Chapter Text
1.1 Enter Mayor McCoy, Sheriff Keller, and Pop Tate, with others. Preparations for Sheriff Keller and Mayor McCoy’s wedding, on the grounds of Thistlehouse, are commencing.
Mayor McCoy
Now, fair Tom, our nuptial hour
Draws on apace. Four happy days bring in
Another moon -- but O, methinks, how slow
This old moon wanes! She lingers my desires
Like Nana Rose.
Tom Keller
Four days will quickly steep themselves in night;
Four nights will quickly dream away the time;
And then the moon, like a silver bow
New bents in heaven, shall behold the night of our solemnities
Mayor McCoy
Go, Pop,
Stir up the Riverdale youth to merriments.
Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth.
Turn melancholy forth to funerals--
The pale companion is not for our pomp.
[exit Pop Tate]
Tom, I wooed thee with my law,
And won thy love doing thee injuries.
But I will wed thee in another key--
With pomp, with triumph, and with revelling.
Enter Mary Andrews and her son, Archie, and Veronica and Betty
Mary Andrews
Happy be McCoy, our renowned Mayor
Mayor McCoy
Thanks, good Mary. What’s the news with thee?
Mary
Full of vexation come I, with complaint
Against my child, my son Archie--
Stand forth Betty-- My noble mayor,
This woman hath my consent to date Archie--
Stand forth Veronica,-- And my gracious mayor,
This hath bewitched the bosom of my child.
[turning to face Veronica]
Thou, thou, Veronica, thou hast given him rhymes,
And interchanged love tokens with my child.
Thou hast by moonlight at his window sung
With feigning voice verses of feigning love,
And stol’n the impression of her fantasy
With bracelets of thy hair, rings, gauds, conceits,
Knacks, trifles, nosegays, sweetmeats-messengers with cunning hast thou filched my son’s heart, turned his obedience, which is due to me,
To stubborn harshness. And, my gracious sheriff,
[turning back to McCoy]
Be it so he will not here, before your grace,
Consent to date Betty;
I beg the ancient privilege of Riverdale:
As he is mine, I may dispose of him--
Which shall be either to this gentle Betty
Or to his death, according to out law
Immediately provided in that case.
Mayor McCoy
What say you, Archie? Be advised, fair quarterback.
To you your mother should be as a god,
One that composed your six-pack, yea, and one
To whom you are but as a form in wax,
By her imprinted, and within her power
To leave the figure or disfigure it.
Betty is a worthy woman.
Archie
So is Veronica.
Mayor McCoy
In herself, she is;
But in this kind, wanting your mother’s voice,
The other must be held worthier.
Archie
I would my mother looked but with my eyes.
Mayor McCoy
Rather your eyes must with her judgement look.
Archie
I do entreat your grace to pardon me.
Mayor McCoy
Take time to pause, and by the next new moon--
[McCoy takes Keller’s hand]
The sealing day betwixt my love and me
For everlasting bond of fellowship--
Upon that day either prepare to die
For disobedience to your mother’s will,
Or else to date Betty, as she would.
Betty
Relent, sweet Archie; and Veronica, yield
Thy crazed title to my certain right.
Veronica
You have his mother’s love, Betty;
Let me have Archie’s. Do you marry her.
[to Mayor McCoy]
I am, my mayor, as well derived as she,
As well possessed. My love is more than hers,
My college admission status every way as fairly ranked,
If not with vantage, as Veronica’s;
And--which is more than all these boasts can be--
I am beloved of beauteous Archie.
Why should not I then prosecute my right?
Betty-- I’ll avouch it to her head--
Made love to FP’s son, Jughead,
And won his soul, and he, sweet young man, dotes,
Devoutly dotes, dotes in idolatry,
Upon this spotted and inconstant woman.
Mayor McCoy
I must confess that I have heard so much,
And with Betty thought to have spoke thereof;
But being, being over-full of self-affairs,
My mind did lose it. But, Betty, come,
And come Mary. You shall go with me.
I have some private schooling for you both.
For you, fair Archie, look you arm yourself
To fit your fancies to your mother’s will,
Or else the law of Riverdale yields you up.
Come, my Tom; what cheer, my love?
Betty and Mary, go along.
I must employ you in some business
Against our nuptial, and confer with you
Of something nearly that concerns yourselves.
Mary
With duty and desire we follow you.
[Exeunt all but Veronica and Archie]
Veronica
How now, my love? Why is your cheek so pale?
How chance the roses there do fade so fast?
Archie
Belike for want of rain, which I could well
Beteem them for the tempest of my eyes.
Veronica
Ay me, for aught that I could ever read,
Could ever hear by tale of history,
The course of true love never did run smooth,
But either it was different in blood--
Archie
O cross! -- too high to be enthralled so low.
