by Thomas Otway
Clum. Murder, murder, murder!
Mala. When there is such odds, a man may with honour retire and steal off. [Exit MALAGENE.
Enter CAPER and SAUNTER.
Cap. Where is this rascal? this coxcomb? this fop? How dare you come hither, sir, to affront ladies and persons of quality?
Clum. Sir, your humble servant: did you see my periwig?
Cap. Sir, you are an ass; and never wore a periwig in your life: jernié, what a bush of briars and thorns is here? The mane of my Lady Squeamish’s Shock is a chedreux to it.
Clum. Why, sir, I know who made it. He was an honest fellow and a barber, and one that loved music and poetry.
Saun. How, sir!
Cap. But, sir, come close to the business: how durst you treat ladies so rudely as we saw you but now? Answer to that, and tell not us of music and poetry.
Clum. Why, he had all Westminster drollery, and Oxford jests at his fingers’-ends. And for the cittern, if ever Troy town were a tune, he mastered it upon that instrument, when he was our butler in the country: an old maid of my grandmother’s took great delight in him for it.
Saun. But, sir, this is nothing to our business.
Clum. Business! hang business! I hate a man of business: if you’ll drink, or whore, break windows, or commit murder, I am for you.
Cap. Sir, will you fight?
Clum. Fight! with whom? for what?
Cap. With me.
Saun. With me.
Clum. Aye, sir, with all my heart; I love fighting, sir.
Cap. But will you, sir? dare you?
Saun. Aye, sir, will you fight? do you think you dare fight?
Clum. Why, you sweet, perfumed, jessamine knaves! you rogues in buckram! were there a dozen of you, I’d beat you out of your artificial sweetness into your own natural rankness. You, stinkards! shall I draw my Cerberus, and cut you off, you gaudy popinjays?
Cap. This fellow’s mad, Saunter! stark mad, by Jericho: dear knight, how long hast thou been in this pickle? this condition, knight? ha?
Clum. What pickle? what condition? you worms.
Saun. Aye, aye, ’tis so, the poor devil must to Bedlam: Bedlam, knight, the madman’s hospital.
Clum. What will become of you then, you vermin; there’s never an hospital for fools yet; mercy on me, if there were! how many handsome fellows in this town might be provided for?
[Fiddles play within.
Cap. Heyday, fiddles!
Saun. Madam Goodvile, hearing we were here, hath sent for them on purpose to regale us.
Enter MRS. GOODVILE, LADY SQUEAMISH, with the fiddles playing, SAUNTER falls to sing the tune with them, and CAPER dances to it. LETTICE.
Mrs. Good. Let my servants take care that all the doors stand open; I’ll have entrance denied to no one fool in town. Mr. Caper and Mr. Saunter here? then we can never want company. Come, madam, let us begin the revels of the day; I long to enjoy the freedom I am mistress of. Lettice, try your vow.
Lady Squ. Oh madam! this gallant spirit ravishes me. Dear Mr. Caper, you and Mr. Saunter were born to be happy! Madam Goodvile has resolved to sacrifice this day to pleasure — what shall we do with ourselves?
Cap. Do, madam! we’ll dance for ever.
Lady Squ. Oh, aye, dance.
Saun. And sing.
Lady Squ. And sing.
Both. And love.
Lady Squ. Oh aye, love! but, Madam Goodvile; have you resolved to wear the willow, and be very melancholy ha, ha, ha. Fiddles! where are you? I cannot endure you out of my sight.
Mrs. Good. Willow! hang it, give it to country girls that sigh for clowns; and melancholy is a disease for bankrupt beauty: I have yet a stock of youth and charms, unsullied by the hands of age or care;
And whilst that lasts, what woman would despair?
Clum. In the mean time I’ll scout out for a doxy of my acquaintance hard by, return in triumph, and let Victoria go hang and despair.
Sings.
To love is a pleasure divine,
Yet I’ll never sigh or be sad;
They are coxcombs that languish and pine,
So long as whores are to be had.
To daroll, darolda.
Lady Squ. Oh secure that deform’d monster, that rebel of mine: fellows, take care of him, and keep him up till I talk with him, and make him sensible of his enormities.
Clum. Slaves, avaunt! if my lady will have it so, I’ll walk soberly into the garden, and consider of what is past.
To love is a pleasure, &c. [Exit CLUM.
Mrs. Good. Lettice?
Let. Madam.
Mrs. Good. Is Mr. Truman come?
