"You have greatly pleased the king by bringing him a new amusement. He asked me where I learned it, and I told him you had taught it to [87]Caskoden, and that I had it from him. I told Caskoden so that he can tell the same story." [87] "Oh! but that is not true. Don't you think you should have told him the truth, or have evaded it in some way?" asked Brandon, who was really a great lover of the truth, "when possible," but who, I fear on this occasion, wished to appear more truthful than he really was. If a man is to a woman's taste, and she is inclined to him, he lays up great stores in her heart by making her think him good; and shameful impositions are often practiced to this end. Mary flushed a little and answered, "I can't help it. You do not know. Had I told Henry that we four had enjoyed such a famous time in my rooms he would have been very angry, and—and—you might have been the sufferer." "But might you not have compromised matters by going around the truth some way, and leaving the impression that others were of the party that evening?" That was a mistake, for it gave Mary an opportunity to retaliate: "The best way to go around the truth, as you call it, is by a direct lie. My lie was no worse than yours. But I did not stop to argue about such matters. There is something else I wished to say. I want to tell you that you have greatly pleased the king with the new dance. Now teach him 'honor and ruff' and your fortune is made. He has had some Jews and Lombards in of late to teach him new games at cards, but yours is [88]worth all of them." Then, somewhat hastily and irrelevantly, "I did not dance the new dance with any other gentleman—but I suppose you did not notice it," and she was gone before he could thank her. [88] [89] [89]
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