II Of living like a wife
When a courtesan is living as a wife with her lover, she should behave like a chaste woman, and do everything to his satisfaction. Her duty in this respect, in short, is that she should give him pleasure, but should not become attached to him, though behaving as if she were really attached.
Now the following is the manner in which she is to conduct herself, so as to accomplish the above-mentioned purpose. She should have a mother dependent on her, one who should be represented as very harsh, and who looks upon money as her chief object in life. In the event of there being no mother, then an old and confidential nurse should play the same role. The mother or nurse, on their part, should appear to be displeased with the lover, and forcibly take her away from him. The woman herself should always show pretended anger, dejection, fear, and shame on this account, but should not disobey the mother or nurse at any time.
She should make out to the mother or nurse that the man is suffering from bad health, and making this a pretext for going to see him, she should go on that account. She is moreover, to do the following things for the purpose of gaining the man’s favor.