"What do you want?"
he gasped.
"Keep quiet,"
said the man.
"If you stir, I shoot you."
"You are mad. What have I done to you?"
"You wrecked the life of Sibyl Vane,"
was the answer,
"and Sibyl Vane was my sister. She killed herself. I know it. Her death is at your door. I swore I would kill you in return."
"For years I have sought you. I had no clue, no trace.
The two people who could have described you were dead.
I knew nothing of you but the pet name she used to call you.
I heard it to-night by chance. Make your peace with God,
for to-night you are going to die."
Dorian Gray grew sick with fear.
"I never knew her,"
he stammered.
"I never heard of her. You are mad."
"You had better confess your sin, for as sure as I am James Vane, you are going to die."
There was a horrible moment. Dorian did
not know what to say or do.
"Down on your knees!"
growled the man.
"I give you one minute to make your peace--no more. I go on board tonight for India, and I must do my job first. One minute. That's all."
Dorian's arms fell to his side. Paralysed with terror, he did not
know what to do. Suddenly a wild hope flashed across his brain.
"Stop,"
he cried.
"How long ago is it since your sister died? Quick, tell me!"
"Eighteen years,"
said the man.
"Why do you ask me?
What do years matter?"
"Eighteen years,"
laughed Dorian Gray, with a touch of triumph in his voice.
"Eighteen years! Set me under the lamp and look at my face!"
James Vane hesitated for a moment, not understanding what was meant.
Then he seized Dorian Gray and dragged him from the archway.
Dim and wavering as was the wind-blown light, yet it served to show
him the hideous error, as it seemed, into which he had fallen,
for the face of the man he had sought to kill had all the bloom
of boyhood, all the unstained purity of youth.
He seemed little more than a lad of twenty summers, hardly older,
if older indeed at all, than his sister had been when they had parted
so many years ago. It was obvious that this was not the man who had destroyed her life.
He loosened his hold and reeled back.
"My God! my God!"
he cried,
"and I would have murdered you!"
Dorian Gray drew a long breath.
"You have been on the brink of committing a terrible crime, my man,"
he said, looking at him sternly.
"Let this be a warning to you not to take vengeance into your own hands."
"Forgive me, sir,"
muttered James Vane.
"I was deceived.
A chance word I heard in that damned den set me on the wrong track."
"You had better go home and put that pistol away, or you may get into trouble,"
said Dorian, turning on his heel and going slowly
down the street.
James Vane stood on the pavement in horror. He was trembling
from head to foot. After a little while, a black shadow
that had been creeping along the dripping wall moved out into
the light and came close to him with stealthy footsteps.
He felt a hand laid on his arm and looked round with a start.
It was one of the women who had been drinking at the bar.
"Why didn't you kill him?"
she hissed out, putting her
haggard face
quite close to his.
"I knew you were following him when you rushed out from Daly's. You fool! You should have killed him. He has lots of money, and he's as bad as bad."
"He is not the man I am looking for,"
he answered,
"and I want
no man's money. I want a man's life. The man whose life I want
must be nearly forty now. This one is little more than a boy.
Thank God, I have not got his blood upon my hands."
The woman gave a bitter laugh.
"Little more than a boy!"
she sneered.
"Why, man, it's nigh on eighteen years since Prince Charming made me what I am."
"You lie!"
cried James Vane.
She raised her hand up to
heaven.
"Before God I am telling the truth,"
she cried.
"Before God?"
"Strike me dumb if it ain't so. He is the worst one that comes here. They say he has sold himself to the devil for a pretty face. It's nigh on eighteen years since I met him. He hasn't changed much since then. I have, though,"
she added, with a sickly
leer.
"You swear this?"
"I swear it,"
came in hoarse
echo from her flat mouth.
"But don't give me away to him,"
she whined;
"I am afraid of him.
Let me have some money for my night's lodging."
He broke from her with an oath and rushed to the corner of the street,
but Dorian Gray had disappeared. When he looked back, the woman had
vanished also.
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