Volpone and Other Plays (63 page)

DAME PURECRAFT
: O, I thank you, blessed, honest men!

BRISTLE
: Nay, never thank us, but thank this madman that comes here. He put it in our heads.

[
TROUBLE-ALL
]
comes again
.

DAME PURECRAFT
: Is he mad? now heaven increase his

100    madness, and bless it, and thank it; sir, your poor handmaid thanks you.

TROUBLE-ALL
: Have you a warrant? An' you have a warrant, show it.

DAME PUBECRAFT
: Yes, I have a warrant out of
the Word
, to give thanks for removing any scorn intended to the Brethren.

[
Exeunt all but
TROUBLE-ALL
.]

TBOUBLE-ALL
: It is Justice Overdo's warrant that i look for. If you have not that, keep your word, I' ll keep mine. Quit ye, and multiply ye.

IV, ii                 [
Enter
EDGWORTH
and
NIGHTINGALE
.]

BDGWORTH
: Come away, Nightingale, I pray thee.

TROUBLE-ALL
: Whither go you? Where's your warrant?

BDGWORTH
: Warrant, for what, sir?

TROUBLE-ALL
: For what you go about; you know how fit it is; an' you have no warrant, bless you, I' ll pray for you, that's all I can do.

Goes out
.

BDGWORTH
: What means he?

10
NIGHTINGALE
: A madman that haunts the Fair; do you not know him? It's marvel he has not more followers after his ragged heels.

BDGWORTH
: Beshrew him, he startled me. I thought he had known of our plot. Guilt's a terrible thing! Ha' you prepared the coster-monger?

NIGHTINGALE
: Yes, and agreed for his basket of pears. He is at the corner here, ready.

[
Enter
COSTER-MONGER
.]

           And your prize, he comes down, sailing that way, all alone, without his protector; he is rid of him, it seems.

BDGWORTH
: Ay, I Know; I should ha' followed his protectorship for a feat I am to do upon him; but this offered itself so i'

20       the way, I could not let it ‘scape. Here he comes; whistle. Be this sport called
‘Dorring the dottrel'
.

[
Enter
COKES
.]

Nightingale whistles
.

NIGHTINGALE
: Wh, wh, wh, wh, etc.

COKES
: By this light, I cannot find my gingerbread-wife nor my hobby-horse-man in all the fair, now, to ha' my money again. And i do not know the way out on't, to go home for more. Do you hear, friend, you that whistle? what tune is that you whistle?

NIGHTINGALE
: A new tune I am practising, sir.

COKES
: Dost thou know where I dwell, I pray thee? Nay, on with

30       thy tune, I ha' no such haste for an answer. I' ll practise with thee.

COSTER-MONGER
: Buy any pears, very fine pears, pears fine! NIGHTINGALE
sets his foot afore him, and he falls with his basket
.

COKES
: Godso! a
muss
, a muss, a muss, a muss!

[
He helps to pick up the pears
.]

COSTER-MONGER
: Good gentleman, my ware, my ware! I am a poor man. Good sir, my ware.

NIGHTINGALE
[
to
COKES
]: Let me hold your sword, sir, it troubles you.

COKES
: Do, and my cloak, an' thou wilt; and my hat too. COKES falls a-scrambling whilst they run away with his things.

40
BDGWORTH
: A delicate great boy! Methinks he out-scrambles 'em all. I cannot persuade myself but he goes to grammar-school yet, and plays the truant today.

NIGHTINGALE
: Would he had another purse to cut, ‘Zekiel.

EDGWORTH
: Purse? a man might cut out his kidneys, I think, and he never feel ' em, he is so earnest at the sport.

NIGHTINGALE
: His soul is half-way out on's body at the game.

EDGWORTH
: Away, Nightingale; that way!

[
Exit
NIGHTINGALE
With
COKBS's
word, cloak, and hat
.]

COKES
: I think I am furnished for Cather' ne pears for one
under-meal
. Gi' me my cloak.

COSTER-MONGER
: Good gentleman, give me my ware.

COKES
: Where's the fellow I ga' my cloak to? My cloak? and my hat? Ha! God's lid, is he gone? Thieves, thieves! Help me to

50              cry, gentlemen.

He runs out
.

BDGWORTH
: Away, Coster-Monger, come to us to Urs' la's.

[
Exit
COSTER-MONGER.]

            Talk of him to have a soul? ' Heart, if he have any more than a thing given him instead of salt, only to keep from stinking, I' ll be hanged afore my time, presently. Where should it be, trow? In his blood? He has not so much toward it in his whole body as will maintain a good flea. And if he take this course, he will not ha' so much land left as to rear a calf within this twelvemonth. Was there ever green plover so
pulled
! That his little overseer had been here now, and been but tall enough,

60      to see him steal pears in exchange for his beaver-hat and his cloak thus! I must go find him out next, for his black box and his
^patent
(it seems) he has of his place; which I think the gentleman would have a
^reversion
of, that spoke to me for it so earnestly.

[
Exit
.]

He
[
COKES
]
comes again
.

COKES
: Would I might lose my doublet, and hose too, as I am an honest man, and never stir, if I think there be anything but thieving and coz' ning i' this whole Fair. Barthol' mew Fair, quoth he; an' ever any Barthol' mew had that luck in't that I

70       have had, I' ll be martyred for him, and in Smithfield, too. I ha' paid for my pears, a rot on ' em, I' ll keep ' em no longer.

Throws away his pears
.

        You were
^choke-pears
to me; I had better ha' gone to
^mum-chance
for you, I wusse. Methinks the Fair should not have used me thus, an' 'twere but for my name's sake; I would not ha' used a dog o' the name so. O, Numps will triumph now!.

TROUBLE-ALL
comes again
.

