Scene changes to a fine pleasant apartment. Enter Don Julio, and knocks, as at the door of his private apartment: Fernando opens the door and lets him in.
Don F. Y' have given me here a very pleasant prison:
But what news, my Julio? Are things disposed
For clearing of your doubts? My own concerns
I cannot think on during your disquiet.
Don. J. And I come now so strangely mov'd with yours,
I scarce have sense or memory of my own.
A heart of adamant could not be hinder'd,
I think, from liquefaction into tears,
To 've seen and heard Elvira, as I have done,
Upon th' occasion of my telling her
That you were gone.
A sense so gallant and so tender both
I never saw in woman.
Don. F. Can that high heart descend to tenderness?
Don J. Not whilst (you present) noble pride upheld it;
But, nature once set free from that constraint,
O, how pathetic was her very silence!
And the restraint of tears in her swol'n eyes,
More eloquent in grief than others' torrents.
If she be guilty, all her sex are devils.
Don. F. O, say no more; for were there room but left
For self-deceit, I might be happy yet.
Ah! evidence too cruel to deny me that! [A noise without.
Don. J. But what can be the noise I hear without—
In the next room? [Fernando peeps through the key-hole.
Don F. 'Slife! I see Don Pedro,
Elvira's father: there's no avoiding him;
He'd not a' come up so, without being sure
You are within.
Don J. Farther put-off would be of little use,
Since first or last he must be satisfied,
Being come hither upon such an errand.
The sooner now we see what 'tis he drives at,
The sooner we shall take from thence our measures;
I'll therefore go out to him, and be sure
To entertain him still so near the door,
That you may hear what passes.
Don F. I shall be attentive, and expect the issue
With much impatience. [Exit Don Julio.