Measure for Measure │ Medida por medida

[print edition page number: 291]

Characters

DUKE VINCENTIO — Duke of Vienna.
ANGELO — The deputy.
ÉSCALO — An old lord.
CLAUDIO — A young gentleman.
JULIET — Beloved of Claudio.
ISABELLA — Sister to Claudio, a novice nun.
LUCIO — Friend to Claudio.
POMPIS — A tapster and bawd.
PROVOST — Keeper of the prison.
ELBOW — A constable.
MARIANA — Betrothed to Angelo.
SOCIAL WORKER — An advocate and translator.
ABHORSON — An executioner.
BERNARDINO — A prisoner.
FRANCISCA — A nun.
FRIAR PETER
GENTLEMEN [292]

Prelude

Music starts. After a moment, lights go up. DUKE VINCENTIO and CLAUDIO face each other. They shake hands. CLAUDIO then runs off stage, leaving DUKE VINCENTIO alone. The music swells and the lights shift for the first line of the play.

ACT 1
Scene 1

A conference room. Enter DUKE VINCENTIO and ÉSCALO.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Éscalo.

ÉSCALO
Señor.

DUKE VINCENTIO
The nature of our people,
Our city’s institutions, and the terms
For common justice, you’re as pregnant in
As art and practice hath enriched any
That we remember. There is our commission,
From which we would not have you warp. Call hither,
I say, bid come before us Angelo.
¿Qué crees que pensará de nosotros?
For you must know, we have with special soul
Elected him our absence to supply,
Lent him our terror, dressed him with our love,
And given his deputation all the organs
Of our own power: ¿qué le parece?

ÉSCALO
Si en Vienna hay alguien más digno
De llevar tanto honor y tal merced,
Ese es Angelo. [293]

DUKE VINCENTIO

Ahí viene.

Enter ANGELO.

ANGELO
Always obedient to your grace’s will,

I come to know your pleasure.

DUKE VINCENTIO

Angelo,

There is a kind of character in thy life,
That to th’observer doth thy history
Fully unfold. Hold therefore, Angelo.
In our remove be thou at full ourself;
Mortality and mercy in Vienna
Live in thy tongue and heart: old Éscalo,
Though first in question, is thy secondary.
Take thy commission.

ANGELO

Now, good my lord,

Let there be some more test made of my metal,
Before so noble and so great a figure
Be stamped upon it.

DUKE VINCENTIO

No more evasion.

We have with a leavened and prepared choice
Proceeded to you; therefore take your honors.
Our haste from hence is of so quick condition,
That it prefers itself, and leaves unquestioned
Matters of needful value. We shall write to you,
As time and our concernings shall importune,
How it goes with us, and do look to know
What doth befall you here. Hasta luego:
Me tengo que ir. Voy con prisa.

ANGELO
Yet, give leave, my lord— [294]

DUKE VINCENTIO
No te preocupes. Dame tu mano.
Your scope is as mine own,
So to enforce or qualify the laws
As to your soul seems good.
Otra vez. Hasta luego.

ANGELO
The heavens give safety to your purposes!

ÉSCALO
Lead forth and bring you back in happiness!

DUKE VINCENTIO
Gracias. Adiós.

Exit DUKE VINCENTIO.

ÉSCALO
A power I have, but of what strength and nature
I am not yet instructed.

ANGELO
’Tis so with me. Let us withdraw together,
And we may soon our satisfaction have
Touching that point.

ÉSCALO

I’ll wait upon your honor.

ANGELO and ÉSCALO exit.

Scene 2

La esquina. LUCIO is sitting.

LUCIO
¿Qué onda, Pompis? ¿En cuál de sus caderas le da más esciática?

POMPIS
Bah. Bueno, pues, there’s one yonder arrested and carried to prison was worth five thousand of you all. [295]

LUCIO
¿Quién es, I pray thee?

POMPIS
Marry, sir, es Claudio, Señor Claudio.

LUCIO
¿Claudio a la cárcel? No puede ser.

POMPIS
Nay, pero sí, es cierto. Vi cómo lo detuvieron, y es más, within these three days his head is to be chopped off.

LUCIO
Basta ya con las bromas. No puedo creerlo. ¿La pura neta?

POMPIS
Segurísima, y es por hacerle panzona a la Julieta.

LUCIO
No mames, quizás es cierto. He promised to meet me two hours since, and he was ever precise in promise-keeping.

POMPIS
You have not heard of the proclamation, have you?

LUCIO
¿Cuál proclamación, hombre?

POMPIS
All brothels in Vienna must be plucked down. ¿Qué pasará conmigo?

LUCIO
Why, here’s a change indeed in the commonwealth! Ven. No te preocupes — good counsellors lack no clients. Though you change your place, you need not change your trade. I’ll be your customer still. No tengas miedo.

POMPIS
Ahí viene el Señor Claudio, led by the provost to prison, y esa es la Señorita Julieta.

Exit POMPIS and LUCIO, as the PROVOST enters with CLAUDIO, followed by JULIET. [296]

CLAUDIO
Amigo, why dost thou show me thus to the world?
Llévame a la cárcel que es donde me envían.

PROVOST
I do it not in evil disposition,
But from Lord Angelo by special charge.

Re-enter LUCIO and two GENTLEMEN.

LUCIO
¡Oye, pero Claudio! ¿Por qué te detuvieron?

CLAUDIO
Por demasiada libertad, Lucio.
La naturaleza lo persigue
Como a ratas que devoran veneno,
Deseamos el mal por tener la sed,
Y si bebemos nos trae la muerte.

LUCIO
What’s thy offense, Claudio?

CLAUDIO
What but to speak of would offend again.

LUCIO
¿Qué? ¿Fue una matanza?

CLAUDIO
No.

LUCIO
Lechery?

CLAUDIO
Call it so.

PROVOST
Ya, señor, vente.

CLAUDIO
Un momento, amigo. Lucio, a word with you. [297]

LUCIO
A hundred, if they’ll do you any good. Is lechery so looked after?

CLAUDIO
Thus stands it with me: upon a true contract
I got possession of Julieta’s bed:
You know the lady. She is fast my wife,
Save that we do the denunciation lack
Of outward order. This we came not to,
Only for propagation of a dower
Remaining in the coffer of her friends,
From whom we thought it meet to hide our love
Till time had made them for us. But it chances
The stealth of our most mutual entertainment
With character too gross is writ on Juliet.

LUCIO
With child, perhaps?

CLAUDIO

Unhappily, even so.

El deputado güero, now the Duke,
Awakes me all the enrolled penalties
Which have, like unscoured armor, hung by the wall
So long that nineteen zodiacs have gone round
And none of them been worn, y por cobrar fama
Puts the drowsy and neglected act
Freshly on me. Seguramente por reputación.

LUCIO
Creo que eso es, y tu cabeza está tan en el aire que una lechera enamorada la volaría de un suspiro. Send after the Duke and appeal to him.

CLAUDIO
Lo hice, pero no lo encontré.
Te ruego, Lucio, hazme el favor:
This day my sister should the cloister enter,
And there receive her approbation.
Acquaint her with the danger of my state,
Suplícale por mí, that she make friends
To the strict deputy, bid herself assay him. [298]
Tengo esperanza, for in her youth
There is a prone and speechless dialect,
Such as move men. Beside, she hath prosperous art
When she will play with reason and discourse,
And well she can persuade.

LUCIO
Ojalá pueda. I would be sorry if other lives should be thus foolishly lost at a game of tick-tack. I’ll to her.

CLAUDIO
Te lo agradezco, mi buen Lucio.

LUCIO
En dos horas.

PROVOST
¡Basta! Ya vente.

They exit.

Scene 3

Enter DUKE VINCENTIO.

DUKE VINCENTIO
I do fear:
Sith ’twas my fault to give the people scope,
’Twould be my tyranny to strike and gall them
For what I bid them do. For we bid this be done,
When evil deeds have their permissive pass,
And not the punishment. Therefore,
I have on Angelo imposed the office,
Who may, in the ambush of my name, strike home,
And yet my nature never in the fight
To do in slander. And to behold his sway,
I will, as ’twere a padre, visit both prince and people.
More reasons for this action
At our more leisure shall I render you.
Only, this one: Lord Angelo is precise; [299]
Stands at a guard with envy, scarce confesses
That his blood flows, or that his appetite
Is more to bread than stone. Hence shall we see,
If power change purpose, what our seemers be.

He exits.

Scene 4

A nunnery. Enter ISABELLA and FRANCISCA.

ISABELLA
¿Y las monjas no tienen más derechos?

FRANCISCA
¿Estos no son bastantes?

ISABELLA
Claro que sí. No estoy pidiendo más,
But rather wishing a more strict restraint—

LUCIO (within)
Ho! Peace be in this place!

ISABELLA

Who’s that which calls?

FRANCISCA
Es voz de hombre. Isabelita,
La llave, and know his business of him.
You may, I may not: you are yet unsworn.
When you have vowed, you must not speak with men
Sin que esté aquí contigo yo.

Exit.

ISABELLA
Peace and prosperity! Who is’t that calls?

Enter LUCIO. [299]

LUCIO
Hail, virgin, if you be, as those cheek-roses
Proclaim you are no less! Me podrás
Llevar a conocer a Isabella,
A novice of this place and the fair sister
To her unhappy brother Claudio?

ISABELLA
Why “her unhappy brother”? let me ask,
The rather for I now must make you know
I am that Isabella and his sister.

LUCIO
Gentle and fair, your brother kindly greets you:
Not to be weary with you, está encarcelado.

ISABELLA
Woe me! ¿Por qué?

LUCIO
Algo que, if myself might be his judge,
He should receive his punishment in thanks:
Embarazó a una gringuita.

ISABELLA
Sir, make me not your story.

LUCIO

Es verdad.

ISABELLA
You do blaspheme the good in mocking me.

LUCIO
La neta que sí, güey. Fewness and truth, ’tis thus:
Your hermano and his chica embraced.
As those that feed grow full,
Even so her plenteous womb
Expresseth his full tilth and husbandry.