Let. He’ll be here presently, madam.
Enter Page with a letter.
Page. A letter for your ladyship.
Mrs. Good. Who brought it?
Page. A porter brought it to the door, madam: but said he had no orders, to stay for an answer.
[Exit Page.
Mrs. Good. A woman’s hand.
Reads.] Mr. Goodvile’s journey out of town is but a pretence: he is jealous of you and Mr. Truman, you will find him anon returned in hopes to surprise you together. Though he has trusted me with the secret, and obliged me to assist him in it: yet I would endeavour by this discovery to persuade you that I am your real servant, VICTORIA.
Postscript. Beware of Malagene, for he is appointed the spy to betray you.
This is generously done, Victoria, and I’ll study to deserve it of thee: now, if I plague not this wise, jealous husband of mine, let all wives curse me, and cuckolds laugh at me! fiddles, lead in! Mr. Caper and Mr. Saunter, pray wait on my lady, and entertain her a little: I’ll follow you presently.
Lady Squ. Come, Mr. Caper, will you walk?
Cap. A coranto, madam.
Lady Squ. Aye, ten thousand, ten thousand, Mr. Saunter, I would be always near you too! Oh for a grove now, and a purling brook with that delightful charming voice ef yours! Come, let us walk, and study which way to divert ourselves.
Cap. Allons! for love and pleasure: by these hands.
Saun. By those eyes Lady Squ. Oh, no more! no more: I shall be lost in happiness. [Exeunt.
Mrs. Good. So, this concert of fools shall be the chorus to my farce; now all the malice, ill-nature, falsehood, and hypocrisy of my sex inspire me. Lettice! see Camilla be sent for instantly, she shall join with me in my revenge, she has reason; Mr. Valentine, I suppose, will be here with Mr. Truman.
Enter TRUMAN.
Tru. And, think you, madam, he durst not answer a fair lady’s challenge without a second?
Mrs. Good. You would pretend, I’ll warrant you, to be very stout. You Hectors in love are as arrant cheats as Hectors in fighting, that bluster, rant, and make a noise for the present; but when they come to the business, prove arrant dastards, and good for nothing.
Tru. But, madam, you should find I dare do something, would you but be civil and stand your ground.
Mrs. Good. What think you though of a cut-throat husband now behind the hangings? what would become of you then?
Tru. Whilst I have such beauty on my side, nothing can hurt me.
Mrs. Good. Then, sir, prepare yourself; Mr. Goodvile is really jealous, and mistrusts all or more than has past between us. His journey out of town was but a pretence, but we shall see him instantly in expectation to catch us together.
Tru. Fear him not, madam; these moles that work under ground are as blind as they are busy: let him run on in his dull jealousy, whilst we still find new windings-out, and lose him in the maze.
Mrs. Good. Then if you wish to preserve me yours, join with me to-day in my design, which is, if possible, to make him mad, work him up to the height of furious suspicion, and at that moment, when he thinks his jealousy most just, baffle him out of it: and let the world know how dull a tool a husband is, compared with that triumphant thing a wife, and her guardian angel lover.
Tru. But Mr. Goodvile, madam, has wit, and so good an opinion of it too.
Mrs. Good. ’T
is that shall be his ruin: were he a fool, he were not worth the trouble of deceiving.
Tru. Dear jewel of my soul, proceed then and prosper. But what must be my part?
Mrs. Good. To secure Malagene. That ill-natured villain has betrayed us, and is appointed by Goodvile chief instrument in the discovery. He has cowardice enough to sell his soul to buy off a beating: be never told truth enough to be believed once so long as he lives. Get him but in your power, and he will own more villanies than ever were in his thoughts to commit, or the necessity of our affair can invent to put upon him.
Tru. And I’ll be sure of him, or may I never taste those lips again, but be condemned to cast mistresses in the side-box at the play-house, or, what is worse, take up with a sempstress, and drudge for cuffs and cravats.
Enter MALAGENE.
Mrs. Good. Here he comes.
Tru. Oh, Monsieur Malagene, welcome!
Mala. Jack Truman, your humble servant.
Tru. Whither so fast, I beseech you, sir! a word with you, a word with you.
Mala. Why, can I do any thing for thee? Hast thou any business for me? Pr’ythee, what is it?
Tru. Sir, you must lie for me.
Mala. Ha, ha, ha. Is that all?
Tru. Nay, sir, you must.
