“Of you. I have been wondering whether, if I had died, you would have sometimes remembered me?”
“Remembered you?” I said earnestly. “Why, of course, dearest. Why do you speak in such a melancholy tone?”
“Because—well, because I am unhappy, Gerald!” she cried, bursting into sudden tears. “Ah! you do not know how I suffer—you can never know!”
I bent and stroked her hair, that beautiful red-gold hair that I had so often heard admired in the great salons in Brussels. It had been bound but lightly by her maid, and was secured by a blue ribbon. She had apologised for receiving me thus, but declared that her head ached, and it was easier so. Doctor Deane had called twice that morning, and had pronounced her entirely out of danger.
“But why are you suffering?” I asked, caressing her and striving to charm away her tears. “Cannot you confide in me?”
She shook her head in despair, and her body was shaken by a convulsive sob.
“Surely there is confidence between us?” I urged. “Do you not remember that day long ago when we walked one evening in the sunset hand-in-hand, as was our wont, along the river-path towards La Roche? Do you not remember how you told me that in future you would have no single secret from me?”
“Yes,” she answered hoarsely, with an effort, “I recollect.”
“Then you intend to break your promise to me?” I whispered earnestly. “Surely you will not do this, Yolande? You will not hide from me the cause of all this bitterness of yours?” She was silent. Her breast, beneath its lace, rose quickly and fell again. Her tear-filled eyes were fixed upon the carpet.
“I would not break my promise,” she said at last, clasping my hand convulsively and lifting her eyes to mine; “but, alas! it is now imperative.”