He sat down again, felt his pockets for his snuff-box, took it out, reflected a moment, and then, with another toss of the head, resumed:
“Alas, Monsieur, I am deeply pained at my inability to accept, offhand, a proposition in itself so generous. Pray do not mistake my meaning: I have the sincerest regard for your word of honor as a soldier. I hold for it the same high esteem which you profess for my word of honor as a gentleman. Both, we may rest assured, are of pure alloy, more precious than gold, more trusty than steel. I have implicit confidence in you, Monsieur le capitaine, as you will have the charity to believe! But—have you considered carefully, Monsieur le capitaine? The Secret which you would take in trust so courageously is a burden that weighs more heavily than you realize perhaps. What is needed to betray it? A word merely, a single imprudent word! Who, other than a man bereft of speech, could undertake to withhold such a word eternally? Why, Monsieur le capitaine, how can one deny it? Look at the matter as it actually stands! I ask you: do you never talk in your sleep? Do you always sleep out of hearing of others? Can you be certain never to have a fever, a delirium? That might be enough! That might be enough! You can see the point, I am sure: good faith, by itself, has no practical value in such a serious circumstance. It is no discourtesy to you if we must reject, to our extreme regret, the offer of a promise which might be dangerous to the honor of the man brave enough to make it—with the most earnest intentions, as I know.”
The old man here bowed to me with a very formal deference. When he proceeded, it was with a change of tone:
“But, whatever the course we are finally to adopt, it would help to know with reasonable accuracy, beforehand, whether we may be exaggerating the probability of immediate danger. Monsieur le capitaine, no one is better placed than you to enlighten us on that detail. Will you not tell us therefore: are we right, or are we wrong, in assuming that, with this coming dawn, a patrol will begin looking for you in this neighborhood?”
Without speaking, I nodded in the affirmative.
“Ah,” commented the marquis, with deep concern.
He sat thinking for some moments.
“Your horse,” he finally continued, “they tell me its carcass is lying out there on the Col de la Mort de Gauthier.”
Again I nodded.
His next words were uttered in a subdued tone almost as though he were thinking aloud to himself: