“Yes, of course,” answered Lord Henry, sinking into a chair and slowly pulling off his yellow gloves.  “It is dreadful, from one point of view, but it was not your fault.  Tell me, did you go behind and see her, after the play was over?”

“Yes.”

“I felt sure you had.  Did you make a scene with her?”

“I was brutal, Harry—­perfectly brutal.  But it is all right now.  I am not sorry for anything that has happened.  It has taught me to know myself better.”

“Ah, Dorian, I am so glad you take it in that way!  I was afraid I would find you plunged in remorse and tearing that nice curly hair of yours.”

“I have got through all that,” said Dorian, shaking his head and smiling.  “I am perfectly happy now.  I know what conscience is, to begin with.  It is not what you told me it was.  It is the divinest thing in us.  Don’t sneer at it, Harry, any more—­at least not before me.  I want to be good.  I can’t bear the idea of my soul being hideous.”

“A very charming artistic basis for ethics, Dorian!  I congratulate you on it.  But how are you going to begin?”

“By marrying Sibyl Vane.”

“Marrying Sibyl Vane!” cried Lord Henry, standing up and looking at him in perplexed amazement.  “But, my dear Dorian—­”

“Yes, Harry, I know what you are going to say.  Something dreadful about marriage.  Don’t say it.  Don’t ever say things of that kind to me again.  Two days ago I asked Sibyl to marry me.  I am not going to break my word to her.  She is to be my wife.”

“Your wife!  Dorian! . . .  Didn’t you get my letter?  I wrote to you this morning, and sent the note down by my own man.”

“Your letter?  Oh, yes, I remember.  I have not read it yet, Harry.  I was afraid there might be something in it that I wouldn’t like.  You cut life to pieces with your epigrams.”

“You know nothing then?”

“What do you mean?”

Lord Henry walked across the room, and sitting down by Dorian Gray, took both his hands in his own and held them tightly.  “Dorian,” he said, “my letter—­don’t be frightened—­was to tell you that Sibyl Vane is dead.”

A cry of pain broke from the lad’s lips, and he leaped to his feet, tearing his hands away from Lord Henry’s grasp.  “Dead!  Sibyl dead!  It is not true!  It is a horrible lie!  How dare you say it?”

“It is quite true, Dorian,” said Lord Henry, gravely.  “It is in all the morning papers.  I wrote down to you to ask you not to see any one till I came.  There will have to be an inquest, of course, and you must not be mixed up in it.  Things like that make a man fashionable in Paris.  But in London people are so prejudiced.  Here, one should never make one’s debut with a scandal.  One should reserve that to give an interest to one’s old age.  I suppose they don’t know your name at the theatre?  If they don’t, it is all right.  Did any one see you going round to her room?  That is an important point.”