LUCENTIO

I'll have no halves; I'll bear it all myself.

Re-enter BIONDELLO

How now! what news?

BIONDELLO

Sir, my mistress sends you word
That she is busy and she cannot come.

PETRUCHIO

How! she is busy and she cannot come!
Is that an answer?

GREMIO

Ay, and a kind one too:
Pray God, sir, your wife send you not a worse.

PETRUCHIO

I hope better.

HORTENSIO

Sirrah Biondello, go and entreat my wife
To come to me forthwith.

Exit BIONDELLO

PETRUCHIO

O, ho! entreat her!
Nay, then she must needs come.

HORTENSIO

I am afraid, sir,
Do what you can, yours will not be entreated.

Re-enter BIONDELLO

Now, where's my wife?

BIONDELLO

She says you have some goodly jest in hand:
She will not come: she bids you come to her.

PETRUCHIO

Worse and worse; she will not come! O vile,
Intolerable, not to be endured!
Sirrah Grumio, go to your mistress;
Say, I command her to come to me.

Exit GRUMIO

HORTENSIO

I know her answer.