"Dear me! That seems rather a riddle!"

"Do you know him?"

"No, but he has sent me Goldoni's 'Theatre,' the translation of my
Tancred, and some Bologna sausages, and he says he will come and see me."

"He will not come; he is not such a fool."

"How a fool? Would there be anything foolish in coming to see me?"

"Certainly not, as far as you are concerned; but very much so far his own
sake."

"Would you mind telling me why?"

"He knows what he would lose; for he enjoys the idea you seem to have of
him, and if he came you would see his nothingness, and good-bye to the
illusion. He is a worthy man with six thousand sequins a year, and a
craze for the theatre. He is a good actor enough, and has written several
comedies in prose, but they are fit neither for the study nor the stage."

"You certainly give him a coat which does not make him look any bigger."

"I assure you it is not quite small enough."

"But tell me how he can belong to the Forty and the Fifty?"

"Just as at Bale noon is at eleven."