Confide your pretty hearts! Confess
To the pleasant friar: trust not Cupid—
ALISOUN
By Peter!
I have the plan!
FRIAR
[Sings.]
Love is a liar,
But lovers love the pleasant friar,
Who, making of their burdens less—
[Here he approaches Alisoun caressingly, and deftly steals agold pin from her head-dress.]
ALISOUN
[Laughing to herself.]
Ha! that shall win my bet!
What, Huberd!
FRIAR
[Secreting the pin.]
Ben’cite!(Thus singeth he.)Bene—benedicite!
ALISOUN
Wilt thou hear my plan?
FRIAR
Fair Alis,
I would console thy jealousy.
ALISOUN
Me jealous!
Blest be thy breech! Who of?
FRIAR
[Imitating Chaucer in his former speech.]
“And, thou, wife, hold
Thy tongue and know thy betters.”
ALISOUN
Ho! my betters?
That little snipper-snapper of a saint
He praised for dancing ring-around-the-rose-tree,
When honest wives are damned for showing their ankles?
A fig for her!—What, him! a walking hay-cock
That woos a knitting-needle of a nun!
And me! that when I was to home in Bath
Walked into kirk before the beadle’s wife:
My betters? Wait until I win my bet!
FRIAR
What bet?
ALISOUN
Canst thou be mum?
FRIAR
Dame, I have been
A bishop’s valet, a nun’s confidant,
A wife’s confessor, a maid’s notary;
As coroner, I’ve sat in Cheapside inns
When more than wine flowed. This breast can be dark
As Pharaoh’s chamber in the pyramids.
ALISOUN
List then: Ye wot I made a bet last night
With Geoffrey. This was it: Dame Eglantine,
Here at this inn, expects to meet her brother—
FRIAR
You mean—Dan Roderigo.
ALISOUN
Aye; but as
She hath not seen him since she was a child,
She hath not recognised him. He, ye ken,
Doth wear a ring wi’ a Latin posy in’t.
FRIAR
I know; ’tis “Amor vincit omnia,”
The same as on her brooch.
ALISOUN
There hangs my bet.
For if Dame Eglantine shall give yon brooch
Into the hands of any but her brother,
Then Geoffrey marries me at Canterbury.
FRIAR
Diable!Marriesthee?
ALISOUN
What then, dear friend?
Wouldst thou forswear thy celibate sweet vows
To buckle on a wife?
FRIAR
Nay, dame, a sister.
ALISOUN
A sister of St. Venus’ house? Go pray!
A husband is my holy pilgrimage,
And Geoffrey is my shrine.
FRIAR
Et moi?
ALISOUN
“Et moi?”
Thou art a jolly incubus. Thou shalt
Help me to catch my bird.
[Enter the Miller by the wicket gate.]
FRIAR
Et donc?
ALISOUN
“Et donc?”
Why, then, I’ll give a farthing to the friars.
FRIAR
Nay, dame, the coin of Cupid is a kiss.
[Pleading.]
One kiss pour moi.—At Canterbury—un baiser!
MILLER
[Seizing the Friar.]
One pasty, eh? thou shorn ape!
FRIAR
[Screams.]
Alisoun!
MILLER
By Corpus bones, I’ll baste thee!
ALISOUN
Let him be!
Shame! Wouldst thou violate a modest friar?
MILLER
He asked thee for a—
ALISOUN
Baiser. Baiser means
In Latin tongue a blessing. Not so, Huberd?
FRIAR
Dame, from thy lips, it meaneth Paradise.
MILLER
[Imitating him.]
Doth it in thooth, thweet thir?—Thou lisping jay!
Thou lousy petticoats!
ALISOUN
[Suddenly embracing the Miller; whispers to him.]
Whist! Robin, thou
Art just in the nick. I have a plan. Run fast;
Fetch here the other lads, and bring a gag.
MILLER
A gag? For him?
ALISOUN
Run quick.
MILLER
[Going.]
By Corpus arms!
FRIAR
[Taunting.]
Mealy miller, moth-miller,Fly away!If Dame Butterfly doth say thee nay,Go and court a caterpillar!
MILLER
[Laughing, shakes his fist.]
Ha, ha! By Corpus bones!
[Exit at gate.]
ALISOUN
Now, bird; the plot.
I’ve sent him for a gag.
FRIAR
A gag? What for?
ALISOUN
To win my bet, of course. ’Tis for this knight.
FRIAR
Thou wilt not gag a knight—the Prioress’
Brother!
ALISOUN
Hast thou forgot I bet with Geoffrey
The man that wears the ring will prove to be
Dame Virtue’s lover?
FRIAR
He that wears the ring?
Methinks I smell: but who’s your man?
ALISOUN
Sweet owl,
The sunlight hurts thine eyes, thou starest too hard.