Mala. Any thing in a civil way, or so, Jack; but nothing upon compulsion, lad: pr’ythee, let me do nothing upon compulsion, pr’ythee now.
Tru. Then, sir, to be brief, this is the business: Goodvile, I hear, has been informed by you of what passed in the garden last night; how durst you be so impudent as to pry into any secrets, where I was concerned?
Mala. Why, look you, Jack, curiosity, you know, and a natural inclination which I have —
Tru. To pimping.
Mala. Confound me, Jack, thou art much in the right: I believe thou art a witch. I knew as well, man —
Tru. What did you know?
Mala. Why, I knew thee to be an arch wag, and an honest fellow: ah, rogue, pr’ythee kiss me: the rogue’s out of humour.
Tru. No, sir; I dare not use you so like a friend, you must deserve it better first.
Mala. Look you, Jack, the truth of the business is, I am bespoke: but the love I have to see the business go forward, may persuade me to much.
Tru. Then presently resolve entirely to disown and abjure all the intelligence you gave Goodvile, or promise to yourself that wherever next I meet you, I’ll cut your throat on the spot.
Mala. But hark you, Jack, how shall I come off with the business? I shall be kicked and used Very scurvily: for the truth is, I did tell —
Tru. What did you tell?
Mala. Why, I told him, you knave, I won’t tell, you little cunning cur, I told him all, man.
Tru. All sir!
Mala. Aye, hang me like a dog, all. But, madam, you must pardon me, there was not a word of it true.
Tru. And what do you think to do with yourself?
Mala. Do? why I’ll deny it all again, man, every word of it, as impudently as ever I at first affirmed it: may be he’ll kick me, and beat me, and use me like a dog, man — that’s nothing, nothing at all, man; I do not value it this.
[Pulls out a Jew’s trump, and plays.
Tru. And this, sir, you’ll stand to?
Mala. If I do not, hang me up for a sign at a bawdy-house door: in the mean time I’ll retire and peruse a young lampoon, which I am lately the happy father of.
Tru. Nay, sir, you are not to stir from me.
Enter LETTICE.
Let. Oh, madam, shift for yourself. Madam Victoria sent me to tell you that my master is returned, and that he pretends to come a masquerader.
Mala. Well, since it must be so, I’ll deny alt indeed; what an excellent fellow might I have been? Some men now with my stock of honesty, and a little more gravity, would have, made a fortune. Well, I have been a lazy rogue; and never knew till now that I was fit for business.
Mrs. Good. Mr. Goodvile in masquerade, say, you?
Let. Yes, madam, and two women with him; madam, they are just now alighted.
Mrs. Good. Women with; him! nay then he comes triumphantly indeed. Mr. Truman, do you retire with Malagene. I’ll stay here, and, receive this Machiavel in disguise. Now, once more let me invoke all the arts of affectation, all the revenge, the counterfeit passions, pretended love, pretended jealousy, pretended rage, and, in sum, the very genius of my sex to my assistance.
Enter GOODVILE, and others, masked.
So! here they come; now this throw for all my future peace! Who waits there?
Enter Servants.
Good. Madam, you’ll excuse this freedom.
Mrs. Good. You oblige me by using it: let all the company know that these noble persons, of quality have honoured me with their presence: let the fiddles be ready, and see the banquet prepared; and let Mr. Truman come to me instantly; I cannot live a minute, a moment without him.
Good. Delicate devil.
Mrs. Good. Sir! let me beg your patience for a moment, whilst I go and put things in order fit for your reception. [Exit.
Good. Footmen! take care that the engines which I have ordered be ready when I call for them. Truman, I see, is a man of punctual assignation; and my wife is a person very adroit at these matters; some hot-brained, horn-mad cuckold now would be for cutting of throats, but I am resolved to turn a civil, sober, discreet person, and hate bloodshed: no, I’ll manage the matter so temperately, that I’ll catch her in his very arms, then civilly discard her bag and baggage, whilst you, my dainty doxies, take possession of her privileges, and enter the territories with colours flying.
1 Woman. And shall I keep my coach, Mr. Goodvile?
Good. Aye, and six, my lovely rampant. Nay, thou shalt every morning swoop the exchange in triumph, to see what gaudy bauble thou canst first grow fond of: and after noon at the theatre, exalted in a box, give audience to every trim, amorous, twiring fop of the corner, that comes thither to make a noise, hear no play, and show himself; thou shalt, my bona roba.
