The Play's the Thing

(Enter GINNY, HERMIONE, and GOYLE, still wearing the stupid hat)

GINNY: (to GOYLE) Do you know, sirrah, where Lieutenant Cassio lies?

GOYLE: I dare not say he... lies any... where.

GINNY: Why, man?

GOYLE: He's a... sold-ier.... and for one to say a... sold-ier lies, is... stabbing.

CRABBE: (offstage, to DRACO) Cassio's Potter, right?

DRACO: (shortly) Yes.

CRABBE: So why's Greg afraid of him?

DRACO: (in no mood to explain drama to one-half of the Thicky Twins) Because he's a homicidal maniac.

GINNY: (ignoring the offstage conversation) Go to: where lodges he?

CRABBE: My mum told me to stand up to homicidal maniacs.

DRACO: Yes, well, this would be the mum that declared with total conviction that you were a brilliant and handsome stallion of a man. I think her opinions are somewhat suspect.

CRABBE: (grinning) I love my mum.

DRACO: And I love chocolate, but I don't ask its advice, do I?

GOYLE: To tell you where he... lodges, is to tell you... where I lie.

HARRY: [offstage] Is it my imagination, or is he getting better?

GINNY: Can any thing be made of this?

GOYLE: I know not... where he... lodges, and for me to... devise a... lodging and say he... lies here or he lies... there, were to lie in... mine own throat.

GINNY: Can you inquire him out, and be edified by report?

GOYLE: I will... cat-a-ch-eyes... the world for him... that is make... questions, and by them... ants were.

GINNY: Seek him, bid him come hither: tell him I have moved my lord on his behalf, and hope all will be well.

GOYLE: To do this is... within the... compass of man's... wit and... there-fore... I will attempt the... doing it.

(GOYLE wanders offstage)

GINNY: Where should I lose that handkerchief, Emilia?

SEAMUS: You didn't lose it, remember? You dropped it when you tried to bandage a headache, you...

HERMIONE: I know not, madam.

DEAN: Liar! She's a liar!

GINNY: Believe me, I had rather have lost my purse
Full of crusadoes: and, but my noble Moor
Is true of mind and made of no such baseness
As jealous creatures are, it were enough
To put him to ill thinking.

HERMIONE: Is he not jealous?

SEAMUS: Well, let's just consider that question....

GINNY: Who, he? I think the sun where he was born
Drew all such humours from him.

SEAMUS: Nice answer... but you're WRONG!

HERMIONE: Look, where he comes.

(Enter DEAN. His script is now sporting a bunny and something that could be a teddy bear)

GINNY: (undertone, to HERMIONE) I will not leave him now till Cassio
Be call'd to him.
(louder, to DEAN)
How is't with you, my lord?

DEAN: Well, my good lady.
(Aside)
O, hardness to dissemble!--
How do you, Desdemona?

SEAMUS: ...Just to prove my mind isn't always in the gutter, I'm not gonna say anything about that.

GINNY: Well, my good lord.

DEAN: Give me your hand: this hand is moist, my lady.

SEAMUS: (sarcastically) Ooh, the telling blow! She washed her hands! She never did that in Venice...

GINNY: It yet hath felt no age nor known no sorrow.

DRACO: Well, not yet, anyway.

DEAN: This argues fruitfulness and liberal heart:
Hot, hot, and moist: this hand of yours requires
A sequester from liberty, fasting and prayer,
Much castigation, exercise devout;
For here's a young and sweating devil here,
That commonly rebels. 'Tis a good hand,
A frank one.

SEAMUS: Wow, you got all that from her hand?

GINNY: You may, indeed, say so;
For 'twas that hand that gave away my heart.

DEAN: A liberal hand: the hearts of old gave hands;
But our new heraldry is hands, not hearts.

SEAMUS: Are they even talking about the same thing?

CRABBE: (who has SEAMUS's script) ...Can't draw puppies....

GINNY: I cannot speak of this. Come now, your promise.

DEAN: What promise, chuck?

DRACO: Now there's a nickname to set a girl's heart aflutter...

HARRY: It's better than some, isn't it?

GINNY: I have sent to bid Cassio come speak with you.

DEAN: I have a salt and sorry rheum offends me;
Lend me thy handkerchief.

