Othello Act 4 Scene 2

So you've seen nothing?

Never heard anything either, and never suspected anything.

Yes, you've seen Cassio and her together.

But I saw no harm in it, and I heard

every single syllable that passed between them.

What — they never whispered?

Never, my lord.

Never sent you out of the room?

Never.

To fetch her fan, her gloves, her mask — nothing at all?

Never, my lord.

That's strange.

I'd dare to bet she's faithful, my lord —

I'd stake my soul on it. If you think otherwise,

get rid of the thought. It's poisoning your heart.

If some wretch has put this into your head,

let heaven pay him back with the curse it laid on the serpent.

Because if she isn't honest and chaste and true,

then no man is happy, and the purest wife alive

is as filthy as the worst thing said about her. (She curses the man who did this, at length, without the faintest idea that she is married to him — and that she handed him the handkerchief herself.)

Tell her to come here. Go.

She says enough. But she'd be a poor sort of brothel-keeper

who couldn't say that much. This one's a clever whore,

a locked cupboard full of wicked secrets.

And still she'll kneel and pray. I've watched her do it. (The one person who has actually been in the room testifies that nothing happened, and he treats her evidence as proof she is running the operation.)

My lord — what do you want?

Come here, pet, would you.

What do you

want?

Let me see your eyes. Look at my face.

What horrible notion is this?

(to Emilia) Get on with your job,

madam.

Leave the couple to their business and shut the door.

Cough, or clear your throat, if anyone comes.

Your trade, your trade! Go on, get on with it. (He has decided to run the next few minutes as though this were a brothel: Emilia is the madam keeping the door, and his wife is the woman he has paid for. The whole scene is staged as that fiction, and he never once explains it to either of them.)

(kneeling) On my knees — what does your speech mean?

I understand there's a fury in your words,

but not the words themselves.

Why? What are you?

Your wife, my lord. Your true and loyal wife.

Go on, swear to it. Damn yourself —

because if you look like one of heaven's own, the devils

might be afraid to take you. So be doubly

damned.

Swear you're faithful.

Heaven knows the truth of it.

Heaven truly knows you're as false as hell.

(standing) To whom, my lord? With whom? How am I false?

Ah, Desdemon — go, go, get away.

Oh, what a terrible day. Why are you crying?

Am I the cause of these tears, my lord?

If by chance you suspect my father

of being behind your recall to Venice,

don't blame me for it. If you've lost him,

I've lost him too.

If it had pleased heaven

to test me with suffering — if they'd rained

every kind of sore and shame on my bare head,

steeped me in poverty right up to the lips,

handed me and all my hopes over to captivity —

I'd have found, somewhere in my soul,

a drop of patience. But to be made

a fixed mark for this scornful age

to point its slow, unmoving finger at —

even that I could bear. Well enough.

But in the one place where I've stored up my heart,

where I must either live or have no life at all,

the spring my whole stream runs from

or else dries up — to be thrown out of there,

or keep it as a tank for filthy toads

to couple and breed in — change your colour at that,

Patience, you young rose-lipped angel;

yes, look grim as hell at that. (He can imagine bearing disease, poverty, slavery and public mockery. The one thing he cannot survive is this — which is precisely the wound Iago went looking for.)

I hope my noble lord believes me faithful.

Oh yes — the way summer flies are in a slaughterhouse,

coming alive the moment they lay their eggs. Oh, you weed —

so beautiful to look at, and smelling so sweet

that the senses ache at you — I wish you had

never been born. (A shambles is a slaughterhouse; flies 'blow' when they lay eggs in meat. He is saying she is fertile the way maggots are, and the word he reaches for is beautiful.)

What sin have I committed without knowing it?

Was this lovely paper, this beautiful book,

made to have 'whore' written on it? What have you committed?

Committed? Oh, you public property —

I'd turn my cheeks into furnaces

that would burn modesty itself to ashes

if I so much as described what you've done. What have you committed?