ISABELLA
Someone with child by him? ¿Es Julieta? [300]

LUCIO
Ella es.

ISABELLA
O, let him marry her.

LUCIO

This is the point.

The Duke is very strangely gone from hence;
Upon his place, and with full line of his authority,
Governs Lord Angelo, a man whose blood
Is very snow-broth, one who never feels
The wanton stings and motions of the sense.
All hope is gone—
Unless you have the grace by your fair prayer
To soften Angelo.

ISABELLA

Doth he so seek his life?

LUCIO
Has censured him already,
And, as I hear, the provost hath
A warrant for his execution.

ISABELLA
Alas! What poor ability’s in me
To do him good?

LUCIO
Assay the power you have.

ISABELLA
My power? Alas, yo dudo que—

LUCIO

Our doubts are traitors,
And make us lose the good we oft might win
By fearing to attempt. Go to Lord Angelo,
And let him learn to know when maidens sue
Men give like gods, pero cuando they weep and kneel,
All their petitions are as freely theirs [302]
As they themselves would owe them.

ISABELLA
I’ll see what I can do.

LUCIO

But speedily.

ISABELLA
Pues voy inmediatamente.

They exit. [303]

ACT 2
Scene 1

Same conference room. Enter ANGELO, ÉSCALO, and PROVOST.

ANGELO
We must not make a scarecrow of the law,
Setting it up to fear the birds of prey,
And let it keep one shape, till custom make it
Their perch, and not their terror.

ÉSCALO

Ay, but yet

Let us be keen, and rather cut a little,
Than fall, and bruise to death. Alas, this gentleman,
Whom I would save, had a most noble father!
Let but your honor know—
Whom I believe to be most strait in virtue—
That, in the working of your own affections,
Had time cohered with place or place with wishing,
Or that the resolute acting of your blood
Could have attained the effect of your own purpose,
Whether you had not sometime in your life
Erred in this point which now you censure him,
And pulled the law upon you.

ANGELO
’Tis one thing to be tempted, Éscalo,
Another thing to fall. I not deny,
The jury, passing on the prisoner’s life,
May in the sworn twelve have a thief or two
Guiltier than him they try.
You may not so extenuate his offense
For I have had such faults; but rather tell me,
When I, that censure him, do so offend,
Let mine own judgment pattern out my death,
And nothing come in partial. Sir, he must die.

ÉSCALO
Be it as your wisdom will. [304]

ANGELO

Where is the Provost?

PROVOST
Here, if it like your honor.

ANGELO

See that Claudio

Be executed by nine tomorrow morning.
Bring him his confessor, let him be prepared,
For that’s the utmost of his pilgrimage.

ÉSCALO (aside)
Well, heaven forgive him, and forgive us all!

PROVOST
Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall.

ÉSCALO
Some run from brakes of vice, and answer none.

PROVOST
And some condemned for a fault alone.

Exit PROVOST. Enter ELBOW and POMPIS.

ELBOW
Come, bring them away. If these be good people in a commonweal that do nothing but use their abuses in common houses, I know no law. Bring them away.

ANGELO
How now, sir! What’s your name? And what’s the matter?

ELBOW
If it please your honor, I am the poor duke’s constable, and my name is Elbow. I do lean upon justice, sir, and do bring in here before your good honor a notorious benefactor.

ANGELO
Benefactor? Well! What benefactor are they? Are they not a malefactor? [305]

ELBOW
If it please your honor, I know not well what they are. [308] But a precise villain they are, that I am sure of, and void of all profanation in the world that good Christians ought to have.

ÉSCALO
This comes off well! Here’s a wise officer.

ANGELO
Go to, what quality are they of? Elbow is your name? Why dost thou not speak, Elbow?

POMPIS
He cannot, sir. He’s out at elbow.

ANGELO
What are you, sir?

ELBOW
He, sir? A tapster, sir, parcel-bawd, whose house, sir, was, as they say, plucked down in the suburbs. And now he professes a hothouse, which, I think, is a very ill house too.

ÉSCALO
How know you that?

ELBOW
My wife, sir, whom I detest before heaven and your honor—

ÉSCALO
How? Thy wife?

ELBOW
Ay, sir—whom, I thank heaven, is an honest woman—

ÉSCALO
Dost thou detest her therefore?

ELBOW
I say, sir, I will detest myself also, as well as she, that this house, if it be not a bawd’s house, it is pity of her life, for it is a naughty house. [306]

ÉSCALO
How dost thou know that, constable?

ELBOW
Marry, sir, by my wife, who, if she had been a woman cardinally given, might have been accused in fornication, adultery, and all uncleanliness there.

POMPIS
Sir, if it please your honor, this is not so.

ELBOW
Prove it before these varlets here, thou honorable man, prove it.

ÉSCALO (to ANGELO)
Do you hear how he misplaces?

POMPIS
Sir, she came in great with child, and longing, saving your honor’s reverence, for stewed prunes. Sir, we had but two in the house, which at that very distant time stood, as it were, in a fruit dish, a dish of some three-pence. Your honors have seen such dishes—they are not China dishes, but very good dishes.

ÉSCALO
Go to, go to. No matter for the dish, sir.

POMPIS
No, indeed, sir, not of a pin; you are therein in the right, but to the point. As I say, this Mistress Elbow, being, as I say, with child, and being great-bellied, and longing, as I said, for prunes; and having but two in the dish, as I said, this very woman, having eaten the rest, as I said—

ÉSCALO
Come, you are a tedious fool. To the purpose. What was done to Elbow’s wife that he hath cause to complain of? Come me to what was done to her.

POMPIS
Sir, your honor cannot come to that yet.

ÉSCALO
No, sir, nor I mean it not.

ANGELO
This will last out a night in Russia, [307]
When nights are longest there. I’ll take my leave,
And leave you to the hearing of the cause.

ÉSCALO
Good morrow to your lordship.

Exit ANGELO.

Now, sir, come on, what was done to Elbow’s wife, once more?

POMPIS
Once, sir? There was nothing done to her once.

ÉSCALO laughs.

By this hand, sir, his wife is a more respected person than any of us all.

ÉSCALO
He’s in the right. Constable, what say you to it?

ELBOW
Varlet, thou liest, thou liest, wicked varlet! The time has yet to come that she was ever respected with man, woman, or child.

POMPIS
Sir, she was respected with him before he married with her.

ÉSCALO
Which is the wiser here? Justice or Iniquity? Is this true?

ELBOW
O thou caitiff! O thou varlet! I respected with her before I was married to her! I’ll have mine action of battery on thee.

ÉSCALO
If he took you a box o’ the ear, you might have your action of slander too.

ELBOW
Marry, I thank your good worship for it. What is’t your worship’s pleasure I shall do with this wicked caitiff?

ÉSCALO
Truly, officer, because he hath some offenses in him that thou wouldst discover if thou couldst, let him continue in his courses till thou knowest what they are.

ELBOW
Marry, I thank your worship for it. Thou seest, thou wicked varlet, now, what’s come upon thee.

ELBOW is shushed.

ÉSCALO
So. What trade are you of, sir?

POMPIS
A tapster, a poor widow’s tapster.

ÉSCALO
Your mistress’ name?

POMPIS
Mistress Overdone.

ÉSCALO
Hath she had any more than one husband?

POMPIS
Nine, sir. Overdone by the last.

ÉSCALO
Troth, and your bum is the greatest thing about you; so that in the beastliest sense you are Pompis the Great. Pompis, you are partly a bawd, Pompis, howsoever you color it in being a tapster, are you not? Come, tell me true: it shall be the better for you.

POMPIS
Truly, sir, I am a poor fellow that would live.

ÉSCALO
How would you live, Pompis? By being a bawd? What do you think of the trade, Pompis? Is it a lawful trade?

POMPIS
If the law would allow it, sir.

ÉSCALO
But the law will not allow it, Pompis; nor it shall not be allowed in Vienna. [309]

POMPIS
Does your worship mean to splay and geld all the youth of the city?

ÉSCALO
No, Pompis.

POMPIS
Truly, sir, in my poor opinion, they will to’t, then. If your worship will take order for the drabs and the knaves, you need not to fear the bawds.

ÉSCALO
Thank you, good Pompis, and, in requital of your prophecy, hark you: I advise you, let me not find you before me again upon any complaint whatsoever.

POMPIS
I thank your worship for your good counsel.

Exit.

ÉSCALO
Fare you well.

ELBOW, who has not been allowed to speak since he was shut up, exits.

It grieves me for the death of Claudio,
But there’s no remedy.
It is but needful:
Mercy is not itself, that oft looks so;
Pardon is still the nurse of second woe.
But yet, poor Claudio!
There is no remedy.

Scene 2

Continuing in the same room. Enter PROVOST.

ÉSCALO
He’s hearing of a cause. Ahorita sale: yo le digo.

PROVOST
Por favor. [310]

Exit ÉSCALO.

I’ll know his pleasure; maybe he will relent. Alas,

Sí. ¡Ha pecado como en sueños!

All sects, all ages smack of this vice; and he

To die for’t!

Enter ANGELO.

ANGELO

Now, what’s the matter. Provost?

PROVOST
Is it your will Claudio shall die mañana?

ANGELO
Did not I tell thee yea? Hadst thou not order?
Why dost thou ask again?

PROVOST

Lest I might be too rash—

ANGELO
Do you your office, or give up your place,
And you shall well be spared.

PROVOST

Discúlpame, señor.

What shall be done, sir, with the groaning Juliet?

ANGELO
Dispose of her to some more fitter place, and that with speed.

Re-enter ÉSCALO.

ÉSCALO
Here is the sister of the man condemned
Desires access to you.

ANGELO

Let her be admitted.

Exit ÉSCALO.

Enter ISABELLA and LUCIO. [311]

PROVOST
¡Bendiciones!

ANGELO
Stay a little while.

(to ISABELLA) You’re welcome. What’s your will?

ISABELLA
I am a woeful suitor to your honor,
Por favor, señor, escúchame.

ANGELO
Well, what’s your suit?

She doesn’t speak.

Well, the matter?

ISABELLA
I have a brother is condemned to die:
I do beseech you, let it be his fault,
And not my brother.

