DUKE Sir, your company is fairer than honest. Rest you well.
LUCIO By my troth, I’ll go with thee to the lane’s end. If bawdy talk offend you, we’ll have very little of it. Nay, friar, I am a kind of burr; I shall stick.
Exeunt
4.4 Enter Angelo and Escalus
ESCALUS Every letter he hath writ hath disvouched other.
ANGELO In most uneven and distracted manner. His actions show much like to madness. Pray heaven his wisdom be not tainted. And why meet him at the gates, and redeliver our authorities there?
ESCALUS I guess not.
ANGELO And why should we proclaim it in an hour before his entering, that if any crave redress of injustice, they should exhibit their petitions in the street?
ESCALUS He shows his reason for that—to have a dispatch of complaints, and to deliver us from devices hereafter, which shall then have no power to stand against us.
ANGELO
Well, I beseech you let it be proclaimed.
Betimes i’th’ morn I’ll call you at your house.
Give notice to such men of sort and suit
As are to meet him.
ESCALUS I shall, sir. Fare you well.
ANGELO Good night.
Exit Escalus
This deed unshapes me quite, makes me unpregnant
And dull to all proceedings. A deflowered maid,
And by an eminent body that enforced
The law against it! But that her tender shame
Will not proclaim against her maiden loss,
How might she tongue me! Yet reason dares her no,
For my authority bears off a credent bulk,
That no particular scandal once can touch
But it confounds the breather. He should have lived,
Save that his riotous youth, with dangerous sense,
Might in the times to come have ta’en revenge
By so receiving a dishonoured life
With ransom of such shame. Would yet he had lived.
Alack, when once our grace we have forgot,
Nothing goes right; we would, and we would not. Exit
4.5 Enter the Duke, in his own habit, and Friar Peter
DUKE
These letters at fit time deliver me.
The Provost knows our purpose and our plot.
The matter being afoot, keep your instruction,
And hold you ever to our special drift,
Though sometimes you do blench from this to that
As cause doth minister. Go call at Flavio’s house,
And tell him where I stay. Give the like notice
To Valentinus, Rowland, and to Crassus,
And bid them bring the trumpets to the gate.
But send me Flavius first.
FRIAR It shall be speeded well.
Exit
Enter Varrius
DUKE
I thank thee, Varrius; thou hast made good haste.
Come, we will walk. There’s other of our friends
Will greet us here anon. My gentle Varrius!
Exeunt
4.6 Enter Isabella and Mariana
ISABELLA
To speak so indirectly I am loath—
I would say the truth, but to accuse him so,
That is your part—yet I am advised to do it,
He says, to veil full purpose.
MARIANA
Be ruled by him.
ISABELLA
Besides, he tells me that if peradventure
He speak against me on the adverse side,
I should not think it strange, for ’tis a physic
That’s bitter to sweet end.
Enter Friar Peter
MARIANA I would Friar Peter—
ISABELLA O, peace; the friar is come.
FRIAR PETER
Come, I have found you out a stand most fit,
Where you may have such vantage on the Duke
He shall not pass you. Twice have the trumpets
sounded.
The generous and gravest citizens
Have hent the gates, and very near upon
The Duke is ent’ring; therefore hence, away. Exeunt
5.1 Enter ⌈at one door⌉ the Duke, Varrius, and lords, ⌈at another door⌉ Angelo, Escalus, Lucio, citizens, ⌈and officers⌉
DUKE (to Angelo)
My very worthy cousin, fairly met.
(To Escalus) Our old and faithful friend, we are glad to
see you.
ANGELO and ESCALUS
Happy return be to your royal grace.
DUKE
Many and hearty thankings to you both.
We have made enquiry of you, and we hear
Such goodness of your justice that our soul
Cannot but yield you forth to public thanks,
Forerunning more requital.
ANGELO
You make my bonds still greater.
DUKE
O, your desert speaks loud, and I should wrong it
To lock it in the wards of covert bosom,
When it deserves with characters of brass
A forted residence ’gainst the tooth of time
And razure of oblivion. Give me your hand,
And let the subject see, to make them know
That outward courtesies would fain proclaim
Favours that keep within. Come, Escalus,
You must walk by us on our other hand,
And good supporters are you.
⌈ They walk forward. ⌉
Enter Friar Peter and Isabella
FRIAR PETER
Now is your time. Speak loud, and kneel before him.
ISABELLA (kneeling)
Justice, O royal Duke! Vail your regard
Upon a wronged—I would fain have said, a maid.
O worthy prince, dishonour not your eye
By throwing it on any other object,
Till you have heard me in my true complaint,
And given me justice, justice, justice, justice!
DUKE
Relate your wrongs. In what? By whom? Be brief.
Here is Lord Angelo shall give you justice.
Reveal yourself to him.