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diff --git a/174-h/174-h.htm b/174-h/174-h.htm index 9e8b0c0..e49607e 100644 --- a/174-h/174-h.htm +++ b/174-h/174-h.htm @@ -1,12 +1,11 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" -"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html lang="en"> <head> -<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" /> -<meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> +<meta charset="utf-8"> <title>The Picture of Dorian Gray | Project Gutenberg</title> +<link rel="icon" href="images/cover.jpg" type="image/x-cover"> -<style type="text/css"> +<style> body { margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; @@ -75,11 +74,11 @@ a:hover {color:red} <h2 class="no-break">by Oscar Wilde</h2> -<hr /> +<hr > <h2>Contents</h2> -<table summary="" style=""> +<table> <tr> <td> <a href="#chap00">THE PREFACE</a></td> @@ -169,7 +168,7 @@ a:hover {color:red} <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap00"></a>THE PREFACE</h2> +<h2><a id="chap00"></a>THE PREFACE</h2> <p> The artist is the creator of beautiful things. To reveal art and conceal the @@ -231,7 +230,7 @@ OSCAR WILDE <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap01"></a>CHAPTER I.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap01"></a>CHAPTER I.</h2> <p> The studio was filled with the rich odour of roses, and when the light summer @@ -882,7 +881,7 @@ Hallward by the arm, he almost led him into the house. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap02"></a>CHAPTER II.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap02"></a>CHAPTER II.</h2> <p> As they entered they saw Dorian Gray. He was seated at the piano, with his back @@ -1780,7 +1779,7 @@ look of pain came into his face. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap03"></a>CHAPTER III.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap03"></a>CHAPTER III.</h2> <p> At half-past twelve next day Lord Henry Wotton strolled from Curzon Street over @@ -2471,7 +2470,7 @@ with me, if you care to.” <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap04"></a>CHAPTER IV.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap04"></a>CHAPTER IV.</h2> <p> One afternoon, a month later, Dorian Gray was reclining in a luxurious @@ -3254,7 +3253,7 @@ to tell him that he was engaged to be married to Sibyl Vane. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap05"></a>CHAPTER V.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap05"></a>CHAPTER V.</h2> <p> “Mother, Mother, I am so happy!” whispered the girl, burying her @@ -3925,7 +3924,7 @@ She felt that they would all laugh at it some day. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap06"></a>CHAPTER VI.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap06"></a>CHAPTER VI.</h2> <p> “I suppose you have heard the news, Basil?” said Lord Henry that @@ -4343,7 +4342,7 @@ seemed to him that he had grown years older. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap07"></a>CHAPTER VII.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap07"></a>CHAPTER VII.</h2> <p> For some reason or other, the house was crowded that night, and the fat Jew @@ -4435,9 +4434,9 @@ on Romeo. The few words she had to speak— </p> <p class="poem"> -Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,<br /> - Which mannerly devotion shows in this;<br /> -For saints have hands that pilgrims’ hands do touch,<br /> +Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,<br > + Which mannerly devotion shows in this;<br > +For saints have hands that pilgrims’ hands do touch,<br > And palm to palm is holy palmers’ kiss— </p> @@ -4468,8 +4467,8 @@ had to say. The beautiful passage— </p> <p class="poem"> -Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face,<br /> -Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek<br /> +Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face,<br > +Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek<br > For that which thou hast heard me speak to-night— </p> @@ -4480,12 +4479,12 @@ balcony and came to those wonderful lines— </p> <p class="poem"> -Although I joy in thee,<br /> -I have no joy of this contract to-night:<br /> -It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden;<br /> -Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be<br /> -Ere one can say, “It lightens.” Sweet, good-night!<br /> -This bud of love by summer’s ripening breath<br /> +Although I joy in thee,<br > +I have no joy of this contract to-night:<br > +It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden;<br > +Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be<br > +Ere one can say, “It lightens.” Sweet, good-night!<br > +This bud of love by summer’s ripening breath<br > May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet— </p> @@ -4876,7 +4875,7 @@ flowers about her. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap08"></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap08"></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h2> <p> It was long past noon when he awoke. His valet had crept several times on @@ -5533,7 +5532,7 @@ chair. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap09"></a>CHAPTER IX.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap09"></a>CHAPTER IX.</h2> <p> As he was sitting at breakfast next morning, Basil Hallward was shown into the @@ -6045,7 +6044,7 @@ friends had access. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap10"></a>CHAPTER X.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap10"></a>CHAPTER X.</h2> <p> When his servant entered, he looked at him steadfastly and wondered if he had @@ -6456,7 +6455,7 @@ passed into the dining-room. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap11"></a>CHAPTER XI.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap11"></a>CHAPTER XI.</h2> <p> For years, Dorian Gray could not free himself from the influence of this book. @@ -7138,7 +7137,7 @@ beautiful. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap12"></a>CHAPTER XII.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap12"></a>CHAPTER XII.</h2> <p> It was on the ninth of November, the eve of his own thirty-eighth birthday, as @@ -7469,7 +7468,7 @@ not have to read long.” <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap13"></a>CHAPTER XIII.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap13"></a>CHAPTER XIII.</h2> <p> He passed out of the room and began the ascent, Basil Hallward following close @@ -7849,7 +7848,7 @@ Mayfair.” Yes; that was the man he wanted. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap14"></a>CHAPTER XIV.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap14"></a>CHAPTER XIV.</h2> <p> At nine o’clock the next morning his servant came in with a cup of @@ -7942,19 +7941,19 @@ till he came to those lovely stanzas upon Venice: </p> <p class="poem"> -Sur une gamme chromatique,<br /> - Le sein de perles ruisselant,<br /> -La Vénus de l’Adriatique<br /> - Sort de l’eau son corps rose et blanc.<br /> -<br /> -Les dômes, sur l’azur des ondes<br /> - Suivant la phrase au pur contour,<br /> -S’enflent comme des gorges rondes<br /> - Que soulève un soupir d’amour.<br /> -<br /> -L’esquif aborde et me dépose,<br /> - Jetant son amarre au pilier,<br /> -Devant une façade rose,<br /> +Sur une gamme chromatique,<br > + Le sein de perles ruisselant,<br > +La Vénus de l’Adriatique<br > + Sort de l’eau son corps rose et blanc.<br > +<br > +Les dômes, sur l’azur des ondes<br > + Suivant la phrase au pur contour,<br > +S’enflent comme des gorges rondes<br > + Que soulève un soupir d’amour.<br > +<br > +L’esquif aborde et me dépose,<br > + Jetant son amarre au pilier,<br > +Devant une façade rose,<br > Sur le marbre d’un escalier. </p> @@ -7970,7 +7969,7 @@ Leaning back with half-closed eyes, he kept saying over and over to himself: </p> <p class="poem"> -“Devant une façade rose,<br /> +“Devant une façade rose,<br > Sur le marbre d’un escalier.” </p> @@ -8510,7 +8509,7 @@ gone. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap15"></a>CHAPTER XV.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap15"></a>CHAPTER XV.</h2> <p> That evening, at eight-thirty, exquisitely dressed and wearing a large @@ -9048,7 +9047,7 @@ rapidly towards the river. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap16"></a>CHAPTER XVI.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap16"></a>CHAPTER XVI.</h2> <p> A cold rain began to fall, and the blurred street-lamps looked ghastly in the @@ -9530,7 +9529,7 @@ Dorian Gray had disappeared. When he looked back, the woman had vanished also. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap17"></a>CHAPTER XVII.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap17"></a>CHAPTER XVII.</h2> <p> A week later Dorian Gray was sitting in the conservatory at Selby Royal, @@ -10080,7 +10079,7 @@ white handkerchief, he had seen the face of James Vane watching him. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap18"></a>CHAPTER XVIII.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap18"></a>CHAPTER XVIII.</h2> <p> The next day he did not leave the house, and, indeed, spent most of the time in @@ -10656,7 +10655,7 @@ eyes were full of tears, for he knew he was safe. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap19"></a>CHAPTER XIX.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap19"></a>CHAPTER XIX.</h2> <p> “There is no use your telling me that you are going to be good,” @@ -10902,7 +10901,7 @@ play—Hamlet, I think—how do they run?— </p> <p class="poem"> -“Like the painting of a sorrow,<br /> +“Like the painting of a sorrow,<br > A face without a heart.” </p> @@ -11107,7 +11106,7 @@ he had something more to say. Then he sighed and went out. <div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="chap20"></a>CHAPTER XX.</h2> +<h2><a id="chap20"></a>CHAPTER XX.</h2> <p> It was a lovely night, so warm that he threw his coat over his arm and did not diff --git a/174-h/images/cover.jpg b/174-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..95ade0b --- /dev/null +++ b/174-h/images/cover.jpg diff --git a/old/174.txt b/old/174.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 7a04471..0000000 --- a/old/174.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,8905 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with -almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org - - -Title: The Picture of Dorian Gray - -Author: Oscar Wilde - -Release Date: June 9, 2008 [EBook #174] -[This file last updated on July 2, 2011] -[This file last updated on July 23, 2014] - - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ASCII - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY *** - - - - -Produced by Judith Boss. HTML version by Al Haines. - - - - - - - - - - -The Picture of Dorian Gray - -by - -Oscar Wilde - - - - -THE PREFACE - -The artist is the creator of beautiful things. To reveal art and -conceal the artist is art's aim. The critic is he who can translate -into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful -things. - -The highest as the lowest form of criticism is a mode of autobiography. -Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without -being charming. This is a fault. - -Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the -cultivated. For these there is hope. They are the elect to whom -beautiful things mean only beauty. - -There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well -written, or badly written. That is all. - -The nineteenth century dislike of realism is the rage of Caliban seeing -his own face in a glass. - -The nineteenth century dislike of romanticism is the rage of Caliban -not seeing his own face in a glass. The moral life of man forms part -of the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality of art consists -in the perfect use of an imperfect medium. No artist desires to prove -anything. Even things that are true can be proved. No artist has -ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in an artist is an -unpardonable mannerism of style. No artist is ever morbid. The artist -can express everything. Thought and language are to the artist -instruments of an art. Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for -an art. From the point of view of form, the type of all the arts is -the art of the musician. From the point of view of feeling, the -actor's craft is the type. All art is at once surface and symbol. -Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. Those who read -the symbol do so at their peril. It is the spectator, and not life, -that art really mirrors. Diversity of opinion about a work of art -shows that the work is new, complex, and vital. When critics disagree, -the artist is in accord with himself. We can forgive a man for making -a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for -making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely. - - All art is quite useless. - - OSCAR WILDE - - - - -CHAPTER 1 - -The studio was filled with the rich odour of roses, and when the light -summer wind stirred amidst the trees of the garden, there came through -the open door the heavy scent of the lilac, or the more delicate -perfume of the pink-flowering thorn. - -From the corner of the divan of Persian saddle-bags on which he was -lying, smoking, as was his custom, innumerable cigarettes, Lord Henry -Wotton could just catch the gleam of the honey-sweet and honey-coloured -blossoms of a laburnum, whose tremulous branches seemed hardly able to -bear the burden of a beauty so flamelike as theirs; and now and then -the fantastic shadows of birds in flight flitted across the long -tussore-silk curtains that were stretched in front of the huge window, -producing a kind of momentary Japanese effect, and making him think of -those pallid, jade-faced painters of Tokyo who, through the medium of -an art that is necessarily immobile, seek to convey the sense of -swiftness and motion. The sullen murmur of the bees shouldering their -way through the long unmown grass, or circling with monotonous -insistence round the dusty gilt horns of the straggling woodbine, -seemed to make the stillness more oppressive. The dim roar of London -was like the bourdon note of a distant organ. - -In the centre of the room, clamped to an upright easel, stood the -full-length portrait of a young man of extraordinary personal beauty, -and in front of it, some little distance away, was sitting the artist -himself, Basil Hallward, whose sudden disappearance some years ago -caused, at the time, such public excitement and gave rise to so many -strange conjectures. - -As the painter looked at the gracious and comely form he had so -skilfully mirrored in his art, a smile of pleasure passed across his -face, and seemed about to linger there. But he suddenly started up, -and closing his eyes, placed his fingers upon the lids, as though he -sought to imprison within his brain some curious dream from which he -feared he might awake. - -"It is your best work, Basil, the best thing you have ever done," said -Lord Henry languidly. "You must certainly send it next year to the -Grosvenor. The Academy is too large and too vulgar. Whenever I have -gone there, there have been either so many people that I have not been -able to see the pictures, which was dreadful, or so many pictures that -I have not been able to see the people, which was worse. The Grosvenor -is really the only place." - -"I don't think I shall send it anywhere," he answered, tossing his head -back in that odd way that used to make his friends laugh at him at -Oxford. "No, I won't send it anywhere." - -Lord Henry elevated his eyebrows and looked at him in