Your note! who will discount it? Not your bookseller; for
he has as many of your notes as he has of your works; both good
lasting ware, and which are never likely to go out of his shop and his
scrutore.
Har. Nay, but, madam, 'tis barbarous to insult him in this
manner.
Money. No doubt you'll take his part. Pray get you about your
business. I suppose he intends to pay me by ruining you. Get you in
this instant: and remember, if ever I see you with him again I'll turn
you out of doors.
SCENE II—LUCKLESS, Mrs MONEYWOOD
Luck. Discharge all your ill-nature on me, madam, but spare
poor Miss Harriot.
Money. Oh! then it is plain. I have suspected your familiarity
a long while. You are a base man. Is it not enough to stay three
months in my house without paying me a farthing, but you must ruin my
child?
Luck. I love her as my soul. Had I the world I'd give it her
all.
Money. But, as you happen to have nothing in the world, I
desire you would have nothing to say to her. I suppose you would have
settled all your castles in the air. Oh! I wish you had lived in one
of them, instead of my house. Well, I am resolved, when you have gone
away (which I heartily hope will be very soon) I'll hang over my door
in great red letters, "No lodgings for poets." Sure never was such a
guest as you have been. My floor is all spoiled with ink, my windows
with verses, and my door has been almost beat down with duns.
Luck. Would your house had been beaten down, and everything but
my dear Harriot crushed under it!
Money. Sir, sir——
Luck. Madam, madam! I will attack you at your own weapons; I
will pay you in your own coin.
Money. I wish you'd pay me in any coin, sir.
Luck. Look ye, madam, I'll do as much as a reasonable woman can
require; I'll shew you all I have; and give you all I have too, if you
please to accept it. [Turns his pockets Inside out.
Money. I will not be used in this manner. No, sir, I will be
paid, if there be any such thing as law.
Luck. By what law you will put money into my pocket I know not;
for I never heard of any one who got money by the law but the
lawyers. I have told you already, and I tell you again, that the first
money I get shall be yours; and I have great expectations from my
play. In the mean time your staying here can be of no service, and you
may possibly drive some line thoughts out of my head. I would write a
love scene, and your daughter would be more proper company, on that
occasion, than you.
Money.
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