Earthwork out of Tuscany eBook

And your hair strays where it likes at present.  I know you have a golden fillet of box-leaves round your brow:  that is because you are only a little girl still, not more than twelve.  And you have tied the ends up in a sort of knot.  But you romp so much and laugh so—­I know you have two bright rows of little teeth—­that you can never expect to keep tidy.  Why, even now, while I am scolding you, you are itching to laugh and run away.  I see a wavy lock trailing down your neck, ragazza, and those heavy tresses on your temples, instead of being drawn meekly back, droop down over your temples, and cover up your little ears.  Don’t you know that Florentine, ladies are proud of their foreheads, and when they have pretty ears, always show them?  Some day, my dear, you will go out into the world; and your hair will be twisted up into coils with gold braid; perhaps you will have on it a flowery garland of Messer Domenico’s making, and a string of Venice beads round your throat.  And when that time comes, you won’t let the sun play with your neck any more; he won’t know his romp when he sees her in stiff velvet of Genoa and a high collar edged with seed-pearls.

And you won’t look me in the eyes as you are doing now, saucy girl, with your chin pushed forward and your mouth all in a pucker—­who’s to know whether you are going to pout or giggle?—­and your pert green eyes wide open, as if to say “Who’s this old thickhead staring at me so hard?” No, Bettina, you will drop them instead; you will blush all over your neck and cheeks, and hang your round head.  You have chestnuts in your two fists now, I know; there’s some of the flour sticking to the corners of your mouth, little slut.  But then you will have a fan perhaps, or a spyglass, or at least a mass-book in the mornings; and when I am looking at you, your ringers will tie themselves in knots and be very interesting.  In two years’ time, Bettina!

But though I shan’t love you half as much as I do now, I shall always come to see you, I think; and, as I shall be a very old man by that time, perhaps you will still sit on a stool at my knee and give me a kiss now and then—­oh, a mere bird’s peck, just for kindness....  The Via de’ Bardi is grey, and you are there in yellow.  You are like a young daffodil dancing in the winter grass.  But soon you will have strained to your full flower-time, and I see you in your summering, lithe and rather languid, with heavy-lidded eyes, and a slow smile.

Then you will not dance; but, instead, you will stoop gravely like a tall garden lily, and give your white hand to the lover kneeling below.

And all in two years, my little Bettina!

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