amazement through -the thin blue wreaths of smoke that curled up in such fanciful whorls -from his heavy, opium-tainted cigarette. "Not send it anywhere? My -dear fellow, why? Have you any reason? What odd chaps you painters -are! You do anything in the world to gain a reputation. As soon as -you have one, you seem to want to throw it away. It is silly of you, -for there is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, -and that is not being talked about. A portrait like this would set you -far above all the young men in England, and make the old men quite -jealous, if old men are ever capable of any emotion." - -"I know you will laugh at me," he replied, "but I really can't exhibit -it. I have put too much of myself into it." - -Lord Henry stretched himself out on the divan and laughed. - -"Yes, I knew you would; but it is quite true, all the same." - -"Too much of yourself in it! Upon my word, Basil, I didn't know you -were so vain; and I really can't see any resemblance between you, with -your rugged strong face and your coal-black hair, and this young -Adonis, who looks as if he was made out of ivory and rose-leaves. Why, -my dear Basil, he is a Narcissus, and you--well, of course you have an -intellectual expression and all that. But beauty, real beauty, ends -where an intellectual expression begins. Intellect is in itself a mode -of exaggeration, and destroys the harmony of any face. The moment one -sits down to think, one becomes all nose, or all forehead, or something -horrid. Look at the successful men in any of the learned professions. -How perfectly hideous they are! Except, of course, in the Church. But -then in the Church they don't think. A bishop keeps on saying at the -age of eighty what he was told to say when he was a boy of eighteen, -and as a natural consequence he always looks absolutely delightful. -Your mysterious young friend, whose name you have never told me, but -whose picture really fascinates me, never thinks. I feel quite sure of -that. He is some brainless beautiful creature who should be always -here in winter when we have no flowers to look at, and always here in -summer when we want something to chill our intelligence. Don't flatter -yourself, Basil: you are not in the least like him." - -"You don't understand me, Harry," answered the artist. "Of course I am -not like him. I know that perfectly well. Indeed, I should be sorry -to look like him. You shrug your shoulders? I am telling you the -truth. There is a fatality about all physical and intellectual -distinction, the sort of fatality that seems to dog through history the -faltering steps of kings. It is better not to be different from one's -fellows. The ugly and the stupid have the best of it in this world. -They can sit at their ease and gape at the play. If they know nothing -of victory, they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat. They -live as we all should live--undisturbed, indifferent, and without -disquiet. They neither bring ruin upon others, nor ever receive it -from alien hands. Your rank and wealth, Harry; my brains, such as they -are--my art, whatever it may be worth; Dorian Gray's good looks--we -shall all suffer for what the gods have given us, suffer terribly." - -"Dorian Gray? Is that his name?" asked Lord Henry, walking across the -studio towards Basil Hallward. - -"Yes, that is his name. I didn't intend to tell it to you." - -"But why not?" - -"Oh, I can't explain. When I like people immensely, I never tell their -names to any one. It is like surrendering a part of them. I have -grown to love secrecy. It seems to be the one thing that can make -modern life mysterious or marvellous to us. The commonest thing is -delightful if one only hides it. When I leave town now I never tell my -people where I am going. If I did, I would lose all my pleasure. It -is a silly habit, I dare say, but somehow it seems to bring a great -deal of romance into one's life. I suppose you think me awfully -foolish about it?" - -"Not at all," answered Lord Henry, "not at all, my dear Basil. You -seem to forget that I am married, and the one charm of marriage is that -it makes a life of deception absolutely necessary for both parties. I -never know where my wife is, and my wife never knows what I am doing. -When we meet--we do meet occasionally, when we dine out together, or go -down to the Duke's--we tell each other the most absurd stories with the -most serious faces. My wife is very good at it--much better, in fact, -than I am. She never gets confused over her dates, and I always do. -But when she does find me out, she makes no row at all. I sometimes -wish she would; but she merely laughs at me." - -"I hate the way you talk about your married life, Harry," said Basil -Hallward, strolling towards the door that led into the garden. "I -believe that you are really a very good husband, but that you are -thoroughly ashamed of your own virtues. You are an extraordinary -fellow. You never say a moral thing, and you never do a wrong thing. -Your cynicism is simply a pose." - -"Being natural is simply a pose, and the most irritating pose I know," -cried Lord Henry, laughing; and the two young men went out into the -garden together and ensconced themselves on a long bamboo seat that -stood in the shade of a tall laurel bush. The sunlight slipped over -the polished leaves. In the grass, white daisies were tremulous. - -After a pause, Lord Henry pulled out his watch. "I am afraid I must be -going, Basil," he murmured, "and before I go, I insist on your -answering a question I put to you some time ago." - -"What is that?" said the painter, keeping his eyes fixed on the ground. - -"You know quite well." - -"I do not, Harry." - -"Well, I will tell you what it is. I want you to explain to me why you -won't exhibit Dorian Gray's picture. I want the real reason." - -"I told you the real reason." - -"No, you did not. You said it was because there was too much of -yourself in it. Now, that is childish." - -"Harry," said Basil Hallward, looking him straight in the face, "every -portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not -of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. It is -not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on -the coloured canvas, reveals himself. The reason I will not exhibit -this picture is that I am afraid that I have shown in it the secret of -my own soul." - -Lord Henry laughed. "And what is that?" he asked. - -"I will tell you," said Hallward; but an expression of perplexity came -over his face. - -"I am all expectation, Basil," continued his companion, glancing at him. - -"Oh, there is really very little to tell, Harry," answered the painter; -"and I am afraid you will hardly understand it. Perhaps you will -hardly believe it." - -Lord Henry smiled, and leaning down, plucked a pink-petalled daisy from -the grass and examined it. "I am quite sure I shall understand it," he -replied, gazing intently at the little golden, white-feathered disk, -"and as for believing things, I can believe anything, provided that it -is quite incredible." - -The wind shook some blossoms from the trees, and the heavy -lilac-blooms, with their clustering stars, moved to and fro in the -languid air. A grasshopper began to chirrup by the wall, and like a -blue thread a long thin dragon-fly floated past on its brown gauze -wings. Lord Henry felt as if he could hear Basil Hallward's heart -beating, and wondered what was coming. - -"The story is simply this," said the painter after some time. "Two -months ago I went to a crush at Lady Brandon's. You know we poor -artists have to show ourselves in society from time to time, just to -remind the public that we are not savages. With an evening coat and a -white tie, as you told me once, anybody, even a stock-broker, can gain -a reputation for being civilized. Well, after I had been in the room -about ten minutes, talking to huge overdressed dowagers and tedious -academicians, I suddenly became conscious that some one was looking at -me. I turned half-way round and saw Dorian Gray for the first time. -When our eyes met, I felt that I was growing pale. A curious sensation -of terror came over me. I knew that I had come face to face with some -one whose mere personality was so fascinating that, if I allowed it to -do so, it would absorb my whole nature, my whole soul, my very art -itself. I did not want any external influence in my life. You know -yourself, Harry, how independent I am by nature. I have always been my -own master; had at least always been so, till I met Dorian Gray. -Then--but I don't know how to explain it to you. Something seemed to -tell me that I was on the verge of a terrible crisis in my life. I had -a strange feeling that fate had in store for me exquisite joys and -exquisite sorrows. I grew afraid and turned to quit the room. It was -not conscience that made me do so: it was a sort of cowardice. I take -no credit to myself for trying to escape." - -"Conscience and cowardice are really the same things, Basil. -Conscience is the trade-name of the firm. That is all." - -"I don't believe that, Harry, and I don't believe you do either. -However, whatever was my motive--and it may have been pride, for I used -to be very proud--I certainly struggled to the door. There, of course, -I stumbled against Lady Brandon. 'You are not going to run away so -soon, Mr. Hallward?' she screamed out. You know her curiously shrill -voice?" - -"Yes; she is a peacock in everything but beauty," said Lord Henry, -pulling the daisy to bits with his long nervous fingers. - -"I could not get rid of her. She brought me up to royalties, and -people with stars and garters, and elderly ladies with gigantic tiaras -and parrot noses. She spoke of me as her dearest friend. I had only -met her once before, but she took it into her head to lionize me. I -believe some picture of mine had made a great success at the time, at -least had been chattered about in the penny newspapers, which is the -nineteenth-century standard of immortality. Suddenly I found myself -face to face with the young man whose personality had so strangely -stirred me. We were quite close, almost touching. Our eyes met again. -It was reckless of me, but I asked Lady Brandon to introduce me to him. -Perhaps it was not so reckless, after all. It was simply inevitable. -We would have spoken to each other without any introduction. I am sure -of that. Dorian told me so afterwards. He, too, felt that we were -destined to know each other." - -"And how did Lady Brandon describe this wonderful young man?" asked his -companion. "I know she goes in for giving a rapid _precis_ of all her -guests. I remember her bringing me up to a truculent and red-faced old -gentleman covered all over with orders and ribbons, and hissing into my -ear, in a tragic whisper which must have been perfectly audible to -everybody in the room, the most astounding details. I simply fled. I -like to find out people for myself. But Lady Brandon treats her guests -exactly as an auctioneer treats his goods. She either explains them -entirely away, or tells one everything about them except what one wants -to know." - -"Poor Lady Brandon! You are hard on her, Harry!" said Hallward -listlessly. - -"My dear fellow, she tried to found a _salon_, and only succeeded in -opening a restaurant. How could I admire her? But tell me, what did -she say about Mr. Dorian Gray?" - -"Oh, something like, 'Charming boy--poor dear mother and I absolutely -inseparable. Quite forget what he does--afraid he--doesn't do -anything--oh, yes, plays the piano--or is it the violin, dear Mr. -Gray?' Neither of us could help laughing, and we became friends at -once." - -"Laughter is not at all a bad beginning for a friendship, and it is far -the best ending for one," said the young lord, plucking another daisy. - -Hallward shook his head. "You don't understand what friendship is, -Harry," he murmured--"or what enmity is, for that matter. You like -every one; that is to say, you are indifferent to every one." - -"How horribly unjust of you!" cried Lord Henry, tilting his hat back -and looking up at the little clouds that, like ravelled skeins of -glossy white silk, were drifting across the hollowed turquoise of the -summer sky. "Yes; horribly unjust of you. I make a great difference -between people. I choose my friends for their good looks, my -acquaintances for their good characters, and my enemies for their good -intellects. A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies. -I have not got one who is a fool. They are all men of some -intellectual power, and consequently they all appreciate me. Is that -very vain of me? I think it is rather vain." - -"I should think it was, Harry. But according to your category I must -be merely an acquaintance." - -"My dear old Basil, you are much more than an acquaintance." - -"And much less than a friend. A sort of brother, I suppose?" - -"Oh, brothers! I don't care for brothers. My elder brother won't die, -and my younger brothers seem never to do anything else." - -"Harry!" exclaimed Hallward, frowning. - -"My dear fellow, I am not quite serious. But I can't help detesting my -relations. I suppose it comes from the fact that none of us can stand -other people having the same faults as ourselves. I quite sympathize -with the rage of the English democracy against what they call the vices -of the upper orders. The masses feel that drunkenness, stupidity, and -immorality should be their own special property, and that if any one of -us makes an ass of himself, he is poaching on their preserves. When -poor Southwark got into the divorce court, their indignation was quite -magnificent. And yet I don't suppose that ten per cent of the -proletariat live correctly." - -"I don't agree with a single word that you have said, and, what is -more, Harry, I feel sure you don't either." - -Lord Henry stroked his pointed brown beard and tapped the toe of his -patent-leather boot with a tasselled ebony cane. "How English you are -Basil! That is the second time you have made that observation. If one -puts forward an idea to a true Englishman--always a rash thing to -do--he never dreams of considering whether the idea is right or wrong. -The only thing he considers of any importance is whether one believes -it oneself. Now, the value of an idea has nothing whatsoever to do -with the sincerity of the man who expresses it. Indeed, the -probabilities are that the more insincere the man is, the more purely -intellectual will the idea be, as in that case it will not be coloured -by either his wants, his desires, or his prejudices. However, I don't -propose to discuss politics, sociology, or metaphysics with you. I -like persons better than principles, and I like persons with no -principles better than anything else in the world. Tell me more about -Mr. Dorian Gray. How often do you see him?" - -"Every day. I couldn't be happy if I didn't see him every day. He is -absolutely necessary to me." - -"How extraordinary! I thought you would never care for anything but -your art." - -"He is all my art to me now," said the painter gravely. "I sometimes -think, Harry, that there are only two eras of any importance in the -world's history. The first is the appearance of a new medium for art, -and the second is the appearance of a new personality for art also. -What the invention of oil-painting was to the Venetians, the face of -Antinous was to late Greek sculpture, and the face of Dorian Gray will -some day be to me. It is not merely that I paint from him, draw from -him, sketch from him. Of course, I have done all that. But he is much -more to me than a model or a sitter. I won't tell you that I am -dissatisfied with what I have done of him, or that his beauty is such -that art cannot express it. There is nothing that art cannot express, -and I know that the work I have done, since I met Dorian Gray, is good -work, is the best work of my life. But in some curious way--I wonder -will you understand me?