SEAMUS: Smooooth, Dean. Now sneeze on her.

GINNY: Here, my lord. (She mimes handing him a handkerchief)

DEAN: That which I gave you.

HARRY: Yeah, he wants the scarf.

DRACO: (snickering) Well, sometimes soldiers just want to feel pretty.

GINNY: I have it not about me.

DEAN: Not?

GINNY: No, indeed, my lord.

DEAN: That is a fault.
That handkerchief
Did an Egyptian to my mother give;
She was a charmer, and could almost read
The thoughts of people: she told her, while
she kept it,
'Twould make her amiable and subdue my father
Entirely to her love, but if she lost it
Or made gift of it, my father's eye
Should hold her loathed and his spirits should hunt
After new fancies: she, dying, gave it me;
And bid me, when my fate would have me wive,
To give it her. I did so: and take heed on't;
Make it a darling like your precious eye;
To lose't or give't away were such perdition
As nothing else could match.

DRACO: (reading ahead. He raises one eyebrow, impressed) You're not wrong.

GINNY: Indeed! is't true?

DEAN: Most veritable; therefore look to't well.

GINNY: Then would to God I had never seen't!

DEAN: Ha! wherefore?

GINNY: Why do you speak so startingly and rash?

DEAN: Is't lost? is't gone? speak, is it out o'the way?

GINNY: Heaven bless us!

DEAN: Say you?

SEAMUS: You!

GINNY: It is not lost, but what an if it were?

SEAMUS: Wrong answer! Die!

DEAN: How!

SEAMUS: How!

GINNY: I say, it is not lost.

DEAN: Fetch't, let me see't.

GINNY: Why, so I can, sir, but I will not now.
This is a trick to put me from my suit:
Pray you, let Cassio be received again.

DEAN: Fetch me the handkerchief, my mind misgives.

GINNY: Come, come;
You'll never meet a more sufficient man.

HARRY: (offstage) Now I *know* they're not talking about the same thing.

DEAN: The handkerchief!

GINNY: I pray, talk me of Cassio.

DEAN: The handkerchief!

GINNY: A man that all his time
Hath founded his good fortunes on your love,
Shared dangers with you,--

DEAN: The handkerchief!

SEAMUS: The handkerchief!

HARRY: Echo!

GINNY: In sooth, you are to blame.

DEAN: Away!

SEAMUS: The handkerchief!

(DEAN stomps offstage)

HERMIONE: Is not this man jealous?

GINNY: I ne'er saw this before.
Sure, there's some wonder in this handkerchief:
I am most unhappy in the loss of it.

HERMIONE: (consolingly) 'Tis not a year or two shows us a man:
They are all but stomachs, and we all but food;
To eat us hungerly, and when they are full,
They belch us. Look you, Cassio and my husband!

(Enter DRACO and HARRY, walking together)

DRACO: There is no other way; 'tis she must do't:
And, lo, the happiness! go, and importune her.

GINNY: How now, good Cassio! what's the news with you?

HARRY: (bowing) Madam, my former suit: I do beseech you
That by your virtuous means I may again
Exist, and be a member of his love
Whom I with all the office of my heart
Entirely honour: I would not be delay'd.
If my offence be of such mortal kind
That nor my service past, nor present sorrows,
Nor purposed merit in futurity,
Can ransom me into his love again,
But to know so must be my benefit;
So shall I clothe me in a forced content,
And shut myself up in some other course,
To fortune's alms.

SEAMUS: I prefer cotton, myself....

GINNY: Alas, thrice-gentle Cassio!
My advocation is not now in tune;
My lord is not my lord; nor should I know him,
Were he in favour as in humour alter'd.
So help me every spirit sanctified,
As I have spoken for you all my best
And stood within the blank of his displeasure
For my free speech! you must awhile be patient:
What I can do I will; and more I will
Than for myself I dare: let that suffice you.

DRACO: Is my lord angry?

SEAMUS: Sure, act like you don't know. Can't anyone else see through this guy?

HERMIONE: He went hence but now,
And certainly in strange unquietness.

CRABBE: (offstage) Here. It doesn't look much like a puppy.

NEVILLE: (hesitantly) Ummm... thanks....