2 Woman. But, Mr. Goodvile, what shall I do then?
Good. Oh thou! thou shalt be my more peculiar punk, my housekeeper, my necessary sin; manage all the affairs of my estate and family, ride up and down in ‘my own coach, attended by my own footmen, nose my wife where’er you meet, and, if I had any, breed up my children. Oh, what a delicious life will this be!
1 Woman. Hear you, sir, the fiddles?
[Fiddles without.
Good. Oh, the procession’s coming, put on your vizors, and observe the ceremony.
Enter TRUMAN, MRS. GOODVILE, CAPER, SAUNTER, LADY SQUEAMISH, CAMILLA, with Fiddles, a Letter.
Mrs. Good. Mr. Caper, Mr. Saunter, you are the life and soul of all good company; command me any thing, command my house, that and all freedom are your’s.
Cap. Masques, my life, my joy, my top of happiness! Sir, your humble servant: by your leave, madam, shall you and I toss and tumble together in the drawingroom hard by for half an hour or so? ha? [Cuts.
Saunt. Fa toldara, toldara, &c. Ah, madam, what do you wear a mask for? Have you never a nose, or but one eye? Let me see how yon are furnished.
2 Wom. Sir, if I want any thing, ’tis to be doubted you cannot supply me.
Good. So; sure this mast come to something anon.
Mrs. Good. Ah, were but Mr. Goodvile here now, what a happy day might this be! but he is melancholy and forlorn in the country, summoning in his tenants and their rents; that shining pelf that must support me in my pleasures.
Good. Is he then, madam, so kind a husband?
Mrs. Good. Oh the most indulgent creature in the world! what husband but he, Mr. Truman, would have so seasonably withdrawn, and left me mistress of such freedom? To spend my days in triumph as I do, to sacrifice myself, my soul, and all my sense to you, the lord of all my joys, my conqueror and protector?
Cam. Heavens, madam, you’ll provoke him beyond all patience.
Mrs. Good. Who? Mr. Goodvile! which way shall it reach his knowledge? no, we’ll be a
s secret —
Tru. As we are happy. So subtly lay the scene of all our joys, that envy or malice, nay the very husband himself, and Malagene to boot, well hired to the business, shall ne’er discover us.
Mrs. Good. Oh discover us! a husband discover us! Were he indeed as jealous as he has reason, I could no more apprehend discovery than a kindness from him.
Good. This impudence is so rank, that I can hold no longer. Say you so, madam? [He unmasks.
Mrs. Good. Oh, a ghost! a ghost! save me, save me. Mr. Truman, see, see Mr. Goodvile’s spirit! sure some base villain has murdered him, and his angry ghost has come to revenge it on me.
Good. No, madam, fear nothing, I am a very harmless goblin, though you are a little shocked at the sight of me.
Cap. Ha, ha, ha. Goodvile returned? dear Frank!
Saun. Honest Goodvile, thou seest, dear soul, we are free here in thy absence.
Good. I see you are, gentlemen, and shall take an opportunity to return the favour. Footmen, be ready.
Mrs. Good. But is it really Mr. Goodvile then? let me receive him to my arms; welcome ten thousand, thousand, thousand times. Dear sir, how does my picture in the gallery do?
Good. Oh, madam, it looked so very charmingly, that I had no power to stay longer from the dear loving original.
Mrs. Good. So, now begins the battle. [Aside.
Good. Well, madam, and for your set of fools here; to what end and purpose have you decreed them in this new model of your family? I hope you have not designed them for your own use.
Mrs. Good. Why, sir, methinks you should not grudge me a coxcomb or two to pass away the time withal, since you had taken your dearer conversation from me.
Good. No, madam, I understand your diet better: a fool is too squob and tender a bit for your fierce appetite: you are for a substantial dish, a man of heat and honour, such as Mr. Truman I know is, and I doubt not will do me reason.
Tru. Ay, sir, whenever you’ll demand it.
Mrs. Good. Nay, sirs, no quarrelling, I beseech you; what would you be at, sir?
Good. At rest, madam; like an honest snail, shrink up my horns into my shell, and, if possible, hold a quiet possession of it.
Mrs. Good. I hope I have done nothing that may disturb your quiet, sir.
Good. Nothing, madam, nothing in the least; how is it possible that any thing should disturb me? a sot, a beetle, a drone of a husband, a mere utensil, a block for you to fashion all your falsehood on, whilst I must still be stupid, bear my office, and never be disturbed.
