CLI. May I be hanged if I love you; and.... [Footnote: Molière ends this line with _sage_, with, apparently, no other motive than to find a rhyme to _davantage._] BEL. No, no. I will hear nothing more. SCENE V. CLITANDRE (_alone_) Deuce take the foolish woman with her dreams! Was anything so preposterous ever heard of? I must go and ask the help of a person of more sense. ACT II. SCENE I.--ARISTE (_leaving_ CLITANDRE, _and still speaking to him_). Yes; I will bring you an answer as soon as I can. I will press, insist, do all that should be done. How many things a lover has to say when one would suffice; and how impatient he is for all that he desires! Never.... SCENE II; CHRYSALE, ARISTE. ARI. Good day to you, brother. CHRY. And to you also, brother. ARI. Do you know what brings me here? CHRY. No, I do not; but I am ready to hear it, if it pleases you to tell me. ARI. You have known Clitandre for some time now? CHRY. Certainly; and he often comes to our house. ARI. And what do you think of him? CHRY. I think him to be a man of honour, wit, courage, and uprightness, and I know very few people who have more merit. ARI. A certain wish of his has brought me here; and I am glad to see the esteem you have for him. CHRY. I became acquainted with his late father when I was in Rome. ARI. Ah! CHRY. He was a perfect gentleman. ARI. So it is said. CHRY. We were only about twenty-eight years of age, and, upon my word, we were, both of us, very gay young fellows. ARI. I believe it. CHRY. We greatly affected the Roman ladies, and everybody there spoke of our pranks. We made many people jealous, I can tell you. ARI. Excellent; but let us come to what brings me here. SCENE III.--BÉLISE (_entering softly and listening_), CHRYSALE, ARISTE. ARI. Clitandre has chosen me to be his interpreter to you; he has fallen in love with Henriette. CHRY. What! with my daughter? ARI. Yes. Clitandre is delighted with her, and you never saw a lover so smitten! BEL. (_to_ ARISTE). No, no; you are mistaken. You do not know the story, and the thing is not as you imagine. ARI. How so, sister? BEL. Clitandre deceives you; it is with another that he is in love. ARI. It is not with Henriette that he is in love? You are joking. BEL. No; I am telling the perfect truth. ARI. He told me so himself. BEL. Doubtless. ARI. You see me here, sister, commissioned by him to ask her of her father. BEL. Yes, I know. ARI. And he besought me, in the name of his love, to hasten the time of an alliance so desired by him. BEL. Better and better. No more gallant subterfuge could have been employed. But let me tell you that Henriette is an excuse, an ingenious veil, a pretext, brother, to cover another flame, the mystery of which I know; and most willingly will I enlighten you both. ARI. Since you know so much, sister, pray tell us whom he loves. BEL. You wish to know? ARI. Yes; who is it? BEL. Me! ARI. You! BEL. Myself. ARI. Come, I say! sister!