Tofano and Ghita
Intro
- Storyteller: Lauretta
- Lauretta praises Love for giving even stupid lovers the ingenuity to hide their lies and schemes.
- To illustrate such ingenuity, she'll tell the story of a woman who really doesn't have much going on upstairs, but who still managed to find her way around a sticky situation.
Story
- A man called Tofano marries a very beautiful woman named Monna Ghita. He immediately becomes jealous of her.
- Since Ghita's done nothing to deserve this, she decides to torment her new husband.
- So she finds herself a handsome young man and quickly devises a way to be with him.
- Ghita finds her husband's Achilles' heel: he loves the drink. She encourages him to get plastered in the evenings so she can put him to bed and do what she likes with her lover.
- But Tofano realizes that his wife never drinks with him. He starts to suspect what she's doing.
- One night, he just pretends to be drunk, so his wife puts him to bed as usual and goes over to her lover's house. Tofano waits until she's gone and bolts the door after her.
- Ghita returns and is left howling on the doorstep to be let in. Tofano refuses.
- Then Ghita gets some inspiration. She tells Tofano that she'll hurl herself into the well if he doesn't let her in. The neighbors will think he killed her in a drunken rage.
- Tofano isn't buying it, so he stands fast. Ghita throws a huge stone into the well to dupe Tofano into thinking she made good on her threat.
- Tofano's horrified when he hears the splash. He runs to the well to save his wife, but Ghita is waiting by the door for her chance.
- Now the tables are turned: Tofano's on the step and Ghita locks herself inside the house. She begins to scream as loudly as possible about his drunken behavior.
- Pretty soon there's a real ruckus and the neighbors get involved. Ghita plays the poor, helpless wife of a drunken jerk. Tofano tries to tell the truth but no one believes him.
- Then Ghita's kinsfolk get wind of the situation and beat Tofano within an inch of his life. They pack up Ghita and her belongings and take her home with them.
- Tofano realizes that he wants his wife back, and after lots of negotiating and promising never again to be jealous, they're reconciled.
- In this way, Ghita's basically given permission to do as she pleased from then on.