‘It is the case with so many things,’ agreed Mouraki: ‘debts, diseases, enemies, wives, lovers.’
There was a little pause before the last word, so slight that I could not tell whether it were intentional or not; and I had learnt to expect no enlightenment from Mouraki’s face or eyes. But he chose himself to solve the mystery this time.
‘Do I touch delicate ground?’ he asked. ‘Ah, my dear lord, I find from my reports that in the account you gave me of your experiences you let modesty stand in the way of candour. It was natural perhaps. I don’t blame you, since I have found out elsewhere what you omitted to tell me. Yet it was hardly a secret, since everybody in Neopalia knew it.’
I smoked my cigarette, feeling highly embarrassed and very uncomfortable.
‘And I am told,’ pursued Mouraki, with his malicious smile, ‘that the idea of a Wheatley-Stefanopoulos dynasty is by no means unpopular. Constantine’s little tricks have disgusted them with him.’
‘What are you going to do with him?’ I asked, risking any offence now in order to turn the topic.
‘Do you really like jumping from subject to subject?’ asked Mouraki plaintively. ‘I am, I suppose, a slow-minded Oriental, and it fatigues me horribly.’
I could have thrown the cigarette I was smoking in his face with keen pleasure.
‘It is for your Excellency to choose the topic,’ said I, restraining my fury.
‘Oh, don’t let us have “Excellencies” when we’re alone together! Indeed I congratulate you on your conquest. She is magnificent; and it was charming of her to make her declaration. That’s what has pleased the islanders: they’re romantic savages, after all, and the chivalry of it touches them.’