The Shakespeare Story-Book

“You spurn me hence, and he will spurn me hither; if I continue in this service, you must case me in leather.”

When the man had gone Luciana rebuked her sister for her impatience, saying that probably her husband was kept by business. But Adriana would not be soothed. She was full of jealous anger, declaring that she stayed at home neglected, while her husband amused himself abroad with merry companions; he was certainly tired of her, and had found some one he liked better.

“Self-harming jealousy! Fie, beat it hence!” said Luciana; but Adriana paid no heed to her wise counsels, preferring to make herself unhappy with groundless jealousy.

Antipholus of Syracuse, on reaching the Centaur Inn, found that his gold was perfectly safe, but he was still extremely annoyed with Dromio for his ill-timed jesting, and when the slave appeared, he asked him what he meant by behaving in such a fashion. Was he mad that he had answered him so madly?

Dromio, of course, replied that he had never seen his master since he parted from him until that moment; and he further asked, what did his master mean by such a jest? Enraged by this apparent fresh impudence on the part of his slave, Antipholus began to beat him soundly.

But both master and man were to be still further bewildered, for at this moment up came two ladies, one of whom addressed Antipholus as if he were her husband, and began to reproach him for his unkind behaviour.

“Ay, ay, Antipholus, look strange and frown!” she said. “Some other lady has your sweet expression; I am not Adriana nor your wife. The time was once when you would vow that never words were music to your ear, that never object was pleasing to your eye, that never touch was welcome to your hand, that never meat was savoury to your taste, unless I spake, or looked, or touched, or carved it to you. How comes it now, my husband, O, how comes it, that you are thus estranged from yourself? Ah, do not tear yourself away from me!”

“Plead you to me, fair dame? I do not know you,” answered the bewildered Antipholus. “I have only been in Ephesus two hours; I am as strange to your town as to your talk; I cannot understand one word of what you say.”

“Fie, brother, how the world is changed with you!” said Luciana. “When were you wont to treat my sister thus? She sent a message by Dromio to tell you to come home to dinner.”

“By Dromio?” said Antipholus.

“By me?” echoed Dromio, who, of course, was not the one she had sent.

“By thee,” retorted Adriana; and she repeated the answer her own servant had brought back.

Antipholus began to think he must be dreaming, and had been married to Adriana in his sleep; but when both the ladies insisted on his going back with them to dinner, he allowed himself to be persuaded, and determined to see what would be the end of this strange adventure.

As for Dromio, he was told to act porter at the gate, and to let no one enter unless he wanted another beating.

Confusion worse Confounded

Dromio of Ephesus, who for the second time had been sent in search of his master, at last found him. Antipholus of Ephesus had been detained at the shop of a goldsmith, Angelo, who was making a chain for his wife. The chain was not yet completed, but was promised for a little later. Antipholus returned home, bringing with him as guests the goldsmith Angelo and a merchant called Balthazar, but when they reached the house they were refused admittance. No argument or entreaty would induce the porter or the servants inside to open the door. They said their master and Dromio were already at home, and that these must be impostors. Antipholus at last went away in a rage, saying that he would go and dine somewhere else, where he was treated with less disdain.

Meanwhile, inside the house, Luciana was not at all pleased with the way her supposed brother-in-law was behaving to his wife, and when they found themselves alone, she took him to task about it. Antipholus of Syracuse again persisted that Adriana was no wife of his; in fact, he said, he very much preferred Luciana herself. Luciana did not think it right to listen to such speeches, and went off to fetch her sister, leaving Antipholus more than ever charmed with her gentle grace, enchanting beauty, and wise discourse.

While he was musing over this, and thinking it high time that he should leave Ephesus, which seemed to him inhabited by none but witches, Angelo the goldsmith came that way, bringing the chain which Antipholus of Ephesus had ordered as a present for his wife. Antipholus of Syracuse, to whom he handed it in mistake, of course knew nothing about it, and declared he had never ordered it; but Angelo insisted on his keeping it, saying he would come back at five o’clock for the money.

Antipholus had already sent Dromio to find out if there were any ship sailing from Ephesus, for he did not want to stay a single night in such a queer place. He now resolved to go and wait for Dromio in the market, so that they could get off at the first possible moment.

