Pagina 200 di 490

Why should he trouble about Sibyl Vane? She was nothing to him

now.

But the picture? What was he to say of that? It held the secret

of his life, and told his story. It had taught him to love his

own beauty. Would it teach him to loathe his own soul? Would he

ever look at it again?

No; it was merely an illusion wrought on the troubled senses. The

horrible night that he had passed had left phantoms behind it.

Suddenly there had fallen upon his brain that tiny scarlet speck

that makes men mad. The picture had not changed. It was folly to

think so.