lack, yes,'
replied Calandrino; 'she hath slain me.' Quoth Bruno, 'I must go see
an it be she I suppose; and if it be so, leave me do.' Accordingly, he
went down into the courtyard and finding Filippo and Niccolosa there,
told them precisely what manner of man Calandrino was and took order
with them of that which each of them should do and say, so they might
divert themselves with the lovesick gull and make merry over his
passion. Then, returning to Calandrino, he said, 'It is indeed she;
wherefore needs must the thing be very discreetly managed, for, should
Filippo get wind of it, all the water in the Arno would not wash us.
But what wouldst thou have me say to her on thy part, if I should
chance to get speech of her?' 'Faith,' answered Calandrino, 'thou
shalt tell her, to begin with, that I will her a thousand measures of
that good stuff that getteth with child, and after, that I am her
servant and if she would have aught.... Thou takest me?' 'Ay,' said
Bruno, 'leave me do.'

Presently, supper-time being come, the painters left work and went
down into the courtyard, where they found Filippo and Niccolosa and
tarried there awhile, to oblige Calandrino. The latter fell to ogling
Niccolosa and making the oddest grimaces in the world, such and so
many that a blind man would have remarked them. She on her side did
everything that she thought apt to inflame him, and Filippo, in
accordance with the instructions he had of Bruno, made believe to talk
with Buffalmacco and the others and to have no heed of this, whilst
taking the utmost diversion in Calandrino's fashions. However, after a
while, to the latter's exceeding chagrin, they took their leave and as
they returned to Florence, Bruno said to Calandrino, 'I can tell thee
thou makest her melt like ice in the sun. Cock's body, wert thou to
fetch thy rebeck and warble thereto some of those amorous ditties of
thine, thou wouldst cause her cast herself out of window to come to
thee.' Quoth Calandrino, 'Deemest thou, gossip? Deemest thou I should
do well to fetch it?' 'Ay, do I,' answered Bruno; and Calandrino went
on, 'Thou wouldst not credit me this morning, whenas I told it thee;
but, for certain, gossip, methinketh I know better than any man alive
to do what I will. Who, other than I, had known to make such a lady so
quickly in love with me? Not your trumpeting young braggarts,[432] I
warrant you, who are up and down all day long and could not make
shift, in a thousand year