When blackest clouds obscured the skies and stormy tempests affrighted the air with their thunderous roar, I descended from my post, and, if nothing else occurred to me to do, I betook myself to my chamber. Thither I summoned my attendants, and passed the time in relating, or in having related, divers stories. And the farther the tales of my maidens were from the truth—a thing to be expected from most people of their condition—the greater seemed their power to drive away my sighs and bring some delectation to me as I listened; so that, occasionally, nathless all my melancholy, I laughed most joyously.
At other times, I feigned to myself that Panfilo was with me, and, so feigning, I said many things to him and asked him many questions; to these questions I replied, feigning to myself that the answers were from him and not from me; and it sometimes betided that, in the middle of such imagined discourse, I fell asleep. And certainly such sleep was much more welcome to me than wakefulness, inasmuch as I truly then beheld him whom I had feigned to be with me when lying awake.
Sometimes methought he had returned and I was wandering along with him in most beautiful gardens, adorned with the rarest of fruits, flowers, and foliage, as if unalarmed of aught, as we were wont to be of old; and there, while he held my hand and I his, I made him recount everything that had happened to him, and often, before he concluded a phrase, meseemed that I broke the words in two with a kiss, and, as if all that I saw was real, I said: “What! thou hast, in good sooth, returned, then? Certainly, thou hast, and now I hold thee forever!”
Oh, how vexatious it was to me when it betided that sleep forsook me! For it bore away with itself that which freely and of its own accord it had lent me. Yet though for a time I remained very sad; nor did I spend the remainder of the day following in such content, always looking forward to the return of night, to the end that I might have that, when asleep, which I could not have when awake.
Still, albeit on some nights sleep was most gracious to me, on others it ordained that I should not enjoy the sweetness thereof unmixed with the bitterness of affliction, inasmuch as there were many of these nights in which meseemed to behold my lover garbed in the vilest sort of raiment, all stained with spots so black that I never knew the like. With features deadly pale, and quivering with anguish, he appeared to me to be running toward me and shrieking aloud: “Help me! help me!” At other times, methought I heard a number of persons speak of him as of one who was dead; and at others, it befell that I beheld him dead before my very eyes; at others, he assumed many and various forms that were to me singular. But at no time did my sleep have greater strength than my sorrow, so that, suddenly awaking and witting at once the vanity of my dreaming, I was content with my dream, and thanked God therefor.
In such manner did I pass the days and nights, anxiously expectant of an end to my sorrows. But when the time appointed for his return drew nearer, I judged it wise to change my mode of life, to take heart and be of good cheer, to the end that my beauties and graces, somewhat injured by my many and long-endured sufferings, might be restored to their due places, and that I, when he again beheld me, might not be displeasing to him through any lack of comeliness.
I found this not at all difficult to accomplish, seeing that, having been so long accustomed to troubles, I was now able to bear them, if not lightly, yet without much labor; and, furthermore, the hope of his promised return, having now become stronger, inspired me every day with an ever-increasing gladness to which I had long been a stranger. The festive entertainments which I had almost suspended, assigning as a cause thereof the inclement weather, I now resumed at the beginning of the new season.
As the soul long engulfed in the bitterness of grievous woes expands when it exchanges a life of pain for a life of pleasure, so I seemed to my companions more beautiful now than I ever had seemed before. My costly attire and my precious ornaments I tried to render more magnificent than when I first wore them; and, like the valiant knight, who, when need requires, polishes and repairs his strong arms for the future combat, so I made ready to appear to him more splendidly vestured and more nobly adorned on his return, a return for which I, the most deceived of women, was to wait in vain.
Woe is me! how often did I say: “As soon as he is within reach of my arms, I shall kiss him a hundred thousand times, and thereafter my kisses will be so multiplied that no word will they allow to pass his lips; and twice a hundred-fold will I return those which he showered on my face as I lay unconscious in his arms, without power to give him back a single one.” Frequently I doubted in my thoughts, whether I should be able to restrain my insatiable longing to embrace him the very moment I perceived him, no matter who might then be present. But of all these things the gods had a care, and so ordered them that they should all work together for my greater desolation.
Whenever I happened to be in my chamber, and some one entered, how often did I believe that she had come to say to me: “Panfilo, has returned!” Nay, never did I hear words uttered in any place that my ears were not at once bent to catch them, I thinking or hoping that they must in some way be concerned with the approaching arrival of Panfilo. When seated, I started up more than a hundred times, and, running to the window, pretending to be curious about something or other, I gazed up and down, saying to myself in my folly: “Panfilo has arrived and is coming now to see thee.”
And, after a while, discovering how vain was my hope, I returned to my room in confusion. Feigning that when he came back, he was to bring with him certain things for my husband of the greatest value, I often asked, and directed others to ask, whether he had returned, or whether he was expected, and when. But to these questions no comforting answer ever reached me, no more than if he were never more to come, as of a truth so it betided.
Chapter IV
Wherein this lady showeth what her thoughts were like and what her life was like, the appointed day having come and Panfilo not returned.
Tormented by these anxieties, compassionate ladies, I not only reached the much desired and long expected period, but passed beyond it by several days. Still was I uncertain whether I should blame him or not for this delay, although my former hopefulness was somewhat weakened, and I partly abandoned the cheerful thought which I had perhaps too amply entertained. Fresh ideas, which had not been there before, began to flit through my brain; and arresting for the time the tendency that was in my mind to learn what was or what could be the reason why Panfilo was delaying his return longer than he had solemnly promised, I began to have other conceptions. Above aught else, I discovered as many circumstances that should plead in his excuse as he himself would have been able to discover, were he present, and, perchance, more. I would sometimes say:
“O Fiammetta, for shame! Wherefore dost thou believe that thy Panfilo has other cause for staying away from thee and not returning, except that it is no longer in his power to act as he would wish? Unforeseen calamities are often visited on the heads of others as well as on thine; nor is it so possible to fulfil the conditions of a compact made for the future as some believe. Now, why should I doubt that he feels his affection for me here more binding than even the filial piety which has detained him yonder? Sure I am, and exceeding sure, that he loves me to excess, and is now thinking of the bitterness of my life, and has great ruth thereof; and incited by his love, has often wished to come away. But haply his aged parent has, by his tears and prayers, a little prolonged the term, and, thwarting his desires, has retained him almost by force. He will come when he can.”
And by these arguments and excuses I was frequently forced to admit into my mind other newer and more grievous ideas. Sometimes I said:
“Who knows but that he, more eager than he even ought to be for a sight of me, laying aside