--his personality has suggested to me an -entirely new manner in art, an entirely new mode of style. I see -things differently, I think of them differently. I can now recreate -life in a way that was hidden from me before. 'A dream of form in days -of thought'--who is it who says that? I forget; but it is what Dorian -Gray has been to me. The merely visible presence of this lad--for he -seems to me little more than a lad, though he is really over -twenty--his merely visible presence--ah! I wonder can you realize all -that that means? Unconsciously he defines for me the lines of a fresh -school, a school that is to have in it all the passion of the romantic -spirit, all the perfection of the spirit that is Greek. The harmony of -soul and body--how much that is! We in our madness have separated the -two, and have invented a realism that is vulgar, an ideality that is -void. Harry! if you only knew what Dorian Gray is to me! You remember -that landscape of mine, for which Agnew offered me such a huge price -but which I would not part with? It is one of the best things I have -ever done. And why is it so? Because, while I was painting it, Dorian -Gray sat beside me. Some subtle influence passed from him to me, and -for the first time in my life I saw in the plain woodland the wonder I -had always looked for and always missed." - -"Basil, this is extraordinary! I must see Dorian Gray." - -Hallward got up from the seat and walked up and down the garden. After -some time he came back. "Harry," he said, "Dorian Gray is to me simply -a motive in art. You might see nothing in him. I see everything in -him. He is never more present in my work than when no image of him is -there. He is a suggestion, as I have said, of a new manner. I find -him in the curves of certain lines, in the loveliness and subtleties of -certain colours. That is all." - -"Then why won't you exhibit his portrait?" asked Lord Henry. - -"Because, without intending it, I have put into it some expression of -all this curious artistic idolatry, of which, of course, I have never -cared to speak to him. He knows nothing about it. He shall never know -anything about it. But the world might guess it, and I will not bare -my soul to their shallow prying eyes. My heart shall never be put -under their microscope. There is too much of myself in the thing, -Harry--too much of myself!" - -"Poets are not so scrupulous as you are. They know how useful passion -is for publication. Nowadays a broken heart will run to many editions." - -"I hate them for it," cried Hallward. "An artist should create -beautiful things, but should put nothing of his own life into them. We -live in an age when men treat art as if it were meant to be a form of -autobiography. We have lost the abstract sense of beauty. Some day I -will show the world what it is; and for that reason the world shall -never see my portrait of Dorian Gray." - -"I think you are wrong, Basil, but I won't argue with you. It is only -the intellectually lost who ever argue. Tell me, is Dorian Gray very -fond of you?" - -The painter considered for a few moments. "He likes me," he answered -after a pause; "I know he likes me. Of course I flatter him -dreadfully. I find a strange pleasure in saying things to him that I -know I shall be sorry for having said. As a rule, he is charming to -me, and we sit in the studio and talk of a thousand things. Now and -then, however, he is horribly thoughtless, and seems to take a real -delight in giving me pain. Then I feel, Harry, that I have given away -my whole soul to some one who treats it as if it were a flower to put -in his coat, a bit of decoration to charm his vanity, an ornament for a -summer's day." - -"Days in summer, Basil, are apt to linger," murmured Lord Henry. -"Perhaps you will tire sooner than he will. It is a sad thing to think -of, but there is no doubt that genius lasts longer than beauty. That -accounts for the fact that we all take such pains to over-educate -ourselves. In the wild struggle for existence, we want to have -something that endures, and so we fill our minds with rubbish and -facts, in the silly hope of keeping our place. The thoroughly -well-informed man--that is the modern ideal. And the mind of the -thoroughly well-informed man is a dreadful thing. It is like a -_bric-a-brac_ shop, all monsters and dust, with everything priced above -its proper value. I think you will tire first, all the same. Some day -you will look at your friend, and he will seem to you to be a little -out of drawing, or you won't like his tone of colour, or something. -You will bitterly reproach him in your own heart, and seriously think -that he has behaved very badly to you. The next time he calls, you -will be perfectly cold and indifferent. It will be a great pity, for -it will alter you. What you have told me is quite a romance, a romance -of art one might call it, and the worst of having a romance of any kind -is that it leaves one so unromantic." - -"Harry, don't talk like that. As long as I live, the personality of -Dorian Gray will dominate me. You can't feel what I feel. You change -too often." - -"Ah, my dear Basil, that is exactly why I can feel it. Those who are -faithful know only the trivial side of love: it is the faithless who -know love's tragedies." And Lord Henry struck a light on a dainty -silver case and began to smoke a cigarette with a self-conscious and -satisfied air, as if he had summed up the world in a phrase. There was -a rustle of chirruping sparrows in the green lacquer leaves of the ivy, -and the blue cloud-shadows chased themselves across the grass like -swallows. How pleasant it was in the garden! And how delightful other -people's emotions were!--much more delightful than their ideas, it -seemed to him. One's own soul, and the passions of one's -friends--those were the fascinating things in life. He pictured to -himself with silent amusement the tedious luncheon that he had missed -by staying so long with Basil Hallward. Had he gone to his aunt's, he -would have been sure to have met Lord Goodbody there, and the whole -conversation would have been about the feeding of the poor and the -necessity for model lodging-houses. Each class would have preached the -importance of those virtues, for whose exercise there was no necessity -in their own lives. The rich would have spoken on the value of thrift, -and the idle grown eloquent over the dignity of labour. It was -charming to have escaped all that! As he thought of his aunt, an idea -seemed to strike him. He turned to Hallward and said, "My dear fellow, -I have just remembered." - -"Remembered what, Harry?" - -"Where I heard the name of Dorian Gray." - -"Where was it?" asked Hallward, with a slight frown. - -"Don't look so angry, Basil. It was at my aunt, Lady Agatha's. She -told me she had discovered a wonderful young man who was going to help -her in the East End, and that his name was Dorian Gray. I am bound to -state that she never told me he was good-looking. Women have no -appreciation of good looks; at least, good women have not. She said -that he was very earnest and had a beautiful nature. I at once -pictured to myself a creature with spectacles and lank hair, horribly -freckled, and tramping about on huge feet. I wish I had known it was -your friend." - -"I am very glad you didn't, Harry." - -"Why?" - -"I don't want you to meet him." - -"You don't want me to meet him?" - -"No." - -"Mr. Dorian Gray is in the studio, sir," said the butler, coming into -the garden. - -"You must introduce me now," cried Lord Henry, laughing. - -The painter turned to his servant, who stood blinking in the sunlight. -"Ask Mr. Gray to wait, Parker: I shall be in in a few moments." The -man bowed and went up the walk. - -Then he looked at Lord Henry. "Dorian Gray is my dearest friend," he -said. "He has a simple and a beautiful nature. Your aunt was quite -right in what she said of him. Don't spoil him. Don't try to -influence him. Your influence would be bad. The world is wide, and -has many marvellous people in it. Don't take away from me the one -person who gives to my art whatever charm it possesses: my life as an -artist depends on him. Mind, Harry, I trust you." He spoke very -slowly, and the words seemed wrung out of him almost against his will. - -"What nonsense you talk!" said Lord Henry, smiling, and taking Hallward -by the arm, he almost led him into the house. - - - -CHAPTER 2 - -As they entered they saw Dorian Gray. He was seated at the piano, with -his back to them, turning over the pages of a volume of Schumann's -"Forest Scenes." "You must lend me these, Basil," he cried. "I want -to learn them. They are perfectly charming." - -"That entirely depends on how you sit to-day, Dorian." - -"Oh, I am tired of sitting, and I don't want a life-sized portrait of -myself," answered the lad, swinging round on the music-stool in a -wilful, petulant manner. When he caught sight of Lord Henry, a faint -blush coloured his cheeks for a moment, and he started up. "I beg your -pardon, Basil, but I didn't know you had any one with you." - -"This is Lord Henry Wotton, Dorian, an old Oxford friend of mine. I -have just been telling him what a capital sitter you were, and now you -have spoiled everything." - -"You have not spoiled my pleasure in meeting you, Mr. Gray," said Lord -Henry, stepping forward and extending his hand. "My aunt has often -spoken to me about you. You are one of her favourites, and, I am -afraid, one of her victims also." - -"I am in Lady Agatha's black books at present," answered Dorian with a -funny look of penitence. "I promised to go to a club in Whitechapel -with her last Tuesday, and I really forgot all about it. We were to -have played a duet together--three duets, I believe. I don't know what -she will say to me. I am far too frightened to call." - -"Oh, I will make your peace with my aunt. She is quite devoted to you. -And I don't think it really matters about your not being there. The -audience probably thought it was a duet. When Aunt Agatha sits down to -the piano, she makes quite enough noise for two people." - -"That is very horrid to her, and not very nice to me," answered Dorian, -laughing. - -Lord Henry looked at him. Yes, he was certainly wonderfully handsome, -with his finely curved scarlet lips, his frank blue eyes, his crisp -gold hair. There was something in his face that made one trust him at -once. All the candour of youth was there, as well as all youth's -passionate purity. One felt that he had kept himself unspotted from -the world. No wonder Basil Hallward worshipped him. - -"You are too charming to go in for philanthropy, Mr. Gray--far too -charming." And Lord Henry flung himself down on the divan and opened -his cigarette-case. - -The painter had been busy mixing his colours and getting his brushes -ready. He was looking worried, and when he heard Lord Henry's last -remark, he glanced at him, hesitated for a moment, and then said, -"Harry, I want to finish this picture to-day. Would you think it -awfully rude of me if I asked you to go away?" - -Lord Henry smiled and looked at Dorian Gray. "Am I to go, Mr. Gray?" -he asked. - -"Oh, please don't, Lord Henry. I see that Basil is in one of his sulky -moods, and I can't bear him when he sulks. Besides, I want you to tell -me why I should not go in for philanthropy." - -"I don't know that I shall tell you that, Mr. Gray. It is so tedious a -subject that one would have to talk seriously about it. But I -certainly shall not run away, now that you have asked me to stop. You -don't really mind, Basil, do you? You have often told me that you -liked your sitters to have some one to chat to." - -Hallward bit his lip. "If Dorian wishes it, of course you must stay. -Dorian's whims are laws to everybody, except himself." - -Lord Henry took up his hat and gloves. "You are very pressing, Basil, -but I am afraid I must go. I have promised to meet a man at the -Orleans. Good-bye, Mr. Gray. Come and see me some afternoon in Curzon -Street. I am nearly always at home at five o'clock. Write to me when -you are coming. I should be sorry to miss you." - -"Basil," cried Dorian Gray, "if Lord Henry Wotton goes, I shall go, -too. You never open your lips while you are painting, and it is -horribly dull standing on a platform and trying to look pleasant. Ask -him to stay. I insist upon it." - -"Stay, Harry, to oblige Dorian, and to oblige me," said Hallward, -gazing intently at his picture. "It is quite true, I never talk when I -am working, and never listen either, and it must be dreadfully tedious -for my unfortunate sitters. I beg you to stay." - -"But what about my man at the Orleans?" - -The painter laughed. "I don't think there will be any difficulty about -that. Sit down again, Harry. And now, Dorian, get up on the platform, -and don't move about too much, or pay any attention to what Lord Henry -says. He has a very bad influence over all his friends, with the -single exception of myself." - -Dorian Gray stepped up on the dais with the air of a young Greek -martyr, and made a little _moue_ of discontent to Lord Henry, to whom he -had rather taken a fancy. He was so unlike Basil. They made a -delightful contrast. And he had such a beautiful voice. After a few -moments he said to him, "Have you really a very bad influence, Lord -Henry? As bad as Basil says?" - -"There is no such thing as a good influence, Mr. Gray. All influence -is immoral--immoral from the scientific point of view." - -"Why?" - -"Because to influence a person is to give him one's own soul. He does -not think his natural thoughts, or burn with his natural passions. His -virtues are not real to him. His sins, if there are such things as -sins, are borrowed. He becomes an echo of some one else's music, an -actor of a part that has not been written for him. The aim of life is -self-development. To realize one's nature perfectly--that is what each -of us is here for. People are afraid of themselves, nowadays. They -have forgotten the highest of all duties, the duty that one owes to -one's self. Of course, they are charitable. They feed the hungry and -clothe the beggar. But their own souls starve, and are naked. Courage -has gone out of our race. Perhaps we never really had it. The terror -of society, which is the basis of morals, the terror of God, which is -the secret of religion--these are the two things that govern us. And -yet--" - -"Just turn your head a little more to the right, Dorian, like a good -boy," said the painter, deep in his work and conscious only that a look -had come into the lad's face that he had never seen there before. - -"And yet," continued Lord Henry, in his low, musical voice, and with -that graceful wave of the hand that was always so characteristic of -him, and that he had even in his Eton days, "I believe that if one man -were to live out his life fully and completely, were to give form to -every feeling, expression to every thought, reality to every dream--I -believe that the world would gain such a fresh impulse of joy that we -would forget all the maladies of mediaevalism, and return to the -Hellenic ideal--to something finer, richer than the Hellenic ideal, it -may be. But the bravest man amongst us is afraid of himself. The -mutilation of the savage has its tragic survival in the self-denial -that mars our lives. We are punished for our refusals. Every impulse -that we