Act 1, Scene 2

--A room in LEONATO'S house.

[Enter LEONATO and ANTONIO, meeting.]
Leonato
249 How now, brother! Where is my cousin your son? Hath he provided
250 this music?
Antonio
251 He is very busy about it. But, brother, I can tell you strange
252 news that you yet dreamt not of.
Leonato
253 Are they good?
Antonio
254 As the event stamps them: but they have a good cover; they show well
255 outward. The prince and Count Claudio, walking in a thick-pleached alley
256 in my orchard, were thus much overheard by a man of mine: the prince
257 discovered to Claudio that he loved my niece your daughter and meant to
258 acknowledge it this night in a dance; and if he found her accordant, he
259 meant to take the present time by the top and instantly break with you
260 of it.
Leonato
261 Hath the fellow any wit that told you this?
Antonio
262 A good sharp fellow: I will send for him; and question him
263 yourself.
Leonato
264 No, no; we will hold it as a dream till it appear itself: but I will
265 acquaint my daughter withal, that she may be the better prepared for
266 an answer, if peradventure this be true. Go you, and tell her of it.
[Several persons cross the stage.]
Leonato
267 Cousins, you know what you have to do. O!I cry you mercy, friend; go
268 you with me, and I will use your skill. Good cousin, have a care this
269 busy time.
[Exeunt.]

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Notes

TLN 255archaic vocab
“a thick-pleached alley”
A 'pleached' alley is a shaded garden walk formed by training and interweaving (pleaching) the branches of trees — usually lime, hornbeam, or elm — to form a dense green tunnel. The word comes from Old French plier, to fold or braid. The thickness of the canopy makes it a place where a private conversation would seem safe from listeners.
TLN 256wordplay
“overheard by a man of mine: the prince discovered to Claudio”
This is the first of many scenes in the play where someone overhears a private conversation and reports it — accurately or not. Here the servant's report is already garbled: Don Pedro said he would woo Hero on Claudio's behalf (disguised as Claudio at the dance), but Antonio's man has heard it as Don Pedro's own declaration of personal love. The play's title puns on this: 'nothing' and 'noting' (observing, overhearing) were near-homophones in Elizabethan English, so Much Ado About Nothing is equally Much Ado About Noting.
historical 'Nothing': noting, eavesdropping, and the bawdy pun
TLN 258archaic vocab
“if he found her accordant”
'Accordant' means agreeable, willing, or in agreement — that is, if Don Pedro found Hero receptive to his declaration of love. The word is from Latin accordare, to bring into accord. It has dropped from standard English usage but was current in Shakespeare's day for someone whose feelings or intentions matched another's.
TLN 259rhetorical device
“take the present time by the top”
This is a version of the classical proverb 'take Occasion by the forelock' — that is, seize the right moment before it passes. Occasion (or Opportunity) was personified in classical and Renaissance imagery as a bald figure with one long forelock: you could only grasp her as she approached, because once past there was nothing to grab. Don Pedro means to act at once, tonight.