“If he’s a gentleman, he must stand to
his word,” John repeated, “unless she
releases him.”
I fumbled again for my letter. “That’s
just about what he says himself,” I rejoined,
sitting down. “He thinks he ought to take
the consequences.”
“Of course!” John Mayrant’s face
was very stern as he sat in judgment on himself.
“But why should she take the consequences?”
I asked.
“What consequences?”
“Being married to a man who doesn’t want
her, all her life, until death them do part.
How’s that? Having the daily humiliation
of his indifference, and the world’s knowledge
of his indifference. How’s that? Perhaps
having the further humiliation of knowing that his
heart belongs to another woman. How’s that?
That’s not what a girl bargains for. His
standing to his word is not an act of honor, but a
deception. And in talking about ‘taking
the consequences,’ he’s patting his personal
sacrifice on the back and forgetting all about her
and the sacrifice he’s putting her to.
What’s the brief suffering of a broken engagement
to that? No: the true consequences that a
man should shoulder for making such a mistake is the
poor opinion that society holds of him for placing
a woman in such a position; and to free her is the
most honorable thing he can do. Her dignity suffers
less so than if she were a wife chained down to perpetual
disregard.”
John, after a silence, said: “That is a
very curious view.”
“That is the view I shall give my friend,”
I answered. “I shall tell him that in keeping
on he is not at bottom honestly thinking of the girl
and her welfare, but of himself and the public opinion
he’s afraid of, if he breaks his engagement.
And I shall tell him that if I’m in church and
they come to the place where they ask if any man knows
just cause or impediment, I shall probably call out,
’He does! His heart’s not in it.
This is not marriage that he’s committing.
You’re pronouncing your blessing upon a fraud.’”
John sat now a long time silent, holding his extinct
cigar. The lamp was almost burned dry; we had
blown out the expiring candles some while since.
“That is a very curious view,” he repeated.
“I should like to hear what your friend says
in answer.”
This finished our late sitting. We opened the
door and went out for a brief space into the night
to get its pure breath into our lungs, and look to
the distant place where the moon had sailed. Then
we went to bed, or rather, I did; for the last thing
that I remembered was John, standing by the window
of our bedroom still dressed, looking out into the
forest.