PROVOST (aside)

¡Dios dale elocuencia!

ANGELO
Condemn the fault, and not the actor of it?
Why, every fault’s condemned ere it be done:
Mine were the very cipher of a function,
To fine the faults whose fine stands in record,
And let go by the actor.

ISABELLA

O just but severe law!

I had a brother, then. Heaven keep your honor!

LUCIO (aside to ISABELLA)
Give’t not o’er so: you are too cold, again;
¡Párate delante de él, dale!

ISABELLA
Sir, I do think that you might pardon him— [312]

ANGELO
I will not do’t.

ISABELLA
But can you, if you would?

ANGELO
Look, what I will not, that I cannot do.

ISABELLA
But might you do’t, and do the world no wrong,
If so your heart were touched with that remorse
As mine is to him?

ANGELO
He’s sentenced. ’Tis too late.

LUCIO (aside to ISABELLA)
You are too cold.

ISABELLA
Too late? Que no. I, that do speak a word,
May call it back again. Well, believe this,
No ceremony that to great ones ’longs,
Not the king’s crown, nor the deputed sword,
The marshal’s truncheon, nor the judge’s robe,
Become them with one half so good a grace
As mercy does.
If he had been as you and you as he,
You would have slipped like him, but he, like you,
Would not have been so stern.

ANGELO

Pray you, be gone.

ISABELLA
No. I would tell what ’twere to be a judge,
And what a prisoner.

LUCIO (aside)
Ay, eso. There’s the vein. [313]

ANGELO
Your brother is a forfeit of the law,
And you but waste your words.

ISABELLA

Alas, alas!

Why, all the souls that were, were forfeit once.
And He that might the vantage best have took
Found out the remedy. How would you be,
If He, which is the top of judgment, should
But judge you as you are? O, piénsalo,
And mercy then will breathe within your lips,
Like man new made.

ANGELO

Be you content, fair maid.

It is the law, not I, condemn your brother.
Were he my kinsman, brother, or my son,
It should be thus with him. He must die mañana.

ISABELLA
Tomorrow! ¿Tan pronto? ¡Perdónalo!
Who is it that hath died for this offense?
There’s many have committed it.

LUCIO (aside)

True that.

ANGELO
The law hath not been dead, though it hath slept.
Those many had not dared to do that evil,
If the first that did the edict infringe
Had answered for his deed.

ISABELLA

Yet show some pity.

ANGELO
I show it most of all when I show justice.
Your brother dies tomorrow. Be content. [314]

ISABELLA
So you must be the first that gives this sentence,
And he, that suffers. Es excelente
Tener poder de gigante, pero tiránico
usarlo como gigante.

LUCIO
Ahí va. I perceive’t.

PROVOST

Pray heaven she win him!

ISABELLA
We cannot weigh our brother with ourself.
Great men may jest with saints; ’tis wit in them,
But in the less foul profanation.

ANGELO
Why do you put these sayings upon me?

ISABELLA
Porque autoridad, aunque también yerre,
Hath yet a kind of medicine in itself,
That skins the vice o’ the top. Toca tu corazón;
Knock there, and ask your heart what it doth know
That’s like my brother’s fault.

ANGELO (aside)

She speaks, and ’tis

Such sense, that my sense breeds with it. Fare you well.

ISABELLA
Gentle señor, escúchame.

ANGELO
I will bethink me. Come again tomorrow.

ISABELLA
Le puedo sobornar. Señor, turn back.

ANGELO
How? Bribe me? [315]

ISABELLA
Sí, con regalos que solamente los cielos podrían compartir.

LUCIO (aside)
Guao.

ANGELO
Well, come to me tomorrow.

LUCIO
Go to, ’tis well. ¡Vámonos!

ISABELLA
¡Dios le cuide!

ANGELO (aside)

Amen.

For I am that way going to temptation,
Where prayers cross.

ISABELLA begins to exit and is almost out of the room when she turns back to ANGELO.

ISABELLA

¿A qué horas vengo

Mañana, excelencia?

ANGELO

At any time ’fore noon.

ISABELLA
¡Bendiciones!

Exeunt ISABELLA, LUCIO, and PROVOST.

ANGELO

From thee, even from thy virtue!

What’s this, what’s this? Is this her fault or mine?
The tempter or the tempted, who sins most?
Ha! O, fie, fie, fie!
What dost thou, or what art thou, Angelo?
Dost thou desire her foully for those things
That make her good? O, let her brother live! [316]
Thieves for their robbery have authority
When judges steal themselves. What, do I love her,
That I desire to hear her speak again,
And feast upon her eyes? Even till now,
When men were fond, I smiled and wondered how.

Exit.

Scene 3

An interview room in a prison. Enter DUKE VINCENTIO, disguised as a friar, CLAUDIO, and PROVOST.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Hail to you, Provost! So I think you are.

PROVOST
I am the Provost. What’s your will, good friar?

DUKE VINCENTIO
Bound by my charity and my blest order,
I come to visit the afflicted spirits
Here in the prison. Do me the common right
To let me see them and to make me know
The nature of their crimes, that I may minister
To them accordingly.

PROVOST
I would do more than that, if more were needful.

Enter JULIET with a SOCIAL WORKER.

Look, here comes one, a gentlewoman of mine,
Who, falling in the flaws of her own youth,
Hath blistered her report. She is with child,
And he that got it, sentenced—a young man
More fit to do another such offense
Than die for this.

The lovers embrace. [317]

DUKE VINCENTIO
When must he die?

PROVOST

As I do think, tomorrow.

(to JULIET) I have provided for you. Stay awhile,
And you shall be conducted.

DUKE VINCENTIO
¿Se arrepiente, caballero, de su pecado?

SOCIAL WORKER (translating)
Repent you, good man, of the sin you carry?

CLAUDIO
Me arrepiento de él y sobrellevo la vergüenza con paciencia.

SOCIAL WORKER (translating)
I do, and bear the shame most patiently.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Le enseñaré a examinar su conciencia
Y a probar si su penitencia es sincera o
Si es superficial.

SOCIAL WORKER (translating)
I’ll teach you how you shall arraign your conscience,
And try your penitence, if it be sound
Or hollowly put on.

CLAUDIO

Aprenderé con gusto.

SOCIAL WORKER (translating)
I’ll gladly learn.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Love you the man that wronged you?

JULIET
Yes, as I love the woman that wronged him. [318]

DUKE VINCENTIO
So then it seems your most offenceful act
Was mutually committed?

JULIET

Mutually.

DUKE VINCENTIO (motioning to JULIET’s pregnant body)
Then was your sin of heavier kind than his.

CLAUDIO
I do confess it—

JULIET

And repent it, father.

DUKE VINCENTIO
’Tis meet so, hijo, but lest you do repent
As that the sin hath brought you to this shame—

CLAUDIO
Me arrepiento de mi pecado como un mal,
Y sobrellevo la vergüenza con alegría.

SOCIAL WORKER (translating)
I do repent me, as it is an evil,
And take the shame with joy.

DUKE VINCENTIO

There rest.

Claudio, as I hear, must die tomorrow.
Grace go with you. ¡Bendiciones!

DUKE VINCENTIO and the SOCIAL WORKER exit.

JULIET
Must die tomorrow? O injurious love,
That respites me a life, whose very comfort
Is still a dying horror!

PROVOST

’Tis pity of him.

Exeunt. [319]

Scene 4

An office.

ANGELO
When I would pray and think, I think and pray
To several subjects. Heaven hath my empty words,
Whilst my invention, hearing not my tongue,
Anchors on Isabel. Heaven in my mouth,
As if I did but only chew his name,
And in my heart the strong and swelling evil
Of my conception.

Enter ÉSCALO.

How now! Who’s there?

ÉSCALO
One Isabel, a sister, desires access to you.

ANGELO
Teach her the way.

ÉSCALO exits.

O heavens!

Why does my blood thus muster to my heart,
Making both it unable for itself,
And dispossessing all my other parts
Of necessary fitness?

Enter ISABELLA.

How now, fair maid?

ISABELLA
I am come to know your pleasure.

ANGELO
That you might know it would much better please me
Than to demand what ’tis. Your brother cannot live.

ISABELLA
Así será—¡que Dios le bendiga! [320]

ANGELO
Yet may he live a while, and, it may be,
As long as you or I. Yet he must die.

ISABELLA
Under your sentence?

ANGELO
Yea.

ISABELLA
¿Me dice cuándo? That in his reprieve,
Longer or shorter, he may be so fitted
That his soul sicken not.

ANGELO
Say you so? Then I shall pose you quickly.
Which had you rather: that the most just law
Now took your brother’s life, or, to redeem him,
Give up your body to such sweet uncleanness
As she that he hath stained?

ISABELLA

Señor, créeme,

I had rather give my body than my soul.

ANGELO
I talk not of your soul. Our compelled sins
Stand more for number than account.
Might there not be a charity in sin
To save this brother’s life?

ISABELLA

Si le gusta,

I’ll take it as peligro to my soul,
It is no pecado, but charity.
Si peco al rogarte por su vida,
Heaven let me bear it!

ANGELO

Escúchame.

Your sense pursues not mine. Either you are ignorant, [321]
Or seem so craftily, and that’s not good.
To be received plain, I’ll speak more gross:
Your brother is to die.

ISABELLA
Sí.

ANGELO
And his offense is so, as it appears,
Accountant to the law upon that pain.

ISABELLA
Sí, es cierto.

ANGELO
Admit no other way to save his life—
As I subscribe not that, nor any other,
But in the loss of question—that you, his sister,
Could fetch your brother from the manacles
Of the all-binding law; and that there were
No earthly mean to save him, but that either
You must lay down the treasures of your body
To this supposed, or else to let him suffer—
What would you do?

ISABELLA
As much for my poor brother as myself.
That is, were I under terms of death,
Escogería cicatrices de
Un látigo, y me vistiera con
Ellos como si fueran rubíes crueles,
Y me desnudaría hasta la muerte,
Y abrazaría el sueño eterno,
Antes de dar mi cuerpo a ti.

