Chapter: SCENE 2.

The same.

[Enter SIR HUGH EVANS and SIMPLE.]

EVANS.
Go your ways, and ask of Doctor Caius' house which is the way; and
there dwells one Mistress Quickly, which is in the manner of his
nurse, or his dry nurse, or his cook, or his laundry, his washer,
and his wringer.

SIMPLE.
Well, sir.

EVANS.
Nay, it is petter yet. Give her this letter; for it is a 'oman that
altogether's acquaintance with Mistress Anne Page; and the letter
is to desire and require her to solicit your master's desires to
Mistress Anne Page. I pray you be gone: I will make an end of my
dinner; there's pippins and cheese to come.

[Exeunt.]

 After dinner, Evans sends a servant named Peter Simple to hand-deliver a letter to a woman named Mistress Quickly. Since Mistress Quickly is chummy with Anne Page, Evans wants her to talk to Anne about marrying Slender. We find out that Mistress Quickly is the servant of a guy named Doctor Caius and lives at his house. Then Evans decides to let us in on a little gossip: apparently, Mistress Quickly doesn't just do Doctor Caius's laundry and cooking. She's also his "oman" . In other words, Mistress Quickly is probably sleeping with her boss. Brain Snack: In Henry IV Part 1, Mistress Quickly isn't a servant--she's the hostess of the Boar's Head Tavern, which is the kind of seedy bar where criminals and prostitutes hang out. Since The Merry Wives of Windsor is basically a spin-off of Henry IV Part 1, Shakespeare would have expected his audience to know all about Mistress Quickly's shady ways.

