better. You know I love my father and you because you are both good, and I love Tito too because he is so good. I see it, I feel it, in everything he says and does. And if he is handsome, too, why should I not love him the better for that? It seems to me beauty is part of the finished language by which goodness speaks. You know you must have been a very handsome youth, godfather,”—she looked up with one of her happy, loving smiles at the stately old man—“you were about as tall as Tito, and you had very fine eyes; only you looked a little sterner and prouder, and—”
“And Romola likes to have all the pride to herself?” said Bernardo, not inaccessible to this pretty coaxing. “However, it is well that in one way Tito’s demands are more modest than those of any Florentine husband of fitting rank that we should have been likely to find for you; he wants no dowry.”
So it was settled in that way between Messer Bernardo del Nero, Romola, and Tito.
Bardo assented with a wave of the hand when Bernardo told him that he thought it would be well now to begin to sell property and clear off debts; being accustomed to think of debts and property as a sort of thick wood that his imagination never even penetrated, still less got beyond.
And Tito set about winning Messer Bernardo’s respect by inquiring, with his ready faculty, into Florentine money-matters, the secrets of the Monti or public funds, the values of real property, and the profits of banking.
“You will soon forget that Tito is not a Florentine, godfather,” said Romola. “See how he is learning everything about Florence.”
“It seems to me he is one of the demoni , who are of no particular country, child,” said Bernardo, smiling. “His mind is a little too nimble to be weighted with all the stuff we men carry about in our hearts.”