Father Honoré was silent. He knew the long pent stream of grief and misery must flow in its own channel when once it should burst its bounds.
"My son must never know—you will give me your word?"
"I give you my word, Mrs. Googe."
She leaned forward from her pillows, looked anxiously at the door, which was open into the hall, then whispered:
"She said—my son was Louis Champney's—bastard;—you don't believe it, do you?"
For the space of a second Father Honoré shrank within himself. He could not tell at that moment whether he had here to do with an overwrought brain, with a mind obsessed, or with an awful fact. But he answered without hesitation and out of his inmost conviction:
"No, I do not believe it, Mrs. Googe."
"I thought you wouldn't—Octavius didn't." She sighed profoundly as if relieved from pain. "That's why she hates me—why she will not help."
"In that case I will go to Mr. Van Ostend. I asked to see you that I might tell you this."
"Will you—oh, will you?" She sighed again—a sigh of great physical relief, for she placed her hand again over her heart, pressing it hard.