Now Travaglino, as soon as the lady had taken her departure, began to feel somewhat troubled in mind and to cast about for some excuse which he might bring forward to his master when he should be called upon to account for the death of the bull with the gilded horns, which was so greatly beloved by Emilliano. While the wretched Travaglino was held by these torments of his mind, knowing neither what to say or to do, it came into his head at last to take a branch of one of the pruned trees which grew about, and to dress this up with some of his own poor garments, and to make believe that it was Emilliano. Then, standing before this scarecrow, he proposed to make trial of what he should do and say when he should be brought face to face with his master. Wherefore, after he had set up the tree branch thus bedizened in a chamber of the house with his own cap on its head and with certain of his garments upon its back, Travaglino went out from the chamber for a short space of time, and then came back and entered, saluting the branch as he went in, and saying, ‘Good day, my master!’ and then, making answer out of his own mouth, he replied, ‘I am glad to see you, Travaglino. How do you find yourself, and how are things going on at the farm? It is a long time since I have seen anything of you.’ ‘I am very well,’ replied Travaglino, ‘but I have been so busy of late that I have not been able to find time to come and see you.’ ‘How did you leave the bull with the gilded horns?’ asked Emilliano, and then Travaglino made as if he would answer: ‘Master, I have to tell you that your favourite bull has been eaten of wolves while he was straying in the woods.’ ‘Then where are his skin and his gilded horns?’ Emilliano inquired. And when he had come to this point poor Travaglino could not hit upon any answer he could possibly give; so, wellnigh overcome with grief, he left the chamber. After a little he came in again and recommenced his discourse by saying, ‘God keep us all, good master!’ ‘And you also, Travaglino,’ said Emilliano, ‘and how prosper things at the farm? how is the bull with the gilded horns?’ ‘I am very well,’ said Travaglino, ‘but one day lately the bull broke out of the yard, and having fallen a-fighting with some of the other bulls, was so heavily mauled by them that he died of his injuries straightway.’ ‘Then where are his skin and his gilded horns?’ asked Emilliano. Whereupon Travaglino knew no better what answer he should give to this question than before. Finally, having gone through the same discourse several times, he had to give up the matter in despair, through not being able to devise any reply which sounded at all reasonable.