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SCENE IV] THE DOUBLE-DEALER 185
thus my anger melts.—[Weeps.]—Here, take this poniard,
for my very spirits faint, and I want strength to hold it;
thou hast disarmed my soul. [Gives the dagger.
Lord Touch. [Aside.] Amazement shakes me—where
will this end?
Mask. So, 'tis well—let your wild fury have a vent; and
when you have temper, tell me.
Lady Touch. Now, now, now I am calm, and can hear
you.
Mask. [Aside.] Thanks, my invention; and now I have
it for you.—[Aloud.] First tell me what urged you to this
violence? for your passion broke in such imperfect terms,
that yet I am to learn the cause.
Lady Touch. My lord himself surprised me with the news
you were to marry Cynthia:—that you had owned your
love to him, and his indulgence would assist you to attain
your ends.
Cyn. [Aside to Lord TOUCHWOOD.] How, my lord!
Lord Touch. [Aside to CYNTHIA.] Pray forbear all resentments
for a while, and let us hear the rest.
Mask. I grant you in appearance all is true; I seemed
consenting to my lord; nay, transported with the blessing.
—But could you think that I, who had been happy in your
loved embraces, could e'er be fond of an inferior slavery.
Lord Touch. [Aside.] Ha! O poison to my cars! what
do I hear!
Cyn. [Aside.] Nay, good my lord, forbear resentment,
let us hear it out.
Lord Touch. [Aside.] Yes, I will contain, though I could
burst.
Mask. I that had wantoned in the rich circle of your
world of love, could I be confined within the puny province
of a girl! No—yet though I dote on each last favour
more than all the rest; though I would give a limb for
every look you cheaply throw away on any other object of
your love; yet so far I prize your pleasures o'er my own,
that all this seeming plot that I have laid has been to
gratify your taste, and cheat the world, to prove a faithful
rogue to you.
Lady Touch. If this were true!—but how can it be?
Mask. I have so contrived that Mcllefont will presently,
in the chaplain's habit, wait for Cynthia in your dressingroom:
but I have put the change upon her that she may