"I think we might as well close with it at once, don't you, Savilla ?" "If you are sure it's only forty francs----" Miss Dassonville was doubtful.
"Quite sure," Peter was very prompt.

"You see they keep them so constantly employed at the hotel"-- which seemed satisfactorily to make way for the arrangement that the gondola was to call for the two ladies the next morning.
"Giuseppe," Weatheral demanded as he stepped out of the gondola at the hotel landing, "how much do I pay you ?" "Sixty francs, _Signore_." Peter had no doubt the extra ten was divided between his own man and the gondolier, but he was not thinking of that.
"I have a very short memory," he said, "and I have told the _Signora_ and the _Signorina_ forty francs.

If they ask you, you are to tell them forty francs; and listen, Beppe, every franc over that you tell them, I shall deduct from your _pourboire_ when I leave, do you understand ?" "_Si, Signore_." VIII A morning or two after the arrangement about the gondola Peter was leaning over the bridge of San Moise watching the sun on the copper vessels the women brought to the fountain, when his man came to him.
This Luigi he had picked up at Naples for the chief excellence of his English and a certain seraphic bearing that led Peter to say to him that he would cheerfully pay a much larger wage if he could only be certain Luigi would not cheat him.
"Oh _Signore!_ In Italy?
_Impossible!_" "In that case," said Peter, "if you can't be honest with me, be as honest as you can"-- but he had to accept the lifted shoulders and the Raphael smile as his only security.

However, Luigi had made him comfortable and as he approached him now it was without any misgiving.
"I have just seen Giuseppe and the gondola," he announced.

"They are at the Palazza Rezzonico, and after that they go to San Georgio degli Sclavoni.