ANGELO
Then must your brother die.

ISABELLA
Sería lo mejor:
Mejor que un hermano muera una vez, [322]
Que la hermana por salvándolo
Se muera por eternidad.

ANGELO
Were not you then as cruel as the sentence
That you have slandered so?

ISABELLA
Ignominy in ransom and free pardon
Are of two houses: lawful mercy
Is nothing kin to foul redemption.

ANGELO
You seemed of late to make the law a tyrant,
And rather proved the sliding of your brother
A merriment than a vice.

ISABELLA
O, discúlpame, señor. Hay veces que
En la pelea por lo que queremos
No decimos lo que intentamos.
I something do excuse the thing I hate,
For his advantage that I dearly love.

ANGELO
We are all frail. All women are frail too.

ISABELLA
Ay, como los espejos en los que se miran,
Which are as easy broke as they make forms.
¡Mujeres! Help, heaven! Men their creation mar
In profiting by them. Llámanos diez veces frágiles,
For we are soft as our complexions are,
And credulous to false prints.

ANGELO

I think it well,

And from this testimony of your own sex,
Since I suppose we are made to be no stronger
Than faults may shake our frames—let me be bold:
I do arrest your words. Be that you are;
That is, a woman. If you be more, you’re none. [323]
If you be one, as you are well expressed
By all external warrants, show it now
By putting on the destined livery.

ISABELLA
I have no tongue but one. Excelencia,
Let me entreat you speak the former language.

ANGELO
Plainly conceive, te amo.

ISABELLA
My brother did love Juliet,
y por tu culpa él va a morir.

ANGELO
He shall not, Isabel, if you give me love.

ISABELLA
Le falta honor para que le crea,
¡Su intención perversa! ¡Hipócrita!
I will proclaim thee, Angelo; look for’t.
Sign me a present pardon for my brother,
Or with an outstretched throat I’ll tell the world aloud
What man thou art.

ANGELO

Who will believe thee, Isabel?

My unsoiled name, the austereness of my life,
My vouch against you, and my place i’th’ state,
Will so your accusation overweigh
That you shall stifle in your own report
And smell of calumny. I have begun,
And now I give my sensual race the rein.
Fit thy consent to my sharp appetite.
Lay by all nicety and prolixious blushes
That banish what they sue for. Redeem thy brother
By yielding up thy body to my will,
Or else he must not only die the death,
But thy unkindness shall his death draw out
To lingering sufferance. Answer me tomorrow, [324]
Or by the affection that now guides me most,
I’ll prove a tyrant to him. As for you,
Say what you can, my false o’erweighs your true.

Exit.

ISABELLA
¿A quién podré quejar? Did I tell this,
Who would believe me? Voy con mi hermano:
Though he hath fallen by prompture of the blood,
Como es tan honorable y fiel,
That had he twenty heads to tender down
On twenty bloody blocks, los rendiría
Antes que su hermana hubiera
Rendido su cuerpo a humillación.
Then, Isabel, live chaste, and, brother, die:
La castidad va antes que mi hermano.
Le cuento lo que Angelo ha hecho
Para que Dios esté satisfecho. [325]

Exit.

ACT 3
Scene 1

A prison visiting room. DUKE VINCENTIO, still disguised, enters with CLAUDIO and PROVOST.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Así que tú tienes esperanza.

CLAUDIO
Los míseros solamente tienen
Esperanza. Espero sobrevivir
aunque estoy preparado para morir.

ISABELLA (offstage)
¡Qué show! ¡Aquí hay paz, gracia, y compañía!

PROVOST
Pásale, el deseo merece bienvenida.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Señor, ere long I’ll visit you again.

CLAUDIO
Muchísimas gracias, padre.

Enter ISABELLA.

PROVOST
Look, sir, here’s your sister.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Provost, ¿una palabra contigo?

PROVOST
Todas las que guste.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Bring me to hear them speak where I may be concealed.

DUKE VINCENTIO and PROVOST exit. [326]

CLAUDIO
Hermana mía, dime que pasa.

ISABELLA
Haz tus preparaciones ya;
Mañana you set on.

CLAUDIO

¿No hay remedio?

ISABELLA
None, but such remedy as, to save a head,
To cleave a heart in twain.

CLAUDIO

¿Pero hay alguno?

ISABELLA
Si, hermano, podrás vivir:
There is a devilish mercy in the judge,
If you’ll implore it, that will free your life,
But fetter you till death.

CLAUDIO

¿De qué modo?

ISABELLA
In such a one as, si tú lo aceptes,
Would bark your honor from that trunk you bear,
And leave you naked.

CLAUDIO

¿Qué quieres decir?

ISABELLA
O, me das miedo, Claudio, and I quake,
Lest thou a feverous life shouldst entertain,
And six or seven winters more respect
Than a perpetual honor. Darest thou die?
The sense of death is most in apprehension,
And the poor beetle that we tread upon
In corporal sufferance finds a pang as great [327]
As when a giant dies.

CLAUDIO

¿Por qué me humillas así?

¿Tú piensas que me van a dar resolución
Tus poemas tiernos? If I must die,
I will encounter darkness as a bride,
Y lo abrazaré.

ISABELLA
There spake my carnal; there my papi’s grave
Did utter forth a voice. Yes, thou must die.
Eres demasiado noble para conservar una vida
Con mentiras. This outward-sainted deputy,
Whose settled visage and deliberate word
Nips youth i’th’ head, and follies doth enew
As falcon doth the fowl, es un sangrón.

CLAUDIO
¡El Angelo!

ISABELLA

Dost thou think, hermano,

If I would yield him my virginity,
Thou mightst be freed?

CLAUDIO

Dios mío, no puede ser.

ISABELLA
That I should do what I abhor to name,
Or else thou diest tomorrow.

CLAUDIO

No lo hagas.

ISABELLA
O, were it but my life,
I’d throw it down for your deliverance
As frankly as a pin. [328]

CLAUDIO

Gracias, querida Isabel.

ISABELLA
Prepárate, Claudio, for your death tomorrow.

CLAUDIO
Sí.

They pray.

ISABELLA & CLAUDIO
Creo en un solo Dios, Padre todopoderoso, Creador del cielo y de la tierra. Creo en Jesucristo su único Hijo, Nuestro Señor, que fue concebido por obra y gracia del Espíritu Santo…

CLAUDIO stops praying and ISABELLA continues.

Nació de Santa María Virgen; padeció bajo el poder de Poncio Pilato; fue crucificado, muerto y sepultado…

ISABELLA
¿Qué pasó, hermano?

CLAUDIO

Death is a fearful thing.

ISABELLA
Y vida sin honra detestable.

CLAUDIO
Ay, but to die, and go we know not where,
To lie in cold obstruction and to rot,
To be imprisoned in the viewless winds,
And blown with restless violence round about
The pendent world; or to be worse than worst
Of those that lawless and incertain thought
Imagine howling—’tis too horrible!

ISABELLA
¡Dios mío!

CLAUDIO

Hermanita, let me live. [329]

El pecado que puede salvarme,
Naturaleza lo absolverá,
Convirtiendo todo a la virtud.

ISABELLA

O you beast!

¡O cobarde sin fe! ¡O desgraciado!
Wilt thou be made a man out of my vice?
Is’t not a kind of incest, to take life
From thine own sister’s shame? What should I think?
Palabras, no. Oraciones, sí.
I’ll pray, but still no word to save thee.

CLAUDIO
Escúchame, Isa—

ISABELLA

O, fie, fie, fie!

Tu pecado no fue accidente sino costumbre.
Mercy to thee would prove itself a bawd.
’Tis best thou diest quickly.

CLAUDIO

O, hear me, Isabella!

DUKE VINCENTIO enters again.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Vouchsafe a word, chiquita, but one word.

ISABELLA
What is your will?

DUKE VINCENTIO
Might you dispense with your leisure, me gustaría hablar contigo en un segundito. The satisfaction I would require is likewise your own benefit.

ISABELLA
No tengo tiempo que me sobra. Quedarme aquí será robarles a otros asuntos, pero ahí le espero.

ISABELLA walks apart from the others. DUKE VINCENTIO and CLAUDIO face off again. No words are exchanged, only head nods. [330]

DUKE VINCENTIO
Provost, a word with you!

PROVOST enters again.

PROVOST
What’s your will, padre?

DUKE VINCENTIO
That now you are come, que te salgas. Dame un ratito with the maid. My mind promises with my habit no loss shall touch her by my company.

PROVOST
Por supuesto, en good time.

Exit PROVOST. ISABELLA comes forward.

DUKE VINCENTIO
La mano que te hizo bella también te hizo buena. ¿Y cómo vas a salvar a tu hermano?

ISABELLA
I am going ahorita to resolve him. Prefiero que mi hermano muera en lugar de que me nazca un hijo ilegítimo. Pero, O, how much is the good duke deceived in Angelo! El día que regrese y pueda hablar con él, abriré mi boca en vano, o denunciaré su conducta.

DUKE VINCENTIO
That shall not be much amiss. Yet, as the matter now stands, he will avoid your accusation: he made trial of you only. Therefore, abre tu oído para escuchar mis consejos. Por lo tanto que me encanta hacer bien, se nos presenta un remedio.

ISABELLA
Dime más. Tengo el ánimo para hacer cualquier cosa que no empañe la pureza de mi espíritu.

DUKE VINCENTIO
La virtud es intrépida, and goodness never fearful. Have you not heard speak of Mariana, the sister of Federico, ¿el soldado que naufragó en el mar?

ISABELLA
I have heard of the chava, and palabras buenas went with her name. [331]

DUKE VINCENTIO
Se iba a casar con Angelo. Se habían prometido formalmente, and the nuptial appointed, between which time of the contract and limit of the solemnity, her brother Federico was wrecked at sea, y con el barco se hundió la dote de su hermana. But mark how heavily this befell to the poor señorita. Perdió a un hermano noble y afamado que la quería con gran ternura; with him, the portion and sinew of her fortune, también se perdió su dote; with both, her combinate husband, el engañoso Angelo.

ISABELLA
No me digas. ¿Y así la dejó?

