Stu. What have I done?

Bev. What the arch-devil of old did—­soothed with false hopes, for certain ruin.

Stu. Myself unhurt; nay, pleased at your destruction—­So your words mean.  Why, tell it to the world:  I am too poor to find a friend in’t.

Bev. A friend!  What’s he?  I had a friend.

Stu. And have one still.

Bev. Ay; I’ll tell you of this friend.  He found me happiest of the happy; fortune and honour crowned me; and love and peace lived in my heart.  One spark of folly lurked there; That too he found; and by deceitful breath, blew it to flames that have consumed me.  This friend were You to Me.

Stu. A little more perhaps—­The friend who gave his all to save you; and not succeeding, chose ruin with you.  But no matter—­I have undone you, and am a villain.

Bev. No; I think not.  The villains are within.

Stu. What villains?

Bev. Dawson and the rest—­We have been dupes to sharpers.

Stu. How know you this?  I have had doubts, as well as You; yet still as fortune changed, I blushed at my own thoughts.  But You have proofs, perhaps?

Bev. Ay, damned ones.  Repeated losses:  night after night, and no reverse.  Chance has no hand in this.

Stu. I think more charitably; yet I am peevish in my nature, and apt to doubt.  The world speaks fairly of this Dawson; so does it of the rest.  We have watched them closely too.  But ’tis a right usurped by losers, to think the winners knaves.  We’ll have more manhood in us.

Bev. I know not what to think.  This night has stung me to the quick—­blasted my reputation too.  I have bound my honour to these vipers; played meanly upon credit, till I tired them; and now they shun me, to rifle one another.  What’s to be done?

Stu. Nothing.  My counsels have been fatal.

Bev. By heaven!  I’ll not survive this shame—­Traitor! ’tis You have brought it on me. (Taking hold of him.) Shew me the means to save me, or I’ll commit a murder here, and next upon myself.

Stu. Why, do it then, and rid me of ingratitude.

Bev. Prithee, forgive this language—­I speak I know not what.  Rage and despair are in my heart, and hurry me to madness.  My home is horror to me—­I’ll not return to’t.  Speak quickly; tell me, if in this wreck of fortune, one hope remains?  Name it, and be my oracle.

Stu. To vent your curses on—­You have bestowed them liberally.  Take your own counsel:  and should a desperate hope present itself, ’twill suit your desperate fortune.  I’ll not advise you.

Bev. What hope?  By heaven!  I’ll catch at it, however desperate.  I am so sunk in misery, it cannot lay me lower.

Stu. You have an uncle.

Bev. Ay.  What of Him?