Henriette, that she must be a Frenchwoman, that she is as gentle as a turtledove, that she has evidently received a good education, and that she enjoys good health.  She is witty and courageous, as we have both seen, I in Rome and you in Cesena at General Spada’s table.  If she would tell you her history, and allow you to translate it for me in Latin she would indeed please me much, for I am sincerely her friend, and I can assure you that it will grieve me to part from her in Parma.  Please to tell her that I intend to give her the thirty sequins I received from the Bishop of Cesena, and that if I were rich I would give her more substantial proofs of my tender affection.  Now, sir, I shall feel obliged to you if you will explain it all to her in French.”

I asked her whether she would feel offended if I gave her an exact translation.  She assured me that, on the contrary, she wished me to speak openly, and I told her literally what the captain had related to me.

With a noble frankness which a slight shade of-shame rendered more interesting, Henriette confirmed the truth of her friend’s narrative, but she begged me to tell him that she could not grant his wish respecting the adventures of her life.

“Be good enough to inform him,” she added, “that the same principle which forbids me to utter a falsehood, does not allow me to tell the truth.  As for the thirty sequins which he intends to give me, I will not accept even one of them, and he would deeply grieve me by pressing them upon me.  The moment we reach Parma I wish him to allow me to lodge wherever I may please, to make no enquiries whatever about me, and, in case he should happen to meet me, to crown his great kindness to me by not appearing to have ever known me.”

As she uttered the last words of this short speech, which she had delivered very seriously and with a mixture of modesty and resolution, she kissed her elderly friend in a manner which indicated esteem and gratitude rather than love.  The captain, who did not know why she was kissing him, was deeply grieved when I translated what Henriette had said.  He begged me to tell her that, if he was to obey her with an easy conscience, he must know whether she would have everything she required in Parma.

“You can assure him,” she answered, “that he need not entertain any anxiety about me.”

This conversation had made us all very sad; we remained for a long time thoughtful and silent, until, feeling the situation to be painful, I rose, wishing them good night, and I saw that Henriette’s face wore a look of great excitement.

As soon as I found myself alone in my room, deeply moved by conflicting feelings of love, surprise, and uncertainty, I began to give vent to my feelings in a kind of soliloquy, as I always do when I am strongly excited by anything; thinking is not, in those cases, enough for me; I must speak aloud, and I throw so much action, so much animation into these monologues that I forget I am alone.  What I knew now of Henriette had upset me altogether.