And felt my wife insult with silent scorn
My ardent truth, and look averse and cold,
I went forth too:  but soon returned again; 325
Yet not so soon but that my wife had taught
My children her harsh thoughts, and they all cried,
’Give us clothes, father!  Give us better food! 
What you in one night squander were enough
For months!’ I looked, and saw that home was hell. 330
And to that hell will I return no more
Until mine enemy has rendered up
Atonement, or, as he gave life to me
I will, reversing Nature’s law...

ORSINO: 
Trust me,
The compensation which thou seekest here 335
Will be denied.

GIACOMO: 
Then...Are you not my friend? 
Did you not hint at the alternative,
Upon the brink of which you see I stand,
The other day when we conversed together? 
My wrongs were then less.  That word parricide, 340
Although I am resolved, haunts me like fear.

ORSINO: 
It must be fear itself, for the bare word
Is hollow mockery.  Mark, how wisest God
Draws to one point the threads of a just doom,
So sanctifying it:  what you devise 345
Is, as it were, accomplished.

GIACOMO: 
Is he dead?

ORSINO: 
His grave is ready.  Know that since we met
Cenci has done an outrage to his daughter.

GIACOMO: 
What outrage?

ORSINO: 
That she speaks not, but you may
Conceive such half conjectures as I do, 350
From her fixed paleness, and the lofty grief
Of her stern brow bent on the idle air,
And her severe unmodulated voice,
Drowning both tenderness and dread; and last
From this; that whilst her step-mother and I, 355
Bewildered in our horror, talked together
With obscure hints; both self-misunderstood
And darkly guessing, stumbling, in our talk,
Over the truth, and yet to its revenge,
She interrupted us, and with a look 360
Which told, before she spoke it, he must die:...

GIACOMO: 
It is enough.  My doubts are well appeased;
There is a higher reason for the act
Than mine; there is a holier judge than me,
A more unblamed avenger.  Beatrice, 365
Who in the gentleness of thy sweet youth
Hast never trodden on a worm, or bruised
A living flower, but thou hast pitied it
With needless tears!  Fair sister, thou in whom
Men wondered how such loveliness and wisdom 370
Did not destroy each other!  Is there made
Ravage of thee?  O, heart, I ask no more
Justification!  Shall I wait, Orsino,
Till he return, and stab him at the door?

ORSINO: 
Not so; some accident might interpose 375
To rescue him from what is now most sure;
And you are unprovided where to fly,
How to excuse or to conceal.  Nay, listen: 
All is contrived; success is so assured
That...