MRS. PAGE
Hang him, dishonest rascal! I would all of the same strain were in the same distress.
MRS. FORD
I think my husband hath some special suspicion of Falstaff’s being here, for I never saw him so gross in his jealousy till now.
MRS. PAGE
I will lay a plot to try that, and we will yet have more tricks with Falstaff: his dissolute disease will scarce obey this medicine.
MRS. FORD
Shall we send that foolish carrion, Mistress Quickly, to him, and excuse his throwing into the water, and give him another hope, to betray him to another punishment?
MRS. PAGE
We will do it; let him be sent for tomorrow eight o’clock, to have amends.
[Re-enter FORD, PAGE, CAIUS, and SIR HUGH EVANS.]
FORD
I cannot find him: may be the knave bragged of that he could not compass.
MRS. PAGE
[Aside to MRS. FORD] Heard you that?
MRS. FORD
[Aside to MRS. PAGE] Ay, ay, peace. —
You use me well, Master Ford, do you?
FORD
Ay, I do so.
MRS. FORD
Heaven make you better than your thoughts!
FORD
Amen!
MRS. PAGE
You do yourself mighty wrong, Master Ford.
FORD
Ay, ay; I must bear it.
EVANS
If there be any pody in the house, and in the chambers, and in the coffers, and in the presses, heaven forgive my sins at the day of judgment!
CAIUS
Be gar, nor I too; there is no bodies.
PAGE
Fie, fie, Master Ford, are you not ashamed? What spirit, what devil suggests this imagination? I would not ha’ your distemper in this kind for the wealth of Windsor Castle.
FORD
‘Tis my fault, Master Page: I suffer for it.
EVANS
You suffer for a pad conscience. Your wife is as honest a ‘omans as I will desires among five thousand, and five hundred too.
CAIUS
By gar, I see ‘tis an honest woman.
FORD
Well, I promised you a dinner. Come, come, walk in the Park: I pray you pardon me; I will hereafter make known to you why I have done this. Come, wife, come, Mistress Page; I pray you pardon me; pray heartily, pardon me.
PAGE
Let’s go in, gentlemen; but, trust me, we’ll mock him. I do invite you tomorrow morning to my house to breakfast; after, we’ll a-birding together; I have a fine hawk for the bush. Shall it be so?
FORD
Any thing.
EVANS
If there is one, I shall make two in the company.
CAIUS
If there be one or two, I shall make-a the turd.
FORD
Pray you go, Master Page.
EVANS
I pray you now, remembrance tomorrow on the lousy knave, mine host.
CAIUS
Dat is good; by gar, with all my heart.
EVANS
A lousy knave! to have his gibes and his mockeries!
[Exeunt.]
SCENE IV. A room in Page’s house
[Enter FENTON, ANNE PAGE, and MISTRESS QUICKLY. MISTRESS QUICKLY stands apart.]
FENTON
I see I cannot get thy father’s love;
Therefore no more turn me to him, sweet Nan.
ANNE
Alas! how then?
FENTON
Why, thou must be thyself.
He doth object, I am too great of birth;
And that my state being gall’d with my expense,
I seek to heal it only by his wealth.
Besides these, other bars he lays before me,
My riots past, my wild societies;
And tells me ‘tis a thing impossible
I should love thee but as a property.
ANNE
May be he tells you true.
FENTON
No, heaven so speed me in my time to come!
Albeit I will confess thy father’s wealth
Was the first motive that I wooed thee, Anne:
Yet, wooing thee, I found thee of more value
Than stamps in gold, or sums in sealèd bags;
And ‘tis the very riches of thyself
That now I aim at.
ANNE
Gentle Master Fenton,
Yet seek my father’s love; still seek it, sir.
If opportunity and humblest suit
Cannot attain it, why then, — hark you hither.
[They converse apart.]
[Enter SHALLOW, SLENDER, and MISTRESS QUICKLY.]
SHALLOW
Break their talk, Mistress Quickly: my kinsman shall speak for himself.
SLENDER
I’ll make a shaft or a bolt on ‘t. ‘Slid, ‘tis but venturing.
SHALLOW
Be not dismayed.
SLENDER
No, she shall not dismay me. I care not for that, but that I am afeard.
QUICKLY
Hark ye; Master Slender would speak a word with you.
ANNE
I come to him.
[Aside] This is my father’s choice.
O, what a world of vile ill-favour’d faults
Looks handsome in three hundred pounds a year!
QUICKLY
And how does good Master Fenton? Pray you, a word with you.
SHALLOW
She’s coming; to her, coz. O boy, thou hadst a father!
SLENDER
I had a father, Mistress Anne; my uncle can tell you good jests of him. Pray you, uncle, tell Mistress Anne the jest how my father stole two geese out of a pen, good uncle.
SHALLOW
Mistress Anne, my cousin loves you.
SLENDER
Ay, that I do; as well as I love any woman in Gloucestershire.
SHALLOW
He will maintain you like a gentlewoman.
SLENDER