strive to strangle broods in the mind and poisons us. The body -sins once, and has done with its sin, for action is a mode of -purification. Nothing remains then but the recollection of a pleasure, -or the luxury of a regret. The only way to get rid of a temptation is -to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for -the things it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its -monstrous laws have made monstrous and unlawful. It has been said that -the great events of the world take place in the brain. It is in the -brain, and the brain only, that the great sins of the world take place -also. You, Mr. Gray, you yourself, with your rose-red youth and your -rose-white boyhood, you have had passions that have made you afraid, -thoughts that have filled you with terror, day-dreams and sleeping -dreams whose mere memory might stain your cheek with shame--" - -"Stop!" faltered Dorian Gray, "stop! you bewilder me. I don't know -what to say. There is some answer to you, but I cannot find it. Don't -speak. Let me think. Or, rather, let me try not to think." - -For nearly ten minutes he stood there, motionless, with parted lips and -eyes strangely bright. He was dimly conscious that entirely fresh -influences were at work within him. Yet they seemed to him to have -come really from himself. The few words that Basil's friend had said -to him--words spoken by chance, no doubt, and with wilful paradox in -them--had touched some secret chord that had never been touched before, -but that he felt was now vibrating and throbbing to curious pulses. - -Music had stirred him like that. Music had troubled him many times. -But music was not articulate. It was not a new world, but rather -another chaos, that it created in us. Words! Mere words! How -terrible they were! How clear, and vivid, and cruel! One could not -escape from them. And yet what a subtle magic there was in them! They -seemed to be able to give a plastic form to formless things, and to -have a music of their own as sweet as that of viol or of lute. Mere -words! Was there anything so real as words? - -Yes; there had been things in his boyhood that he had not understood. -He understood them now. Life suddenly became fiery-coloured to him. -It seemed to him that he had been walking in fire. Why had he not -known it? - -With his subtle smile, Lord Henry watched him. He knew the precise -psychological moment when to say nothing. He felt intensely -interested. He was amazed at the sudden impression that his words had -produced, and, remembering a book that he had read when he was sixteen, -a book which had revealed to him much that he had not known before, he -wondered whether Dorian Gray was passing through a similar experience. -He had merely shot an arrow into the air. Had it hit the mark? How -fascinating the lad was! - -Hallward painted away with that marvellous bold touch of his, that had -the true refinement and perfect delicacy that in art, at any rate comes -only from strength. He was unconscious of the silence. - -"Basil, I am tired of standing," cried Dorian Gray suddenly. "I must -go out and sit in the garden. The air is stifling here." - -"My dear fellow, I am so sorry. When I am painting, I can't think of -anything else. But you never sat better. You were perfectly still. -And I have caught the effect I wanted--the half-parted lips and the -bright look in the eyes. I don't know what Harry has been saying to -you, but he has certainly made you have the most wonderful expression. -I suppose he has been paying you compliments. You mustn't believe a -word that he says." - -"He has certainly not been paying me compliments. Perhaps that is the -reason that I don't believe anything he has told me." - -"You know you believe it all," said Lord Henry, looking at him with his -dreamy languorous eyes. "I will go out to the garden with you. It is -horribly hot in the studio. Basil, let us have something iced to -drink, something with strawberries in it." - -"Certainly, Harry. Just touch the bell, and when Parker comes I will -tell him what you want. I have got to work up this background, so I -will join you later on. Don't keep Dorian too long. I have never been -in better form for painting than I am to-day. This is going to be my -masterpiece. It is my masterpiece as it stands." - -Lord Henry went out to the garden and found Dorian Gray burying his -face in the great cool lilac-blossoms, feverishly drinking in their -perfume as if it had been wine. He came close to him and put his hand -upon his shoulder. "You are quite right to do that," he murmured. -"Nothing can cure the soul but the senses, just as nothing can cure the -senses but the soul." - -The lad started and drew back. He was bareheaded, and the leaves had -tossed his rebellious curls and tangled all their gilded threads. -There was a look of fear in his eyes, such as people have when they are -suddenly awakened. His finely chiselled nostrils quivered, and some -hidden nerve shook the scarlet of his lips and left them trembling. - -"Yes," continued Lord Henry, "that is one of the great secrets of -life--to cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses by means -of the soul. You are a wonderful creation. You know more than you -think you know, just as you know less than you want to know." - -Dorian Gray frowned and turned his head away. He could not help liking -the tall, graceful young man who was standing by him. His romantic, -olive-coloured face and worn expression interested him. There was -something in his low languid voice that was absolutely fascinating. -His cool, white, flowerlike hands, even, had a curious charm. They -moved, as he spoke, like music, and seemed to have a language of their -own. But he felt afraid of him, and ashamed of being afraid. Why had -it been left for a stranger to reveal him to himself? He had known -Basil Hallward for months, but the friendship between them had never -altered him. Suddenly there had come some one across his life who -seemed to have disclosed to him life's mystery. And, yet, what was -there to be afraid of? He was not a schoolboy or a girl. It was -absurd to be frightened. - -"Let us go and sit in the shade," said Lord Henry. "Parker has brought -out the drinks, and if you stay any longer in this glare, you will be -quite spoiled, and Basil will never paint you again. You really must -not allow yourself to become sunburnt. It would be unbecoming." - -"What can it matter?" cried Dorian Gray, laughing, as he sat down on -the seat at the end of the garden. - -"It should matter everything to you, Mr. Gray." - -"Why?" - -"Because you have the most marvellous youth, and youth is the one thing -worth having." - -"I don't feel that, Lord Henry." - -"No, you don't feel it now. Some day, when you are old and wrinkled -and ugly, when thought has seared your forehead with its lines, and -passion branded your lips with its hideous fires, you will feel it, you -will feel it terribly. Now, wherever you go, you charm the world. -Will it always be so? ... You have a wonderfully beautiful face, Mr. -Gray. Don't frown. You have. And beauty is a form of genius--is -higher, indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. It is of the -great facts of the world, like sunlight, or spring-time, or the -reflection in dark waters of that silver shell we call the moon. It -cannot be questioned. It has its divine right of sovereignty. It -makes princes of those who have it. You smile? Ah! when you have lost -it you won't smile.... People say sometimes that beauty is only -superficial. That may be so, but at least it is not so superficial as -thought is. To me, beauty is the wonder of wonders. It is only -shallow people who do not judge by appearances. The true mystery of -the world is the visible, not the invisible.... Yes, Mr. Gray, the -gods have been good to you. But what the gods give they quickly take -away. You have only a few years in which to live really, perfectly, -and fully. When your youth goes, your beauty will go with it, and then -you will suddenly discover that there are no triumphs left for you, or -have to content yourself with those mean triumphs that the memory of -your past will make more bitter than defeats. Every month as it wanes -brings you nearer to something dreadful. Time is jealous of you, and -wars against your lilies and your roses. You will become sallow, and -hollow-cheeked, and dull-eyed. You will suffer horribly.... Ah! -realize your youth while you have it. Don't squander the gold of your -days, listening to the tedious, trying to improve the hopeless failure, -or giving away your life to the ignorant, the common, and the vulgar. -These are the sickly aims, the false ideals, of our age. Live! Live -the wonderful life that is in you! Let nothing be lost upon you. Be -always searching for new sensations. Be afraid of nothing.... A new -Hedonism--that is what our century wants. You might be its visible -symbol. With your personality there is nothing you could not do. The -world belongs to you for a season.... The moment I met you I saw that -you were quite unconscious of what you really are, of what you really -might be. There was so much in you that charmed me that I felt I must -tell you something about yourself. I thought how tragic it would be if -you were wasted. For there is such a little time that your youth will -last--such a little time. The common hill-flowers wither, but they -blossom again. The laburnum will be as yellow next June as it is now. -In a month there will be purple stars on the clematis, and year after -year the green night of its leaves will hold its purple stars. But we -never get back our youth. The pulse of joy that beats in us at twenty -becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail, our senses rot. We degenerate into -hideous puppets, haunted by the memory of the passions of which we were -too much afraid, and the exquisite temptations that we had not the -courage to yield to. Youth! Youth! There is absolutely nothing in -the world but youth!" - -Dorian Gray listened, open-eyed and wondering. The spray of lilac fell -from his hand upon the gravel. A furry bee came and buzzed round it -for a moment. Then it began to scramble all over the oval stellated -globe of the tiny blossoms. He watched it with that strange interest -in trivial things that we try to develop when things of high import -make us afraid, or when we are stirred by some new emotion for which we -cannot find expression, or when some thought that terrifies us lays -sudden siege to the brain and calls on us to yield. After a time the -bee flew away. He saw it creeping into the stained trumpet of a Tyrian -convolvulus. The flower seemed to quiver, and then swayed gently to -and fro. - -Suddenly the painter appeared at the door of the studio and made -staccato signs for them to come in. They turned to each other and -smiled. - -"I am waiting," he cried. "Do come in. The light is quite perfect, -and you can bring your drinks." - -They rose up and sauntered down the walk together. Two green-and-white -butterflies fluttered past them, and in the pear-tree at the corner of -the garden a thrush began to sing. - -"You are glad you have met me, Mr. Gray," said Lord Henry, looking at -him. - -"Yes, I am glad now. I wonder shall I always be glad?" - -"Always! That is a dreadful word. It makes me shudder when I hear it. -Women are so fond of using it. They spoil every romance by trying to -make it last for ever. It is a meaningless word, too. The only -difference between a caprice and a lifelong passion is that the caprice -lasts a little longer." - -As they entered the studio, Dorian Gray put his hand upon Lord Henry's -arm. "In that case, let our friendship be a caprice," he murmured, -flushing at his own boldness, then stepped up on the platform and -resumed his pose. - -Lord Henry flung himself into a large wicker arm-chair and watched him. -The sweep and dash of the brush on the canvas made the only sound that -broke the stillness, except when, now and then, Hallward stepped back -to look at his work from a distance. In the slanting beams that -streamed through the open doorway the dust danced and was golden. The -heavy scent of the roses seemed to brood over everything. - -After about a quarter of an hour Hallward stopped painting, looked for -a long time at Dorian Gray, and then for a long time at the picture, -biting the end of one of his huge brushes and frowning. "It is quite -finished," he cried at last, and stooping down he wrote his name in -long vermilion letters on the left-hand corner of the canvas. - -Lord Henry came over and examined the picture. It was certainly a -wonderful work of art, and a wonderful likeness as well. - -"My dear fellow, I congratulate you most warmly," he said. "It is the -finest portrait of modern times. Mr. Gray, come over and look at -yourself." - -The lad started, as if awakened from some dream. - -"Is it really finished?" he murmured, stepping down from the platform. - -"Quite finished," said the painter. "And you have sat splendidly -to-day. I am awfully obliged to you." - -"That is entirely due to me," broke in Lord Henry. "Isn't it, Mr. -Gray?" - -Dorian made no answer, but passed listlessly in front of his picture -and turned towards it. When he saw it he drew back, and his cheeks -flushed for a moment with pleasure. A look of joy came into his eyes, -as if he had recognized himself for the first time. He stood there -motionless and in wonder, dimly conscious that Hallward was speaking to -him, but not catching the meaning of his words. The sense of his own -beauty came on him like a revelation. He had never felt it before. -Basil Hallward's compliments had seemed to him to be merely the -charming exaggeration of friendship. He had listened to them, laughed -at them, forgotten them. They had not influenced his nature. Then had -come Lord Henry Wotton with his strange panegyric on youth, his -terrible warning of its brevity. That had stirred him at the time, and -now, as he stood gazing at the shadow of his own loveliness, the full -reality of the description flashed across him. Yes, there would be a -day when his face would be wrinkled and wizen, his eyes dim and -colourless, the grace of his figure broken and deformed. The scarlet -would pass away from his lips and the gold steal from his hair. The -life that was to make his soul would mar his body. He would become -dreadful, hideous, and uncouth. - -As he thought of it, a sharp pang of pain struck through him like a -knife and made each delicate fibre of his nature quiver. His eyes -deepened into amethyst, and across them came a mist of tears. He felt -as if a hand of ice had been laid upon his heart. - -"Don't you like it?" cried Hallward at last, stung a little by the -lad's silence, not understanding what it meant. - -"Of course he likes it," said Lord Henry. "Who wouldn't like it? It -is one of the greatest things in modern art. I will give you anything -you like to ask for it. I must have it." - -"It is not my property, Harry." - -"Whose property is it?" - -"Dorian's, of course," answered the painter. - -"He is a very lucky fellow." - -"How sad it is!" murmured Dorian Gray with his eyes still fixed upon -his own portrait. "How sad it is! I shall grow old, and horrible, and -dreadful. But this picture will remain always young. It will never be -older than this particular day of June.... If it were only the other -way! If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was -to grow old! For that--for that--I would give everything! Yes, there -is nothing in the whole world I would not give! I would give my soul -for that!" - -"You would hardly care for such an arrangement, Basil," cried Lord -Henry, laughing. "It would be rather hard lines on your work." - -"I should object very strongly, Harry," said Hallward. - -Dorian Gray turned and looked at him. "I believe you would, Basil. -You like your art better than your friends. I am no more to you than a -green bronze figure. Hardly as much, I dare say." - -The painter stared in amazement. It was so unlike Dorian to speak like -that. What had happened? He seemed quite angry. His face was flushed -and his cheeks burning. - -"Yes," he continued, "I am less to you than your ivory Hermes or your -silver Faun. You will like them always. How long will you like me? -Till I have my first wrinkle, I suppose. I know, now, that when one -loses one's good looks, whatever they may be, one loses everything. -Your picture has taught me that. Lord Henry Wotton is perfectly right. -Youth is the only thing worth having. When I find that I am growing -old, I shall kill myself." - -Hallward turned pale and caught his hand. "Dorian! Dorian!" he cried, -"don't talk like that. I have never had such a friend as you, and I -shall never have such another. You are not jealous of material things, -are you?