"Such advice shows you are no friend of Oscar's."

"What do you mean?" I asked in wonderment; but he turned and left the
room on the spot. To my astonishment Oscar also got up.

"It is not friendly of you, Frank," he said weakly. "It really is not
friendly."

I stared at him: he was parrotting Douglas' idiotic words.

"Don't be absurd," I said; but he repeated:

"No, Frank, it is not friendly," and went to the door and disappeared.

Like a flash I saw part at least of the truth. It was not Oscar who
had ever misled Douglas, but Lord Alfred Douglas who was driving Oscar
whither he would.

I turned to Shaw.

"Did I say anything in the heat of argument that could have offended
Oscar or Douglas?"

"Nothing," said Shaw, "not a word: you have nothing to reproach
yourself with."[12]

Left to myself I was at a loss to imagine what Lord Alfred Douglas
proposed to himself by hounding Oscar on to attack his father. I was
still more surprised by his white, bitter face. I could not get rid of
the impression it left on me. While groping among these reflections I
was suddenly struck by a sort of likeness, a similarity of expression
and of temper between Lord Alfred Douglas and his unhappy father. I
could not get it out of my head--that little face blanched with rage
and the wild, hating eyes; the shrill voice, too, was Queensberry's.

FOOTNOTES:

[12] I am very glad that Bernard Shaw has lately put in print his
memory of this conversation. The above account was printed, though not
published, in 1911, and in 1914 Shaw published his recollection of
what took place at this consultation. Readers may judge from the
comparison how far my general story is worthy of credence. In the
Introduction to his playlet, "The Dark Lady of the Sonnets," Shaw
writes:

"Yet he (Harris) knows the taste and the value of humour. He was one
of the few men of letters who really appreciated Oscar Wilde, though
he did not rally fiercely to Wilde's side until the world deserted
Oscar in his ruin. I myself was present at a curious meeting between
the two when Harris on the eve of the Queensberry trial prophesied to
Wilde with miraculous precision exactly what immediately afterwards
happened to him and warned him to leave the country. It was the first
time within my knowledge that such a forecast proved true. Wilde,
though under no illusion as to the folly of the quite unselfish
suit-at-law he had been persuaded to begin, nevertheless so
misc