“No, no, my friend! you only waste your time. It cannot be cleaned as easily as that: you cannot do any good. I must have another gown and another kerchief-there is nothing else to be done. Go home and fetch them, and make haste and come back, or we shall lose the Mass in addition to our other troubles.”
The old woman seeing that there was imperative need of the clothes, did not dare to refuse her mistress, and took the gown and kerchief under her mantle, and went home.
She had scarcely turned on her heels, before her mistress was conducted to the chamber where her lover was, who was pleased to see her in a simple petticoat and with her hair down.
Whilst they are talking together, let us return to the old woman, who went back to the house, where she found her master, who did not wait for her to speak, but asked her at once,
“What have you done with my wife? where is she?”
“I have left her,” she replied, “at such a person’s house, in such a place.”
“And for what purpose?” said he.
Then she showed him the gown and the kerchief, and told him about the pitcher of water and ashes, and said that she had been sent to seek other clothes, for her mistress could not leave the place where she was in that state.
“Is that so?” said he. “By Our Lady! that trick is not in my book! Go! Go! I know well what has happened.”
He would have added that he was cuckolded, and I believe he was at that time, and he never again kept a record of the various tricks that had been played on husbands. Moreover, it is believed that he never forgot the trick which had been played on him. There was no need for him to write it down—he preserved a lively memory of it the few good days that he had to live.