im. I sat down at once and
wrote begging Oscar to lunch with me the next day alone, as I had
something important to say to him. He turned up in Park Lane,
manifestly anxious, a little frightened, I think.

"What is it, Frank?"

I told him very seriously what I had heard and gave besides my
impression of Queensberry's character, and his insane pugnacity.

"What can I do, Frank?" said Oscar, showing distress and apprehension.
"It's all Bosie."

"Who is Bosie?" I asked.

"That is Lord Alfred Douglas' pet name. It's all Bosie's fault. He has
quarrelled with his father, or rather his father has quarrelled with
him. He quarrels with everyone; with Lady Queensberry, with Percy
Douglas, with Bosie, everyone. He's impossible. What can I do?"

"Avoid him," I said. "Don't go about with Lord Alfred Douglas. Give
Queensberry his triumph. You could make a friend of him as easily as
possible, if you wished. Write him a conciliatory letter."

"But he'll want me to drop Bosie, and stop seeing Lady Queensberry,
and I like them all; they are charming to me. Why should I cringe to
this madman?"

"Because he is a madman."

"Oh, Frank, I can't," he cried. "Bosie wouldn't let me."

"'Wouldn't let you'? I repeated angrily. "How absurd! That Queensberry
man will go to violence, to any extremity. Don't you fight other
people's quarrels: you may have enough of your own some day."

"You're not sympathetic, Frank," he chided weakly. "I know you mean it
kindly, but it's impossible for me to do as you advise. I cannot give
up my friend. I really cannot let Lord Queensberry choose my friends
for me. It's too absurd."

"But it's wise," I replied. "There's a very bad verse in one of Hugo's
plays. It always amused me--he likens poverty to a low door and
declares that when we have to pass through it the man who stoops
lowest is the wisest. So when you meet a madman, the wisest thing to
do is to avoid him and not quarrel with him."

"It's very hard, Frank; of course I'll think over what you say. But
really Queensberry ought to be in a madhouse. He's too absurd," and in
that spirit he left me, outwardly self-confident. He might have
remembered Chaucer's words:

Beware also to spurne again a nall;
Strive not as doeth a crocke with a wall;
Deme thy selfe that demest others dede,
And trouth thee shall deliver, it is no drede.

FOOTNOTES:

[11] "The Promise of May" was produced in November, 1882.

CHAPTER XII