He sat upright again for a minute, and then said, in the same tone as before,
“Why should it not be? I will think of it; I will talk with Bernardo.”
Tito felt a disagreeable chill at this answer, for Bernardo del Nero’s eyes had retained their keen suspicion whenever they looked at him, and the uneasy remembrance of Fra Luca converted all uncertainty into fear.
“Speak for me, Romola,” he said, pleadingly. “Messer Bernardo is sure to be against me.”
“No, Tito,” said Romola, “my godfather will not oppose what my father firmly wills. And it is your will that I should marry Tito—is it not true, father? Nothing has ever come to me before that I have wished for strongly: I did not think it possible that I could care so much for anything that could happen to myself.”
It was a brief and simple plea; but it was the condensed story of Romola’s self-repressing colourless young life, which had thrown all its passion into sympathy with aged sorrows, aged ambition, aged pride and indignation.
It had never occurred to Romola that she should not speak as directly and emphatically of her love for Tito as of any other subject.
“Romola mia!” said her father fondly, pausing on the words, “it is true thou hast never urged on me any wishes of thy own. And I have no will to resist thine; rather, my heart met Tito’s entreaty at its very first utterance.