Heaven holds its nose at it, and the moon shuts her eyes.

The filthy wind, that kisses everything it passes,

goes quiet in its cave underground

and refuses to listen. What have you committed?

Shameless whore!

By heaven, you're wronging me.

Aren't you a whore?

No — as I'm a Christian.

If keeping this body for my husband,

away from any other filthy unlawful touch,

isn't being a whore, then I'm not one.

What — not a whore?

No. As I hope to be saved.

Is that possible?

Oh, heaven forgive us.

I beg your pardon, then.

I took you for that cunning whore of Venice

who married Othello. — You, madam — (He has stopped using his own name for himself. He is describing his wife to her face as a stranger's problem.)

you who hold the post that is the opposite of Saint Peter's

and keep the gate of hell — you, you, yes, you.

We've finished our business. Here's money for your

trouble.

Lock the door, please, and keep our secret. (He pays her. The fiction is complete: he has cast his wife as a prostitute, her friend as the madam, and himself as a customer settling up on the way out.)

God — what has this gentleman got into his head?

How are you, madam? How are you, my good lady?

Honestly — half asleep.

Good madam, what's the matter with my lord?

With who?

With my lord, madam.

Who is your lord?

The man who is yours, sweet lady.

I haven't got one. Don't talk to me, Emilia.

I can't cry, and I've no answers to give

except the ones that would come as tears. Please — tonight,

put my wedding sheets on my bed. Don't forget.

And send your husband to me.

Well, here's a change.

It's right that I should be treated like this. Quite right.

What have I done that would let him fasten

even the smallest suspicion on the slightest fault of mine?

What can I do for you, madam? How are you?

I can't say. People who teach small children

do it gently, with easy tasks.

He could have told me off like that — because honestly,

I'm a child when it comes to being scolded.

What's the matter, my lady?

Iago, my lord has called her a whore so often,

thrown such contempt and such hard words at her,

as no honest heart could stand.

Am I that word, Iago?

What word, dear

lady?

The one she says my lord called me.

He called her a whore. A drunk beggar

wouldn't have used language like that on his woman.

Why would he do that?

I don't know. I'm certain I'm nothing of the kind.

Don't cry, don't cry. Oh, what a day.

Has she given up so many noble matches,

her father, her country and her friends,

to be called a whore? Wouldn't that make anyone

cry?

It's my wretched luck.

Curse him for it. How has this fit come over him?

Heaven knows — I don't.

I'll be hanged if some everlasting villain,

some meddling, insinuating rogue,

some cheating, swindling wretch after a post,

hasn't invented this slander. I'll be hanged if he hasn't. (She has just described her husband — the meddling, the insinuating, the office he wanted — accurately and in detail, standing next to him. She is the only character who works it out, and she works it out four scenes early.)

Nonsense. There's no such man. It's impossible.

If there is such a man, heaven forgive him.

Let a hangman's rope forgive him, and hell chew his bones.

Why should he call her a whore? Who does she

keep company with?

Where? When? How? What

likelihood is there in it?

The Moor's being deceived by some utter villain,

some low, notorious villain, some rotten creature.

Oh heaven, if only you'd expose such men

and put a whip in every honest hand

to drive the swine naked through the world,

from one end of it to the other.

Keep your voice down.

Oh, damn them. It was a man like that

who turned your mind inside out

and made you suspect me with the Moor. (Iago accused her of exactly this in Act 2, and she has been carrying it ever since. She thinks somebody put the idea into his head. Nobody did.)

You're a fool. That's enough.

Oh, Iago,

what can I do to win my husband back?

Go to him, my good friend. By the light of heaven,

I don't know how I lost him. (kneeling) Here I

kneel.

