"What are a man's debts of honor?" I went on with growing excitement. "Gaming debts and things he would scarcely care to explain to the public at large. Your honor is involved in this, is it? And you must save your honor at all hazards, no matter who goes to the wall in the process! I suppose if you made the rash vow that, if your horse won the race, you would cut your mother's head off, while you were still in the flush of victory, you would seize your bowie-knife and go to work! No? Oh, yes, Charlie. Your honor, as you call it, is involved. I insist upon it. You must do it. Oh, I am going too far, am I? Not one step further than men go in the mire whither their honor leads them. Debts of honor, indeed! Debts of dishonor I call them. So do most women." "Yes, but, Ruth," interrupted Charlie uneasily, "an engagement is different. I don't dispute what you say in regard to gambling debts--" "You can't," I murmured rebelliously. "--but a man can't, with any decency, ask a girl to release him when he has sought her out and asked her to marry him." "Perhaps not with decency. But it is a place where this precious honor of yours might come into play. It would at least be honorable." "There isn't a man who would agree with you," he cried. "Nor is there a woman who would agree with you," I retorted. But both of us stretched things a little at this point. He thought over the situation for a few minutes, then said, "You understand that, in my opinion, Louise loves me the best." "The best--yes. For that very reason you must not marry her. O Charlie! try to understand," I pleaded. "She must love the best when she loves at all. She has loved the best in you, until she has put it out of your reach ever to attain to it. It would not be fair to the girl, it would be robbing her, to accept all this beautiful love for you, and give her in return--your love for another girl. Do you suppose for an instant that you could continue to deceive her after you were married? Supposing she found out afterwards, then what? She might die of that. I cannot say. It would be enough to kill her. But not if you are honest and manly enough to tell her in time to save her self-respect. You are powerless to touch it now. You could kill it if you were married." "Honest and manly enough to confess myself a rascal? I don't see where it would come in," he replied gloomily. "It is the nearest approach to it which lies in your power." "If the girls' places were only reversed now! I could tell Frankie that I had been false to our engagement and had fallen in love with Louise. She would know how it was herself. But Louise couldn't comprehend such things. I believe she has been as true to me, even in thought, as if she had been my wife. How can I tell her?" "The more you say, the plainer you make it your duty. I say, how can you not tell her?" "I might go away for a year and not let her know and not write to her. Then she would know without my having to tell her."