        Friend, do you know who I am? Or where I lie? I do not myself, I' ll be sworn. Do but
^carry
.
me home, and I' ll please thee; I ha' money enough there. I ha' lost myself, and my cloak and my hat; and my fine sword, and my sister, and Numps, and

80     Mistress Grace (a gentlewoman that I should ha' married), and a cut-work handkercher she ga' me, and two purses, today. And my bargain o' hobby-horses and gingerbread, which grieves me worst of all.

TROUBLE-ALL
: By Whose Warrant, sir, have you done all this?

COKES
: Warrant? thou art a wise fellow, indeed – as if a man need a warrant to lose anything with.

TROUBLE-ALL
: Yes, Justice Overdo's warrant, a man may get and lose with, I' ll stand to't.

COKES
: Justice Overdo? Dost thou know him? I
^lie
there, he is

90      my brother-in-law; he married my sister. Pray thee show me the way, dost thou know the house?

TROUBLE-ALL
: Sir, show me your warrant; I know nothing without a warrant, pardon me.

COKES
: Why, I warrant thee, come along. Thou shalt see i have
wrought
pillows there, and cambric sheets, and
^{sweet bags}
too. pray thee guide me to the house.

TROUBLE-ALL
: Sir, I' ll tell you: go you thither yourself, first, alone; tell your worshipful brother your mind; and but bring me three lines of his hand, or his clerk's, with Adam Overdo

100      underneath. Here I' ll stay you; I' ll obey you, and I' ll guide you presently.

COKES [
aside
]
: 'Slid, this is an ass; I ha'
found
him. Pox upon me, what do I talking to such a dull fool? – Farewell. You are a very coxcomb, do you hear?

TROUBLE-ALL
: I think I am; if Justice Overdo sign to it, I am, and so we are all; he' ll quit us all, multiply us all.

[
Exeunt
.]

IV viii     [
Enter
GRACE
with
QUARLOUS
and
WINWIFE.]
They enter
with their swords drawn
.

[
GRACE:
] Gentlemen, this is no way that you take. You do but breed one another trouble and offence, and give me no contentment at all. i am no she that
affects
to be quarrelled for, or have my name or fortune made the question of men's swords.

QUARLOUS
: 'Slood, we love you.

GRACE
: If you both love me, as you pretend, your own reason will tell you but one can enjoy me; and to that point there leads a directer line than by my infamy, which must follow if you fight. 'Tis true, I have professed it to you ingenuously, that rather than to be yoked with this bridegroom is appointed me,

10      I Would take up any husband, almost upon any trust. Though subtlety would say to me, I know, he is a fool, and has an estate, and I might govern him and enjoy a friend beside. But these are not my aims. I must have a husband I must love, or I cannot live with him. I shall ill make one of these politic wives!

WINWIFE
: Why, if you can like either of us, lady, say which is he, and the other shall swear instantly to desist.

QUARLOUS
: Content; I accord to that willingly.

GRACE
: Sure you think me a woman of an extreme levity, gentlemen, or a strange fancy, that (meeting you by chance in such a

20      place as this, both at one instant, and not yet of two hours' acquaintance, neither of you deserving afore the other of me) I should so forsake my modesty (though I might affect one more particularly) as to say, ‘This is he, ' and name him.

QUARLOUS
: Why, wherefore should you not? what should hinder you?

GRACE
: If you would not give it to my modesty, allow it yet to
my wit; give me so much of woman and cunning as not to betray myself impertinently. How can I judge of you so far as

30       to a choice without knowing you more? You are both equal and alike to me yet; and so indifferently affected by me as each of you might be the man if the other were away. For you are reasonable creatures; you have understanding and
discourse
. And if fate send me an understanding husband, I have no fear at all but mine own manners shall make him a good one.

QUARLOUS
: Would I were Put forth
^{to making}
for you, then!

GRACE
: It may be you are; you know not what's
^toward
you.

Will you consent to a
^motion
of mine, gentlemen?

WINWIFE
: Whatever it be, we'll presume reasonableness,

40      coming from you.

QUARLOUS
: And fitness too.

GRACE
: I saw one of you buy a pair of
^tables
e'en now.

WINWIFE
: Yes, here they be, and maiden ones too, unwritten in.

GRACE
: The fitter for what they may be employed in. You shall write, either of you, here, a word or a name – what you like best – but of two or three syllables at most; and the next person that comes this way (because destiny has a high hand in business of this nature) I' ll demand which of the two words he or she doth approve; and according to that sentence fix my resolution

50        and affection without change.

QUARLOUS
: Agreed. My word is conceived already.

WINWIFE
: And mine shall not be long creating after.

GRACE
: But you shall promise, gentlemen, not to be curious to know which of you it is, taken; but give me leave to conceal that till you have brought me either home, or where I may safely
^tender
myself.

WINWIFE
: Why, that's but
^equal
.

QUARLOUS
: We are pleased.

60
GRACE
: Because I will bind both your endeavours to work together, friendly and jointly, each to the other's fortune, and
have myself fitted with some means to make him that is forsaken a part of amends.

QUARLOUS
: These conditions are very courteous. Well, my word is out of the
Arcadia
, then: ‘Argalus'.

WINWIFE
: And mine out of the play, ‘Palemon'.

TROUBLE-ALL
comes again
.

TROUBLE-ALL
: Have you any warrant for this, gentlemen?

QUARLOUS, WINWIFE
: Ha!

TROUBLE-ALL
: There must be a warrant had, believe it.

WINWIFE
: For what?

TROUBLE-ALL
: For Whatsoever it is, anything indeed, no matter

70      what.

QUARLOUS
: 'Slight, here's a fine ragged prophet, dropped down i' the nick!

TROUBLE-ALL
: Heaven quit you, gentlemen.