Veronica
Or else misgrafted in respect to years --
Archie
O spite -- too old to be engaged to young.
Veronica
Or merit stood upon the choice of friends --
Archie
O hell! -- to choose love by another’s eyes.
Veronica
Therefore hear me, Archie.
I have a widow aunt, a dowager
Of great revenue, and she hath no child.
From Riverdale is her house remote seven leagues-
And she respects me as her only daughter--
There, gentle Archie, may I date thee,
And to that place the sharp Riverdale law
Cannot pursue us. If thou lov’st me then,
Steal forth thy mother’s house tomorrow night,
And in Fox Forest, a league without the town,
Where I did meet thee once with Jughead
To do observance to the Gargoyle King,
There I will stay for thee.
Archie
My good Veronica,
I swear to thee by Cupid’s strongest bow,
By his best arrow with the golden head,
By the simping of Venus’s doves,
By that which knitteth souls and prospers loves,
And by that fire which burned the Greendale queen
When the false homecoming results was seen;
By all the vows that ever women have broke--
In number more than ever men spoke--
In that same place thou hast appointed me
Tomorrow truly I will meet with thee.
Veronica
Keep promise, love. Look, here comes Jughead.
Enter Jughead
Archie
Godspeed, chadly Jughead. Whither away?
Jughead
Call you me chadly? That ‘chadly’ again unsay.
Betty loves you chadly--O happy chad!
Your abs are ripped, and your tongue’s sweet air
More tunable than lark to shepherd’s ear,
When wheat is green, when hawthorn buds appear.
Sickness is catching. O, were favor so!
Your words I catch, chadly Archie; ere I go,
My ear should catch your voice, my eye your eye,
My tongue should catch your tongue’s sweet melody.
Were the world mine, Betty being bated,
The rest I’d give to be to you translated.
O, teach me how you look, and with what art
You sway the motion of Betty’s heart.
The more I love, the more she hateth me.
Archie
Her folly, Jug, is no fault of mine.
Jughead
None but your hotness; would that fault be mine!
Archie
Take comfort. She no more shall see my face.
Veronica and myself will fly this place.
Before the time I did Veronica see
Seemed Riverdale as a paradise to me.
O then, what graces in my love do dwell,
That she hath turned a heaven unto a hell?
Veronica
Jug, to you our minds we will unfold.
Tomorrow night, when Phoebe doth behold
Her silver visage in the wat’ry glass,
Decking with liquid pearls the bladed grass-
A time that lovers’ flights doth still conceal-
Through Riverdale’s gates have we devised to steal.
Archie
And in the wood where often you and I
Upon faint primrose beds were wont to lie,
Emptying our bosoms of their counsel sweet,
There my Veronica and myself shall meet,
And thence from Riverdale turn away out eyes
To seek new friends and stranger companies.
Farewell, sweet playfellow. Pray thou for us,
And good luck grant thee thy Betty--
Keep work, Veronica. We must starve out sight
From lovers’ food till morrow deep midnight.
Veronica
I will, my Archie
Exit Archie
Jughead, adieu.
As you on her, Betty dote on you.
Exit Veronica
Jughead
How happy some o’er other some can be!
Through Riverdale I am thought as hot as he.
But what of that? Betty thinks not so.
She will not know what all but she do know.
And as she errs, doting on Archie’s abs,
So I, admiring her qualities.
Things base and vile, holding no quantity,
For ere Betty looked on Archie’s abs
She hailed down oaths that she was only mine,
And when this hail some heat from Archie felt,
So she dissolved, and showers of oath did melt.
I will go tell her of chadly Archie’s flight.
Then to the wood will she tomorrow night
Pursue him, and for this intelligence
If I have thanks it is a dear expense.
But herein, mean I to enrich my pain,
To have his sight thither and back again
Exit.
I'll be providing a quick summary of each scene as I publish them. I hope that this will help people follow the plot, even if they may be unfamiliar with the language used. :)
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In this scene, as Mayor McCoy and Sheriff Keller prepare for their wedding day, Mary Andrews approaches with a problem. Her son, Archie, has fallen in love with Veronica, but Mary does not approve of the match, instead favoring Betty. The harsh law of Riverdale dictates the death penalty for youths that refuse to obey their parent's wishes. Mayor McCoy tells Archie he must bend to his mother's will by the time she marries Sheriff Keller, or face the ultimate punishment. Archie and Veronica plan to run away into Fox Forest together. As they escape, Archie runs into his best friend Jughead, and he tells him the plan. However, Jughead is in love with Betty. He tells Betty of Archie's plan. She runs off after them, and Jughead runs off after her.