If you're unfortunate enough to be caught telling a lie, the chances of lying your way out of your predicament successfully are very slender indeed, because anything you say now is going to be subject to close scrutiny and regarded with grave suspicion. Put out of your mind, therefore, any thought of attempting to pass off your lie as 'an honest mistake'.

Your best bet is to present yourself as an honest man forced by circumstances into the distasteful position of having to tell an untruth. You did this not to further your own interests, but to protect others, as will become clear shortly. More than this you cannot say at the moment, because by being caught telling this untruth you have already let down quite enough those you sought to protect.

An equally honourable motive for lying is that you did it to protect the person to whom you told this untruth. Such is your esteem and affection for them you could not bear to hurt or disappoint them by confronting them with the unpalatable truth. It was your intention, after telling this lie, vigorously to set about changing the various relevant circumstances so that in six months' time you could hold your head up and repeat this 'lie' and be telling the truth. The 'lie' was therefore no more than a stop-gap measure. The next half-year profit figures will be as good as you pretended the last half-year figures were.

When a past lie catches up with you, the best solution is to plead insanity, while making it clear that you have now fully recovered your faculties. You lied because, in your distressed and emotional state at that time, you were incapable of distinguishing between the truth and what you wanted the truth to be. This is what your psychiatrist has since told you, and he has no reason to lie.

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