“Supposing that at high ’change on the Paris Bourse, Asmodeus should lounge in, distributing hand-bills, revealing the true thoughts and designs of all the operators present—would that be the fair thing in Asmodeus? Or, as Hamlet says, were it ‘to consider the thing too curiously?’”
“We won’t go into that. But since you admit the fellow to be a knave——”
“I don’t admit it. Or, if I did, I take it back. Shouldn’t wonder if, after all, he is no knave at all, or, but little of one. What can you prove against him?”
“I can prove that he makes dupes.”
“Many held in honor do the same; and many, not wholly knaves, do it too.”
“How about that last?”
“He is not wholly at heart a knave, I fancy, among whose dupes is himself. Did you not see our quack friend apply to himself his own quackery? A fanatic quack; essentially a fool, though effectively a knave.”
Bending over, and looking down between his knees on the floor, the auburn-haired gentleman meditatively scribbled there awhile with his cane, then, glancing up, said:
“I can’t conceive how you, in anyway, can hold him a fool. How he talked—so glib, so pat, so well.”
“A smart fool always talks well; takes a smart fool to be tonguey.”