«Most scrupulously true in all particulars.»
«You … You pledge your word for that? Your honour as a gentleman? For I must assume you a gentleman, since you bear commissions from the King.»
«And on no other ground?» quoth he, a little taken aback.
«Do you pledge me your word?» she insisted.
«Unhesitatingly. My word of honour. Why should you doubt me?»
«You give me cause. You are not truthful in all things. Why, for instance, do you say you are my cousin?»
«You do not, then, remember me?»
«I remember Pedro de Queiroz. The years might have given you height and slenderness; the sun might have tanned your face, and under your black periwig your hair may still be fair, though I take leave to doubt it. But what, I ask myself, could have changed the colour of your eyes? For your eyes are blue, and Pedro's were dark brown.»
He was silent a moment, like a man considering, and she watched his stern, handsome face, made plain by the light beating upon it from the windows of the house. He did not meet her glance. Instead his eyes sought the sea, gleaming under the bright stars and reflecting the twinkling lights of ships in the roadstead, watched the fireflies flitting among the bushes in pursuit of moths, looked anywhere but at the little figure at his side.
At last he spoke, quietly, almost humorously, in admission of the imposture. «We hoped you would have forgotten such a detail.»