“In that case, there are plenty of places, half hotel, half sanatorium, where the life is as luxurious as can be.”
“I couldn't think of deserting him. Even if he—weren't altogether unselfish about me, there would always be my promise.”
“What does that matter—such a promise?” inquired Edna, between sips of tea.
“You would make one think you were perfectly unscrupulous, dear,” said Florence, smiling. “But you know as well as I, that a promise is sacred.”
“Not all promises. Are they, Tommy?”
“No, not all,” replied Larcher. “It's like this: When you make a bad promise, you inaugurate a wrong. As long as you keep that promise, you perpetuate that wrong. The only way to end the wrong, is to break the promise.”
“Bravo, Tommy! You can't get over logic like that, Florence, dear, and your promise did inaugurate a wrong—a wrong against yourself.”
“Well, then, it's allowable to wrong oneself,” said Florence.
“But not one's friends—one's true, disinterested friends. And as for that other promise of yours—that fearful promise!—you can't deny you wronged somebody by that; somebody you had no right to wrong.”
“It was a choice between him and my father,” replied Florence, in a low voice, and turning very red.