"Remember, Bardo," he said at length, "thou hast a rare gem of thy own;
take care no one gets it who is not like to pay a worthy price. That
pretty Greek has a sleekness about him that seems marvelously fitted for
slipping into any nest he fixes his mind on."


_III.--The Man who was Wronged_


It was undeniable that Tito's coming had been the dawn of a new life for
both father and daughter, and he grew to care for Romola supremely--to
wish to have her for his beautiful and loving wife.

He took her place as Bardo's assistant, and served him with an easy
efficiency that had been beyond her; and she, happier in her father's
happiness, had given her love to Tito even before he ventured to offer
her his own. He was thus sailing under the fairest breeze, and besides
convincing fair judges that his talents squared with his good fortune,
he wore that fortune so unpretentiously that no one seemed to be
offended by it.

And that was not the whole of Tito's good fortune, for he had sold his
jewels, and was master of full five hundred gold florins. Yet the moment
when he first had this sum in his possession was the crisis of the first
serious struggle his facile, good-humoured nature had known.

"A man's ransom!" Who was it that had said five hundred florins was more
than a man's ransom? If, now, under this mid-day sun, on some hot coast
far away, a man somewhat stricken in years--a man not without high
thoughts, and with the most passionate heart--a man who long years ago