The Country Wife, William Wycherley [debian ebook reader txt] 📗

him! ha! ha! he! Pinchwife D’ye mock me, sir? a cuckold is a kind of a wild beast; have a care, sir. Sir Jasper No, sure, you mock me, sir. He cuckold you! it can’t be, ha! ha! he! why, I’ll tell you, sir⁠—Offers to whisper. Pinchwife I tell you again, he has whored my wife, and yours too, if he knows her, and all the women he comes near; ’tis not his dissembling, his hypocrisy, can wheedle me. Sir Jasper How! does he dissemble? is he a hypocrite? Nay, then⁠—how⁠—wife⁠—sister, is he a hypocrite? Lady Squeamish A hypocrite! a dissembler! Speak, young harlotry, speak, how? Sir Jasper Nay, then⁠—O my head too!⁠—O thou libidinous lady! Lady Squeamish O thou harloting harlotry! hast thou done’t then? Sir Jasper Speak, good Horner, art thou a dissembler, a rogue? hast thou⁠— Horner So! Lucy I’ll fetch you off, and her too, if she will but hold her tongue. Apart to Horner. Horner Canst thou? I’ll give thee⁠—Apart to Lucy. Lucy To Pinchwife. Pray have but patience to hear me, sir, who am the unfortunate cause of all this confusion. Your wife is innocent, I only culpable; for I put her upon telling you all these lies concerning my mistress, in order to the breaking off the match between Mr. Sparkish and her, to make way for Mr. Harcourt. Sparkish Did you so, eternal rotten tooth? Then, it seems, my mistress was not false to me, I was only deceived by you. Brother, that should have been, now man of conduct, who is a frank person now, to bring your wife to her lover, ha? Lucy I assure you, sir, she came not to Mr. Horner out of love, for she loves him no more⁠— Mrs. Pinchwife Hold, I told lies for you, but you shall tell none for me, for I do love Mr. Horner with all my soul, and nobody shall say me nay; pray, don’t you go to make poor Mr. Horner believe to the contrary; ’tis spitefully done of you, I’m sure. Horner Peace, dear idiot. Aside to Mrs. Pinchwife. Mrs. Pinchwife Nay, I will not peace. Pinchwife Not till I make you. Enter Dorilant and Quack. Dorilant Horner, your servant; I am the doctor’s guest, he must excuse our intrusion. Quack But what’s the matter, gentlemen? for Heaven’s sake, what’s the matter? Horner Oh, ’tis well you are come. ’Tis a censorious world we live in; you may have brought me a reprieve, or else I had died for a crime I never committed, and these innocent ladies had suffered with me; therefore, pray satisfy these worthy, honourable, jealous gentlemen⁠—that⁠—Whispers. Quack O, I understand you, is that all?⁠—Sir Jasper, by Heavens, and upon the word of a physician, sir⁠—Whispers to Sir Jasper. Sir Jasper Nay, I do believe you truly.⁠—Pardon me, my virtuous lady, and dear of honour. Lady Squeamish What, then all’s right again? Sir Jasper Ay, ay, and now let us satisfy him too. They whisper with Pinchwife. Pinchwife An eunuch! Pray, no fooling with me. Quack I’ll bring half the chirurgeons in town to swear it. Pinchwife They!⁠—they’ll swear a man that bled to death through his wounds, died of an apoplexy. Quack Pray, hear me, sir⁠—why, all the town has heard the report of him. Pinchwife But does all the town believe it? Quack Pray, inquire a little, and first of all these. Pinchwife I’m sure when I left the town, he was the lewdest fellow in’t. Quack I tell you, sir, he has been in France since; pray, ask but these ladies and gentlemen, your friend Mr. Dorilant. Gentlemen and ladies, han’t you all heard the late sad report of poor Mr. Horner? All the Ladies. Ay, ay, ay. Dorilant Why, thou jealous fool, dost thou doubt it? he’s an arrant French capon. Mrs. Pinchwife ’Tis false, sir, you shall not disparage poor Mr. Horner, for to my certain knowledge⁠— Lucy O, hold! Mrs. Squeamish Stop her mouth! Aside to Lucy. Lady Fidget Upon my honour, sir, ’tis as true⁠—To Pinchwife. Mrs. Dainty D’ye think we would have been seen in his company? Mrs. Squeamish Trust our unspotted reputations with him? Lady Fidget This you get, and we too, by trusting your secret to a fool. Aside to Horner. Horner Peace, madam.⁠—Aside to Quack. Well, doctor, is not this a good design, that carries a man on unsuspected, and brings him off safe? Pinchwife Well, if this were true⁠—but my wife⁠—Aside. Dorilant whispers with Mrs. Pinchwife. Alithea Come, brother, your wife is yet innocent, you see; but have a care of too strong an imagination, lest, like an over-concerned timorous gamester, by fancying an unlucky cast, it should come. Women and fortune are truest still to those that trust ’em. Lucy And any wild thing grows but the more fierce and hungry for being kept up, and more dangerous to the keeper. Alithea There’s doctrine for all husbands, Mr. Harcourt. Harcourt I edify, madam, so much, that I am impatient till I am one. Dorilant And I edify so much by example, I will never be one. Sparkish And because I will not disparage my parts, I’ll ne’er be one. Horner And I, alas! can’t be one. Pinchwife But I must be one⁠—against my will to a country wife, with a country murrain to me! Mrs. Pinchwife And I must be a country wife still too, I find; for I can’t, like a city one, be rid of my musty husband, and do what I list. Aside. Horner Now, sir, I must pronounce your wife innocent, though I blush whilst I do it; and I am the only man by her now exposed to shame, which I will straight drown in wine, as you shall your suspicion; and the ladies’ troubles we’ll divert with a ballad.⁠—Doctor, where are your maskers? Lucy Indeed, she’s innocent, sir, I am her witness, and her end of coming out was but to see her sister’s wedding; and what she has said to your face of her love to Mr. Horner, was but the usual innocent revenge on a husband’s jealousy;⁠—was it not, madam, speak? Mrs. Pinchwife Aside to Lucy and Horner. Since you’ll have me tell more lies⁠—Aloud. Yes, indeed, bud.