[Blindfolding his eyes with her hands, she whirls him thriceround.]
Behold him.
FRIAR
[Dizzily.]
Where?
[Alisoun slaps her own shoulder.]
What, thou? O ecce homo!
Thou wilt enact the lover and the knight
And woo Dame Eglantine?
ALISOUN
Who else? Forsooth,
I am a shapely crusader. This leg
Hath strode a palfrey thrice to Palestine.
I’ve won my spurs.
FRIAR
Thou wit of Aristotle.
O Helen of Troy! O Amazon! I catch:
Thou gaggest therealknight and bear’st him off
Where thou mayst steal his ring and togs.
ALISOUN
And borrow
A false beard from thy tippet. Thou shalt be
My valet, and retouch the Wife of Bath
To play the Devil in the Mystery.
FRIAR
But where’ll be thy boudoir?
ALISOUN
The cellar yonder.
Bob Miller and the other lads shall gag
And tie him there.
FRIAR
Why, this is merrier than
Nine wenches ducking in a Hallow-een bowl.
[Doubling over with laughter, he almost knocks againstChaucer, who enters, left, meditative.]
Whist! Geoffrey! Come away.
CHAUCER
[Reads from a parchment.]
“April, May,Cannot stay;We be pilgrims—so are they,And our shrine,Far away—”
[A bell sounds outside; Chaucer pauses, and draws out apocket sun-dial.]
The chapel bell!
Four, by my cylinder. My signorino
Will claim his verses!
[Reads on.]
“And our shrine,
Far away,
Is the heart of Eglantine.”
[Pauses and writes.]
ALISOUN
[Aside to Friar.]
Eglantine! What’s this?
FRIAR
Love verses. He hath writ them for the Squire
To give unto his lady-love Johanna.
ALISOUN
But he said “Eglantine.”
FRIAR
Aye, dame; he dubs
Her Eglantine to be poetical.
ALISOUN
A poet! Him?
FRIAR
Why not? Jack Straw himself
Could ring a rhyme, God wot, till his neck was wrung.
CHAUCER
[Reads.]
“Eglantine,
O to be
There with thee,
Over sea,
In olive-shaded Italy.”
Too rough. “Shaded” is harsh. H’m! “Olive-silvered.”
“In olive-silvered Italy.”—That’s better.
FRIAR
[To Alisoun.]
Hide there!
ALISOUN
What now?
FRIAR
Watch.
[The Friar approaches Chaucer obsequiously.]
CHAUCER
[Reads.]
“There to prayAt thy shrine—”
“There to prayAt thy shrine—”
“There to prayAt thy shrine—”
“There to pray
At thy shrine—”
FRIAR
Benedicite!
The blissful martyr save you, sir.
CHAUCER
And you.
FRIAR
The gentle Squire sent me for—
CHAUCER
His verses? They are just finished.
[Folds them up.]
FRIAR
Sir, you see, he hailed me
Passing upon the road. He lies out yonder
Along a brookside, sighing for his lady.
CHAUCER
[Handing the parchment to the Friar.]
Bid him despatch her these. Here, wait; this spray
Of eglantine goes with them.
FRIAR
Save you, sir.
[The Friar starts for the wicket gate. Chaucer, absent-minded, passes on to the inn door. As he does so, the Friar, treading tip-toe behind him, steals another parchment, which is sticking from his pouch.]
[The Friar starts for the wicket gate. Chaucer, absent-minded, passes on to the inn door. As he does so, the Friar, treading tip-toe behind him, steals another parchment, which is sticking from his pouch.]
CHAUCER
“April, May,Cannot stay;We be pilgrims—so are they.”
“April, May,Cannot stay;We be pilgrims—so are they.”
“April, May,Cannot stay;We be pilgrims—so are they.”
“April, May,
Cannot stay;
We be pilgrims—so are they.”
[Exit.]
FRIAR
[Stands holding the second parchment, from which he reads.]
“There was also a nun, a prioress,
That of her smiling was full simple and coy;
The greatest oath she swore—”
Blessed be larceny!
This rhyme is slicker to have up my sleeve
Than five aces of trumps.
ALISOUN
[Joining him.]
What’s up?
FRIAR
List, dame!
Of human hearts I am an alchemist.
To stir them in the crucible of love
Is all my research and experiment;
And but to find a new amalgam makes
My mouth to water like a dilettante’s.
ALISOUN
Well?
FRIAR
Geoffrey wrote these verses for the Squire
To give his lady; therefore,Iwill give them
To Eglantine, and watch thetertium quid;
That is to say, whether the resultant be
A mantlingcoleur rose, or—an explosion.
ALISOUN
What’s in the verses? Nay, man, read ’em out;
I am no clerk.
FRIAR