--you who are finer than any of them!" - -"I am jealous of everything whose beauty does not die. I am jealous of -the portrait you have painted of me. Why should it keep what I must -lose? Every moment that passes takes something from me and gives -something to it. Oh, if it were only the other way! If the picture -could change, and I could be always what I am now! Why did you paint -it? It will mock me some day--mock me horribly!" The hot tears welled -into his eyes; he tore his hand away and, flinging himself on the -divan, he buried his face in the cushions, as though he was praying. - -"This is your doing, Harry," said the painter bitterly. - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "It is the real Dorian Gray--that -is all." - -"It is not." - -"If it is not, what have I to do with it?" - -"You should have gone away when I asked you," he muttered. - -"I stayed when you asked me," was Lord Henry's answer. - -"Harry, I can't quarrel with my two best friends at once, but between -you both you have made me hate the finest piece of work I have ever -done, and I will destroy it. What is it but canvas and colour? I will -not let it come across our three lives and mar them." - -Dorian Gray lifted his golden head from the pillow, and with pallid -face and tear-stained eyes, looked at him as he walked over to the deal -painting-table that was set beneath the high curtained window. What -was he doing there? His fingers were straying about among the litter -of tin tubes and dry brushes, seeking for something. Yes, it was for -the long palette-knife, with its thin blade of lithe steel. He had -found it at last. He was going to rip up the canvas. - -With a stifled sob the lad leaped from the couch, and, rushing over to -Hallward, tore the knife out of his hand, and flung it to the end of -the studio. "Don't, Basil, don't!" he cried. "It would be murder!" - -"I am glad you appreciate my work at last, Dorian," said the painter -coldly when he had recovered from his surprise. "I never thought you -would." - -"Appreciate it? I am in love with it, Basil. It is part of myself. I -feel that." - -"Well, as soon as you are dry, you shall be varnished, and framed, and -sent home. Then you can do what you like with yourself." And he walked -across the room and rang the bell for tea. "You will have tea, of -course, Dorian? And so will you, Harry? Or do you object to such -simple pleasures?" - -"I adore simple pleasures," said Lord Henry. "They are the last refuge -of the complex. But I don't like scenes, except on the stage. What -absurd fellows you are, both of you! I wonder who it was defined man -as a rational animal. It was the most premature definition ever given. -Man is many things, but he is not rational. I am glad he is not, after -all--though I wish you chaps would not squabble over the picture. You -had much better let me have it, Basil. This silly boy doesn't really -want it, and I really do." - -"If you let any one have it but me, Basil, I shall never forgive you!" -cried Dorian Gray; "and I don't allow people to call me a silly boy." - -"You know the picture is yours, Dorian. I gave it to you before it -existed." - -"And you know you have been a little silly, Mr. Gray, and that you -don't really object to being reminded that you are extremely young." - -"I should have objected very strongly this morning, Lord Henry." - -"Ah! this morning! You have lived since then." - -There came a knock at the door, and the butler entered with a laden -tea-tray and set it down upon a small Japanese table. There was a -rattle of cups and saucers and the hissing of a fluted Georgian urn. -Two globe-shaped china dishes were brought in by a page. Dorian Gray -went over and poured out the tea. The two men sauntered languidly to -the table and examined what was under the covers. - -"Let us go to the theatre to-night," said Lord Henry. "There is sure -to be something on, somewhere. I have promised to dine at White's, but -it is only with an old friend, so I can send him a wire to say that I -am ill, or that I am prevented from coming in consequence of a -subsequent engagement. I think that would be a rather nice excuse: it -would have all the surprise of candour." - -"It is such a bore putting on one's dress-clothes," muttered Hallward. -"And, when one has them on, they are so horrid." - -"Yes," answered Lord Henry dreamily, "the costume of the nineteenth -century is detestable. It is so sombre, so depressing. Sin is the -only real colour-element left in modern life." - -"You really must not say things like that before Dorian, Harry." - -"Before which Dorian? The one who is pouring out tea for us, or the -one in the picture?" - -"Before either." - -"I should like to come to the theatre with you, Lord Henry," said the -lad. - -"Then you shall come; and you will come, too, Basil, won't you?" - -"I can't, really. I would sooner not. I have a lot of work to do." - -"Well, then, you and I will go alone, Mr. Gray." - -"I should like that awfully." - -The painter bit his lip and walked over, cup in hand, to the picture. -"I shall stay with the real Dorian," he said, sadly. - -"Is it the real Dorian?" cried the original of the portrait, strolling -across to him. "Am I really like that?" - -"Yes; you are just like that." - -"How wonderful, Basil!" - -"At least you are like it in appearance. But it will never alter," -sighed Hallward. "That is something." - -"What a fuss people make about fidelity!" exclaimed Lord Henry. "Why, -even in love it is purely a question for physiology. It has nothing to -do with our own will. Young men want to be faithful, and are not; old -men want to be faithless, and cannot: that is all one can say." - -"Don't go to the theatre to-night, Dorian," said Hallward. "Stop and -dine with me." - -"I can't, Basil." - -"Why?" - -"Because I have promised Lord Henry Wotton to go with him." - -"He won't like you the better for keeping your promises. He always -breaks his own. I beg you not to go." - -Dorian Gray laughed and shook his head. - -"I entreat you." - -The lad hesitated, and looked over at Lord Henry, who was watching them -from the tea-table with an amused smile. - -"I must go, Basil," he answered. - -"Very well," said Hallward, and he went over and laid down his cup on -the tray. "It is rather late, and, as you have to dress, you had -better lose no time. Good-bye, Harry. Good-bye, Dorian. Come and see -me soon. Come to-morrow." - -"Certainly." - -"You won't forget?" - -"No, of course not," cried Dorian. - -"And ... Harry!" - -"Yes, Basil?" - -"Remember what I asked you, when we were in the garden this morning." - -"I have forgotten it." - -"I trust you." - -"I wish I could trust myself," said Lord Henry, laughing. "Come, Mr. -Gray, my hansom is outside, and I can drop you at your own place. -Good-bye, Basil. It has been a most interesting afternoon." - -As the door closed behind them, the painter flung himself down on a -sofa, and a look of pain came into his face. - - - -CHAPTER 3 - -At half-past twelve next day Lord Henry Wotton strolled from Curzon -Street over to the Albany to call on his uncle, Lord Fermor, a genial -if somewhat rough-mannered old bachelor, whom the outside world called -selfish because it derived no particular benefit from him, but who was -considered generous by Society as he fed the people who amused him. -His father had been our ambassador at Madrid when Isabella was young -and Prim unthought of, but had retired from the diplomatic service in a -capricious moment of annoyance on not being offered the Embassy at -Paris, a post to which he considered that he was fully entitled by -reason of his birth, his indolence, the good English of his dispatches, -and his inordinate passion for pleasure. The son, who had been his -father's secretary, had resigned along with his chief, somewhat -foolishly as was thought at the time, and on succeeding some months -later to the title, had set himself to the serious study of the great -aristocratic art of doing absolutely nothing. He had two large town -houses, but preferred to live in chambers as it was less trouble, and -took most of his meals at his club. He paid some attention to the -management of his collieries in the Midland counties, excusing himself -for this taint of industry on the ground that the one advantage of -having coal was that it enabled a gentleman to afford the decency of -burning wood on his own hearth. In politics he was a Tory, except when -the Tories were in office, during which period he roundly abused them -for being a pack of Radicals. He was a hero to his valet, who bullied -him, and a terror to most of his relations, whom he bullied in turn. -Only England could have produced him, and he always said that the -country was going to the dogs. His principles were out of date, but -there was a good deal to be said for his prejudices. - -When Lord Henry entered the room, he found his uncle sitting in a rough -shooting-coat, smoking a cheroot and grumbling over _The Times_. "Well, -Harry," said the old gentleman, "what brings you out so early? I -thought you dandies never got up till two, and were not visible till -five." - -"Pure family affection, I assure you, Uncle George. I want to get -something out of you." - -"Money, I suppose," said Lord Fermor, making a wry face. "Well, sit -down and tell me all about it. Young people, nowadays, imagine that -money is everything." - -"Yes," murmured Lord Henry, settling his button-hole in his coat; "and -when they grow older they know it. But I don't want money. It is only -people who pay their bills who want that, Uncle George, and I never pay -mine. Credit is the capital of a younger son, and one lives charmingly -upon it. Besides, I always deal with Dartmoor's tradesmen, and -consequently they never bother me. What I want is information: not -useful information, of course; useless information." - -"Well, I can tell you anything that is in an English Blue Book, Harry, -although those fellows nowadays write a lot of nonsense. When I was in -the Diplomatic, things were much better. But I hear they let them in -now by examination. What can you expect? Examinations, sir, are pure -humbug from beginning to end. If a man is a gentleman, he knows quite -enough, and if he is not a gentleman, whatever he knows is bad for him." - -"Mr. Dorian Gray does not belong to Blue Books, Uncle George," said -Lord Henry languidly. - -"Mr. Dorian Gray? Who is he?" asked Lord Fermor, knitting his bushy -white eyebrows. - -"That is what I have come to learn, Uncle George. Or rather, I know -who he is. He is the last Lord Kelso's grandson. His mother was a -Devereux, Lady Margaret Devereux. I want you to tell me about his -mother. What was she like? Whom did she marry? You have known nearly -everybody in your time, so you might have known her. I am very much -interested in Mr. Gray at present. I have only just met him." - -"Kelso's grandson!" echoed the old gentleman. "Kelso's grandson! ... -Of course.... I knew his mother intimately. I believe I was at her -christening. She was an extraordinarily beautiful girl, Margaret -Devereux, and made all the men frantic by running away with a penniless -young fellow--a mere nobody, sir, a subaltern in a foot regiment, or -something of that kind. Certainly. I remember the whole thing as if -it happened yesterday. The poor chap was killed in a duel at Spa a few -months after the marriage. There was an ugly story about it. They -said Kelso got some rascally adventurer, some Belgian brute, to insult -his son-in-law in public--paid him, sir, to do it, paid him--and that -the fellow spitted his man as if he had been a pigeon. The thing was -hushed up, but, egad, Kelso ate his chop alone at the club for some -time afterwards. He brought his daughter back with him, I was told, -and she never spoke to him again. Oh, yes; it was a bad business. The -girl died, too, died within a year. So she left a son, did she? I had -forgotten that. What sort of boy is he? If he is like his mother, he -must be a good-looking chap." - -"He is very good-looking," assented Lord Henry. - -"I hope he will fall into proper hands," continued the old man. "He -should have a pot of money waiting for him if Kelso did the right thing -by him. His mother had money, too. All the Selby property came to -her, through her grandfather. Her grandfather hated Kelso, thought him -a mean dog. He was, too. Came to Madrid once when I was there. Egad, -I was ashamed of him. The Queen used to ask me about the English noble -who was always quarrelling with the cabmen about their fares. They -made quite a story of it. I didn't dare show my face at Court for a -month. I hope he treated his grandson better than he did the jarvies." - -"I don't know," answered Lord Henry. "I fancy that the boy will be -well off. He is not of age yet. He has Selby, I know. He told me so. -And ... his mother was very beautiful?" - -"Margaret Devereux was one of the loveliest creatures I ever saw, -Harry. What on earth induced her to behave as she did, I never could -understand. She could have married anybody she chose. Carlington was -mad after her. She was romantic, though. All the women of that family -were. The men were a poor lot, but, egad! the women were wonderful. -Carlington went on his knees to her. Told me so himself. She laughed -at him, and there wasn't a girl in London at the time who wasn't after -him. And by the way, Harry, talking about silly marriages, what is -this humbug your father tells me about Dartmoor wanting to marry an -American? Ain't English girls good enough for him?" - -"It is rather fashionable to marry Americans just now, Uncle George." - -"I'll back English women against the world, Harry," said Lord Fermor, -striking the table with his fist. - -"The betting is on the Americans." - -"They don't last, I am told," muttered his uncle. - -"A long engagement exhausts them, but they are capital at a -steeplechase. They take things flying. I don't think Dartmoor has a -chance." - -"Who are her people?" grumbled the old gentleman. "Has she got any?" - -Lord Henry shook his head. "American girls are as clever at concealing -their parents, as English women are at concealing their past," he said, -rising to go. - -"They are pork-packers, I suppose?" - -"I hope so, Uncle George, for Dartmoor's sake. I am told that -pork-packing is the most lucrative profession in America, after -politics." - -"Is she pretty?" - -"She behaves as if she was beautiful. Most American women do. It is -the secret of their