Anselmus’ house
Enter Votarius sadly.
VOTARIUS
All’s gone; there’s nothing but the prodigal left:
I have played away my soul at one short game
Where e’en the winner loses.
Pursuing sin, how often did I shun thee!
How swift art thou afoot, beyond man’s goodness,
Which has a lazy pace! So was I catched.
A curse upon the cause! Man in these days
Is not content to have his lady honest,
And so rest pleased with her without more toil,
But he must have her tried, forsooth, and tempted;
And when she proves a quean then he lies quiet,
Like one that has a watch of curious making,
Thinking to be more cunning than the workman,
Never gives over tamp’ring with the wheels
Till either spring be weakened, balance bowed,
Or some wrong pin put in, and so spoils all.
How I could curse myself! Most business else
Delight[s] in the dispatch; that’s the best grace to’t.
Only this work of blind, repented lust
Hangs shame and sadness on his master’s cheek.
Yet wise men take no warning —
Enter Wife.
Nor can I now.
Her very sight strikes my repentance backward;
It cannot stand against her. Chamber thoughts
And words that have sport in ‘em, they’re for ladies.
WIFE
My best and dearest servant!
VOTARIUS
Worthiest mistress!
Enter Leonella.
[LEONELLA]
Madam!
WIFE
Who’s that? My woman? She’s myself.
Proceed, sir.
LEONELLA
Not if you love your honour, madam.
I came to give you warning my lord’s come.
VOTARIUS
How!
WIFE
My lord!
LEONELLA
[Aside] Alas, poor vessels, how this tempest tosses ‘em!
They’re driven both asunder in a twinkling;
Down goes the sails here, and main mast yonder.
Here rides a bark with better fortune yet;
I fear no tossing, come what weather will.
I have a trick to hold out water still.
VOTARIUS
[Aside] His very name shoots like a fever through me,
Now hot, now cold. Which cheek shall I turn toward him,
For fear he should read guiltiness in my looks?
I would he would keep from home like a wise man;
’Tis no place for him now. I would not see him
Of any friend alive. It is not fit
We two should come together; we have abused
Each other mightily: he used me ill
To employ me thus, and I ha’ used him worse.
I’m too much even with him.
Enter Anselmus.
Yonder’s a sight on him.
WIFE
My loved and honoured lord! Most welcome, sir.
[They kiss.]
LEONELLA
[Aside] Oh, there’s a kiss! Methinks my lord might taste
Dissimulation rank in’t, if he had wit.
He takes but of the breath of his friend’s lip.
A second kiss is here, but that she keeps
For her first friend. We women have no cunning!
WIFE
You parted strangely from me.
ANSELMUS
That’s forgotten.
Votarius! I make speed to be in thine arms.
[Embraces Votarius.]
VOTARIUS
You never come too soon, sir.
ANSELMUS
How goes business?
VOTARIUS
Pray think upon some other subject, sir.
What news at court?
ANSELMUS
Pish, answer me!
VOTARIUS
Alas, sir, would you have me work by wonders,
To strike fire out of ice? Y’are a strange lord, sir.
Put me to possible things and find ‘em finished
At your return to me. I can say no more.
ANSELMUS
[Taking him aside] I see by this thou didst not try her throughly.
VOTARIUS
How, sir, not throughly! By this light, he lives not
That could make trial of a woman better.
ANSELMUS
I fear thou wast too slack.
VOTARIUS
Good faith, you wrong me, sir.
She never found it so.
ANSELMUS
Then I’ve a jewel,
And nothing shall be thought too precious for her.
I may advance my forehead and boast purely.
Methinks I see her worth with clear eyes now.
Oh, when a man’s opinion is at peace,
’Tis a fine life to marry! No state’s like it.
[To Wife] My worthy lady, freely I confess
To thy wronged heart, my passion had alate
Put rudeness on me, which I now put off.
I will no more seem so unfashionable
For pleasure and the chamber of a lady.
WIFE
I’m glad you’re changed so well, sir.
VOTARIUS
[Aside] Thank himself for’t.
Exeunt Wife and Anselmus.
LEONELLA
[Aside] This comes like physic when the party’s dead.
Flows kindness now, when ’tis so ill deserved?
This is the fortune still. Well, for this trick,
I’ll save my husband and his friend a labour;
I’ll never marry as long as I’m honest,
For commonly queans have the kindest husbands.
Exit Leonella, manet Votarius.
VOTARIUS
I do not like his company now; ’tis irksome.
His eye offends me. Methinks ’tis not kindly
We two should live together in one house,
And ’tis impossible to remove me hence.
I must not give way first. She is my mistress,
And that’s a degree kinder than a wife.
