J. Stirling Coyne

“ BETSY. I thought so. I see you’re dreadfully intoxicated; you’d better go to bed—do! You’ll be ashamed of yourself in the morning. I never see a gentleman so drunk in my life—never! Go to bed, I advise you.
GREEN. Go to the devil! I’ll penetrate this horrid mystery, and know the worst at once.
BETSY. Then you may depend on having your bones broken.
GREEN. Bones! I have no bones. I’m all iron—adamant. I’ll find this villain—this unknown destroyer of my peace. Who is he? what is he?
BETSY. Here he is, sir, to answer for himself. ”

“ Todd. Marietta.
Mrs. T. Marietta! Ha!—the girl! She was married this evening—to whom?—speak—to whom?
Todd. Forgive me, my beloved Laura.—How shall I tell you—how shall I shock your strict sense of propriety when you hear that your unfortunate Samuel—the husband of your bosom—and the father—I mean the prospective father of your children—is—is—look at me—much injured woman—and behold a perfect specimen of—of—a—
Mrs. T. Monster!
Todd. Monster’s the word! A man with two wives must be a monster; but I’m an innocent monster!
Mrs. T. Wretch! Was not one good one enough for you? Where is the creature? ”

“ GREEN. Stop! destroyer of my peace, and confounder of my identity—stop, and hear me! Young woman retire.
Exit BETSY into room, L. 2 E., with one candle.
Hem! now, sir, I shall ask you one momentous question—Do you mean to stick to it that you’re Greenfinch?
MRS. G. Stick to it?—oh! aw—like demned wax.
GREEN. (solemnly) The world’s a cage, not wide enough for two Greenfinches like us; one of us must hop the perch.
[Pg 14]
MRS. G. Exactly, my good fellow; I shall dispose of you immediately—my pistols are in the next room. (going)
GREEN. Stop! We must fight in this apartment. ”

“ Todd. (L. shaking his hand) How d’ye do, Croker? How are you? Never saw you look so jolly in your life. (aside) Dismal as a cherub on a tombstone! It was very kind of you to call; we start on our tour in the morning, so you’re just in time to see the last of us.
Crok. ( C.) The last of you! Ah, Samuel, I hope there may be nothing prophetic in your words, but I have a melancholy foreboding—
Mrs. T. (R.) For goodness sake, uncle, don’t talk of melancholy forebodings—when we are looking forward to the Continent.
Todd. Aye, what do you think of six months amidst the classic scenes of Italy. ”

“ MRS. G. (confronting him) Mr. Greenfinch! Sir! Will you look at me and repeat you don’t know me?
GREEN. (uneasily) Hem! ah! (aside) I feel the Countess has her eye upon me—I’m a dead man if I give way. (to MRS. G.) I tell you I haven’t the slightest knowledge of you. (goes to table)
MRS. G. (aside to BETSY) This is going beyond a joke, Betsy—the man’s quite serious—looks in my face and denies me.
BETSY. Yes, mum; and means to stick to it.
MRS. G. (aside to BETSY) Does he? Mr. Greenfinch! (taking hold of him) you’d better mind what you are doing—I’m not a woman to be trifled with. ”

“ Ah, she’s still there, standing, with all her imperfections, on her head in the water-butt! Well, I suppose everyone has his lot, but mine’s a lot I don’t know how to dispose of. I must remove the body from the establishment at all events, and I’ll do it now, while the house is still. (Goes to folding-doors and puts key in the lock.) I haven’t strength to open the door with them green boots kicking at my conscience! Courage, Widgetts—courage! Be a man—though you are but a tailor. Stay! ”

“ In my country, ever since the invention of doors, the practice of entering a house by the window has been confined to thieves, cats, and lovers; (tenderly) need I say, it was in the character of the last-named interesting quadruped, I risked my neck in the most perilous performance I ever attempted on the slack-rope. (Mrs. Todd makes a gesture of astonishment; up stage, L.) Sweet Marietta! How I admire that name! It’s much prettier than Laura. What’s your opinion of Samuel? Do you think, in the ardent simplicity of your exalted nature, you could love a Samuel—or a Sam—or a Sammy, for instance? ”

“ Hey! Death and Glory, old fellow! You’re a dead shot, Greenfinch!
GREEN. What! you’re cousin Charley yourself!
MRS. G. Of course I am! It was a plan of Betsy’s and mine to punish you—the pistols were loaded with powder—the Gendarme is only the waiter, (WAITER bows and exit, 3 E. L.) and as no harm has been done——
BETSY. I hope, sir, you’ll forgive me?
GREEN. Forgive you! I’m so happy I’ll forgive the whole world!
(to the Audience) Pity the failings of a poor young man,
Whose trembling tongue——
MRS. G. Pray hold it—if you can! ”

