English drama -- 17th century; Retribution -- Drama; Siblings -- Drama; Tragedies (Drama)
JULIA. I forgive you
This equal piece of justice you have done;
For I betray'd your counsel to that fellow.
He over-heard it; that was the cause I said
It lay not in me to conceal it.
BOSOLA. O foolish woman,
Couldst not thou have poison'd him?
JULIA. 'Tis weakness,
Too much to think what should have been done. I go,
I know not whither.
[Dies.]
CARDINAL. Wherefore com'st thou hither?
BOSOLA. That I might find a great man like yourself,
Not out of his wits, as the Lord Ferdinand,
To remember my service.
CARDINAL. I 'll have thee hew'd in pieces.
BOSOLA. Make not yourself such a promise of that life
Which is not yours to dispose of.
CARDINAL. Who plac'd thee here?
BOSOLA. Her lust, as she intended.
CARDINAL. Very well:
Now you know me for your fellow-murderer.
BOSOLA. And wherefore should you lay fair marble colours
Upon your rotten purposes to me?
Unless you imitate some that do plot great treasons,
And when they have done, go hide themselves i' th' grave
Of those were actors in 't?
CARDINAL. No more; there is
A fortune attends thee.
BOSOLA. Shall I go sue to Fortune any longer?
'Tis the fool's pilgrimage.
CARDINAL. I have honours in store for thee.
BOSOLA. There are a many ways that conduct to seeming
Honour, and some of them very dirty ones.
CARDINAL. Throw to the devil
Thy melancholy. The fire burns well;
What need we keep a stirring of 't, and make
A greater smother?[132] Thou wilt kill Antonio?
BOSOLA. Yes.
CARDINAL. Take up that body.
BOSOLA. I think I shall
Shortly grow the common bier for church-yards.
CARDINAL. I will allow thee some dozen of attendants
To aid thee in the murder.
BOSOLA. O, by no means. Physicians that apply horse-leeches
to any rank swelling use to cut off their tails, that the blood
may run through them the faster: let me have no train when I go
to shed blood, less it make me have a greater when I ride
to the gallows.
CARDINAL. Come to me after midnight, to help to remove
That body to her own lodging. I 'll give out
She died o' th' plague; 'twill breed the less inquiry
After her death.
BOSOLA. Where 's Castruccio her husband?
CARDINAL. He 's rode to Naples, to take possession
Of Antonio's citadel.
BOSOLA. Believe me, you have done a very happy turn.
CARDINAL. Fail not to come. There is the master-key
Of our lodgings; and by that you may conceive
What trust I plant in you.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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