“You do wrong to destroy them!” Socrate said aloud. “Some of them are, perhaps, in earnest.”
“How is that?” Helia said, looking at him. “What do you mean?”
“I—why—”
Helia’s uprightness disarmed him. She would never understand anything! Was it possible to be so naïve? Socrate was exasperated by it.
“By dint of shutting yourself out from everybody, you’ll soon have no more friends,” he said, trying to be insinuating. “Who knows if there’s not a letter from the duke there?”
“And what then?” Helia said, as she arose.
“He is, perhaps, your best friend,” Socrate answered. “A powerful protector like him—”
“What!”
“Of course, next to Monsieur Phil,” he went on, with the perspiration starting out on his forehead. “But Monsieur Phil is too busy! They say, even—” And Socrate hunted for a word with which to end his embarrassment, and he had to be inventive and prompt.
“What is it they say?” Helia asked.