The Greatest Christmas Books of All Time. Люси Мод Монтгомери
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Dem. And then I find that my son objects to letting his wife go. But come right over to the Forum, if you please, Phormio, and sign this money back to me again. Pho. How can I, when I have already used it to pay my debts with? Dem. Well, what then? Pho. [pompously]. If you are willing to give me the girl you promised for my wife, I'll marry her: but if you want her to stay with you, why, the dowry stays with me, Demipho. For it isn't right that I should lose this on your account, when it was for the sake of your honor that I broke with the other girl who was offering the same dowry. Dem. Go be hanged, with your big talk, you jail-bird! Do you suppose that I don't see through you and your tricks? Pho. Look out, I'm getting hot. Dem. Do you mean to say you would marry this girl if we gave her to you? Pho. Just try me and see. Dem. [with a sneer]. O yes, your scheme is to have my son live with her at your house. Pho. [indignantly]. What do you mean? Dem. Come, give me that money. Pho. Come, give me my wife. Dem. [laying hands on him]. You come along to court with me. Pho. You'd better look out! If you don't stop—Dem. What will you do? Pho. I? [Turning to Chremes]. Perhaps you think that I take only poor girls under my protection. I'll have you know I sometimes stand as patron to girls with dowries too. Chr. [with a guilty start]. What's that to us? Pho. O nothing. I knew a woman here once whose husband had—Chr. O! Dem. What's that? Pho. Another wife in Lemnos—Chr. I'm a dead man. Pho. By whom he had a daughter; and he's bringing her up on the quiet. Chr. I'm buried. Pho. And these very things I'll tell his real wife. Chr. Good gracious, don't do that! Pho. Oho! You were the man, were you, Chremes? Dem. [in a rage]. How the villain gammons us! Chr. You may go. Pho. The deuce you say! Chr. Why, what do you mean? We are willing that you should keep the money. Pho. Yes, I see. But what, a plague! do you mean? Do you think you can guy me by changing your minds like a pair of silly boys? "I won't, I will—I will, I won't, again—take it, give it back—what's said is unsaid—what's been agreed on is no go"—that's your style. [He turns to go away]. Chr. [apart]. How in the world did he find that out? Dem. I don't know, but I'm sure I never told any one. Chr. Lord! it seems like a judgment on me! Pho. [gleefully, aside]. I've put a spoke in their wheel! Dem. [aside]. See here, Chremes, shall we let this rascal cheat us out of our money and laugh in our faces besides? I'd rather die first. Now make up your mind to be manly and resolute. You see that your secret is out, and that you can't keep it from your wife any longer. Now what she is bound to learn from others it will be much better for her to hear from your own lips. And then we will have the whip hand of this dirty fellow. Pho. [overhearing these words, aside]. Tut! tut! Unless I look out, I'll be in a hole. They're coming at me hard. Chr. But I am afraid that she will never forgive me. Dem. O, cheer up, man. I'll make you solid with her again, more especially since the mother of this girl is dead and gone. Pho. Is that your game? I tell you, Demipho, it's not a bit to your brother's advantage that you are stirring me up. [To Chremes]. Look here, you! When you have followed your own devices abroad, and haven't thought enough of your own wife to keep you from sinning most outrageously against her, do you expect to come home and make it all up with a few tears? I tell you, I'll make her so hot against you that you can't put out her wrath, not if you dissolve in tears. Dem. Confound the fellow! Was ever a man treated so outrageously? Chr. [all in a tremble]. I'm so rattled that I don't know what to do with the fellow. Dem. [grasping Phormio's collar]. Well I do. We'll go straight to court. Pho. To court, is it? [Dragging off toward Chremes' house]. This way, if you please. Dem. [hurrying toward his own house]. Chremes, you catch him and hold him, while I call my slaves out. Chr. [holding off]. I can't do it alone; you come here and help.
Demipho comes back and lays hold of Phormio, and all engage in a violent struggle mingled with angry words and blows. Phormio is getting the worst of it, when he says:
Now I'll have to use my voice. Nausistrata! Come out here! Chr. Stop his mouth. Dem. [trying to do so, without success]. See how strong the rascal is. Pho. I say, Nausistrata! Chr. Won't you keep still? Pho. Not much.
