and his men, from
the neighborhood of Arezzo, in the hope that perhaps he and they might
be of some service to the authorities in aiding them to keep the public
peace.

Now, Messer Griffo said what he said in a very loud voice, so that as
many as might be should hear him. As the people were keeping very still
since the coming of the mercenaries, out of eagerness and curiosity,
very many did hear him, and naturally Messer Simone, that was only a few
feet away, heard him. It seemed as if his rage and hatred boiled over
within him, so that he could not abide in silence, but must needs give
speech to his spleen. So he urged his horse a little forward and looked
straight at Messer Griffo, and very fiercely. Then he called out, in a
huge voice, "Florence has come to a poor pass if her peace depends upon
a scoundrel and his strumpet!" And as he said this he pointed a great
finger direct at Vittoria, and burst out into a horrible laugh. And
Griffo showed no sign that he had as much as heard Simone, but the woman
went pale under the insult, and tried to speak, but at first she could
not.

At length, in a little, she found her breath, and she cried back at the
giant: "You have won your wager, Messer Simone, and I wish you joy of
your winning and the wife that loves another lord! But I would not have
you now or ever, for I have found a better man!"

At this I guessed, and was right in my guesswork, that she meant Messer
Griffo, of whom, it seems, that she had suddenly become overweeningly
fond, as indeed he of her. Then Madonna Vittoria pulled with her right
hand at a finger of her left, and drew thence a heavy gold ring that
carried a great emerald set in its socket, and I remembered, as I saw
that this was the ring she had staked in her wager against Simone's
promise to wed. She rose a little in her stirrups, holding up the ring.
"Take your gain, beast!" she screamed, and she flung the ring with all
her force in Simone's face, and struck him on the left cheek and cut it
open, and the ring fell clattering to the ground among the horses'
hooves, and the red blood ran over Simone's face, very ugly to behold.

What happened then happened more quickly than I can write it down,
happened more quickly than I could tell it across a table to a friend.
With a cry that was more like the bellow of some beast of the field than
any sound of a man's voice, Simone drove his horse against Vittoria,
and, bending over his charger's neck, gripp