Thus Peppe gained the door.
"Say, friar; in my ear, now--Was that a hare you stewed, or an outworn sandal ?" "Now, God forgive me," roared the monk, springing towards him.
"For your cooking?
Aye, pray--on your knees." He dodged a blow, ducked, and doubled back into the room.

"A cook, you?
Pish! you tun of convent lard! Your ortolans were burnt, your trout swam in grease, your pasty----" What the pasty may have been the company was not to learn, for Fra Domenico, crimson of face, had swooped down upon the fool, and would have caught him but that he dived under the table by Valentina's skirts, and craved her protection from this gross maniac that held himself a cook.
"Now, hold your wrath, father," she said, laughing with the rest.

"He does but plague you.

Bear with him for the sake of that beautitude you cited, which has fired him to reprisals." Mollified, but still grumbling threats of a beating to be bestowed on Peppe when the opportunity should better serve him, the friar turned to his domestic duties.

They rose soon after, and at Gonzaga's suggestion Valentina paused in the great hall to issue orders that Fortemani be brought before her for judgment.