“I know that you love me,” she said with an attempt at a broken-hearted smile, which even now when I think of it makes me ill, “and I know, too, that you sincerely pity me. But you must let me weep, you know. With these tears it seems to me that my folly departs. I would like only one promise from you, a real man’s promise, your word of honour that you say 'yes’ to the request I am going to make you.”
“You believe in my friendship,” I said to her. “You know that I will obey all your designs, whatever they may be.”
“That is not sufficient,” she said at my evasive reply, behind which, seeing her so excited, I had sheltered a last remnant of prudence. What was she going to ask me? And she insisted: “It is your word of honour I want.”
“You have it,” I told her, overcome by the sad supplication in her dear blue eyes from which the tears still flowed.
“Thank you,” she said as she pressed my hand, and she added: “I want to be sure that you will not say anything to Jacques of what I have told you?”
“I give you my word of honour,” I replied; “but you yourself will not be able to tell him.”
“I?” she replied, shaking her head with grim pride. “I shall tell him nothing. I do not wish him to suspect me of spying upon him. I will quarrel with him without giving a reason. I shall have courage against my love now from disgust. I shall only have to recall what I have seen and heard.”
After her departure my heart-broken pity for her changed into increasing uneasiness. Was I to keep my word to the poor girl and not warn Molan? I knew too well the value of lovers’ oaths to believe that, after assisting in concealment at this rendezvous between her lover and her rival, she would keep to her resolution of a silent rupture without vengeance. It is in vain for a woman to try and bear in her heart that sentimental pride, of which she had given proof in a very unlikely fashion by remaining in her hiding-place; she is still a woman, and sooner or later the pressure of her instinct will overcome her reason and dignity. If a fresh attack of grief overwhelmed the outraged mistress, would she not, when a prey to the delirium of jealousy, write the truth to her rival’s husband? The look came to my mind which Bonnivet had given at his table the woman who bore his name and who was now the mistress of Jacques. How was it that this coquette, so obviously gaunt, so profoundly ironical, and so little impulsive, had given herself thus?
Curiosity to learn the details of this culpable adventure did not enter into the temptation which seized me directly Camille had gone to go and see my friend. At least I could warn him against danger and a surprise likely to be tragic. I, however, resisted this desire, which was almost a need, of warning him through a point of honour which I have never yet failed to keep. That is the result of being the son of a Puritan. My father’s words always came into my mind at times like this: “A promise is not to be interpreted but to be kept.”
I have this principle in my blood and marrow. I cannot recall circumstances when to keep a promise has cost me such an effort.