“ Don’t be impertinent, Twill, but listen to me. The party I expect is Ma’amselle Cheri Bounce, a splendid creature, who dances on a limited income, with the strictest regard to propriety, at the Opera House, and gives lessons to private pupils in the pokar and the waltz ah do tongs.
Twill. Whoo! She must be a switcher. (Going.) I’ll run directly, sir.
Wid. Stay! I must make myself attractive for the interesting occasion. Give me the coat that has just been finished for Sir Chippin Porrage, and the waistcoat that’s to be sent home to-morrow morning for the Honourable Cecil Harrowgate’s wedding. ”

“ Take my advice, Samuel, and stay in your own country. If you must travel—if you must go to the seaside—have you not Gravesend, Southend, and Mile-end?
Todd. Oh, but you know, if one never moves from one’s native shore, one might as well be born a muscle—or a barnacle!
Mrs. T. Besides, my dear uncle, it’s now too late to alter our arrangements. What would they say at Brompton if we went to Margate, with a passport for Naples?
Crok. Have you considered the practices of the Italian innkeepers, who skin an Englishman alive, when they catch him? ”

“ MRS. G. Come, sir, you shall take one and leave me the other.
GREEN. Thank you. (feels the pistol; aside) The touch of them throws me into a cold perspiration! I wish I knew which was the mildest of the pair.
MRS. G. Well, have you made your choice?
GREEN. No—yes—there—this will do! (takes one of the pistols, MRS. G keeps the other. Apart) Oh, lord, my heart’s in my wellingtons!
MRS. G. Are you ready now?
GREEN. No—no—no—not yet! let’s take our time! do you think a human being should be shot with as little ceremony as a sack of coals? ”

“ What? (Reads.) “Mary White—I’m going to drown myself in the water-butt, where you’ll find me.” Gracious powers! “Adieu, Widgetts, I forgive you.” Poor dear soul. “But my ghost, and them lobsters will sit heavy on your stomach to-night.” Horrible idea! It can’t be true—she’d never go to commit such a catastrophe in my establishment. Make a coroner’s inquest of herself in my private water-butt, when the Thames is open to all! No, she’s only said so to frighten me. (Throws letter on the floor and goes to folding-doors.) Why Mary, Mary, my dear, don’t be foolish! ”

“ BETSY. Ah, mum, I know what husbands is made of! I was once accidentally married myself for three weeks to a sea cap’n, who took me, mum, as his mate—but I diskivered I was only his second mate, for he’d got another wife alive, mum—and so he slipped hisself through the wedding ring that way. Oh! mum, husbands isn’t to be trusted no ways.
MRS. G. ’Twas your experience and advice, Betsy, that put me upon this plan of trying Mr. Greenfinch’s fidelity. Before he went to Paris about that legacy left him by his aunt, there wasn’t a more dutiful little husband in Peckham Rye. ”

“ Todd. An opium cigar! that’s it! Then I’m not a brigand with two wives! Laura, my love, come to the arms of your doting husband. (they embrace—door bell rings outside)
Mrs. T. There’s the policeman who was to ring the bell at five o’clock. You know we start at six.
Todd. Oh, yes, to be sure! I’ll be ready in five minutes. But first a word with our friends. (to audience) If I have been dreaming that you are pleased, pray don’t dispel so pleasant an illusion—but, with your usual good nature—give me a lucky omen for my dream to-night and to-morrow.—“What will they say at Brompton?” ”

“ I must not let the dismal forebodings of old Croker prey upon me! Now! think of it, I’ll light one of those Turkish cigarettes, which my friend, Captain Crasher, brought home from the East. He tells me they’re prepared with opium and produce the most tranquillizing effect on the spirits. (he takes a cigar case from the table drawer and lights a cigarette) This I hope will restore the serenity of my mind. Be a man, Todd! be a man! Croker’s an ass! He and his stories may go to the devil. ”

“ Where on earth can I conceal myself? Ah, here! (Throws open folding doors. Widgetts stands transfixed with terror; Mdlle. Cheri Bounce screams in a state of dreadful alarm.) Oh, oh, oh! There’s a woman drowned in the water-butt.
Mary. ’Tis Mary White, the laundress. Widgetts murdered her. ”

“ BETSY. (apart) There’s brandy in it, mum; not madness.
MRS. G. (apart to BETSY) It won’t do to irritate him now. (to GREENFINCH) My dear Gregory, of course ’tis all a joke. (coaxingly) You remember me—your dotey little wife—your lovey dovey? [Pg 11] Why don’t you speak to your own pidgey-widgey, and give her a toosey-woosey kiss?
GREEN. (aside, and turning away) Oh! this is too much for a husband’s feelings! (to MRS. G.) Don’t please—don’t talk that way; you don’t know me; I’m a domestic fiend—doomed for a certain time to walk this earth in patent leather boots. Farewell, farewell for ever! ”

“ Well, we all want comfort in this miserable world. (Drinks.) There’s poor Mary White gone on a weeping and wailing voyage to that bourne from whence no traveller gets a return ticket. (Mary laughs in room, R.) Ah, what’s that? A laugh. It had a hollow and inhuman sound. Could it be she? (Points to folding-doors.) Mary—a—a—a—how do I know—she may have been turned into something horrible. The fiend of the water butt, perhaps. She may come to me at night—she said she would. Oh, Lord! The idea of the ghost of a damp laundress at your back. ”

