“Speak lower!” Phil said, disquieted.
But even if they had talked louder, no one would have caught a word. Conversation was general around the board. The kissing was finished, and they were smoking cigarettes. The men talked horses, balancing, feats of strength; the ladies talked dress, spangled maillots, gauze skirts.
Phil and Poufaille, at their end of the table, were as free to converse as if they had been alone. Poufaille now bent over Phil, as if to tell him a secret.
“Yes; you swore it!” he continued. “And Suzanne concludes from it that the best of men are worth nothing at all—that men are windmills for lying. When I tell her I love her, that I’ll make her happy—when I swear to her that I cannot live without her, she turns on her heel, saying: ‘That’s all humbug!’ and that she can trust no one, not me more than you; that it costs nothing to get down on one’s knees; that our promises and oaths ought to be stuffed down our throats; and that the way you treated Helia was a shame—”
“Speak lower!” said Phil.
“—that you had promised her marriage,” Poufaille kept on; “that you loved her madly; that if need had been you would have taken God to witness; that you had sworn to her she should be your wife, and that you could not live without her. And, besides, it was no sudden stroke—you had known her for years, you had long loved her. And all at once, without any one knowing why, just because you earn a little money and have talent, while she is only a poor acrobat,—suddenly, without reason, you know her no longer; and if you should meet her in the street, you would turn your head. That’s what Suzanne says; and she has more head than all of us—and more heart, too!”
Poufaille looked toward Suzanne with a sigh. Then he went on again: “Oh, Phil, I should never have told you all this; but, ma foi, it was choking me! I’m not one of your Northern folks, to keep a secret. To me it’s like a starched collar—I must pull it off! Now give me a glass of wine!”
Phil hesitated.
“Pour it out, I tell you,” Poufaille insisted. “I have a fever. It calms me; and, after all, there’s truth in wine!”
Phil poured out a full glass, which Poufaille emptied.