Nausistrata now appears at the door of her house; Phormio, seeing her, says, panting but gleeful:
Here's where my revenge comes in. Naus. Who's calling me? [Seeing the disordered and excited condition of the men]. Why, what's all this row about, husband? Who is this man? [Chremes remains tongue-tied]. Won't you answer me? Pho. How can he answer you, when, by George, he doesn't know where he is? Chr. [trembling with fear]. Don't you believe a word he says. Pho. Go, touch him; if he isn't frozen stiff, you may strike me dead. Chr. It isn't so. Naus. What is this man talking about, then? Pho. You shall hear; just listen. Chr. You aren't going to believe him? Naus. Good gracious, how can I believe one who hasn't said anything yet? Pho. The poor fellow is crazy with fear. Naus. Surely it's not for nothing that you are so afraid. Chr. [with chattering teeth]. Wh-wh-who's afraid? Pho. Well then, since you're not afraid, and what I say is nothing, you tell the story yourself. Dem. Scoundrel! Shall he speak at your bidding? Pho. [contemptuously]. O you! you've done a fine thing for your brother. Naus. Husband, won't you speak to me? Chr. Well—Naus. Well? Chr. There's no need of my talking. Pho. You're right; but there's need of her knowing. In Lemnos—Chr. O don't! Pho. unbeknown to you—Chr. O me! Pho. he took another wife. Naus.[screaming]. My husband! Heaven forbid. Pho. But it's so, just the same. Naus. O wretched me! Pho. And by her he had a daughter—also unbeknown to you. Naus. By all the gods, a shameful and evil deed! Pho. But it's so, just the same. Naus. It's the most outrageous thing I ever heard of. [Turning her back on Chremes]. Demipho, I appeal to you; for I am too disgusted to speak to him again. Was this the meaning of those frequent journeys and long stays at Lemnos? Was this why my rents ran down so? Dem. Nausistrata, I don't deny that he has been very much to blame in this matter; but is that any reason why you should not forgive him? Pho. He's talking for the dead. Dem. For it wasn't through any scorn or dislike of you that he did it. And besides, the other woman is dead who was the cause of all this trouble. So I beg you to bear this with equanimity as you do other things. Naus. Why should I bear it with equanimity? I wish this were the end of the wretched business; but why should I hope it will be? Am I to think that he will be better now he's old? But he was old before, if that makes any difference. Or am I any more beautiful and attractive now than I was, Demipho? What assurance can you give me that this won't happen again?
Phormio now comes to the front of the stage and announces in a loud official voice to the audience:
All who want to view the remains of Chremes, now come forward! The time has come.—That's the way I do them up. Come along now, if any one else wants to stir up Phormio. I'll fix him just like this poor wretch here.—But there! he may come back to favor now. I've had revenge enough. She has something to nag him with as long as he lives. Naus. But I suppose I have deserved it. Why should I recount to you, Demipho, all that I have been to this man? Dem. I know it all, Nausistrata, as well as you. Naus. Well, have I deserved this treatment? Dem. By no means! but, since what's been done can't be undone by blaming him, pardon him. He confesses his sin, he prays for pardon, he promises never to do so again: what more do you want? Pho. [aside]. Hold on here; before she pardons him, I must look out for myself and Phædria. Say, Nausistrata, wait a minute before you answer him. Naus. Well? Pho. I tricked Chremes out of six hundred dollars; I gave the money to your son, and he has used it to buy his wife with. Chr. [angrily]. How? What do you say? Naus. [to Chremes]. How now? Does it seem to you a shameful thing for your son, a young man, to have one wife, when you, an old man, have had two? Shame on you! With what face will you rebuke him? Answer me that? [Chremes slinks back without a word]. Dem. He will do as you say. Naus. Well, then, here is my decision: I'll neither pardon him, nor promise anything, nor give you any answer at all, until I have seen my son. And I shall do entirely as he says. Pho. You are a wise woman, Nausistrata. Naus. [to Chremes]. Does