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During the meal she was quiet and cool: but I could not undeceive her then.

“The old man paused and then continued, ‘If you will unreservedly confide to me the particulars of your tale, I perhaps may be of use in undeceiving them.

But this is what surely gives Jhabvala’s work its rare gleam: the undeceived clarity of the eternal outsider, immersed yet apart.

Malcontents, by Addison’s definition, need to be “undeceived” in the interest of advancing civil society.

Falsehood flies, and truth comes limping after it, so that when men come to be undeceived, it is too late; the jest is over, and the tale hath had its effect.