DUKE VINCENTIO
La dejó deshecha en lágrimas, and dried not one of them with his comfort; swallowed his vows whole, pretending in her discoveries of dishonor. In few, la abandonó a que estuviera sola, que por él todavía está dolorida; and he, a marble to her tears, is washed with them but relents not.

ISABELLA
¿Pero cómo puede beneficiar a ella de este asunto?

DUKE VINCENTIO
Es una herida que nosotros podemos curar fácilmente, and the cure of it not only saves your brother, but keeps you from dishonor in doing it.

ISABELLA
Enséñame cómo, buen padre.

DUKE VINCENTIO
This forenamed maid hath yet in her the continuance of her first affection. His unjust unkindness hubiera apagado el amor de Mariana, pero como un obstáculo en la corriente lo ha hecho más violento e indomable. Vete tú con Angelo. Agree with his demands to the point, that the time may have all shadow and silence in it. We shall advise la pobrecita to stead up your appointment, go in your place. And here, by this is your hermano saved, your honor untainted, the poor Mariana advantaged, y el maldito juez juzgado. ¿Qué te parece?

ISABELLA
The image of it gives me content already. [332]

DUKE VINCENTIO
It lies much in your holding up. Apúrale hacia Angelo. If for this night he entreat you to his bed, give him promise of satisfaction. I will presently to San Lucas. There, en la calle, resides this dejected Mariana. At that place call upon me.

ISABELLA
Gracias por este consuelo. Adiós, buen padre.

Exit both.

Scene 2

The barrio. Enter, on one side, DUKE VINCENTIO disguised as before, on the other, ELBOW with POMPIS.

ELBOW
Come your way, sir.

POMPIS
’Twas never merry world since, of two usuries, the merriest was put down, and the worser allowed by order of law a furred gown to keep him warm—and furred with fox and lambskins too, to signify that craft, being richer than innocency, stands for the facing.

DUKE VINCENTIO
¡Ay, Dios santo! ¿Qué está pasando aquí?

ELBOW
Bless you, good padre.

DUKE VINCENTIO
And you, good compadre. What offense hath this man made you, sir?

ELBOW
Marry, sir, he hath offended the law; and, sir, we take him to be a thief too, sir, for we have found upon him, sir, a strange picklock.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Fie, sirrah! ¡Un ladrón, un pinche ladrón! [333]

POMPIS
Sí, señor, se que apesta, pero—

DUKE VINCENTIO
Nay, if el diablo have given thee proofs for sin,
Thou wilt prove his. Take him to prison, officer.
Correction and instruction must both work
Ere this maldito will profit.

ELBOW
He must before the deputy, sir; he has given him warning—

DUKE VINCENTIO
That we were all, as some would seem to be,
From our faults, as faults from seeming, free!

ELBOW
His neck will come to your waist: a cord, sir.

POMPIS
I spy comfort; I cry bail. Here’s a gentleman and a friend of mine.

Enter LUCIO.

LUCIO
¡Pompis, qué pedo cabrón! ¿Qué dices, Trot? Is the world as it was, man? ¿Cómo está la onda? Is it sad, and few words ¿Qué chingados? The trick of it?

DUKE VINCENTIO
Sigue y sigue; still worse!

LUCIO
¿Ándale, cómo estás, güey, y tu jefa? ¿Sigue cogiendo? Procures she still, ha?

POMPIS
Troth, sir, she hath eaten up all her beef, and she is herself in the tub.

LUCIO
Órale, ’tá bien. It is the right of it; así debe de ser. Art going to prison, Pompón?

POMPIS
Simón, carnal. [334]

LUCIO
For debt, Pompis? ¿O, qué vergas?

ELBOW
For being a bawd, for being a bawd.

LUCIO
Bueno, mándalo a la bestia. Al rato, buen Pompis. Commend me to la cárcel, Pompis.

POMPIS
Amigo, espero que puedas ser mi fiado.

LUCIO
Chale, güey, yo no, Pompón. It is not the wear.

POMPIS
You will not bail me, then, sir?

LUCIO
Que yo no, joven.

POMPIS
My lord, this is one Lucio’s information against me. La señorita Catia Camas was with child by him in the Duke’s time. He promised her marriage. His child is a year and a quarter old y se llama Pepito—

LUCIO
Go to kennel, Pompis, ya.

POMPIS
¿Cómo dicen en mi pueblo?

LUCIO
Ahí nos vemos—

POMPIS
La cola cuando nos bañemos.

POMPIS swaggers off.

ELBOW
Come your ways, sir, come. [335]

ELBOW and POMPIS exit.

LUCIO
¿Qué hay de nuevo, vato? What news of the Duke?

DUKE VINCENTIO
Sepa. ¿Tú sabes algo?

LUCIO
It was a mad fantastical trick of him to steal from el gobierno and usurp the beggary he was never born to. Lord Angelo dukes it well in his absence; he puts transgression to’t.

DUKE VINCENTIO
He does well in’t.

LUCIO
Ser un poco más simpático no le haría daño: es bien culero con la lujuria, güey.

DUKE VINCENTIO
It is too general a vice, and severity must cure it.

LUCIO
Dicen que este vato, Angelo, no nació de hombre y mujer según el modo normal de procreación. This ungenitured agent will unpeople the province with continency. Sparrows must not build in his house-eaves, because they are lecherous. Pero lo que sí se sabe es que cuando el mea, güey, sale hielo. Eso sí lo sé, güey, por supuesto.

DUKE VINCENTIO
You are pleasant, sir, and speak apace.

LUCIO
Why, what a ruthless thing is this in him, for the rebellion of a pito to take away the life of a man! Would the Duke that is absent have done this? Antes, ahorcaban a un vato por haber creado cien bastardos, hubiera pagado por la crianza de mil. He had some feeling of the sport; he knew the service, and that instructed him to mercy.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Yo nunca escuché que es mujeriego el Duque; he was not inclined that way. [336]

LUCIO
Ay, güey, estás equivocado.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Imposible.

LUCIO
Who, not the Duke? Estaría pedo tambien—that let me inform you.

DUKE VINCENTIO
You do him wrong, surely.

LUCIO
Güey, era mi compa. A shy fellow was the Duke, and I believe I know the cause of his withdrawing.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Bueno, pues, ¿por qué se fue?

LUCIO
No, perdón, este secreto se debe de guardar entre los dientes y los labios. But this I can let you understand: the greater file of the subject held the Duke to be wise.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Wise? Why, no question but he was.

LUCIO
Es un fulano bien cobarde, malvado, culero, necio—muy pendejo, la verdad.

DUKE VINCENTIO
O estás celoso, tonto, o loco.

LUCIO
Bro, yo lo conozco y lo amo.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Love talks with better knowledge, and knowledge with dearer love.

LUCIO
Come, sir, I know what I know.

DUKE VINCENTIO
No puedo creerlo, tú ni sabes nada de lo que dices. I pray you, ¿cómo te llamas? [337]

LUCIO
Sir, my name is Lucio, well known to the Duke.

DUKE VINCENTIO
He shall know you better, sir, if I may live to report you.

LUCIO
No me das miedo.

DUKE VINCENTIO
O, you hope the Duke will return no more. You’ll forswear this again.

LUCIO
Primero me ahorcarán. Thou art deceived in me, friar. Pero ya con esto. Canst thou tell if Claudio die mañana or no?

DUKE VINCENTIO
¿Por qué morirá, señor?

LUCIO
Why should he die? Marry, el Claudio está condenado por desabrocharse. Adiós, compadre, rece por mí. The Duke, I say to thee again, would eat mutton on Fridays. He’s not past it yet, and I say to thee, se besaría con una mendiga, aunque oliera a ajo. Say that I said so. Al rato.

Exit.

DUKE VINCENTIO
No might nor greatness in mortality
Can censure scape; back-wounding calumny
The whitest virtue strikes. What king so strong
Can tie the gall up in the slanderous tongue?

Enter ÉSCALO.

But who comes here?

ÉSCALO looks at DUKE VINCENTIO as if he seems familiar, but can’t quite place him.

ÉSCALO
Good even, good father. [338]

ACT 4
Scene 1

San Lucas, en la calle. Music plays. Enter MARIANA, singing along. As she begins to speak, DUKE VINCENTIO enters, still disguised.

MARIANA
Ahí viene uno que me consuela,
Y siempre calma mi amargura.
Discúlpame, señor, deseo que
No me hubiera visto así
Tan musical. Por favor créeme
Que siempre curo el dolor así.

Enter ISABELLA.

DUKE VINCENTIO
La hora ya ha llegado.

MARIANA
Siempre estoy a su lado, padre.

Exit.

ISABELLA
I made my promise
Upon the heavy middle of the night
To call upon him.

DUKE VINCENTIO
But shall you on your knowledge find this way?

ISABELLA
I have ta’en a due and wary note upon’t.
With whispering and most guilty diligence,
In action all of precept, he did show me
The way twice o’er.

DUKE VINCENTIO

Are there no other tokens

Between you ’greed concerning her observance? [339]

ISABELLA
No, none, but only a repair i’th’ dark,
And that I have possessed him my most stay
Can be but brief, for I have made him know
I have a servant comes with me along
That stays upon me, whose persuasion is
I come about my brother.

DUKE VINCENTIO

’Tis well borne up.

I have not yet made known to Mariana
A word of this. ¡Señora! ¡Ven acá!

Re-enter MARIANA.

Aquí presento a la Isabel.

Viene por ayudarte.

ISABELLA

Es lo que deseo.

DUKE VINCENTIO
¿Usted cree que la cuidaremos bien?

MARIANA
Yo sé que ya tienen mi confianza.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Toma la mano de tu amiga,
Quien te contará una historia.
Aquí estaré yo. Apúrale,
La noche nebulosa ya se acerca.

MARIANA
¿Vendrás conmigo?

MARIANA and ISABELLA exit.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Craft against vice I must apply.
With Angelo tonight shall lie
His old betrothèd but despisèd;
So disguise shall, by th’ disguisèd, [340]
Pay with falsehood false exacting,
And perform an old contracting.

