The Way of the World Part 20

LADY. This will never do. It will never make a match,--at least before he has been abroad.

SCENE XII.

LADY WISHFORT, WAITWELL disguised as for SIR ROWLAND.

LADY. Dear Sir Rowland, I am confounded with confusion at the retrospection of my own rudeness,--I have more pardons to ask than the pope distributes in the year of jubilee. But I hope where there is likely to be so near an alliance, we may unbend the severity of decorum, and dispense with a little ceremony.

WAIT. My impatience, madam, is the effect of my transport; and till I have the possession of your adorable person, I am tantalised on the rack, and do but hang, madam, on the tenter of expectation.

LADY. You have excess of gallantry, Sir Rowland, and press things to a conclusion with a most prevailing vehemence. But a day or two for decency of marriage -

WAIT. For decency of funeral, madam! The delay will break my heart--or if that should fail, I shall be poisoned. My nephew will get an inkling of my designs and poison me--and I would willingly starve him before I die--I would gladly go out of the world with that satisfaction. That would be some comfort to me, if I could but live so long as to be revenged on that unnatural viper.

LADY. Is he so unnatural, say you? Truly I would contribute much both to the saving of your life and the accomplishment of your revenge. Not that I respect myself; though he has been a perfidious wretch to me.

WAIT. Perfidious to you?

LADY. O Sir Rowland, the hours that he has died away at my feet, the tears that he has shed, the oaths that he has sworn, the palpitations that he has felt, the trances and the tremblings, the ardours and the ecstasies, the kneelings and the risings, the heart- heavings and the hand-gripings, the pangs and the pathetic regards of his protesting eyes!--Oh, no memory can register.

WAIT. What, my rival? Is the rebel my rival? A dies.

LADY. No, don't kill him at once, Sir Rowland: starve him gradually, inch by inch.

WAIT. I'll do't. In three weeks he shall be barefoot; in a month out at knees with begging an alms; he shall starve upward and upward, 'till he has nothing living but his head, and then go out in a stink like a candle's end upon a save-all.

LADY. Well, Sir Rowland, you have the way,--you are no novice in the labyrinth of love,--you have the clue. But as I am a person, Sir Rowland, you must not attribute my yielding to any sinister appet.i.te or indigestion of widowhood; nor impute my complacency to any lethargy of continence. I hope you do not think me p.r.o.ne to any iteration of nuptials?

WAIT. Far be it from me -

LADY. If you do, I protest I must recede, or think that I have made a prost.i.tution of decorums, but in the vehemence of compa.s.sion, and to save the life of a person of so much importance -

WAIT. I esteem it so -

LADY. Or else you wrong my condescension -

WAIT. I do not, I do not -

LADY. Indeed you do.

WAIT. I do not, fair shrine of virtue.

LADY. If you think the least scruple of causality was an ingredient -

WAIT. Dear madam, no. You are all camphire and frankincense, all chast.i.ty and odour.

LADY. Or that -

SCENE XIII.

[To them] FOIBLE.

FOIB. Madam, the dancers are ready, and there's one with a letter, who must deliver it into your own hands.

LADY. Sir Rowland, will you give me leave? Think favourably, judge candidly, and conclude you have found a person who would suffer racks in honour's cause, dear Sir Rowland, and will wait on you incessantly.

SCENE XIV.

WAITWELL, FOIBLE.

WAIT. Fie, fie! What a slavery have I undergone; spouse, hast thou any cordial? I want spirits.

FOIB. What a washy rogue art thou, to pant thus for a quarter of an hour's lying and swearing to a fine lady?

WAIT. Oh, she is the antidote to desire. Spouse, thou wilt fare the worse for't. I shall have no appet.i.te to iteration of nuptials- -this eight-and-forty hours. By this hand I'd rather be a chairman in the dog-days than act Sir Rowland till this time to-morrow.

SCENE XV.

[To them] LADY with a letter.

LADY. Call in the dancers; Sir Rowland, we'll sit, if you please, and see the entertainment. [Dance.] Now, with your permission, Sir Rowland, I will peruse my letter. I would open it in your presence, because I would not make you uneasy. If it should make you uneasy, I would burn it--speak if it does--but you may see, the superscription is like a woman's hand.

FOIB. By heaven! Mrs. Marwood's, I know it,--my heart aches--get it from her! [To him.]

WAIT. A woman's hand? No madam, that's no woman's hand: I see that already. That's somebody whose throat must be cut.

LADY. Nay, Sir Rowland, since you give me a proof of your pa.s.sion by your jealousy, I promise you I'll make a return by a frank communication. You shall see it--we'll open it together. Look you here. [Reads.] MADAM, THOUGH UNKNOWN TO YOU (look you there, 'tis from n.o.body that I know.) I HAVE THAT HONOUR FOR YOUR CHARACTER, THAT I THINK MYSELF OBLIGED TO LET YOU KNOW YOU ARE ABUSED. HE WHO PRETENDS TO BE SIR ROWLAND IS A CHEAT AND A RASCAL. O heavens!

what's this?

FOIB. Unfortunate; all's ruined.

WAIT. How, how, let me see, let me see. [Reading.] A RASCAL, AND DISGUISED AND SUBORNED FOR THAT IMPOSTURE--O villainy! O villainy!-- BY THE CONTRIVANCE OF -

LADY. I shall faint, I shall die. Oh!

FOIB. Say 'tis your nephew's hand. Quickly, his plot, swear, swear it! [To him.]

WAIT. Here's a villain! Madam, don't you perceive it? Don't you see it?

LADY. Too well, too well. I have seen too much.