The Jewel Merchants: A Comedy in One Act

A compact comedy staged for the little theatre depicts a Renaissance Tuscan episode in which three characters treat transgression as calculable risk rather than moral failing; when a woman and her ally seek to rid themselves of an unwelcome man, the discovery of a corpse becomes an inconvenient domestic problem to be concealed and managed rather than an occasion for horror, and the ensuing manoeuvres reveal habits of convenience, ambiguous loyalties, and pragmatic amorality. The piece privileges theatrical action and economy of scene, gently satirizing period attitudes toward sin while remaining stageable and lightly comic.