"I will not, I will stay with you now and for all time. Listen! I feel a strong desire to hold a long discourse with you on jealousy. But first we ought to conciliate the offended gods."
"Rather, first the discourse and afterward the gods."
"You are right, we are not yet worthy of them. It takes you a long time to get over it after you have been disturbed and annoyed about something. How nice it is that you are so sensitive!"
"I am no more sensitive than you are—only in a different way."
"Well then, tell me! I am not jealous—how does it happen that you are?"
"Am I, unless I have cause to be? Answer me that!"
"I do not know what you mean."
"Well, I am not really jealous. But tell me: What were you talking about all yesterday evening?"
"So? It is Amalia of whom you are jealous? Is it possible? That nonsense? I did not talk about anything with her, and that was the funny part of it. Did I not talk just as long with Antonio, whom a short time ago I used to see almost every day?"
"You want me to believe that you talk in the same way with the coquettish Amalia that you do with the quiet, serious Antonio. Of course! It is nothing more than a case of clear, pure friendship!"