She bent her head
down on them, and began to weep bitterly.
"Surely you must have thought of that?" reiterated Father Rocco.
"Oh, I have often, often thought of it!" murmured the girl "I
have mourned over it, and cried about it in secret for many
nights past. He said I looked pale, and ill, and out of spirits
to-day, and I told him it was with thinking of that!"
"And what did he say in return?"
There was no answer. Father Rocco looked down. Nanina raised her
head directly from his knees, and tried to turn it away again. He
took her hand and stopped her.
"Come!" he said; "speak frankly to me. Say what you ought to say
to your father and your friend. What was his answer, my child,
when you reminded him of the difference between you?"
"He said I was born to be a lady," faltered the girl, still
struggling to turn her face away, "and that I might make myself
one if I would learn and be patient. He said that if he had all
the noble ladies in Pisa to choose from on one side, and only
little Nanina on the other, he would hold out his hand to me, and
tell them, 'This shall be my wife.' He said love knew no
difference of rank; and that if he was a nobleman and rich, it
was all the more reason why he should please himself. He was so
kind, that I thought my heart would burst while he was speaking;
and my little sister liked him so, that she got upon his knee and
kissed him.
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