FLORINDO: Ah, but wait …

TRUFFALDINO: [aside] Oh-oh.

FLORINDO: Are you saying … before he died, he fired you and hired another servant and that servant was the same servant who this morning asked you to collect mail from the post? Pasquale?

TRUFFALDINO: That’s right! It was Pasquale!

FLORINDO: [aside] All hope is gone. Beatrice is dead. Poor Beatrice. The heartbreak must have killed her. Oh, I cannot bear this agony.

FLORINDO exits.

TRUFFALDINO: Oh, he’s sad, poor guy. Oh well, better than getting another beating. [To the ZANNI] Come on, put those trunks back before they cause more trouble!

BEATRICE and PANTALONA enter.

Oh no, here comes the other one.

BEATRICE: Believe me, Signora Pantalona, the last consignment was definitely dispatched to Venice.

PANTALONA: Maybe there was a mistake.

BEATRICE: Let’s clarify things immediately. Truffaldino!

TRUFFALDINO: Signor.

BEATRICE: Open my trunk and give me … Who does the other trunk belong to?

TRUFFALDINO: Some other guy who just arrived.

BEATRICE: Give me my diary.

TRUFFALDINO: Signor sì.

BEATRICE: Hurry up!

TRUFFALDINO hands her a book.

Who does this book belong to?

TRUFFALDINO: [aside] Oh no, I’ve done it again!

BEATRICE: [aside] Letters that I wrote to Florindo? Oh my, these belong to him. I feel faint. I’m sweating, I’m shaking. I don’t where I am.

PANTALONA: What is it, Signor Federigo? Are you not well?

BEATRICE: It’s nothing. [To TRUFFALDINO] How did this book end up in my trunk?

TRUFFALDINO: Caro Signor [Dear sir], the book is mine, I hid it in there so I wouldn’t lose it. I’m sorry.

BEATRICE: How did you get this book?

TRUFFALDINO: I inherited it from my master.

BEATRICE: Inherited?

TRUFFALDINO: Sì Signor, I serve a master who died and left me his stuff, most of which I sold, but I kept this book.

BEATRICE: How long has this master of yours been dead?

TRUFFALDINO: I don’t know, ten or twelve days?

BEATRICE: [aside] Oh, wretched me. [To TRUFFALDINO] This master of yours, was his name Florindo?

TRUFFALDINO: Sì! Florindo.

BEATRICE: Aretusi?

TRUFFALDINO: Correct, Aresushi.

BEATRICE: And you’re certain he’s dead.

TRUFFALDINO: Absolutely, dead as. Dead as a sewer rat squashed between two gondolas.

BEATRICE: And how did he die?

TRUFFALDINO: It was awful, he died in an accident. He fell in the canal and drowned, and we never saw him again.

BEATRICE: Oh, inconsolable me! Florindo my love is dead and dead is all my hope. What’s the point of living if the only person I’ve lived for is gone? Everything was in vain. All caution thrown to the wind. The plan to reunite with my love—unhappy ending. I leave my country, abandon my family, face danger, risk my life and dress as a man, all for Florindo. And now my Florindo is dead. Was the loss of my brother not enough that I need to lose my love as well? But what if I was the cause of their deaths, what if heaven has a vendetta against me? Tears are useless and so is lamenting. Florindo is gone. Oh, how the pain oppresses me. I can no longer see the light. My idol, my betrothed, I will follow you in despair.