Chrem. (in a low voice.) Step a little this way from that door, Sophrona, if you please (pointing). Don’t you, henceforth, be calling me by that name.
Soph. Why? Pray, are you not the person you always used to say you were?
Chrem. Hush! (pointing to his own house.)
Soph. Why are you afraid about that door?
Chrem. (in a low voice.) I have got a shrew of a wife shut up there. For by that name I formerly falsely called myself, in order that you might not chance indiscreetly to blab it out of doors, and then my wife, by some means or other, might come to know of it.
Soph. I’ faith, that’s the very reason why we, wretched creatures, have never been able to find you out here.
Chrem. Well, but tell me, what business have you with that family from whose house you were coming out? Where are the ladies?[74]
Soph. Ah, wretched me!
Chrem. Hah! What’s the matter? Are they still alive?
Soph. Your daughter is alive. Her poor mother died of grief.