Moc. A fit instrument for my purpose! How luckily has fortune brought me to him! [Aside.] Do you hear, sir, 'tis but the slight killing of a man, or so—no more.
Bravo. Is that all?
Moc. Is that nothing?
Bravo. Some queasy stomach might turn, perhaps, at such a motion; but I am more resolved, better hardened. What is he? For I have my several rates, salaries for blood: for a lord, so much; for a knight, so much; a gentleman, so much; a peasant, so much; a stranger, so much, and a native, so much.
Moc. Nay, he is a gentleman, and a citizen of Venice.
Bravo. Let him be what he will, and we can agree: it has been a foolish ambition heretofore to save them, and men were rewarded for it with garlands;[326] but I had rather destroy one or two of them: they multiply too fast.
Moc. Do you know one Signior Aurelio, then? He is the man; he wooed my mistress, and sought to win her from me.
Bravo. A warrantable cause! show me the man, and 'tis enough.
Moc. And what must I give you?
Bravo. At a word, thirty livres: I'll not bate you a betso.[327]