- Vindice and Hippolito come back, this time with Vindice as himself. Let's hope that was a good disguise the first time.
- Vindice gets philosophical, talking about killing Lussurioso and coming up with a really strange argument for why it would actually be doing Lussurioso a favor to kill him. Hippolito is more practical, pointing out that Vindice will need to act differently as well as look different to pull off the ruse.
- Vindice says he'll pretend to be melancholy and depressed. Hippolito says that's perfect, since he already told Lussurioso his brother is all emo and sad.
- Hippolito introduces the real Vindice to Lussurioso. Vindice pretends he's a melancholy lawyer, and they all have a long conversation about law and imagination, working their way slowly around to the job that Lussurioso wants Vindice to do.
- The job turns out to be a unique one: Lussurioso wants to hire Vindice to kill Vindice. Of course, Lussurioso doesn't know that his previous bad guy hire Piato was also Vindice in disguise, so who can blame him for thinking they're two different people? He tells Vindice that Piato wronged him and asks Vindice to kill Piato.
- In the process, Lussurioso lies, telling the brothers that Piato wanted to seduce their sister, and Lussurioso was furious with him about it. Since we all know Lussurioso was the would-be seducer and Piato was just hired as a go-between, this shows just how untrustworthy Lussurioso is.
- Things get complicated when Lussurioso sends Hippolito to find Piato. Hippolito goes out, pretending to look for him.
- While he's away, Lussurioso asks Vindice his name, and when he hears it, he says it's a good name. Vindice answers, "Ay, a revenger" (4.2.195). Vindice thinks that's just great, since it implies that Vindice will valiantly kill his enemies. Little does Lussurioso know that Vindice sees him as an enemy. Yep, more irony—it just doesn't quit in this play.
- Hippolito comes back and says he can't fetch Piato, because Piato is raging drunk. Way to think on your feet, Hippolito. This convinces Lussurioso, who repeats his instructions to kill Piato and promises to take good care of the brothers if they do so. Lussurioso exits.
- Vindice bursts into an impassioned speech, wondering why heaven hasn't struck Lussurioso down with thunder. Suddenly, boom—a burst of thunder. This seems kind of ambiguous, though, since it doesn't appear to harm Lussurioso, and Hippolito immediately says, "Brother, we lose ourselves" (2.4.228). Is the thunder a sign of divine retribution against Lussurioso, or is it something else? The scene doesn't really answer that question.
- The brothers then come with a plan, and it's a doozy: Since people are starting to wonder what happened to the Duke, they decide they'll dress the Duke up in the costume Vindice was wearing when he was pretending to be Piato. They figure that everyone will assume Piato killed the Duke and then dressed him up in Piato's clothes before skipping town. What could possibly go wrong?
- Vindice says that, while they're at it, they should try to "conjure that base devil [the willingness to pressure her daughter into having sex for money] out of our mother" (2.4.260-261). You know, because there won't already be enough to do covering up the Duke's death.