Emilia and Reggie's Unfortunate Encounter

A young lady is standing in line in a official-looking building. She keeps fidgeting around and drops the handkerchief she was holding. She gasps and bends down to pick it up, but before she reaches it a man in a wheelchair maneuvers right on top of it. She looks at him, about to ask him to watch were he's going, but she stops when sees that the man has no legs and only one arm. She has never seen anyone so pathetic. Strapped to his wheelchair, furthermore, is an assortment of bulky, suspicious objects. The man looked both panicky and maniacal. Nevertheless, she needs the handkerchief back--it belongs to her mistress.

Emilia: [Timidly] Excuse me, sir, I believe your chair rests upon something of mine.

Reggie: [Distractedly] ...What? Oh, um, sorry, here. I'll get it....

Emilia: [Moves to stop him, for fear of him falling out of the wheelchair] Oh, don't--

Reggie: Don't "'Tell me 'don't.''" I got this. [With great effort, he extracts the handkerchief from underneath the wheel.] (42)

Emilia: I thank you.

Reggie: [Pensively] No problem. You know, you seem like a lady who has seen her share of bad days.

Emilia: Well, yes, I suppose. My husband, Iago, has been treating me poorly lately. I believe he suspects me of being adulterous, which I am not. Besides, "'I do think it is their husbands' faults/ If wives do fall'" (4.3.89-90).

Reggie: Yeah... I have plenty of experience in that area. It was an affair with a married woman that brought me to this sorry state. If only I had know that when she said, "I'm going to get real weird with it," it would result in my contracting a flesh-eating bacteria infection. And now my whole world is ruined.

Emilia: "'The world's a huge thing; it is a great price for a small vice'" (4.3.70-71).

Reggie: I guess so... but now I'm gettin' my revenge. Can you keep a secret?

Emilia: I have kept many secrets for my mistress, I trust I can keep yours as well.

Reggie: I believe you. The Fox has a sixth sense about these kind of things. Well... "'I [have] enough C-4 on my chair to blow [this] place to bits'" (109).

Emilia: [Gasps in horror] "'Villainy, villainy, villainy!'" (5.2.188). How could you stand to kill so many innocent people?

Reggie: "'Maybe then they pay more attention to what's goin' on with cripple people'" (109).

Emilia: Please, you do not have to do this. Surely there much be a better way!

Reggie: [Gravely] I wish there was.

[The faint sound of ticking becomes more pronounced. Reggie looks at Emilia almost apologetically.]