Women are always better to their friends
Than to their husbands, and more true to them.
Then let the worst give place, whom she ‘as least need on,
He that can best be spared, and that’s her husband.
I do not like his overboldness with her;
He’s too familiar with the face I love.
I fear the sickness of affection;
I feel a grudging on’t. I shall grow jealous
E’en of that pleasure which she has by law,
I shall go so near with her!
Enter Bellarius passing over the stage.
Ha, what’s he?
Life, ’tis Bellarius, my rank enemy!
Mine eye snatched so much sight of him. What’s his business?
His face half darkened, stealing through the house
With a whoremaster’s pace: I like it not.
This lady will be served like a great woman,
With more attendants, I perceive, than one;
She has her shift of friends. My enemy one?
Do we both shun each other’s company
In all assemblies public, at all meetings,
And drink to one another in one mistress?
My very thought’s my poison. ’Tis high time
To seek for help. Where is our head physician?
A doctor of my making and that lecher’s!
Oh, woman, when thou once leav’st to be good,
Thou car’st not who stands next thee! Every sin
Is a companion for thee, for thy once-cracked honesty
Is like the breaking of whole money:
It never comes to good, but wastes away.
Enter Anselmus.
ANSELMUS
Votarius.
VOTARIUS
Ha!
ANSELMUS
We miss you, sir, within.
VOTARIUS
I missed you more without. Would you had come sooner, sir!
ANSELMUS
Why, what’s the business?
VOTARIUS
You should ha’ seen a fellow,
A common bawdy-house ferret, one Bellarius,
Steal through this room, his whorish barren face
Three-quarters muffled. He is somewhere hid
About the house, sir.
ANSELMUS
Which way took the villain,
That marriage felon, one that robs the mind,
Twenty times worse than any highway striker?
Speak, which way took he?
VOTARIUS
Marry, my lord, I think —
Let me see, which way was’t now? Up yon stairs.
ANSELMUS
The way to chamb’ring! Did not I say still
All thy temptations were too faint and lazy?
Thou didst not play ‘em home.
VOTARIUS
To tell you true, sir,
I found her yielding ere I left her last,
And wavering in her faith.
ANSELMUS
Did not I think so?
VOTARIUS
That makes me suspect him.
ANSELMUS
Why, partial man!
Couldst thou hide this from me, so dearly sought for,
And rather waste thy pity upon her?
Thou’rt not so kind as my heart praised thee to me.
Hark!
VOTARIUS
’Tis his footing, certain.
ANSELMUS
Are you chambered?
I’ll fetch you from aloft.
Exit Anselmus.
VOTARIUS
He takes my work
And toils to bring me ease. This use I’ll make on him:
His care shall watch to keep all strange thieves out
Whiles I familiarly go in and rob him
Like one that knows the house.
But how has rashness and my jealousy used me!
Out of my vengeance to mine enemy
Confessed her yielding, I have locked myself
From mine own liberty with that key. Revenge
Does no man good but to his greatest harm.
Suspect and malice, like a mingled cup,
Made me soon drunk. I knew not what I spoke,
And that may get me pardon.
Enter Anselmus, a dagger in his hand, with Leonella.
LEONELLA
Why, my lord!
ANSELMUS
Confess, thou mystical panderess! Run, Votarius,
To the back gate; the guilty slave leaped out
And scaped me so. This strumpet locked him up
In her own chamber!
Exit Votarius.
LEONELLA
Hold, my lord! I might;
He is my husband, sir!
ANSELMUS
Oh, soul of cunning!
Came that arch-subtlety from thy lady’s counsel
Or thine own sudden craft? Confess to me
How oft thou hast been a bawd to their close actions,
Or all thy light goes out!
LEONELLA
My lord, believe me,
In troth, I love a man too well myself
To bring him to my mistress.
ANSELMUS
Leave thy sporting,
Or my next offer makes thy heart weep blood!
LEONELLA
Oh, spare that strength, my lord, and I’ll reveal
A secret that concerns you, for this does not.
ANSELMUS
Back, back, my fury, then:
It shall not touch thy breast. Speak freely. What is’t?
LEONELLA
Votarius and my lady are false gamesters;
They use foul play, my lord.
ANSELMUS
Thou liest!
LEONELLA
Reward me then
For all together; if it prove not so,
I’ll never bestow time to ask your pity.
ANSELMUS
Votarius and thy lady! ‘Twill ask days
Ere it be settled in belief. So, rise;
Go get thee to thy chamber.
Exit.
LEONELLA
A pox on you!
You hindered me of better business, thank you.
H’as frayed a secret from me; would he were whipped!
Faith, from a woman a thing’s quickly slipped.
Exit.