“ Perhaps, Countess, you are not aware that there’s a previous Mrs. Greenfinch at this moment on the British shores; a splendid woman, though I say it, who sits like a pensive dove mourning for her absent mate at Peckham Rye. ”

“ Todd. You think I’m brave? (drinks)
Jaco. You’re a devil! And yet how we may be deceived by appearances—to judge by your looks—I should say you were a coward.
Todd. (aside) Nature writes a plain hand!
Jaco. But I know that in that breast beats the heart of a lion.
Todd. (aside) He means a mouse—the smallest of mice.
Jaco. Never saw anything like your coolness this morning, when you were attacked.
Todd. It was you then, who—
Jaco. (takes up Todd’s hat) Made this hole in your hat. I meant to have made a bole in your head—half an inch lower, and the bullet would have been through your brain. ”

“ BETSY. (peeping in at door, R.) Is he gone, mum?
MRS. G. Yes, Betsy, you may come in. (lays the basket she carries on table, L. and puts up her veil)
BETSY. (enters by door, R.) Well, mum, does he suspect nothing yet?
MRS. G. Nothing. He has not yet seen my face—but if he had, I think this red wig, these spectacles, and this cravat would completely prevent his recognizing me.
BETSY. He little thinks, mum, ’tis his own lawful wife he’s running away with instead of a fine foreign Countess. ”

“ Mary. And you know, Widgy, dear, when we enter that happy state——
Wid. What state do you allude to, Miss White?
Mary. The marriage state, of course.
Wid. Oh, indeed. Ah!
Mary. You don’t forget, I hope, that I have your promissory note on the back of twenty-nine unpaid washing bills to make me your lawful wife. (Produces several papers.) ”

“ Your attentions have compromised her honour, signor, and you must make reparation by marrying her.
Todd. Marrying! Do I clearly understand you? (both come forward, C.) ;
Jaco. Clearly; I have been long seeking for a man of coolness and courage, as a husband for Marietta. When you become my nephew, you shall be second in command to myself in the band.
(Grimbaldi is seen peeping in at door, R. 2 E., and listening)
Todd. (R. C.) Gracious powers! Have I been growing up at Cozy Cottage to be the nephew of a brigand? What would they say at Brompton to that? ”

“ Ghosts haven’t got a singing license. Hark! ’Tis somebody committing vocal violence in my bedroom. (Goes to door of bed-chamber, R., and looks in.) Hey, there’s a young fellow making himself quite at home in my establishment. I am not aware I ever saw him before. What had I better do? Go in and ask him what he wants? No; that might be dangerous. ’Twill be safer in my present peculiar position to appear as a stranger. Let me see. I have it—capital idea—the waiter from the tavern with the supper—I think I could do a waiter. ”

“ GREEN. Well now this is something like an adventure. (putting down the umbrella and bandbox, R.) There’s a romantic mystery attached to me that I can’t unravel, in fact I feel myself like a tangled penn’orth of thread; the more I try to clear myself the more complicated I become. Let me calmly consider my singular position. (throws the cloak on the easy chair, R. and places the carpet bag beside it) In the first place here I have arrived at the Hotel d’ Angleterre in Dieppe accompanied by the Countess de Rambuteau—a real Countess! ”

“ But some men are never to be taught. How he got into this house, I can’t imagine—but the object of his visit is apparent; he comes to make love to the Signor’s niece—a pastime that I shall take the liberty of interrupting.
Re-enter Grimbaldi, R. 2 E.
Grim. I can’t stand it any longer. Diavolo! I had a good mind (threatening with dagger) but Terreboli’s eye was upon me, and I durst not move a finger.
Mrs. T. (L.) You seem agitated—what has happened?
Grim. (R. gloomily) Oh, nothing! but—torture!—she is married!
Mrs. T. Who’s married?
Grim. She—she—Marietta—married—to—ten thousand fiends! ”

“ Widgetts totters back, horrified at the sight.) Oh, oh, oh! She done it. She’s there, with her legs sticking out of the water-butt, and her green Sunday boots on her feet—and the vital spark extinct. Oh, it’s too dreadful a sight for human feelings them legs, and them green boots. (Returns, and closes the folding-doors.) What an awful sensation ’twill make when it’s found out ”

“ Who is this person who has been exciting himself so enormously?
BETSY. I’m sure I don’t know, sir; but he seems to be a gent who has been putting himself in the way that gentlemen wish to be who love their wine. ”

“ Marietta discovered alone, looking out on balcony at back.
Mari. Not a living creature to be seen; not a sound to be heard but the chirping of the cicalas amongst the pine trees, (comes down, C.) Heigho!—what a lonely life is mine! no better than a prisoner in this desolate old house in the mountains, seeing nobody but my uncle Jacopo and his frightful followers, except when they happen to bring in some unlucky traveller, who has fallen into their hands.
p. 10Enter Todd, L. 2 E., he is dressed in mourning, and wears a black hatband round a high-crowned Italian peasant’s hat ”