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Read Ebook: Next Door Neighbours: A Comedy; In Three Acts by Destouches N Ricault Inchbald Mrs Mercier Louis S Bastien
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Ebook has 76 lines and 6018 words, and 2 pages
ousand guineas this way, instead of fitting up a theatre in my own house.--That is a mere trifle; my box at the opera, or my dinner; I mean to dine alone to morrow, instead of inviting company.
HENRY. Sir George, I spoke so rudely to you at first, that I know no other way to shew my humility, than to accept your present without reluctance.--I do therefore, as the gift of benevolence, not as the insult of better fortune.
SIR GEORGE. You have a brother, have not you?
HENRY. No, Sir--and only one sister.
SIR GEORGE. A sister is it? well, let me see your father and your brother--your sister I mean--did not you say?--you said a sister, did not you?
HENRY. Yes, Sir.
SIR GEORGE. Well, let me see your father and her; they will rejoice at their good fortune I imagine, and I wish to be a witness of their joy.
HENRY. I will this moment go to our lawyer, extricate my father, and we will all return and make you the spectator of the happiness you have bestowed.
Forgive my eagerness to disclose your bounty, sir, if, before I have said half I feel, I fly to reveal it to my father; to whom I can more powerfully express my sensations--than in your presence. only speak a single syllable, and I'll send a ball instantly through your head.
BLUNTLY. I am dumb, Sir--I don't speak indeed, Sir--upon my life I don't. I wish I may die if I speak a word.
SIR GEORGE. Go on the errand I told you; and if you dare to return without the girl this is your fate. But you may depend upon my prayers. Lucre, my dear Lucre, are not you amazed at what you see?
MR. LUCRE. No, not at all--'tis the way of the world--we caress our acquaintances whilst they are happy and in power, but if they fall into misfortune, we think we do enough if we have the good nature to pity them.
SIR GEORGE. And are you, one of these friends?
MR. LUCRE. I am like the rest of the world.--I was in the number of your flatterers; but at present you have none--for you may already perceive, we are grown sincere.
SIR GEORGE. But have not you a thousand times desired me, in any distress, to prove you?
MANLY. Come in--walk in, and let me know what I can do to serve you.
WILLFORD. I deposited, sir, in your clerk's hands, a sum of money to set me free from confinement for debt.--On his word, I was discharged--he owns he has not yet paid away this money, still he refuses to restore it to me, though in return I again render up my person.
MANLY. And why would you do this?
WILLFORD. Because my honour--I mean my conscience--for that's the poor man's honour--is concerned.
MANLY. Explain yourself.
MANLY. And who is he?
WILLFORD. Sir George Splendorville--I suppose you have heard of him?
MANLY. He, you mean, who by the desire of his father's will, lately changed his name from Blandford?
WILLFORD. Sir!
MANLY. The name, which some part of the family, while reduced, had taken.
WILLFORD. Good Heaven! Is there such a circumstance in his story?
MANLY. Why do you ask with such emotion?
WILLFORD. Because he is the man, in search of whom I left my habitation in the country, to present before him a destitute young woman, a near relation.
MANLY. What relation?--Be particular in your answer.
WILLFORD. A sister.
MANLY. I thank you for your intelligence. You have named a person who for these three years past, I have in vain endeavoured to find.--But did you say she was in poverty?
WILLFORD. I did.
MANLY. I give you joy then--for I have in my possession a deed which conveys to a lost daughter of Sir George's father, the other half of the fortune he bequeathed his son--but as yet, all my endeavours have been in vain to find where she, and an uncle, to whose care she was entrusted in her infancy, are retired.
WILLFORD.
BLACKMAN. Yes, sir.
BLUNTLY. . Yes, sir.
MANLY. Pray sir, what disorder took the young lady, on whose account you have been brought hither, out of the world?
BLACKMAN. Oh! the old disorder, I suppose.
BLUNTLY. The old disorder.
MANLY. And pray what may that be, sir? . Mr. Blackman, Please to let this gentleman speak for himself.--What is it you mean, pray sir, by the old disorder?
BLUNTLY. I--I--mean--Love, sir.
MANLY. You will not pretend to say, that love, was the cause of her death?
BLUNTLY. . That--and a few fits of the gout.
MANLY. I fear, sir, you are not in perfect health yourself--you tremble and look very pale.
BLACKMAN. That is because the subject affects him.
MANLY. Do you then never mention the young lady without being affected?
BLUNTLY. No more can I--for though she was not my relation--yet she was my Patient. .
SIR GEORGE. I can bear no more.--Mr. Manly, you are imposed upon. But think not, however appearances may be against me, that I came here as the tool of so infamous a deceit.--Thoughtlessness, Mr. Manly, has embarrassed my circumstances; and thoughtlessness alone, has made me employ a villain to retrieve them.
BLACKMAN. Mighty fine!
SIR GEORGE. I have no authority, sir, to affirm, that my sister is not alive; and I am confident the account you have just now heard, of her death, is but an artifice. My indiscretions have reduced me nearly to beggary; but I will perish in confinement--cheerfully perish--rather than owe my affluence to one dishonourable action.
BLACKMAN. Grief has turned his brain.
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