In Act 4, we see Sparafucile (Alon Eshet) preparing for an evening's work. Rigoletto (Yevgeny Yablonovsky) has contracted with him to kill the Duke, and brings Gilda (Catherine Rooney) along so that she can see what kind of man the Duke is. He hopes that she will lose her love for him when she sees what an unprincipled lecher he is.

The Duke (Jeremy Corneil) soon arrives, arranges with Sparafucile for a room for the night, and is soon putting the make on Maddalena, Sparafucile’s sister (Elizabeth McLeod).
A heartbroken Gilda and a vengeful Rigoletto watch through a crack in the wall.

Rigoletto tells Gilda that she must flee to Verona, where he will meet her. When she leaves, he makes the first payment to Sparafucile — the rest will be paid when the Duke is dead.
Maddalena, however, has fallen in love with the Duke and begs her brother not to kill him. Sparafucile agrees, but only if they can substitute the body of another victim — anyone else who might turn up at their door before midnight.

Gilda overhears this arrangement (left), and though she knows the Duke is false, resolves to die in order to save him. She knocks on the door, pretends to be a poor indigent with no shelter from the storm, and is stabbed (right) when she enters.
Sparafucile stuffs her body into a sack, and hands it over to Rigoletto when he returns. The jester is about to push the sack into the river when he hears the Duke singing in the distance. Horrified, he discovers it is Gilda, not the Duke, he has paid to have killed. She begs her father to forgive her, and dies. Rigoletto realizes that Monterone’s curse has finally been fulfilled.

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