William Shakespeare: All's Well That Ends Well

ACT V. SCENE 3. The same. A room in the COUNTESS'S palace. (continued)

DIANA.
Good mother, fetch my bail.--Stay, royal sir;

[Exit WIDOW.]

The jeweller that owes the ring is sent for,
And he shall surety me. But for this lord
Who hath abus'd me as he knows himself,
Though yet he never harm'd me, here I quit him:
He knows himself my bed he hath defil'd;
And at that time he got his wife with child.
Dead though she be, she feels her young one kick;
So there's my riddle:--One that's dead is quick;
And now behold the meaning.

[Re-enter Widow with HELENA.]

KING.
Is there no exorcist
Beguiles the truer office of mine eyes?
Is't real that I see?

HELENA.
No, my good lord;
'Tis but the shadow of a wife you see--
The name, and not the thing.

BERTRAM.
Both, both; O, pardon!

HELENA.
O, my good lord, when I was like this maid;
I found you wondrous kind. There is your ring,
And, look you, here's your letter. This it says,
'When from my finger you can get this ring,
And are by me with child, &c.'-- This is done:
Will you be mine now you are doubly won?

BERTRAM.
If she, my liege, can make me know this clearly,
I'll love her dearly, ever, ever dearly.

HELENA.
If it appear not plain, and prove untrue,
Deadly divorce step between me and you!--
O my dear mother, do I see you living?

LAFEU.
Mine eyes smell onions; I shall weep anon:--
Good Tom Drum [to PAROLLES], lend me a handkercher: so, I
thank thee; wait on me home, I'll make sport with thee:
let thy courtesies alone, they are scurvy ones.