was a good deal cooler than she would have liked—that
she saw day break; whereupon, disconcerted that it
had not fallen out as the scholar had promised, she
said to herself:—I misdoubt me he was minded
to give me such a night as I gave him; but if such
was his intent, he is but maladroit in his revenge,
for this night is not as long by a third as his was,
besides which, the cold is of another quality.
And that day might not overtake her there, she began
to think of descending, but, finding that the ladder
was removed, she felt as if the world had come to
nought beneath her feet, her senses reeled, and she
fell in a swoon upon the floor of the roof. When
she came to herself, she burst into tears and piteous
lamentations, and witting now very well that ’twas
the doing of the scholar, she began to repent her that
she had first offended him, and then trusted him unduly,
having such good cause to reckon upon his enmity;
in which frame she abode long time. Then, searching
if haply she might find some means of descent, and
finding none, she fell a weeping again, and bitterly
to herself she said:—Alas for thee, wretched
woman! what will thy brothers, thy kinsmen, thy neighbours,
nay, what will all Florence say of thee, when ’tis
known that thou hast been found here naked? Thy
honour, hitherto unsuspect, will be known to have
been but a shew, and shouldst thou seek thy defence
in lying excuses, if any such may be fashioned, the
accursed scholar, who knows all thy doings, will not
suffer it. Ah! poor wretch! that at one and the
same time hast lost thy too dearly cherished gallant
and thine own honour! And therewith she was taken
with such a transport of grief, that she was like
to cast herself from the tower to the ground.
Then, bethinking her that if she might espy some lad
making towards the tower with his sheep, she might
send him for her maid, for the sun was now risen,
she approached one of the parapets of the tower, and
looked out, and so it befell that the scholar, awakening
from a slumber, in which he had lain a while at the
foot of a bush, espied her, and she him. Whereupon:—“Good-day,
Madam,” quoth he:—“are the damsels
yet come?” The lady saw and heard him not without
bursting afresh into a flood of tears, and besought
him to come into the tower, that she might speak with
him: a request which the scholar very courteously
granted. The lady then threw herself prone on
the floor of the roof; and, only her head being visible
through the aperture, thus through her sobs she spoke:—“Verily,
Rinieri, if I gave thee a bad night, thou art well
avenged on me, for, though it be July, meseemed I
was sore a cold last night, standing here with never
a thread upon me, and, besides, I have so bitterly
bewept both the trick I played thee and my own folly
in trusting thee, that I marvel that I have still
eyes in my head. Wherefore I implore thee, not
for love of me, whom thou hast no cause to love, but
for the respect thou hast for thyself as a gentleman,