er for it
to-morrow!" Don Pedro thought she was Hero, too; but she was not Hero;
she was Margaret.

Don John chuckled noiselessly when Claudio and Don Pedro quitted the
garden; he gave Borachio a purse containing a thousand ducats.

The money made Borachio feel very gay, and when he was walking in the
street with his friend Conrade, he boasted of his wealth and the giver,
and told what he had done.

A watchman overheard them, and thought that a man who had been paid a
thousand ducats for villainy was worth taking in charge. He therefore
arrested Borachio and Conrade, who spent the rest of the night in
prison.

Before noon of the next day half the aristocrats in Messina were at
church. Hero thought it was her wedding day, and she was there in her
wedding dress, no cloud on her pretty face or in her frank and shining
eyes.

The priest was Friar Francis.

Turning to Claudio, he said, "You come hither, my lord, to marry this
lady?" "No!" contradicted Claudio.

Leonato thought he was quibbling over grammar. "You should have said,
Friar," said he, "'You come to be married to her.'"

Friar Francis turned to Hero. "Lady," he said, "you come hither to be
married to this Count?" "I do," replied Hero.

"If either of you know any impediment to this marriage, I charge you to
utter it," said the Friar.

"Do you know of any, Hero?" asked Claudio. "None," said she.

"Know you of any, Count?" demanded the Friar. "I dare reply for him,
'None,'" said Leonato.

Claudio exclaimed bitterly, "O! what will not men dare say! Father,"
he continued, "will you give me your daughter?" "As freely," replied
Leonato, "as God gave her to me."

"And what can I give you," asked Claudio, "which is worthy of this
gift?" "Nothing," said Don Pedro, "unless you give the gift back to the
giver."

"Sweet Prince, you teach me," said Claudio. "There, Leonato, take her
back."

These brutal words were followed by others which flew from Claudio, Don
Pedro and Don John.

The church seemed no longer sacred. Hero took her own part as long as
she could, then she swooned. All her persecutors left the church, except
her father, who was befooled by the accusations against her, and cried,
"Hence from her! Let her die!"

But Friar Francis saw Hero blameless with his clear eyes that probed the
soul. "She is innocent," he said; "a thousand signs have told me so."

Hero revived under his kind gaze. Her father, flurried and angry, knew
not what to think