charm." - -"Why can't these American women stay in their own country? They are -always telling us that it is the paradise for women." - -"It is. That is the reason why, like Eve, they are so excessively -anxious to get out of it," said Lord Henry. "Good-bye, Uncle George. -I shall be late for lunch, if I stop any longer. Thanks for giving me -the information I wanted. I always like to know everything about my -new friends, and nothing about my old ones." - -"Where are you lunching, Harry?" - -"At Aunt Agatha's. I have asked myself and Mr. Gray. He is her latest -_protege_." - -"Humph! tell your Aunt Agatha, Harry, not to bother me any more with -her charity appeals. I am sick of them. Why, the good woman thinks -that I have nothing to do but to write cheques for her silly fads." - -"All right, Uncle George, I'll tell her, but it won't have any effect. -Philanthropic people lose all sense of humanity. It is their -distinguishing characteristic." - -The old gentleman growled approvingly and rang the bell for his -servant. Lord Henry passed up the low arcade into Burlington Street -and turned his steps in the direction of Berkeley Square. - -So that was the story of Dorian Gray's parentage. Crudely as it had -been told to him, it had yet stirred him by its suggestion of a -strange, almost modern romance. A beautiful woman risking everything -for a mad passion. A few wild weeks of happiness cut short by a -hideous, treacherous crime. Months of voiceless agony, and then a -child born in pain. The mother snatched away by death, the boy left to -solitude and the tyranny of an old and loveless man. Yes; it was an -interesting background. It posed the lad, made him more perfect, as it -were. Behind every exquisite thing that existed, there was something -tragic. Worlds had to be in travail, that the meanest flower might -blow.... And how charming he had been at dinner the night before, as -with startled eyes and lips parted in frightened pleasure he had sat -opposite to him at the club, the red candleshades staining to a richer -rose the wakening wonder of his face. Talking to him was like playing -upon an exquisite violin. He answered to every touch and thrill of the -bow.... There was something terribly enthralling in the exercise of -influence. No other activity was like it. To project one's soul into -some gracious form, and let it tarry there for a moment; to hear one's -own intellectual views echoed back to one with all the added music of -passion and youth; to convey one's temperament into another as though -it were a subtle fluid or a strange perfume: there was a real joy in -that--perhaps the most satisfying joy left to us in an age so limited -and vulgar as our own, an age grossly carnal in its pleasures, and -grossly common in its aims.... He was a marvellous type, too, this lad, -whom by so curious a chance he had met in Basil's studio, or could be -fashioned into a marvellous type, at any rate. Grace was his, and the -white purity of boyhood, and beauty such as old Greek marbles kept for -us. There was nothing that one could not do with him. He could be -made a Titan or a toy. What a pity it was that such beauty was -destined to fade! ... And Basil? From a psychological point of view, -how interesting he was! The new manner in art, the fresh mode of -looking at life, suggested so strangely by the merely visible presence -of one who was unconscious of it all; the silent spirit that dwelt in -dim woodland, and walked unseen in open field, suddenly showing -herself, Dryadlike and not afraid, because in his soul who sought for -her there had been wakened that wonderful vision to which alone are -wonderful things revealed; the mere shapes and patterns of things -becoming, as it were, refined, and gaining a kind of symbolical value, -as though they were themselves patterns of some other and more perfect -form whose shadow they made real: how strange it all was! He -remembered something like it in history. Was it not Plato, that artist -in thought, who had first analyzed it? Was it not Buonarotti who had -carved it in the coloured marbles of a sonnet-sequence? But in our own -century it was strange.... Yes; he would try to be to Dorian Gray -what, without knowing it, the lad was to the painter who had fashioned -the wonderful portrait. He would seek to dominate him--had already, -indeed, half done so. He would make that wonderful spirit his own. -There was something fascinating in this son of love and death. - -Suddenly he stopped and glanced up at the houses. He found that he had -passed his aunt's some distance, and, smiling to himself, turned back. -When he entered the somewhat sombre hall, the butler told him that they -had gone in to lunch. He gave one of the footmen his hat and stick and -passed into the dining-room. - -"Late as usual, Harry," cried his aunt, shaking her head at him. - -He invented a facile excuse, and having taken the vacant seat next to -her, looked round to see who was there. Dorian bowed to him shyly from -the end of the table, a flush of pleasure stealing into his cheek. -Opposite was the Duchess of Harley, a lady of admirable good-nature and -good temper, much liked by every one who knew her, and of those ample -architectural proportions that in women who are not duchesses are -described by contemporary historians as stoutness. Next to her sat, on -her right, Sir Thomas Burdon, a Radical member of Parliament, who -followed his leader in public life and in private life followed the -best cooks, dining with the Tories and thinking with the Liberals, in -accordance with a wise and well-known rule. The post on her left was -occupied by Mr. Erskine of Treadley, an old gentleman of considerable -charm and culture, who had fallen, however, into bad habits of silence, -having, as he explained once to Lady Agatha, said everything that he -had to say before he was thirty. His own neighbour was Mrs. Vandeleur, -one of his aunt's oldest friends, a perfect saint amongst women, but so -dreadfully dowdy that she reminded one of a badly bound hymn-book. -Fortunately for him she had on the other side Lord Faudel, a most -intelligent middle-aged mediocrity, as bald as a ministerial statement -in the House of Commons, with whom she was conversing in that intensely -earnest manner which is the one unpardonable error, as he remarked once -himself, that all really good people fall into, and from which none of -them ever quite escape. - -"We are talking about poor Dartmoor, Lord Henry," cried the duchess, -nodding pleasantly to him across the table. "Do you think he will -really marry this fascinating young person?" - -"I believe she has made up her mind to propose to him, Duchess." - -"How dreadful!" exclaimed Lady Agatha. "Really, some one should -interfere." - -"I am told, on excellent authority, that her father keeps an American -dry-goods store," said Sir Thomas Burdon, looking supercilious. - -"My uncle has already suggested pork-packing, Sir Thomas." - -"Dry-goods! What are American dry-goods?" asked the duchess, raising -her large hands in wonder and accentuating the verb. - -"American novels," answered Lord Henry, helping himself to some quail. - -The duchess looked puzzled. - -"Don't mind him, my dear," whispered Lady Agatha. "He never means -anything that he says." - -"When America was discovered," said the Radical member--and he began to -give some wearisome facts. Like all people who try to exhaust a -subject, he exhausted his listeners. The duchess sighed and exercised -her privilege of interruption. "I wish to goodness it never had been -discovered at all!" she exclaimed. "Really, our girls have no chance -nowadays. It is most unfair." - -"Perhaps, after all, America never has been discovered," said Mr. -Erskine; "I myself would say that it had merely been detected." - -"Oh! but I have seen specimens of the inhabitants," answered the -duchess vaguely. "I must confess that most of them are extremely -pretty. And they dress well, too. They get all their dresses in -Paris. I wish I could afford to do the same." - -"They say that when good Americans die they go to Paris," chuckled Sir -Thomas, who had a large wardrobe of Humour's cast-off clothes. - -"Really! And where do bad Americans go to when they die?" inquired the -duchess. - -"They go to America," murmured Lord Henry. - -Sir Thomas frowned. "I am afraid that your nephew is prejudiced -against that great country," he said to Lady Agatha. "I have travelled -all over it in cars provided by the directors, who, in such matters, -are extremely civil. I assure you that it is an education to visit it." - -"But must we really see Chicago in order to be educated?" asked Mr. -Erskine plaintively. "I don't feel up to the journey." - -Sir Thomas waved his hand. "Mr. Erskine of Treadley has the world on -his shelves. We practical men like to see things, not to read about -them. The Americans are an extremely interesting people. They are -absolutely reasonable. I think that is their distinguishing -characteristic. Yes, Mr. Erskine, an absolutely reasonable people. I -assure you there is no nonsense about the Americans." - -"How dreadful!" cried Lord Henry. "I can stand brute force, but brute -reason is quite unbearable. There is something unfair about its use. -It is hitting below the intellect." - -"I do not understand you," said Sir Thomas, growing rather red. - -"I do, Lord Henry," murmured Mr. Erskine, with a smile. - -"Paradoxes are all very well in their way...." rejoined the baronet. - -"Was that a paradox?" asked Mr. Erskine. "I did not think so. Perhaps -it was. Well, the way of paradoxes is the way of truth. To test -reality we must see it on the tight rope. When the verities become -acrobats, we can judge them." - -"Dear me!" said Lady Agatha, "how you men argue! I am sure I never can -make out what you are talking about. Oh! Harry, I am quite vexed with -you. Why do you try to persuade our nice Mr. Dorian Gray to give up -the East End? I assure you he would be quite invaluable. They would -love his playing." - -"I want him to play to me," cried Lord Henry, smiling, and he looked -down the table and caught a bright answering glance. - -"But they are so unhappy in Whitechapel," continued Lady Agatha. - -"I can sympathize with everything except suffering," said Lord Henry, -shrugging his shoulders. "I cannot sympathize with that. It is too -ugly, too horrible, too distressing. There is something terribly -morbid in the modern sympathy with pain. One should sympathize with -the colour, the beauty, the joy of life. The less said about life's -sores, the better." - -"Still, the East End is a very important problem," remarked Sir Thomas -with a grave shake of the head. - -"Quite so," answered the young lord. "It is the problem of slavery, -and we try to solve it by amusing the slaves." - -The politician looked at him keenly. "What change do you propose, -then?" he asked. - -Lord Henry laughed. "I don't desire to change anything in England -except the weather," he answered. "I am quite content with philosophic -contemplation. But, as the nineteenth century has gone bankrupt -through an over-expenditure of sympathy, I would suggest that we should -appeal to science to put us straight. The advantage of the emotions is -that they lead us astray, and the advantage of science is that it is -not emotional." - -"But we have such grave responsibilities," ventured Mrs. Vandeleur -timidly. - -"Terribly grave," echoed Lady Agatha. - -Lord Henry looked over at Mr. Erskine. "Humanity takes itself too -seriously. It is the world's original sin. If the caveman had known -how to laugh, history would have been different." - -"You are really very comforting," warbled the duchess. "I have always -felt rather guilty when I came to see your dear aunt, for I take no -interest at all in the East End. For the future I shall be able to -look her in the face without a blush." - -"A blush is very becoming, Duchess," remarked Lord Henry. - -"Only when one is young," she answered. "When an old woman like myself -blushes, it is a very bad sign. Ah! Lord Henry, I wish you would tell -me how to become young again." - -He thought for a moment. "Can you remember any great error that you -committed in your early days, Duchess?" he asked, looking at her across -the table. - -"A great many, I fear," she cried. - -"Then commit them over again," he said gravely. "To get back one's -youth, one has merely to repeat one's follies." - -"A delightful theory!" she exclaimed. "I must put it into practice." - -"A dangerous theory!" came from Sir Thomas's tight lips. Lady Agatha -shook her head, but could not help being amused. Mr. Erskine listened. - -"Yes," he continued, "that is one of the great secrets of life. -Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and -discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are -one's mistakes." - -A laugh ran round the table. - -He played with the idea and grew wilful; tossed it into the air and -transformed it; let it escape and recaptured it; made it iridescent -with fancy and winged it with paradox. The praise of folly, as he went -on, soared into a philosophy, and philosophy herself became young, and -catching the mad music of pleasure, wearing, one might fancy, her -wine-stained robe and wreath of ivy, danced like a Bacchante over the -hills of life, and mocked the slow Silenus for being sober. Facts fled -before her like frightened forest things. Her white feet trod the huge -press at which wise Omar sits, till the seething grape-juice rose round -her bare limbs in waves of purple bubbles, or crawled in red foam over -the vat's black, dripping, sloping sides. It was an extraordinary -improvisation. He felt that the eyes of Dorian Gray were fixed on him, -and the consciousness that amongst his audience there was one whose -temperament he wished to fascinate seemed to give his wit keenness and -to lend colour to his imagination. He was brilliant, fantastic, -irresponsible. He charmed his listeners out of themselves, and they -followed his pipe, laughing. Dorian Gray never took his gaze off him, -but sat like one under a spell, smiles chasing each other over his lips -and wonder growing grave in his darkening eyes. - -At last, liveried in the costume of the age, reality entered the room -in the shape of a servant to tell the duchess that her carriage was -waiting. She wrung her hands in mock despair. "How annoying!" she -cried. "I must go. I have to call for my husband at the club, to take -him to some absurd meeting at Willis's Rooms, where he is going to be -in the chair. If I am late he is sure to be furious, and I couldn't -have a scene in this bonnet. It is far too fragile. A harsh word -would ruin it. No, I must go, dear Agatha. Good-bye, Lord Henry, you -are quite delightful and dreadfully demoralizing. I am sure I don't -know what to say about your views. You must come and dine with us some -night. Tuesday? Are you disengaged Tuesday?" - -"For you I would throw over anybody, Duchess," said Lord Henry with a -bow. - -"Ah! that is very nice, and very wrong of you," she cried; "so mind you -come"; and she swept out of the room, followed by Lady Agatha and the -other ladies. - -When Lord Henry had sat down again, Mr. Erskine moved round, and taking -a chair close to him, placed his hand upon his arm. - -"You talk books away," he said; "why don't you write one?" - -"I am too fond of reading books to care to write them, Mr. Erskine. I -should like to write a novel certainly, a novel that would be as lovely -as a Persian carpet and as unreal. But there is no literary public in -England for anything except newspapers, primers, and encyclopaedias. -Of all people in the world the