling heart; let me have some intermission of this rage, and one minute’s coolness to dissemble. [She weeps.]
MEL. You have been to blame. I like those tears, and hope they are of the purest kind, — penitential tears.
LADY TOUCH. O the scene was shifted quick before me, — I had not time to think. I was surprised to see a monster in the glass, and now I find ’tis myself; can you have mercy to forgive the faults I have imagined, but never put in practice? — O consider, consider how fatal you have been to me, you have already killed the quiet of this life. The love of you was the first wandering fire that e’er misled my steps, and while I had only that in view, I was betrayed into unthought of ways of ruin.
MEL. May I believe this true?
LADY TOUCH. O be not cruelly incredulous. — How can you doubt these streaming eyes? Keep the severest eye o’er all my future conduct, and if I once relapse, let me not hope forgiveness; ‘twill ever be in your power to ruin me. My lord shall sign to your desires; I will myself create your happiness, and Cynthia shall be this night your bride. Do but conceal my failings, and forgive.
MEL. Upon such terms I will be ever yours in every honest way.
SCENE XIX.
Maskwell softly introduces Lord Touchwood, and retires.
MASK. I have kept my word, he’s here, but I must not be seen.
SCENE XX.
Lady Touchwood, Lord Touchwood, Mellefont.
LORD TOUCH. Hell and amazement, she’s in tears.
LADY TOUCH. [Kneeling.] Eternal blessings thank you. — Ha! my lord listening! O fortune has o’erpaid me all, all! all’s my own! [Aside.]
MEL. Nay, I beseech you rise.
LADY TOUCH. [Aloud.] Never, never! I’ll grow to the ground, be buried quick beneath it, e’er I’ll be consenting to so damned a sin as incest! unnatural incest!
MEL. Ha!
LADY TOUCH. O cruel man, will you not let me go? I’ll forgive all that’s past. O heaven, you will not ravish me?
MEL. Damnation!
LORD TOUCH. Monster, dog! your life shall answer this! [Draws and runs at Mellefont, is held by Lady Touchwood.]
LADY TOUCH. O heavens, my lord! Hold, hold, for heaven’s sake.
MEL. Confusion, my uncle! O the damned sorceress.
LADY TOUCH. Moderate your rage, good my lord! He’s mad, alas, he’s mad. Indeed he is, my lord, and knows not what he does. See how wild he looks.
MEL. By heaven, ‘twere senseless not to be mad, and see such witchcraft.
LADY TOUCH. My lord, you hear him, he talks idly.
LORD TOUCH. Hence from my sight, thou living infamy to my name; when next I see that face, I’ll write villain in’t with my sword’s point.
MEL. Now, by my soul, I will not go till I have made known my wrongs. Nay, till I have made known yours, which, if possible, are greater, — though she has all the host of hell her servants.
LADY TOUCH. Alas, he raves! Talks very poetry! For heaven’s sake away, my lord, he’ll either tempt you to extravagance, or commit some himself.
MEL. Death and furies, will you not hear me? — Why by heaven she laughs, grins, points to your back; she forks out cuckoldom with her fingers, and you’re running horn-mad after your fortune. [As she is going she turns back and smiles at him.]
LORD TOUCH. I fear he’s mad indeed. — Let’s send Maskwell to him.
MEL. Send him to her.
LADY TOUCH. Come, come, good my lord, my heart aches so, I shall faint if I stay.
SCENE XXI.
Mellefont alone.
MEL. Oh, I could curse my stars, fate, and chance; all causes and acc
idents of fortune in this life! But to what purpose? Yet, ‘sdeath, for a man to have the fruit of all his industry grow full and ripe, ready to drop into his mouth, and just when he holds out his hand to gather it, to have a sudden whirlwind come, tear up tree and all, and bear away the very root and foundation of his hopes: — what temper can contain? They talk of sending Maskwell to me; I never had more need of him. But what can he do? Imagination cannot form a fairer and more plausible design than this of his which has miscarried. O my precious aunt, I shall never thrive without I deal with the devil, or another woman.
Complete Works of William Congreve Page 38