Volpone — Act V (Part 6 of 14)

Mos. God save you, madam!

Lady P. Good sir.

Volp. Mosca! welcome,
Welcome to my redemption.

Mos. Why, sir?

Volp. Oh,
Rid me of this my torture, quickly, there;
My madam, with the everlasting voice:
The bells, in time of pestilence, ne’er made
Like noise, or were in that perpetual motion!
The Cock-pit comes not near it. All my house,
But now, steam’d like a bath with her thick breath,
A lawyer could not have been heard; nor scarce
Another woman, such a hail of words
She has let fall. For hell’s sake, rid her hence.

Mos. Has she presented?

Volp. O, I do not care;
I’ll take her absence, upon any price,
With any loss.

Mos. Madam—

Lady P. I have brought your patron
A toy, a cap here, of mine own work.

Mos. ’Tis well.
I had forgot to tell you, I saw your knight.
Where you would little think it.—

Lady P. Where?

Mos. Marry,
Where yet, if you make haste, you may apprehend
Rowing upon the water in a gondole
With the most cunning courtezan of Venice.

Lady P. Is’t true?

Mos. Pursue them, and believe your eyes:
Leave me, to make your gift. [Exit Lady P. hastily.]—I knew
’twould take:
For, lightly, they that use themselves most license,
Are still most jealous.

Volp. Mosca, hearty thanks,
For thy quick fiction, and delivery of me.
Now to my hopes, what say’st thou?

Lady P. But do you hear, sir?—

Volp. Again! I fear a paroxysm.

Lady P. Which way
Row’d they together?

Mos. Toward the Rialto.

Lady P. I pray you lend me your dwarf.

Mos. I pray you take him.—