DRACO: Can he be angry? I have seen the cannon,
When it hath blown his ranks into the air,
And, like the devil, from his very arm
Puff'd his own brother:--and can he be angry?
Something of moment then: I will go meet him:
There's matter in't indeed, if he be angry.

GINNY: (gratefully) I prithee, do so.

SEAMUS: Oh sure. Give him an inch and he'll hang you with it.

(Exit DRACO)

GINNY: Something, sure, of state,
Either from Venice, or some unhatch'd practise
Made demonstrable here in Cyprus to him,
Hath puddled his clear spirit: and in such cases
Men's natures wrangle with inferior things,
Though great ones are their object. 'Tis even so;
For let our finger ache, and it indues
Our other healthful members even to that sense
Of pain: nay, we must think men are not gods,
Nor of them look for such observances
As fit the bridal. Beshrew me much, Emilia,
I was, unhandsome warrior as I am,
Arraigning his unkindness with my soul;
But now I find I had suborn'd the witness,
And he's indicted falsely.

SEAMUS: Nice thought... but you're WRONG!

HERMIONE: Pray heaven it be state-matters, as you think,
And no conception nor no jealous toy
Concerning you.

GINNY: Alas the day! I never gave him cause.

DEAN: That's what you think.

HERMIONE: But jealous souls will not be answer'd so;
They are not ever jealous for the cause,
But jealous for they are jealous: 'tis a monster
Begot upon itself, born on itself.

GINNY: Heaven keep that monster from Othello's mind!

HARRY: (muttering) Too late.

HERMIONE: (discreeetly kicks HARRY in the shins) Lady, amen.

GINNY: I will go seek him. Cassio, walk hereabout:
If I do find him fit, I'll move your suit
And seek to effect it to my uttermost.

HARRY: (bows) I humbly thank your ladyship.

(GINNY sweeps dramatically offstage, followed by HERMIONE. Enter PANSY)

PANSY: (in an irritating simpering half-whine Save you, friend Cassio!

HARRY: (wincing) What make you from home?
How is it with you, my most fair Bianca?
I' faith, sweet love, I was coming to your house.

RON: Now that is acting.

PANSY: (still in the irritating simpering half-whine)
And I was going to your lodging, Cassio.
What, keep a week away? seven days and nights?
Eight score eight hours? and lovers' absent hours,
More tedious than the dial eight score times?
O weary reckoning!

HARRY: Pardon me, Bianca:
I have this while with leaden thoughts been press'd:
But I shall, in a more continuate time,
Strike off this score of absence. Sweet Bianca,
(hands her the filmy pink scarf)
Take me this work out.

PANSY: (whining irritatingly and simpering) O Cassio, whence came this?
This is some token from a newer friend:
To the felt absence now I feel a cause:
Is't come to this? Well, well.

SEAMUS: That's... not her normal voice, is it?

DRACO: ...I'm afraid it is.

HARRY: Go to, woman!
Throw your vile guesses in the devil's teeth,
From whence you have them. You are jealous now
That this is from some mistress, some remembrance:
No, in good troth, Bianca.

PANSY: Why, whose is it?

HARRY: I know not, sweet: I found it in my chamber.
I like the work well: ere it be demanded--
As like enough it will--I'ld have it copied:
Take it, and do't; and leave me for this time.

PANSY: Leave you! wherefore?

HARRY: I do attend here on the general;
And think it no addition, nor my wish,
To have him see me woman'd.

PANSY: Why, I pray you?

SEAMUS: He can't take your voice any more, Pansy! Do you need a sign or something?

HARRY: Not that I love you not.

DRACO: Even though that's the case...

PANSY: But that you do not love me.
I pray you, bring me on the way a little,
And say if I shall see you soon at night.

HARRY: 'Tis but a little way that I can bring you;
For I attend here: but I'll see you soon.

PANSY: 'Tis very good; I must be circumstanced.

(Exit HARRY and PANSY. PANSY keeps the scarf in her hands, but as she passes by, DRACO takes it away. She doesn't notice. DRACO hands the scarf to HARRY)

DRACO: Here. She'd only lose it.

HARRY: Thanks... (tosses it around his neck playfully) There. What do you think?

DRACO: Pink isn't your color.

RON: I'm going to be sick....