Re-enter MARIANA and ISABELLA.

(to ISABELLA) ¿Está de acuerdo?

ISABELLA
Aceptará el cometido, padre,
Si usted lo aprueba.

DUKE VINCENTIO

No es que lo apruebo,

Le suplico.

ISABELLA

Hay poco que decirle

Cuando lo dejes, pero en voz
Baja le dices…

ISABELLA & MARIANA
“Remember now my brother.”

MARIANA
No temas.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Tampoco, hija, tengas miedo tú.
Es su marido por compromiso.
Reunirlos no es un pecado,
Ya que nuestros derechos sobre él
Justifican el engaño. Vámonos ya.
Antes de cosechar aún hay que sembrar.

They exit. [341]

Scene 2

In the penitentiary. Enter PROVOST and POMPIS.

PROVOST
Come hither, cabrón. Can you cut off a man’s head?

POMPIS
Si es soltero, señor, sí puedo; but if he be a married vato, he’s his vieja’s head, and I can never cut off his vieja’s head.

PROVOST
Come, sir, leave me your snatches, and yield me a direct answer. Tomorrow morning are to die Claudio and Bernardino. Here is in our prison a common executioner, who in his office lacks a helper.

POMPIS
Me encantaría que mi compañero me instruya.

PROVOST
What, ho! Abhorson!

Enter ABHORSON.

ABHORSON
Do you call, sir?

PROVOST
Sirrah, here’s a fellow will help you tomorrow in your execution.

ABHORSON
A bawd, sir? Fie upon him!

PROVOST
Go to, sir. Call hither Bernardino and Claudio.

POMPIS and ABHORSON exit.

The one has my pity; el otro no,

Aunque fuera mi hermano, siendo un criminal.

Enter CLAUDIO.

Look, here’s the warrant, Claudio, for thy death. [342]

Ya es medianoche, and by eight tomorrow

Thou must be made immortal. Where’s Bernardino?

CLAUDIO
As fast locked up in sleep as guiltless labor
When it lies starkly in the traveler’s bones.
No despierta.

PROVOST

Who can do good on him?

Bueno, prepárate.

Knocking within.

¿Qué ruido es ése?

Heaven give your spirits comfort!

Exit CLAUDIO.

¡Ahí voy!

I hope it is some pardon or reprieve

For the most gentle Claudio.

Enter DUKE VINCENTIO disguised.

Bienvenido, padre.

DUKE VINCENTIO
The best and wholesomest spirits of the night
Envelop you, good alcalde! ¿Quién vino hoy?

PROVOST
Nadie, desde el timbre de curfew.

DUKE VINCENTIO
¿Isabel, no?

PROVOST
No.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Llegarán pronto.

PROVOST
What comfort is for Claudio? [343]

DUKE VINCENTIO
Esperanza.

PROVOST
It is a bitter deputy.

DUKE VINCENTIO
¿No tienes contraorden por Claudio?
¿Ha de morir mañana?

PROVOST

None, sir, none.

DUKE VINCENTIO
As near the dawning, Provost, as it is,
You shall hear more ere morning.

PROVOST

Puede ser

Que sepas algo, yet I believe there comes
No countermand. No such example have we.
Besides, upon the very siege of justice
Lord Angelo hath to the public ear
Professed the contrary.

He holds up a message.

This is his lordship’s word.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Pray you, let’s hear.

PROVOST (reading)
“Whatsoever you may hear to the contrary, let Claudio be executed by four of the clock, and in the afternoon Bernardino. For my better satisfaction, let me have Claudio’s head sent me by five. Thus fail not to do your office, as you will answer it at your peril.”

¿Usted, qué dice sobre esto?

DUKE VINCENTIO
¿Quién es este Bernardino que van a ejecutar mañana? Hath he born himself penitently in prison? ¿Cómo lo ha afectado? [344]

PROVOST
Es un hombre al que la muerte no es más aterradora que dormir la borrachera. No le angustia, ni le inquieta, no le da miedo el pasado, ni el presente o el futuro; insensible de mortalidad, y desesperadamente mortal.

DUKE VINCENTIO
He wants advice.

PROVOST
No hace caso: he hath evermore had the liberty of the prison. Lo dejas huir y no se va. Se emborracha varias veces al día cuando no es que lleva varios días pedo. We have very oft awaked him, as if to carry him to execution, and showed him a seeming warrant for it. It hath not moved him at all.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Hablemos más sobre él pronto. I crave but four days’ respite, for the which you are to do me both a present and a dangerous courtesy.

PROVOST
¿Bendito, señor, en qué?

DUKE VINCENTIO
In the delaying of Claudio’s death.

PROVOST
Carajo, pero ¿cómo lo hago? Si me meto hasta un poquito, me pasará lo mismo que a Claudio.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Que le ejecuten a Bernardino en la mañana y le lleven su cabeza a Angelo.

PROVOST
Angelo los ha visto a los dos, reconocerá sus caras.

DUKE VINCENTIO
O, la muerte es un buen disfraz, y tú podrías contribuir. Shave the head and tie the beard, and say it was the desire of the penitent to be so bared before his death. If anything fall to you upon this, I will plead against it with my life.

PROVOST
Perdóname, buen padre, va contra mi juramento. [345]

DUKE VINCENTIO
Were you sworn to the Duke, or to the deputy?

PROVOST
To him and to his substitutes.

DUKE VINCENTIO
You will think you have made no offense if the Duke avouch the justice of your dealing?

PROVOST
But what likelihood is in that?

DUKE VINCENTIO
No es cuestión de probablemente, sino es que es definitivamente. Mire, aquí está la letra y el sello del Duque. You know the character, I doubt not, and the signet is not strange to you.

PROVOST
Conozco a los dos.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Put not yourself into amazement how these things should be. Lo difícil es fácil cuando se sabe. Llámale al verdugo que ejecuten a Bernardino. Yet you are amazed, but this shall absolutely resolve you. Vámonos, ya se acerca el día.

Exeunt.

Scene 3

Another room in the penitentiary. Enter POMPIS and ABHORSON.

POMPIS
I am as well acquainted here as I was in our house of profession, for here be many of our old customers.

He points to members of the audience and addresses them by name.

ABHORSON
Sirrah, bring Bernardino hither. [346]

POMPIS
Master Bernardino! You must rise and be hanged, Master Bernardino!

ABHORSON
What, ho, Bernardino!

BERNARDINO (offstage)
¡Puta chingada madre! ¿Qué vergas es ese ruido? ¿Ustedes quiénes son?

POMPIS
Amigos suyos, señor, los verdugos. Tiene la bondad de levantarse y ser ajusticiado.

BERNARDINO (offstage)
¡Déjenme, a la verga! Tengo sueño.

ABHORSON
Tell him he must awake, and that quickly too.

POMPIS
Don Bernardino, despiértese hasta que lo ejecuten, y luego podrá dormirse.

Enter BERNARDINO.

BERNARDINO
¿Qué pedo, Abhorson? WHAT’S UP, MAN!? What’s the news with you?

ABHORSON
Truly, sir, I would desire you to clap into your prayers, for, look you, the warrant’s come.

BERNARDINO
Chale, I have been drinking all night. I am not fitted for’t.

POMPIS
O, pues es mejor, ese. For he that drinks all night and is hanged betimes in the morning, duerme mejor el día siguiente.

ABHORSON
Do we jest now, think you?

Enter DUKE VINCENTIO disguised as before. [247]

DUKE VINCENTIO
Señor, vengo a aconsejarte, consolarte, y rezar contigo.

BERNARDINO
Padre, yo no. Estuve pisteando toda la noche. Claro que no. I swear I will not die today for any man’s persuasion.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Mira—

BERNARDINO
Ni una palabra. If you have anything to say to me, come to my ward, que de ahí no saldré hoy.

Exit.

DUKE VINCENTIO
After him, fellows; bring him to the block.

ABHORSON and POMPIS exit. Re-enter PROVOST.

PROVOST
Now, señor, ¿cómo está el preso?

DUKE VINCENTIO
A creature unprepared, unmeet for death,
And to transport him in the mind he is
Were damnable.

PROVOST

Aquí en la cárcel, padre,

There died this morning of a cruel fever
One Ragozine, a most notorious narco,
A man of Claudio’s years, his beard and head
Just of his color. What if we do omit
This reprobate till he were well inclined,
And satisfy the deputy with the visage
Of Ragozine, more like to Claudio?

DUKE VINCENTIO
¡Es un milagro que nos manda Dios!
Dispatch it presently. The hour draws on
Prefixed by Angelo. See this be done, [348]
De prisa. Manda la cabeza a Angelo.

Exit PROVOST.

Escribiré cartas a Angelo—

The Provost, he shall bear them—whose contents

Shall witness to him I am near at home,

And that by great injunctions I am bound

To enter publicly. Le diré que

Nos veamos en la fuente consagrada,

A league below the city, and from thence,

By cold gradation and well-balanced form,

Seguiré con el Angelo.

ISABELLA (offstage)
Peace, ho, be here!

DUKE VINCENTIO
La voz de Isabel. She’s come to know
If yet her brother’s pardon be come hither:
But I will keep her ignorant of her good,
To make her heavenly comforts of despair
When it is least expected.

Enter ISABELLA.

ISABELLA

Permiso.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Buenos días, fair and gracious daughter.

ISABELLA
The better, given me by so holy a man.
Hath yet the Deputy sent my brother’s pardon?

DUKE VINCENTIO
He hath released him, Isabel, from the world.
His head is off and sent to Angelo.

ISABELLA
No, no puede ser. [349]

DUKE VINCENTIO

It is no other.

Show your wisdom, daughter, in your close patience.

ISABELLA
O, I will to him para sacarle los ojos!

DUKE VINCENTIO
You shall not be admitted to his sight.

ISABELLA
Unhappy Claudio! ¡Pobre Isabel!
Injurious world! ¡Maldito Angelo!