If my will ever offended against his love,

either in the run of my thoughts or in anything I did,

or if my eyes, my ears or any sense of mine

ever took pleasure in any other shape,

or if I don't still — as I always have

and always will, even if he shakes me off

into a beggar's divorce — love him dearly,

then let all comfort abandon me. (standing) Unkindness can

do a great deal,

and his unkindness may destroy my life,

but it will never spoil my love. I can't say the word 'whore' —

it disgusts me even as I say it.

As for doing the thing that would earn me the title,

not everything the world has to offer could make me. (She says the word twice while insisting she cannot say it. It is the only crude thing she says in the play, and it was put in her mouth an hour ago.)

Please don't upset yourself. It's just his mood.

State business has annoyed him,

and he's taking it out on you.

If that were all it was —

That's all it is, I promise you.

Listen — that's the call to supper.

The messengers from Venice are waiting to eat.

Go inside and don't cry. Everything will be all right.

Well then, Roderigo?

I don't find

that you're dealing fairly with me.

What makes you say otherwise?

Every day you fob me off with some trick,

Iago — and rather, as it looks to me now,

you keep every opportunity away from me instead of giving me

the slightest bit of hope. I won't

put up with it any longer. And I'm not convinced I should quietly swallow

what I've already stupidly put up with.

Will you listen to me, Roderigo?

I've heard too much already, and your

words and your actions are no relation to each other.

That's a very unfair accusation.

It's nothing but the truth. I've spent myself

into poverty. The jewels you've had

off me to deliver to Desdemona would have half

corrupted a nun. You've told me she's

received them, and brought me back expectations and

assurances of prompt attention and acquaintance — and I

find none of it.

All right, enough. Very well.

'Very well.' 'Enough.' I can't let it be enough, man,

and it is not very well. I swear it's thoroughly

rotten, and I'm starting to think I've been made a fool of.

Very well.

I'm telling you it is not very well. I'll make

myself known to Desdemona. If she'll give me back

my jewels, I'll drop my pursuit of her and repent

for approaching her unlawfully. If not, rest assured I'll

come to you for satisfaction. (Roderigo has worked out that he is being robbed. He is the second person in this scene to see through Iago, and like Emilia he says it to Iago's face and is talked out of it inside a minute.)

Now you've had your say.

I have, and I've said nothing I don't declare

I intend to do.

Well, now I see there's real spirit in you, and from

this moment I think better of you

than I ever did. Give me your hand, Roderigo.

You've raised a perfectly fair objection against me —

but I swear I've acted absolutely straight in your

business.

It hasn't looked like it.

I grant you it hasn't looked like it, and your

suspicion shows brains and judgement. But,

Roderigo — if you've really got in you what I

have more reason than ever to think you have, and I

mean purpose, courage and nerve — show it

tonight. If you haven't had Desdemona by the following night,

have me murdered by treachery and

invent instruments of torture to kill me with.

Well — what is it? Is it reasonable and

possible?

Sir, a special order has come from

Venice putting Cassio into Othello's post.

Is that true? Then Othello and Desdemona

will be going back to Venice.

Oh no. He's going to Mauritania and taking

the lovely Desdemona with him — unless his stay here is

dragged out by some accident, and nothing

would be as decisive as removing Cassio. (There is no Mauritania in Othello's orders. Iago invents a destination on the spot, because Roderigo will only act if he believes she is about to be taken out of reach.)

What do you mean, removing him?

By making him incapable of taking Othello's

post — knocking his brains out.

And you want me to do that?

Yes — if you've the nerve to do yourself some good and get justice. He's

having supper with a whore tonight, and I'll go and meet

him there. He doesn't know yet about his promotion. If

you watch for him leaving — and I'll arrange

for that to happen between twelve and one — you can

have him as you like. I'll be close by to back

you up, and he'll go down between the two of us. Come on,

don't stand there stunned — come with me. I'll

show you such a need for his death that you'll

feel obliged to deliver it. It's well past

supper time and the night is running out. Get to it.

I want to hear more reasons for this.

And you shall have them.