Marcolina's window or from any of the others. Rising to his feet with an
aching back, he stretched body and limbs, and felt himself restored to
his senses, as though re-transformed from a whipped hound into a human
being--doomed to feel the chastisement, not as bodily pain, but as
profound humiliation.

"Why," he asked himself, "did I not go to the window while it was still
open? Why did I not leap over the sill? Could she have offered any
resistance; would she have dared to do so; hypocrite, liar, strumpet?"

He continued to rail at her as though he had a right to do so, as though
he had been her lover to whom she had plighted troth and whom she had
betrayed. He swore to question her face to face; to denounce her before
Olivo, Amalia, the Marchese, the Abbate, the servants, as nothing better
than a lustful little whore. As if for practice, he recounted to himself
in detail what he had just witnessed, delighting in the invention of
incidents which would degrade her yet further. He would say that she had
stood naked at the window; that she had permitted the unchaste caresses
of her lover while the morning wind played upon them both.

After thus allaying the first vehemence of his anger, he turned
to consider whether he might not make a better use of his present
knowledge. Was she not in his power? Could he not now exact by threats
the favors which she had not been willing to grant him for love? But
this infamous design was speedily abandoned; not so much because
Casanova realized its infamy, as because, even while the plan crossed
his mind, he was aware of its futility. Why should Marcolina,
accountable to no one but herself, be concerned at his threats? In the
last resort she was astute enough, if needs must, to have him driven
from the house as a slanderer and blackmailer. Even if, for one reason