The Gamester (1753)

_Enter STUKELY._

_Bev._ Why is this villain here?

_Stu._ To give You liberty and safety. There's his discharge, madam. (_Giving a paper to Mrs. Beverley_) Let him begone this moment. The arrest last night was meant in friendship; but came too late.

_Char._ What mean you, Sir?

_Stu._ The arrest was too late, I say. I would have kept his hands from blood, but was too late.

_Mrs. Bev._ His hands from blood! Whose blood?--O, wretch! wretch!

_Stu._ From Lewson's blood.

_Char._ No, villain! Yet what of Lewson? Speak quickly!

_Stu._ You are ignorant then! I thought I heard the murderer at confession.

_Char._ What murderer? And who is murdered? Not Lewson? Say he lives, and I'll kneel down and worship you.

_Stu._ In pity, so I would; but that the tongues of all cry murder. I came in pity, not in malice; to save the brother, not kill the sister. Your Lewson's dead.

_Char._ O horrible! Why, who has killed him?--And yet it cannot be. What crime had He committed that he should die? Villain! he lives! he lives! and shall revenge these pangs.

_Mrs. Bev._ Patience, sweet Charlotte!

_Char._ O, 'tis too much for patience!

_Mrs. Bev._ He comes in pity, he says. O! execrable villain! The friend is killed then, and this the murderer?

_Bev._ Silence, I charge you. Proceed, Sir.

_Stu._ No. Justice may stop the tale--and here's an evidence.