"It is only the sacred things that are worth touching, Dorian,"
said Lord Henry, with a strange touch of pathos in his voice.
"But why should you be annoyed? I suppose she will belong
to you some day. When one is in love, one always begins by
deceiving one's self, and one always ends by deceiving others.
That is what the world calls a romance. You know her, at any rate,
I suppose?"

"Of course I know her. On the first night I was at the theatre,
the horrid old Jew came round to the box after the performance was over
and offered to take me behind the scenes and introduce me to her.
I was furious with him, and told him that Juliet had been dead
for hundreds of years and that her body was lying in a marble
tomb in Verona. I think, from his blank look of amazement,
that he was under the impression that I had taken too much champagne,
or something."

"I am not surprised."

"Then he asked me if I wrote for any of the newspapers.
I told him I never even read them. He seemed terribly disappointed
at that, and confided to me that all the dramatic critics
were in a conspiracy against him, and that they were every
one of them to be bought."

"I should not wonder if he was quite right there. But, on the other hand,
judging from their appearance, most of them cannot be at all expensive."

"Well, he seemed to think they were beyond his means,"