Instead of replying, Madame Langai asked what had induced him to bring him there.
"Well, but he's a splendid fellow, isn't he?"
"You said yesterday that he was a vagabond."
"I said so, I know, but it is not true."
"You said, too, that he was a robber."
"What! I said that? Impossible. I didn't say that."
Old Demetrius here intervened as a peacemaker.
"You said it, John, you did indeed; but you were angry, and at such times a man says more than he means."
"So far from being a robber or a vagabond," replied John, "he is one of the principal landowners in the Hátszegi district. How could I have said such things! He has a castle that is like a fortress. He is like a prince, a veritable prince in his own domains. He is just like a petty sovereign. I must have been downright mad to call him a vagabond. . . ."
"Yet, yesterday, you would have called him out," continued Madame Langai teasingly.