DUKE VINCENTIO
This nor hurts him nor profits you a jot.
Forbear it therefore; give your cause to heaven.
Escúchame, encontrarás
Una verdad en cada sílaba.
El Duque llega mañana—nay, dry your eyes—
One of our convent, and his confessor,
Gives me this instance. Already he hath carried
Notice to Éscalo and Angelo,
Who do prepare to meet him at the gates,
There to give up their power. If you can, pace your wisdom
In that good path that I would wish it go,
And you shall have venganza on this wretch,
Grace of the Duke, revenges to your heart,
And general honor.

ISABELLA

Diríjame.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Lleva esta carta al fray Pedro.
Dice que ya regresa el Duque.
Say, by this token, I desire his company
At Mariana’s house tonight. Her cause and yours
I’ll perfect him withal, and he shall bring you
Before the Duke, and to the head of Angelo
Accuse him home and home. For my poor self, [350]
I am combinèd by a sacred vow,
Y estaré ausente. Lleva la carta.
Command these fretting waters from your eyes
With a light heart. Trust not my holy order,
If I pervert your course. —¿Quién es?

Enter LUCIO.

LUCIO
Good even, ese. ¿Dónde está the Provost?

DUKE VINCENTIO
Aquí no está, señor.

LUCIO
O pretty Isabella, I am pale at mine heart to see thine eyes so red. Thou must be patient. Pero dicen que mañana llega el Duque. By my troth, Isabel, I loved thy carnal. If the old fantastical Duke of dark corners had been at home, estaría vivo.

Exit ISABELLA.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Sir, the Duke is marvelous little beholding to your reports, but the best is, he lives not in them.

LUCIO
Friar, no conoces al Duque tan bien como yo. He’s a better woodman than thou takest him for.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Bueno, ya casi verás. Adiós.

LUCIO
Güey, espérate. I’ll go along with thee. I can tell thee pretty tales of the Duke.

DUKE VINCENTIO
You have told me too many of him already, sir, if they be true. If not true, none were enough.

LUCIO
I was once before him for getting a wench with child. [351]

DUKE VINCENTIO
No me digas.

LUCIO
Neta, güey, la verdad. Pero tuve que negarlo. They would else have married me to the rotten medlar.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Quede con Dios.

LUCIO
Te lo juro, güey. I’ll go with thee to the lane’s end. If bawdy talk offend you, we’ll have very little of it. Nay, friar, I am a kind of burr; me pego a tu lado.

They exit.

Scene 4

The office.

ANGELO
This deed unshapes me quite, makes me unpregnant
And dull to all proceedings. A deflowered maid!
And by an eminent body that enforced
The law against it! But that her tender shame
Will not proclaim against her maiden loss,
How might she tongue me! Yet reason dares her no,
For my authority bears of a credent bulk,
That no particular scandal once can touch
But it confounds the breather. He should have lived,
Save that riotous youth, with dangerous sense,
Might in the times to come have ta’en revenge
By so receiving a dishonored life
With ransom of such shame. Would yet he had lived!
Alack, when once our grace we have forgot,
Nothing goes right. We would, and we would not.

Exit. [352]

Scene 5

En la calle. Enter ISABELLA and MARIANA.

ISABELLA
Hablar con tanto engaño me repugna.
Aunque el padre me aconsejó
Hacerlo yo.

MARIANA
Hay que hacerle caso.

ISABELLA
Además, me dice que, si pasa que
Me contradice defendiendo al otro,
No me asombre, es medicina
Amarga para un fin dulce.

MARIANA
Ojalá el fray—

ISABELLA
¡O, paz! ¡Ya llegó!

Enter FRIAR PETER.

FRIAR PETER
Les encontré el mejor sitio,
Enfrentito al Duque, no podrá
Pasar sin verles. Han sonado dos veces
Las trompetas. Llegó el Duque. ¡Vámonos!

They exit. [353]

ACT V
Scene 1

La frontera. Enter DUKE VINCENTIO, ANGELO, ÉSCALO, and PROVOST.

DUKE VINCENTIO
My very worthy cousin, fairly met!

ANGELO & ÉSCALO
Happy return be to your royal grace!

DUKE VINCENTIO
Many and hearty thankings to you both.
We have made inquiry of you, and we hear
Such goodness of your justice, that our soul
Cannot but yield you forth to public thanks,
Forerunning more requital. Dame sus manos.

FRIAR PETER and ISABELLA come forward.

FRIAR PETER
Ahora ya. Voz alta, híncate.

ISABELLA
O worthy prince, dishonor not your eye
By throwing it on any other object
Till you have heard me in my true complaint,
And given me justicia, justicia!

DUKE VINCENTIO
Relate your wrongs. ¿De cuál? ¿De quién? Be brief.
Aquí Lord Angelo te va dar justicia.
Explícaselo a él.

ISABELLA

O worthy Duke,

You bid me seek redención en el diablo.

ANGELO
My lord, her wits, I fear me, are not firm.
She hath been a suitor to me for her brother [353]
Cut off by course of justice—

ISABELLA

By course of justice!

ANGELO
And she will speak most bitterly and strange.

ISABELLA
Increíble, but yet most truly, will I speak:
That Angelo’s forsworn, is it not strange?
That Angelo’s a murderer, is’t not strange?
That Angelo is an adulterous thief,
Hipócrita, a virgin-violator,
Is it not strange and strange?

DUKE VINCENTIO

Son diez veces “estrange.”

ISABELLA
Nay, it is ten times true, for truth is truth
To the end of reckoning.

DUKE VINCENTIO

Away with her! Pobre,

She speaks this como una loca.

ISABELLA
Soy la hermana de un Claudio,
Condenado por fornicación a
Perder su cabeza, condemned by Angelo.
I, in probation of a sisterhood,
Was sent to by my brother. Un Lucio
Fue mensajero—

LUCIO

Él soy yo, an’t like your grace.

DUKE VINCENTIO
You were not bid to speak. [355]

LUCIO

No, my good lord;

Tampoco me callo.

DUKE VINCENTIO

I wish you now, then.

LUCIO
’Tá bien.

ISABELLA
El caballero dio parte de la historia—

LUCIO
Simón.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Tal vez es cierto, pero es incorrecto
Hablar cuando no te toca. Proceed.

ISABELLA

I went

To this maldito caitiff deputy—

DUKE VINCENTIO
That’s somewhat madly spoken.

ISABELLA

Sí, perdón.

The phrase is to the matter.
I now begin with grief and shame to utter.
He would not, but by gift of my chaste body
To his concupiscible intemperate lust,
Release my brother; and, after much debatement,
Mi composición venció a mi honor,
And I did yield to him. Pero al día siguiente,
His purpose surfeiting, mandó decapitar
Al pobre de mi hermano.

DUKE VINCENTIO

This is most likely! [356]

ISABELLA
O, that it were as like as it is true!

DUKE VINCENTIO
Por Dios, desgraciada, thou know’st not what thou speak’st,
Or else thou art suborned against his honor
In hateful practice. Alguien la incitó.
Confesa la verdad, y dinos quién te dijo que
Vinieras a quejarte.

ISABELLA
One that I would were here—Friar Lodovico.

DUKE VINCENTIO
A ghostly father, belike. ¿Quién es el Lodovico?

LUCIO
Yo lo conozco. ’Tis a meddling friar;
No me cae bien el güey. Had he been lay, señor,
For certain words he spake against your grace
In your retirement, le hubiera dado un—

DUKE VINCENTIO
Words against me? This is a good friar, belike!

LUCIO
Anoche mismo los vi, she and that friar,
I saw them at the prison. A saucy friar,
Un cabezón culero.

DUKE VINCENTIO
¿Conoce al Lodovico de cual habló?

FRIAR PETER
Es un hombre divino y bueno;
Ni cabezón, ni malvado culero,
As he’s reported by this gentleman;
And, on my fe, a man that never yet
Did, as he vouches, misreport your grace.

LUCIO
My lord, most villainously, créemelo. [357]

FRIAR PETER
Well, he in time may come to clear himself,
Pero ahorita está enfermo
Con una fiebre. Upon his mere request,
Being come to knowledge that there was complaint
Intended ’gainst Lord Angelo, yo me vine,
To speak, as from his mouth, lo que sea
Cierto y falso.

DUKE VINCENTIO

Good friar, let’s hear it.

ISABELLA is carried off by guards, and MARIANA comes forward.

Do you not smile at this, Lord Angelo?

Hay que ver su cara, and after speak.

MARIANA
Perdón, señor, no enseñaré mi cara hasta
Que lo permita mi marido.

DUKE VINCENTIO
¿Estás casada?

MARIANA
No, señor.

DUKE VINCENTIO
¿Eres virgen?

MARIANA
No, señor.

DUKE VINCENTIO
¿Entonces, una viuda?

MARIANA
Tampoco, señor.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Bueno, que no eres nada, pues: ¿ni virgen, ni viuda, ni casada? [358]

LUCIO
Güey, puede ser una puta, eso sí, for many of them are neither maid, widow, nor wife.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Silence that fellow! I would he had some cause to prattle for himself.

LUCIO
Bien, my lord.

MARIANA speaks with a heavy accent when she speaks English. She’s been learning.

MARIANA
Confieso yo, señor, que nunca me casé,
También ya sé que yo no soy virgen.
Conozco a mi esposo; my husband
Knows not that ever he knew me.

LUCIO
A de haber estado borracho, señor, así siempre es.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Chin, mano, cállate el hocico, ya.

LUCIO
Ay, caray. Ok.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Esta mujer no es testiga por el Angelo.

MARIANA
A eso iba, señor.
Por acusarlo de haber fornicado
También acusa a mi marido.

ANGELO
This is a strange abuse. Let’s see thy face.

MARIANA
My husband bids me; now I will unmask.

She unveils herself. [359]

This is my face, thou cruel Angelo.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Know you this woman?

LUCIO
Carnally, she says.

DUKE VINCENTIO

¡Ya basta!

LUCIO
Ya terminé, güey. Te lo juro, ya.

ANGELO
My lord, I must confess I know this woman:
And five years since there was some speech of marriage
Betwixt myself and her, which was broke off,
Partly for that her promised proportions
Came short of composition, but in chief,
For that her reputation was disvalued
In levity. Since which time of five years
I never spake with her, saw her, nor heard from her,
Upon my faith and honor.

