Dorian started to his feet. A terrible hope fluttered past him. He
clutched at it madly. "Where is the body?" he exclaimed. "Quick! I must
see it at once."

"It is in an empty stable in the Home Farm, sir. The folk don't like to
have that sort of thing in their houses. They say a corpse brings bad luck."

"The Home Farm! Go there at once and meet me. Tell one of the grooms to
bring my horse round. No. Never mind. I'll go to the stables myself. It
will save time."

In less than a quarter of an hour, Dorian Gray was galloping down the
long avenue as hard as he could go. The trees seemed to sweep past him
in spectral procession, and wild shadows to fling themselves across his
path. Once the mare swerved at a white gate-post and nearly threw him.
He lashed her across the neck with his crop. She cleft the dusky air
like an arrow. The stones flew from her hoofs.

At last he reached the Home Farm. Two men were loitering in the yard. He
leaped from the saddle and threw the reins to one of them. In the
farthest stable a light was glimmering. Something seemed to tell him
that the body was there, and he hurried to the door and put his hand
upon the latch.

There he paused for a moment, feeling that he was on the brink of a
discovery that would either make or mar his life. Then he thrust the
door open and entered.

On a heap of sacking in the far corner was lying the dead body of a man
dressed in a coarse shirt and a pair of blue trousers. A spotted
handkerchief had been placed over the face. A coarse candle, stuck in a
bottle, sputtered beside it.

Dorian Gray shuddered. He felt that his could not be the hand to take
the handkerchief away, and called out to one of the farm-servants to
come to him.

"Take that thing off the face. I wish to see it," he said, clutching at
the door-post for support.

When the farm-servant had done so, he stepped forward. A cry of joy
broke from his lips. The man who had been shot in the thicket was James
Vane.

He stood there for some minutes looking at the dead body. As he rode
home, his eyes were full of tears, for he knew he was safe.

CHAPTER 19

"There is no use your telling me that you are going to be good," cried
Lord Henry, dipping his white fingers into a red copper bowl filled with
rose-water. "You are quite perfect. Pray, don't change."

Dorian Gray shook his head. "No, Harry, I have done too many dreadful
things in my life. I am not going to do any more. I began my good
actions yesterday."

"Where were you yesterday?"

"In the country, Harry. I was staying at a little inn by myself."

"My dear boy," said Lord Henry, smiling, "anybody can be good in the
country. There are no temptations there. That is the reason why people
who live out of town are so absolutely uncivilized. Civilization is not
by any means an easy thing to attain to. There are only two ways by
which man can reach it. One is by being cultured, the other by being
corrupt. Country people have no opportunity of being either, so they
stagnate."

"Culture and corruption," echoed Dorian. "I have known something of
both. It seems terrible to me now that they should ever be found
together. For I have a new ideal, Harry. I am going to alter. I think I
have altered."

"You have not yet told me what your good action was. Or did you say you
had done more than one?" asked his companion as he spilled into his
plate a little crimson pyramid of seeded strawberries and, through a
perforated, shell-shaped spoon, snowed white sugar upon them.

"I can tell you, Harry. It is not a story I could tell to any one else.
I spared somebody. It sounds vain, but you understand what I mean. She
was quite beautiful and wonderfully like Sibyl Vane. I think it was that
which first attracted me to her. You remember Sibyl, don't you? How long
ago that seems! Well, Hetty was not one of our own class, of course. She
was simply a girl in a village. But I really loved her. I am quite sure
that I loved her. All during this wonderful May that we have been
having, I used to run down and see her two or three times a week.
Yesterday she met me in a little orchard. The apple-blossoms kept
tumbling down on her hair, and she was laughing. We were to have gone
away together this morning at dawn. Suddenly I determined to leave her
as flowerlike as I had found her."

"I should think the novelty of the emotion must have given you a thrill
of real pleasure, Dorian," interrupted Lord Henry. "But I can finish
your idyll for you. You gave her good advice and broke her heart. That
was the beginning of your reformation."

"Harry, you are horrible! You mustn't say these dreadful things. Hetty's
heart is not broken. Of course, she cried and all that. But there is no


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