"Consequently," said he, continuing my sentence, "when I told you that I was going to Austria I was lying."
"The frankness of the statement obliges me to believe that you are now telling the truth," I answered, angrily. I felt uneasy. Benoni laughed in his peculiar way.
"Precisely," he continued again, "I was lying. I generally do, for so long as I am believed I deceive people; and when they find me out, they are confused between truth and lying, so that they do not know what to believe at all. By the by, I am wandering, I am sorry to see you here. I hope you understand that." He looked at me with the most cheerful expression. I believe I was beginning to be angry at his insulting calmness. I did not answer him.
"Signor Grandi," he said in a moment, seeing I was silent, "I am enchanted to see you, if you prefer that I should be. But may I imagine if I can do anything more for you, now that you have heard from my own lips that I am a liar? I say it again,—I like the word,—I am a liar, and I wish I were a better one. What can I do for you?"
"Tell me why you have acted this comedy," said I, recollecting at the right moment the gist of my reflections during the past two days.
"Why? To please myself, good sir; for the sovereign; pleasure of myself."
"I would surmise," I retorted tartly, "that it could not have been for the pleasure of anyone else."
"Perhaps you mean, because no one else could be base enough to take pleasure in what amuses me?" I nodded savagely at his question. "Very good. Knowing this of me, do you further surmise that I should be so simple as to tell you how I propose to amuse myself in the future?" I recognised the truth of this, and I saw myself checkmated at the outset. I therefore smiled, and endeavoured to seem completely satisfied, hoping that his vanity would betray him into some hint of the future. He seemed to have before taken pleasure in misleading me with a fragment of truth, supposing that I could not make use of it. I would endeavour to lead him into such a trap again.
"It is a beautiful country, is it not?" I remarked, going to the window before which he stood, and looking out. "You must enjoy it greatly, after the turmoil of society." You see, I was once as gay as any of them, in the old days; and so I made the reflection that seemed natural to his case, wondering how he would answer.
"It is indeed a very passable landscape," he said, indifferently. "With horses and a charming companion one may kill a little time here, and find a satisfaction in killing it." I noticed the slip, by which he spoke of a single companion instead of two.