Lucy.  Was she so forward To pour her hateful meanings in your ear At the first hint?

Selby.  Her newly flatter’d hopes
Array’d themselves at first in forms of doubt;
And with a female caution she stood off
Awhile, to read the meaning of my suit,
Which with such honest seeming I enforced,
That her cold scruples soon gave way; and now
She rests prepared, as mistress, or as wife,
To seize the place of her betrayed friend—­
My much offending, but more suffering, Katherine.

Lucy.  Into what labyrinth of fearful shapes
My simple project has conducted you—­
Were but my wit as skilful to invent
A clue to lead you forth!—­I call to mind
A letter, which your wife received from the Cape,
Soon after you were married, with some circumstances
Of mystery too.

Selby.  I well remember it. 
That letter did confirm the truth (she said)
Of a friend’s death, which she had long fear’d true,
But knew not for a fact.  A youth of promise
She gave him out—­a hot adventurous spirit—­
That had set sail in quest of golden dreams,
And cities in the heart of Central Afric;
But named no names, nor did I care to press
My question further, in the passionate grief
She show’d at the receipt.  Might this be he?

Lucy.  Tears were not all.  When that first shower was past,
With clasp’d hands she raised her eyes to Heav’n,
As if in thankfulness for some escape,
Or strange deliverance, in the news implied,
Which sweeten’d that sad news.

Selby.  Something of that I noted also—­

Lucy.  In her closet once,
Seeking some other trifle, I espied
A ring, in mournful characters deciphering
The death of “Robert Halford, aged two
And twenty.”  Brother, I am not given
To the confident use of wagers, which I hold
Unseemly in a woman’s argument;
But I am strangely tempted now to risk
A thousand pounds out of my patrimony,
(And let my future husband look to it,
If it be lost,) that this immodest Widow
Shall name the name that tallies with that ring.

Selby.  That wager lost, I should be rich indeed—­
Rich in my rescued Kate—­rich in my honor,
Which now was bankrupt.  Sister, I accept
Your merry wager, with an aching heart
For very fear of winning.  ’Tis the hour
That I should meet my Widow in the walk,
The south side of the garden.  On some pretence
Lure forth my Wife that way, that she may witness
Our seeming courtship.  Keep us still in sight,
Yourselves unseen; and by some sign I’ll give,
(A finger held up, or a kerchief waved,)
You’ll know your wager won—­then break upon us,
As if by chance.

Lucy.  I apprehend your meaning—­

Selby.  And may you prove a true Cassandra here,
Though my poor acres smart for’t, wagering sister.
                                                       [Exeunt.