Angelo the goldsmith was in debt to another merchant, and now the creditor began to press for his money. Angelo replied that the very sum he owed was due to him from Antipholus; he expected to receive the money at five o’clock that day, and if the merchant would walk down with him to the house, he would discharge the bond. Antipholus of Ephesus, however, saved them the trouble by walking up at that moment. Angelo asked him for payment for the chain, which, of course, this Antipholus declared he had never had. Angelo protested that he had given it him only half an hour before. Antipholus indignantly denied it.

The merchant creditor now lost patience, thinking Angelo only wished to escape by some false excuse, and he ordered an officer to arrest him. Angelo, feeling that his reputation was at stake, then ordered the officer to arrest Antipholus for not paying him the money for the chain. To add to the confusion, at that moment up came Dromio of Syracuse, who, mistaking this wrong Antipholus for his own master, told him that a ship was just ready to sail, he had got all their goods on board, and the vessel only waited for them and the skipper.

Antipholus of Ephesus thought this was his own Dromio, and that he must be losing his senses, but he had no time to debate the matter now. He bade him hasten home to Adriana and get from her a purse of ducats, which would serve to bail him from arrest. Dromio did as he was told. He rushed to the house, stammered out his confused story, got the purse from Adriana, and was returning with it, when he happened to meet his own master, Antipholus of Syracuse. To him he handed the purse. Antipholus was quite unable to understand this new freak, but not caring to waste time in explanations, asked if any ship were departing that night. Dromio replied that an hour ago he had brought him word that the bark Expedition was just ready to sail, when Antipholus was arrested.

“Here is the money you sent for to deliver you,” he concluded.

“The fellow is distracted, and so am I,” said Antipholus. “We wander here in illusions. Some blessed power deliver us hence!”

Adriana, with Luciana, hastened to the release of her husband, but when they found him he said such strange things – declaring that he had not dined at home, and that he had been locked out of his own house, while she and Luciana knew quite well that he had dined with them – that everyone thought he was mad, and he was bound and carried away home, and put under care of a doctor, his man Dromio being also treated in the same way.

Not long after this, Angelo and his merchant creditor met Antipholus of Syracuse, who this time, instead of denying he had had the chain, at once admitted it. Angelo reproached him with having denied it before. Antipholus declared he had never done so. The merchant said they had heard him with their own ears. The end of the matter was that they all got so angry that they drew their swords and began to fight. Adriana, coming up at that moment, thought it was her husband who had got free from his bondage, and called to the others not to hurt him, he was mad, but to seize him and take away his sword.

Antipholus of Syracuse, seeing that he was likely to be overpowered, slipped with Dromio for refuge inside a Priory, near which they were standing. The Abbess refused to give them up, as they had taken sanctuary there, though Adriana vehemently demanded her husband.

Luciana advised her sister to appeal to the Duke, and as it happened, the Duke himself now approached, on his way to attend the execution of the luckless Ægeon, who up to the present had not been able to obtain the money for his ransom.

Adriana told her story to the Duke, who thereupon commanded that the Lady Abbess should be summoned to his presence. At that instant a servant came rushing up in terror to Adriana saying that his master and Dromio had got loose, and had tied up the doctor, and were beating the servants.

“Peace, fool! Your master and his man are here,” said Adriana. “What you report to us is false.”

But the speedy appearance of Antipholus and Dromio of Ephesus showed that the servant had spoken truth.

“Unless the fear of death makes me doat,” said Ægeon, “I see my son Antipholus and Dromio.”

There was still some further confusion, for this Antipholus had no knowledge of his father. But when Antipholus of Syracuse came from the Priory, and the two sets of brothers stood face to face, matters were soon happily cleared up. To add to the general joy, the good Abbess turned out to be no other than the wife of Ægeon. There was no difficulty now about getting ransom for the merchant, and, in fact, the Duke pardoned his life without accepting the ducats which Antipholus of Ephesus offered.

Antipholus of Syracuse could now pay his court without rebuke to the lady who had so charmed his fancy; and Adriana, to whom the Duke had spoken some plain words, promised to be a less shrewish wife for the future.

Among the gay company none were merrier or more delighted than the two Dromios. They embraced vigorously, and gazed at each other with admiration.

“Methinks you are my glass, and not my brother,” said Dromio of Ephesus. “I see by you I am a sweet-faced youth. Will you walk in to see their gossiping?”

But each brother was too modest to walk into the house first, so they settled the difficulty by going in hand in hand, not one before the other.