"I know too well where they are," he said. "But I've wanted a good talk with you, face to face,—not with a veil of commonplace people between. You're not yourself among them. I like you best when your spirits are a little ruffled, and your eye kindles, and your lip curls, as it does now,—not when you say, "No, Sir," or "Yes, Ma'am," and smile as though it were only skin-deep."
I started my horse.
"Let's be going, Jessie," I said. "It's our duty to feel insulted. He accuses your mistress of being deceitful among her friends, and says he likes her when she's cross."
He laughed lightly, and walked along by my side.
"How are your ladies? and when will Miss Lucy come to ride out with me?" I asked, fearing a look into his eyes.
This brought him down. I knew it would.
He answered that she was well, and walked along with his head down, quite like another man. At length he looked up, very pale, and put his hand on my bridle.
"I want to put a case to you," he said. "Suppose a man to have made some engagement before his mind was mature, and under a strong outside pressure of which he was not aware. When he grows to a better knowledge of the world and himself, and finds that he has been half cheated, and that to keep his word will entail lasting misery and ruin on himself, without really benefiting any one else, is he bound to keep it?"
I stopped an instant to press my heart back, and then I answered him.
"A promise is a promise, Mr. Ames. I have thought that a man of honor valued his word more than happiness or life."