MARIANA

Príncipe,

I am affianced this man’s wife as strongly
As words could make up vows. Y, buen señor,
El martes pasado, en su jardín,
He knew me as a wife.

ANGELO
Let me have way, my lord,
To find this practice out.

DUKE VINCENTIO

Ay, with my heart,

And punish them to your height of pleasure.
There is another friar that set them on.
Ve por él. [360]

Exit PROVOST.

I for a while will leave you;

But stir not you till you have well determined

Upon these slanderers.

ÉSCALO
My lord, we’ll do it throughly. Call that same Isabel here once again: I would speak with her.

Exit DUKE VINCENTIO.

Re-enter ISABELLA and PROVOST with DUKE VINCENTIO in his friar’s habit.

Come on, mistress, here’s a gentlewoman denies all that you have said.

LUCIO
My lord, here comes the vato I spoke of, here with the Provost.

ÉSCALO
In very good time. Speak not you to him till we call upon you.

LUCIO
¡A la madre!

ÉSCALO
Come, sir, did you set these women on to slander Lord Angelo? They have confessed you did.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Where is the Duke? ’Tis he should hear me speak.

ÉSCALO
The Duke’s in us, and we will hear you speak.
Look you speak justly.

DUKE VINCENTIO
The Duke’s unjust. My business in this state
Made me a looker on here in Vienna,
Where I have seen corruption boil and bubble
Till it o’errun the stew. [361]

ÉSCALO
Slander to the state! Away with him to prison!

ANGELO
Is this the man that you did tell us of?

LUCIO
Es él, simón. Come hither, cabrón. ¿Me conoces?

DUKE VINCENTIO
Te conocí en la cárcel, en ausencia del Duque.

LUCIO
O, did you so? And do you remember what you said of the Duke?

DUKE VINCENTIO
Por supuesto.

LUCIO
Do you so, sir? And was the Duke a mujeriego, pendejo, and cobarde, as you then reported him to be?

DUKE VINCENTIO
Señor, antes de atribuirme eso, deberías de cambiar conmigo. Fuiste tú el que dijo esas cosas, hasta más peores.

LUCIO
¡Pinche, malvado! Did not I pluck thee by the nose for thy speeches?

DUKE VINCENTIO
I protest I love the Duke as I love myself, como a mi mismo.

ANGELO
Hark, how the villain would close now, after his treasonable abuses!

ÉSCALO
Such a fellow is not to be talked withal. Away with them all to prison!

DUKE VINCENTIO (to PROVOST)
Quieto, señor, un momentito.

ANGELO
What, resists he? Help him, Lucio. [362]

LUCIO
Vente, güey. Vámonos, cabrón. A la bestia! You must be hooded, must you? Carajo ¿no te lo quitas?

He pulls off the friar’s hood and discovers DUKE VINCENTIO.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Thou art the first cholo that e’er madest a duke.

LUCIO
No mames.

DUKE VINCENTIO
First, Provost, let me bail these gentle three.

(to LUCIO) No te vayas, güey, for the friar and you
Must have a word anon. Agárrenlo.

LUCIO
Esto será peor que la horca.

DUKE VINCENTIO (to ÉSCALO)
What you have spoke, I pardon. You did well.

(to ANGELO) Hast thou or word, or wit, or impudence
That yet can do thee office?

ANGELO

O my lord,

I should be guiltier than my guiltiness
To think I can be undiscernible
When I perceive your grace, like power divine,
Hath looked upon my passes. Then, good prince,
No longer session hold upon my shame,
But let my trial be mine own confession.
Immediate sentence then and sequent death
Is all the grace I beg.

DUKE VINCENTIO

Ven aquí, Mariana.

Say, wast thou e’er contracted to this woman?

ANGELO
I was, my lord. [363]

DUKE VINCENTIO
Go, take her hence and marry her instantly.
Do you the office, friar, which consummate,
Return him here again. Go with him, Provost.

ANGELO, MARIANA, FRIAR PETER, and PROVOST exit.

ÉSCALO
My lord, I am more amazed at his dishonor
Than at the strangeness of it.

DUKE VINCENTIO

Ven acá, Isabel.

Tu fray ya es tu príncipe. As I was then,
Advertising and holy to your business,
Not changing heart with habit, seguiré
A tu lado sirviéndote.

ISABELLA

O, perdóname,

Por haberte molestado tanto
¡A su alteza fiel!

DUKE VINCENTIO

Estás perdonada, Isabel.

Y ya, mujer, be you as free to us.
Ya sé que pesa en tu alma tu hermano.
Peace be with him!
That life is better life, past fearing death,
Than that which lives to fear. Hazlo tu consuelo,
Que él está feliz.

ISABELLA

Tienes razón.

Re-enter ANGELO, MARIANA, FRIAR PETER, and PROVOST.

DUKE VINCENTIO
For this new-married man approaching here,
The very mercy of the law cries out
Most audible, even from his proper tongue,
“An Angelo for Claudio, death for death!” [364]
Haste still pays haste, and leisure answers herida;
Igual por igual, measure por medida.
¡Llévenselo!

MARIANA (kneeling)
Noble alteza, gentle my liege—

DUKE VINCENTIO
You do but lose your labor.
Away with him to death!

(to LUCIO) Now, sir, to you.

MARIANA
¡O mi señor! Sweet Isabel, apóyame.
Ponte de rodillas, y yo pondré
El resto de mi vida a tu servicio.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Against all sense you do importune her.
Should she kneel down in mercy of this fact,
Her brother’s ghost his pavèd bed would break,
And take her hence in horror.

MARIANA

Isabel,

Querida Isabel, do kneel by me.
Levanta las manos, no digas nada, yo lo hablaré.
Dicen que todos tenemos faltas,
Y algunos se vuelven más mejor
Siendo mal un poco. También mi esposo.
O Isabel, ¿no te vas a hincar?

DUKE VINCENTIO
Él muere por Claudio.

ISABELLA (kneeling)

Most bounteous sir,

Look, if it please you, on this man condemned
As if my brother lived. Por Angelo,
Su acto no cumplió su mal propósito.
It must be buried but as an intent [365]
That perished by the way. Thoughts are no subjects,
Intents but merely thoughts.

MARIANA

Merely, señor.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Inútil es su súplica. Levántense.
I have bethought me of another fault.
Provost, how came it Claudio was beheaded
At an unusual hour?

PROVOST

Pues, fue ordenado.

Yet did repent me, after more advice,
For testimony whereof one in the prison
That should by private order else have died
I have reserved alive.

DUKE VINCENTIO
¿Quién es?

PROVOST

Se llama Bernardino.

DUKE VINCENTIO
I would thou hadst done so by Claudio.
Go fetch him hither. Déjame verlo.

Exit PROVOST.

ÉSCALO
I am sorry one so learnèd and so wise
As you, Lord Angelo, have still appeared,
Should slip so grossly, both in the heat of blood
And lack of tempered judgment afterward.

ANGELO
I am sorry that such sorrow I procure,
And so deep sticks it in my penitent heart
That I crave death more willingly than mercy.
’Tis my deserving, and I do entreat it. [366]

Re-enter PROVOST with CLAUDIO, who is muffled.

DUKE VINCENTIO
¿Es el Bernardino?

PROVOST

Sí, señor.

Hubiera muerto junto a Claudio,
Y se parece mucho a Claudio.

He unmuffles CLAUDIO.

DUKE VINCENTIO (to ISABELLA)
Si se parece a tu hermano,
Lo perdono, and, for your lovely sake,
Give me your hand, di que serás mio.
También él es mi hermano. But fitter time for that.
By this Lord Angelo perceives he’s safe.
Methinks I see a quickening in his eye.
Well, Angelo, your evil quits you well.
Look that you love your wife, her worth worth yours.
I find an apt remission in myself;
Aquí hay uno que no puedo perdonar.

(to LUCIO) Tú, que me llamaste tonto,
Culero, necio, cobarde, demente,
¿Qué cosa he hecho para merecer
Tus chismes feos contra mi nombre?

LUCIO
Pues, señor, I spoke it but according to the trick. Si me va a ahorcar por eso, ’tá bién, but I had rather it would please you I might be whipt.

DUKE VINCENTIO
If any woman wronged by this malvado—
As I have heard him swear himself there’s one
Whom he begot with child—let her appear,
And he shall marry her. Tras la boda,
Azótalo y cuélgalo. [367]

LUCIO
Por favor your highness, do not marry me to that puta. Your highness said even now I made you a duke. Good my lord, tampoco que me hagan mandilón y cornudo. Marrying a cabrona, señor, is pressing to death, whipping, and hanging.

DUKE VINCENTIO
Slandering a prince deserves it.
She, Claudio, that you wronged, look you restore.
¡Alegría, Mariana! Love her, Angelo.
I have confessed her, and I know her virtue.
Thanks, Provost, for thy care and secrecy.
Thanks, good friend Éscalo, for thy much goodness.

Dear Isabel,
I have a motion much imports your good,
Whereto if you’ll a willing ear incline,
What’s mine is yours, and what is yours is mine.

On his very last line, DUKE VINCENTIO offers his hand to ISABELLA. There is a second of silence, as she does not respond. She would, but it becomes too late. As the celebratory music swells, the rest of the characters onstage are enjoying the glory of this moment. She feels more powerless with every beat. The rest of the cast dances their way offstage as the music is dulled and distorted. ISABELLA and DUKE VINCENTIO have not moved. Lights go back to the same reddish color that appeared in the Prelude. CLAUDIO walks back onstage to shake DUKE VINCENTIO’s hand. The siblings make eye contact for a heart-wrenching moment before CLAUDIO runs offstage again where JULIET is waiting.

DUKE VINCENTIO has not put his hand down yet. All lights are off except for a spotlight on ISABELLA. She takes a few weak steps downstage, wanting to pray to God. She reaches for the cross she wears around her neck. The moment she clutches it, the music shuts off, and she falls to her knees in despair. She cries in silence, still holding her cross, until the spotlight on her fades.

END OF PLAY