ACT THREE, Scene 1:

INT. THE RESTAURANT, EARLY MORNING (EUNICE AND DESDEE’S PLEA FOR GABRIEL’S FORGIVENESS)

(EUNICE, DESDEE, AND GABRIEL ARE STANDING IN THE KITCHEN.)

Eunice: I’ll do ev’ry thing I can for you, Gabriel.

Desdee: Please do, Eunice. Lázaro’s so upset about Gabriel’s drinking, you’d think Gabriel’s problems were his own.

Eunice: Your man is such a good man, don’t you worry, my dear.

Gabriel: Whatever becomes of me, I will always be here for you.

Eunice: Your Jae-sahn’s friend and may you rest assured he’ll stand in strangeness no farther off than a polite distance. I give thee warrant of thy place.

Gabriel: I’d better go.

Desdee: Bye, now.

(LAZARO CHUCKLES AS HE AND JAE-SAHN ENTER THE RESTAURANT.)

Lázaro: No, not like that.

Jae-sahn: Like what then?

Lázaro: Never mind, mí carnál.

Jae-sahn: Did you hear the back door shut as we came in?

(JAE-SAHN AND LÁZARO PROCEED TO THE KITCHEN.)

Lázaro: Back door? No, I don’t think so. Who would be leaving out the back at this time?

(JAE-SAHN AND LÁZARO STOP, SURPRISED, WHEN THEY SEE EUNICE AND DESDEE IN THE KITCHEN.)

Eunice: Jagiya, I was just talking on the phone with someone who languishes in your anger.

Jae-sahn: What are you talkin about?

Eunice: Why, your dude, Gabriel. If I have any pretension to move you, his present reconciliation take. For if he be one for whom you’ve shown some love, that errs in ignorance and not in cunning, I cannot read his face, I ask you call him back.

Jae-sahn: Not now, sweet Eunseon.

Desdee (sarcastically): Wednesday then? Or Tuesday in the morn? Please name a time.

Eunice: But no later than Thursday night. In faith he is penitent.

Desdee: He deserves more than punishment.

Eunice: I wonder in my soul what you would ask of me that I would deny or stay here muttering.

Jae-sahn: Enough, you will be denied no more.

Eunice: I do you no favors. Have I ever denied you anything?

(EUNICE AND DESDEE EXIT TO THE FRONT OF THE HOUSE.)

Jae-sahn: What do you think of this?

Lázaro: Think of what?

Jae-sahn: There must be something here, he makes good company, free of vice and full of honesty. But he does not weigh his words before he speaks.

Lázaro: Certain men are exactly as they seem.

Jae-sahn: I believe so. Why then I think that Gabriel is an honest man. Yet, there is more to this, I see you thinking.

Lázaro: Jae-sahn, pardon me, I act out of duty.

Jae-sahn: Do you conspire against your friend, you Lázaro? Or if he be wrong does thou make it his right? Or are you a stranger to his thoughts?

Lázaro: Though I perchance am vicious in my guess, I do confess. It is my nature’s plague as one who so imperfectly conceits, so Jae-sahn, pardon me, my scattered and unsure observance.

Jae-sahn: What did you say to me? Do you besmirch Gabriel’s good name? Say he were to filch my good name instead he would rob me not of that which him enriches, but of what leaves me the poorer indeed. A good name in a man and woman, good Lázaro, is the instant jewel within their soul.

Lázaro: This shall not pass whilst in my custody. Beware, mí carnál. The cuck who lives in bliss, who, certain of his fate, hates not his wronger. Who dotes, yet doubts, suspects, yet soundly loves is poor, though picked, and never rich enough.

Jae-sahn: Be a man, you think ev’ry wedded fellow is a joke? There are millions now alive that nightly lie. Which I do swear, peculiar as the case may be, better that, in spite of the hell that it may cause. Thou speakest surely now of misery. For know, thou Lázaro, that if I did not love the gentle Eunice, I would not my unhoused condition put into circumscription and confine. These are matters of life and death.

Lázaro: Then deat' and life they be. With franker spirit therefore I am bound. Receive from me I speak not yet of proof. Let your eyes be thus, not jealous nor secure, so as to keep your free and noble nature.

Jae-sahn: Let him do what he will. The service which I have done for
Eunice shall out-tongue his advances.

Lázaro: Yet, if in this manner thou be thus abused, I know your country disposition well. Do not show your hand.

(JAE-SAHN LOOKS AWAY.)

Jae-sahn: Understood.

(LAZARO EXITS TO THE FRONT OF THE HOUSE.)

(EUNICE ENTERS THE KITCHEN.)

Eunice: What’s going on, my darling Jae-sahn? The keepers of this gen’rous isle do await your presence.

Jae-sahn (sotto voce): I am to blame.

Eunice: Why do you speak in whispered tones? Are you sick?

Jae-sahn: I have a pain upon my forehead, here.

(EUNICE PULLS OUT JAE-SAHN'S BANDANA FROM HER BACK POCKET AND PATS HIS FOREHEAD.)

Eunice: ‘Tis but a lack of sleep.

(EUNICE PUTS DOWN JAE-SAHN’S BANDANA AND BEGINS TO MASSAGE HIS TEMPLES.)

[END SCENE]