English have the least sense of the -beauty of literature." - -"I fear you are right," answered Mr. Erskine. "I myself used to have -literary ambitions, but I gave them up long ago. And now, my dear -young friend, if you will allow me to call you so, may I ask if you -really meant all that you said to us at lunch?" - -"I quite forget what I said," smiled Lord Henry. "Was it all very bad?" - -"Very bad indeed. In fact I consider you extremely dangerous, and if -anything happens to our good duchess, we shall all look on you as being -primarily responsible. But I should like to talk to you about life. -The generation into which I was born was tedious. Some day, when you -are tired of London, come down to Treadley and expound to me your -philosophy of pleasure over some admirable Burgundy I am fortunate -enough to possess." - -"I shall be charmed. A visit to Treadley would be a great privilege. -It has a perfect host, and a perfect library." - -"You will complete it," answered the old gentleman with a courteous -bow. "And now I must bid good-bye to your excellent aunt. I am due at -the Athenaeum. It is the hour when we sleep there." - -"All of you, Mr. Erskine?" - -"Forty of us, in forty arm-chairs. We are practising for an English -Academy of Letters." - -Lord Henry laughed and rose. "I am going to the park," he cried. - -As he was passing out of the door, Dorian Gray touched him on the arm. -"Let me come with you," he murmured. - -"But I thought you had promised Basil Hallward to go and see him," -answered Lord Henry. - -"I would sooner come with you; yes, I feel I must come with you. Do -let me. And you will promise to talk to me all the time? No one talks -so wonderfully as you do." - -"Ah! I have talked quite enough for to-day," said Lord Henry, smiling. -"All I want now is to look at life. You may come and look at it with -me, if you care to." - - - -CHAPTER 4 - -One afternoon, a month later, Dorian Gray was reclining in a luxurious -arm-chair, in the little library of Lord Henry's house in Mayfair. It -was, in its way, a very charming room, with its high panelled -wainscoting of olive-stained oak, its cream-coloured frieze and ceiling -of raised plasterwork, and its brickdust felt carpet strewn with silk, -long-fringed Persian rugs. On a tiny satinwood table stood a statuette -by Clodion, and beside it lay a copy of Les Cent Nouvelles, bound for -Margaret of Valois by Clovis Eve and powdered with the gilt daisies -that Queen had selected for her device. Some large blue china jars and -parrot-tulips were ranged on the mantelshelf, and through the small -leaded panes of the window streamed the apricot-coloured light of a -summer day in London. - -Lord Henry had not yet come in. He was always late on principle, his -principle being that punctuality is the thief of time. So the lad was -looking rather sulky, as with listless fingers he turned over the pages -of an elaborately illustrated edition of Manon Lescaut that he had -found in one of the book-cases. The formal monotonous ticking of the -Louis Quatorze clock annoyed him. Once or twice he thought of going -away. - -At last he heard a step outside, and the door opened. "How late you -are, Harry!" he murmured. - -"I am afraid it is not Harry, Mr. Gray," answered a shrill voice. - -He glanced quickly round and rose to his feet. "I beg your pardon. I -thought--" - -"You thought it was my husband. It is only his wife. You must let me -introduce myself. I know you quite well by your photographs. I think -my husband has got seventeen of them." - -"Not seventeen, Lady Henry?" - -"Well, eighteen, then. And I saw you with him the other night at the -opera." She laughed nervously as she spoke, and watched him with her -vague forget-me-not eyes. She was a curious woman, whose dresses -always looked as if they had been designed in a rage and put on in a -tempest. She was usually in love with somebody, and, as her passion -was never returned, she had kept all her illusions. She tried to look -picturesque, but only succeeded in being untidy. Her name was -Victoria, and she had a perfect mania for going to church. - -"That was at Lohengrin, Lady Henry, I think?" - -"Yes; it was at dear Lohengrin. I like Wagner's music better than -anybody's. It is so loud that one can talk the whole time without other -people hearing what one says. That is a great advantage, don't you -think so, Mr. Gray?" - -The same nervous staccato laugh broke from her thin lips, and her -fingers began to play with a long tortoise-shell paper-knife. - -Dorian smiled and shook his head: "I am afraid I don't think so, Lady -Henry. I never talk during music--at least, during good music. If one -hears bad music, it is one's duty to drown it in conversation." - -"Ah! that is one of Harry's views, isn't it, Mr. Gray? I always hear -Harry's views from his friends. It is the only way I get to know of -them. But you must not think I don't like good music. I adore it, but -I am afraid of it. It makes me too romantic. I have simply worshipped -pianists--two at a time, sometimes, Harry tells me. I don't know what -it is about them. Perhaps it is that they are foreigners. They all -are, ain't they? Even those that are born in England become foreigners -after a time, don't they? It is so clever of them, and such a -compliment to art. Makes it quite cosmopolitan, doesn't it? You have -never been to any of my parties, have you, Mr. Gray? You must come. I -can't afford orchids, but I spare no expense in foreigners. They make -one's rooms look so picturesque. But here is Harry! Harry, I came in -to look for you, to ask you something--I forget what it was--and I -found Mr. Gray here. We have had such a pleasant chat about music. We -have quite the same ideas. No; I think our ideas are quite different. -But he has been most pleasant. I am so glad I've seen him." - -"I am charmed, my love, quite charmed," said Lord Henry, elevating his -dark, crescent-shaped eyebrows and looking at them both with an amused -smile. "So sorry I am late, Dorian. I went to look after a piece of -old brocade in Wardour Street and had to bargain for hours for it. -Nowadays people know the price of everything and the value of nothing." - -"I am afraid I must be going," exclaimed Lady Henry, breaking an -awkward silence with her silly sudden laugh. "I have promised to drive -with the duchess. Good-bye, Mr. Gray. Good-bye, Harry. You are -dining out, I suppose? So am I. Perhaps I shall see you at Lady -Thornbury's." - -"I dare say, my dear," said Lord Henry, shutting the door behind her -as, looking like a bird of paradise that had been out all night in the -rain, she flitted out of the room, leaving a faint odour of -frangipanni. Then he lit a cigarette and flung himself down on the -sofa. - -"Never marry a woman with straw-coloured hair, Dorian," he said after a -few puffs. - -"Why, Harry?" - -"Because they are so sentimental." - -"But I like sentimental people." - -"Never marry at all, Dorian. Men marry because they are tired; women, -because they are curious: both are disappointed." - -"I don't think I am likely to marry, Harry. I am too much in love. -That is one of your aphorisms. I am putting it into practice, as I do -everything that you say." - -"Who are you in love with?" asked Lord Henry after a pause. - -"With an actress," said Dorian Gray, blushing. - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "That is a rather commonplace -_debut_." - -"You would not say so if you saw her, Harry." - -"Who is she?" - -"Her name is Sibyl Vane." - -"Never heard of her." - -"No one has. People will some day, however. She is a genius." - -"My dear boy, no woman is a genius. Women are a decorative sex. They -never have anything to say, but they say it charmingly. Women -represent the triumph of matter over mind, just as men represent the -triumph of mind over morals." - -"Harry, how can you?" - -"My dear Dorian, it is quite true. I am analysing women at present, so -I ought to know. The subject is not so abstruse as I thought it was. -I find that, ultimately, there are only two kinds of women, the plain -and the coloured. The plain women are very useful. If you want to -gain a reputation for respectability, you have merely to take them down -to supper. The other women are very charming. They commit one -mistake, however. They paint in order to try and look young. Our -grandmothers painted in order to try and talk brilliantly. _Rouge_ and -_esprit_ used to go together. That is all over now. As long as a woman -can look ten years younger than her own daughter, she is perfectly -satisfied. As for conversation, there are only five women in London -worth talking to, and two of these can't be admitted into decent -society. However, tell me about your genius. How long have you known -her?" - -"Ah! Harry, your views terrify me." - -"Never mind that. How long have you known her?" - -"About three weeks." - -"And where did you come across her?" - -"I will tell you, Harry, but you mustn't be unsympathetic about it. -After all, it never would have happened if I had not met you. You -filled me with a wild desire to know everything about life. For days -after I met you, something seemed to throb in my veins. As I lounged -in the park, or strolled down Piccadilly, I used to look at every one -who passed me and wonder, with a mad curiosity, what sort of lives they -led. Some of them fascinated me. Others filled me with terror. There -was an exquisite poison in the air. I had a passion for sensations.... -Well, one evening about seven o'clock, I determined to go out in search -of some adventure. I felt that this grey monstrous London of ours, -with its myriads of people, its sordid sinners, and its splendid sins, -as you once phrased it, must have something in store for me. I fancied -a thousand things. The mere danger gave me a sense of delight. I -remembered what you had said to me on that wonderful evening when we -first dined together, about the search for beauty being the real secret -of life. I don't know what I expected, but I went out and wandered -eastward, soon losing my way in a labyrinth of grimy streets and black -grassless squares. About half-past eight I passed by an absurd little -theatre, with great flaring gas-jets and gaudy play-bills. A hideous -Jew, in the most amazing waistcoat I ever beheld in my life, was -standing at the entrance, smoking a vile cigar. He had greasy -ringlets, and an enormous diamond blazed in the centre of a soiled -shirt. 'Have a box, my Lord?' he said, when he saw me, and he took off -his hat with an air of gorgeous servility. There was something about -him, Harry, that amused me. He was such a monster. You will laugh at -me, I know, but I really went in and paid a whole guinea for the -stage-box. To the present day I can't make out why I did so; and yet if -I hadn't--my dear Harry, if I hadn't--I should have missed the greatest -romance of my life. I see you are laughing. It is horrid of you!" - -"I am not laughing, Dorian; at least I am not laughing at you. But you -should not say the greatest romance of your life. You should say the -first romance of your life. You will always be loved, and you will -always be in love with love. A _grande passion_ is the privilege of -people who have nothing to do. That is the one use of the idle classes -of a country. Don't be afraid. There are exquisite things in store -for you. This is merely the beginning." - -"Do you think my nature so shallow?" cried Dorian Gray angrily. - -"No; I think your nature so deep." - -"How do you mean?" - -"My dear boy, the people who love only once in their lives are really -the shallow people. What they call their loyalty, and their fidelity, -I call either the lethargy of custom or their lack of imagination. -Faithfulness is to the emotional life what consistency is to the life -of the intellect--simply a confession of failure. Faithfulness! I -must analyse it some day. The passion for property is in it. There -are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that -others might pick them up. But I don't want to interrupt you. Go on -with your story." - -"Well, I found myself seated in a horrid little private box, with a -vulgar drop-scene staring me in the face. I looked out from behind the -curtain and surveyed the house. It was a tawdry affair, all Cupids and -cornucopias, like a third-rate wedding-cake. The gallery and pit were -fairly full, but the two rows of dingy stalls were quite empty, and -there was hardly a person in what I suppose they called the -dress-circle. Women went about with oranges and ginger-beer, and there -was a terrible consumption of nuts going on." - -"It must have been just like the palmy days of the British drama." - -"Just like, I should fancy, and very depressing. I began to wonder -what on earth I should do when I caught sight of the play-bill. What -do you think the play was, Harry?" - -"I should think 'The Idiot Boy', or 'Dumb but Innocent'. Our fathers -used to like that sort of piece, I believe. The longer I live, Dorian, -the more keenly I feel that whatever was good enough for our fathers is -not good enough for us. In art, as in politics, _les grandperes ont -toujours tort_." - -"This play was good enough for us, Harry. It was Romeo and Juliet. I -must admit that I was rather annoyed at the idea of seeing Shakespeare -done in such a wretched hole of a place. Still, I felt interested, in -a sort of way. At any rate, I determined to wait for the first act. -There was a dreadful orchestra, presided over by a young Hebrew who sat -at a cracked piano, that nearly drove me away, but at last the -drop-scene was drawn up and the play began. Romeo was a stout elderly -gentleman, with corked eyebrows, a husky tragedy voice, and a figure -like a beer-barrel. Mercutio was almost as bad. He was played by the -low-comedian, who had introduced gags of his own and was on most -friendly terms with the pit. They were both as grotesque as the -scenery, and that looked as if it had come out of a country-booth. But -Juliet! Harry, imagine a girl, hardly seventeen years of age, with a -little, flowerlike face, a small Greek head with plaited coils of -dark-brown hair, eyes that were violet wells of passion, lips that were -like the petals of a rose. She was the loveliest thing I had ever seen -in my life. You said to me once that pathos left you unmoved, but that -beauty, mere beauty, could fill your eyes with tears. I tell you, -Harry, I could hardly see this girl for the mist of tears that came -across me. And her voice--I never heard such a voice. It was very low -at first, with deep mellow notes that seemed to fall singly upon one's -ear. Then it became a little louder, and sounded like a flute or a -distant hautboy. In the garden-scene it had all the tremulous ecstasy -that one hears just before dawn when nightingales are singing. There -were moments, later on, when it had the wild passion of violins. You -know how a voice can stir one. Your voice and the voice of Sibyl Vane -are two things that I shall never forget. When I close my eyes, I hear -them, and each of them says something different. I don't know which to -follow. Why should I not love her? Harry, I do love her. She is -everything to me in life. Night after night I go to see her play. One -evening she is Rosalind, and the next evening she is Imogen. I have -seen her die in the gloom of an Italian tomb, sucking the poison from -her lover's lips. I have watched her wandering through the forest of -Arden, disguised as a pretty boy in hose and doublet and dainty cap. -She has been mad, and has come into the presence of a guilty king, and -given him rue to wear and bitter herbs to taste of. She has been -innocent, and the black hands of jealousy have crushed her reedlike -throat. I have seen her in every age and in every costume. Ordinary -women never appeal to one's imagination. They are limited to their -century. No glamour ever transfigures them. One knows their minds as -easily as one knows their bonnets. One can always find them. There is -no mystery in any of them. They ride in the park in the morning and -chatter at tea-parties in the afternoon. They have their stereotyped -smile and their fashionable manner. They are quite obvious. But an -actress! How different an actress is! Harry! why didn't you tell me -that the only thing worth loving is an actress?" - -"Because I have loved so many of them, Dorian." - -"Oh, yes, horrid people with dyed hair and painted faces." - -"Don't run down dyed hair and painted faces. There is an extraordinary -charm in them, sometimes," said Lord Henry. - -"I wish now I had not told you about Sibyl Vane." - -"You could not have helped telling me, Dorian. All through your life -you will tell me everything you do." - -"Yes, Harry, I believe that is true. I cannot help telling you things. -You have a curious influence over me. If I ever did a crime, I would -come and confess it to you. You would understand me." - -"People like you--the wilful sunbeams of life--don't commit crimes, -Dorian. But I am much obliged for the compliment, all the same. And -now tell me--reach me the matches, like a good boy--thanks--what are -your actual relations with Sibyl Vane?" - -Dorian Gray leaped to his feet, with flushed cheeks and burning eyes. -"Harry! Sibyl Vane is sacred!" - -"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," laughed Dorian. -"By this time, however, the lights were being put out in the theatre, -and I had to go. He wanted me to try some cigars that he strongly -recommended. I declined. The next night, of course, I arrived at the -place again. When he saw me, he made me a low bow and assured me that -I was a munificent patron of art. He was a most offensive brute, -though he had an extraordinary passion for Shakespeare. He told me -once, with an air of pride, that his five bankruptcies were entirely -due to 'The Bard,' as he insisted on calling him. He seemed to think -it a distinction." - -"It was a distinction, my dear Dorian--a great distinction. Most -people become bankrupt through having invested too heavily in the prose -of life. To have ruined one's self over poetry is an honour. But when -did you first speak to Miss Sibyl Vane?" - -"The third night. She had been playing Rosalind. I could not help -going round. I had thrown her some flowers, and she had looked at -me--at least I fancied that she had. The old Jew was persistent. He -seemed determined to take me behind, so I consented. It was curious my -not wanting to know her, wasn't it?" - -"No; I don't think so." - -"My dear Harry, why?" - -"I will tell you some other time. Now I want to know about the girl." - -"Sibyl? Oh, she was so shy and so gentle. There is something of a -child about her. Her eyes opened wide in exquisite wonder when I told -her what I thought of her performance, and she seemed quite unconscious -of her power. I think we were both rather nervous. The old Jew stood -grinning at the doorway of the dusty greenroom, making elaborate -speeches about us both, while we stood looking at each other like -children. He would insist on calling me 'My Lord,' so I had to assure -Sibyl that I was not anything of the kind. She said quite simply to -me, 'You look more like a prince. I must call you Prince Charming.'" - -"Upon my word, Dorian, Miss Sibyl knows how to pay compliments." - -"You don't understand her, Harry. She regarded me merely as a person -in a play. She knows nothing of life. She lives with her mother, a -faded tired woman who played Lady Capulet in a sort of magenta -dressing-wrapper on the first night, and looks as if she had seen -better days." - -"I know that look. It depresses me," murmured Lord Henry, examining -his rings. - -"The Jew wanted to tell me her history, but I said it did not interest -me." - -"You were quite right. There is always something infinitely mean about -other people's tragedies." - -"Sibyl is the only thing I care about. What is it to me where she came -from? From her little head to her little feet, she is absolutely and -entirely divine. Every night of my life I go to see her act, and every -night she is more marvellous." - -"That is the reason, I suppose, that you never dine with me now. I -thought you must have some curious romance on hand. You have; but it -is not quite what I expected." - -"My dear Harry, we either lunch or sup together every day, and I have -been to the opera with you several times," said Dorian, opening his -blue eyes in wonder. - -"You always come dreadfully late." - -"Well, I can't help going to see Sibyl play," he cried, "even if it is -only for a single act. I get hungry for her presence; and when I think -of the wonderful soul that is hidden away in that little ivory body, I -am filled with awe." - -"You can dine with me to-night, Dorian, can't you?" - -He shook his head. "To-night she is Imogen," he answered, "and -to-morrow night she will be Juliet." - -"When is she Sibyl Vane?" - -"Never." - -"I congratulate you." - -"How horrid you are! She is all the great heroines of the world in -one. She is more than an individual. You laugh, but I tell you she -has genius. I love her, and I must make her love me. You, who know -all the secrets of life, tell me how to charm Sibyl Vane to love me! I -want to make Romeo jealous. I want the dead lovers of the world to -hear our laughter and grow sad. I want a breath of our passion to stir -their dust into consciousness, to wake their ashes into pain. My God, -Harry, how I worship her!" He was walking up and down the room as he -spoke. Hectic spots of red burned on his cheeks. He was terribly -excited. - -Lord Henry watched him with a subtle sense of pleasure. How different -he was now from the shy frightened boy he had met in Basil Hallward's -studio! His nature had developed like a flower, had borne blossoms of -scarlet flame. Out of its secret hiding-place had crept his soul, and -desire had come to meet it on the way. - -"And what do you propose to do?" said Lord Henry at last. - -"I want you and Basil to come with me some night and see her act. I -have not the slightest fear of the result. You are certain to -acknowledge her genius. Then we must get her out of the Jew's hands. -She is bound to him for three years--at least for two years and eight -months--from the present time. I shall have to pay him something, of -course. When all that is settled, I shall take a West End theatre and -bring her out properly. She will make the world as mad as she has made -me." - -"That would be impossible, my dear boy." - -"Yes, she will. She has not merely art, consummate art-instinct, in -her, but she has personality also; and you have often told me that it -is personalities, not principles, that move the age." - -"Well, what night shall we go?" - -"Let me see. To-day is Tuesday. Let us fix to-morrow. She plays -Juliet to-morrow." - -"All right. The Bristol at eight o'clock; and I will get Basil." - -"Not eight, Harry, please. Half-past six. We must be there before the -curtain rises. You must see her in the first act, where she meets -Romeo." - -"Half-past six! What an hour! It will be like having a meat-tea, or -reading an English novel. It must be seven. No gentleman dines before -seven. Shall you see Basil between this and then? Or shall I write to -him?" - -"Dear Basil! I have not laid eyes on him for a week. It is rather -horrid of me, as he has sent me my portrait in the most wonderful -frame, specially designed by himself, and, though I am a little jealous -of the picture for being a whole month younger than I am, I must admit -that I delight in it. Perhaps you had better write to him. I don't -want to see him alone. He says things that annoy me. He gives me good -advice." - -Lord Henry smiled. "People are very fond of giving away what they need -most themselves. It is what I call the depth of generosity." - -"Oh, Basil is the best of fellows, but he seems to me to be just a bit -of a Philistine. Since I have known you, Harry, I have discovered -that." - -"Basil, my dear boy, puts everything that is charming in him into his -work. The consequence is that he has nothing left for life but his -prejudices, his principles, and his common sense. The only artists I -have ever known who are personally delightful are bad artists. Good -artists exist simply in what they make, and consequently are perfectly -uninteresting in what they are. A great poet, a really great poet, is -the most unpoetical of all creatures. But inferior poets are -absolutely fascinating. The worse their rhymes are, the more -picturesque they look. The mere fact of having published a book of -second-rate sonnets makes a man quite irresistible. He lives the -poetry that he cannot write. The others write the poetry that they -dare not realize." - -"I wonder is that really so, Harry?" said Dorian Gray, putting some -perfume on his handkerchief out of a large, gold-topped bottle that -stood on the table. "It must be, if you say it. And now I am off. -Imogen is waiting for me. Don't forget about to-morrow. Good-bye." - -As he left the room, Lord Henry's heavy eyelids drooped, and he began -to think. Certainly few people had ever interested him so much as -Dorian Gray, and yet the lad's mad adoration of some one else caused -him not the slightest pang of annoyance or jealousy. He was pleased by -it. It made him a more interesting study. He had been always -enthralled by the methods of natural science, but the ordinary -subject-matter of that science had seemed to him trivial and of no -import. And so he had begun by vivisecting himself, as he had ended by -vivisecting others. Human life--that appeared to him the one thing -worth investigating. Compared to it there was nothing else of any -value. It was true that as one watched life in its curious crucible of -pain and pleasure, one could not wear over one's face a mask of glass, -nor keep the sulphurous fumes from troubling the brain and making the -imagination turbid with monstrous fancies and misshapen dreams. There -were poisons so subtle that to know their properties one had to sicken -of them. There were maladies so strange that one had to pass through -them if one sought to understand their nature. And, yet, what a great -reward one received! How wonderful the whole world became to one! To -note the curious hard logic of passion, and the emotional coloured life -of the intellect--to observe where they met, and where they separated, -at what point they were in unison, and at what point they were at -discord--there was a delight in that! What matter what the cost was? -One could never pay too high a price for any sensation. - -He was conscious--and the thought brought a gleam of pleasure into his -brown agate eyes--that it was through certain words of his, musical -words said with musical utterance, that Dorian Gray's soul had turned -to this white girl and bowed in worship before her. To a large extent -the lad was his own creation. He had made him premature. That was -something. Ordinary people waited till life disclosed to them its -secrets, but to the few, to the elect, the mysteries of life were -revealed before the veil was drawn away. Sometimes this was the effect -of art, and chiefly of the art of literature, which dealt immediately -with the passions and the intellect. But now and then a complex -personality took the place and assumed the office of art, was indeed, -in its way, a real work of art, life having its elaborate masterpieces, -just as poetry has, or sculpture, or painting. - -Yes, the lad was premature. He was gathering his harvest while it was -yet spring. The pulse and passion of youth were in him, but he was -becoming self-conscious. It was delightful to watch him. With his -beautiful face, and his beautiful soul, he was a thing to wonder at. -It was no matter how it all ended, or was destined to end. He was like -one of those gracious figures in a pageant or a play, whose joys seem -to be remote from one, but whose sorrows stir one's sense of beauty, -and whose wounds are like red roses. - -Soul and body, body and soul--how mysterious they were! There was -animalism in the soul, and the body had its moments of spirituality. -The senses could refine, and the intellect could degrade. Who could -say where the fleshly impulse ceased, or the psychical impulse began? -How shallow were the arbitrary definitions of ordinary psychologists! -And yet how difficult to decide between the claims of the various -schools! Was the soul a shadow seated in the house of sin? Or was the -body really in the soul, as Giordano Bruno thought? The separation of -spirit from matter was a mystery, and the union of spirit with matter -was a mystery also. - -He began to wonder whether we could ever make psychology so absolute a -science that each little spring of life would be revealed to us. As it -was, we always misunderstood ourselves and rarely understood others. -Experience was of no ethical value. It was merely the name men gave to -their mistakes. Moralists had, as a rule, regarded it as a mode of -warning, had claimed for it a certain ethical efficacy in the formation -of character, had praised it as something that taught us what to follow -and showed us what to avoid. But there was no motive power in -experience. It was as little of an active cause as conscience itself. -All that it really demonstrated was that our future would be the same -as our past, and that the sin we had done once, and with loathing, we -would do many times, and with joy. - -It was clear to him that the experimental method was the only method by -which one could arrive at any scientific analysis of the passions; and -certainly Dorian Gray was a subject made to his hand, and seemed to -promise rich and fruitful results. His sudden mad love for Sibyl Vane -was a psychological phenomenon of no small interest. There was no -doubt that curiosity had much to do with it, curiosity and the desire -for new experiences, yet it was not a simple, but rather a very complex -passion. What there was in it of the purely sensuous instinct of -boyhood had been transformed by the workings of the imagination, -changed into something that seemed to the lad himself to be remote from -sense, and was for that very reason all the more dangerous. It was the -passions about whose origin we deceived ourselves that tyrannized most -strongly over us. Our weakest motives were those of whose nature we -were conscious. It often happened that when we thought we were -experimenting on others we were really experimenting on ourselves. - -While Lord Henry sat dreaming on these things, a knock came to the -door, and his valet entered and reminded him it was time to dress for -dinner. He got up and looked out into the street. The sunset had -smitten into scarlet gold the upper windows of the houses opposite. -The panes glowed like plates of heated metal. The sky above was like a -faded rose. He thought of his friend's young fiery-coloured life and -wondered how it was all going to end. - -When he arrived home, about half-past twelve o'clock, he saw a telegram -lying on the hall table. He opened it and found it was from Dorian -Gray. It was to tell him that he was engaged to be married to Sibyl -Vane. - - - -CHAPTER 5 - -"Mother, Mother, I am so happy!" whispered the girl, burying her face -in the lap of the faded, tired-looking woman who, with back turned to -the shrill intrusive light, was sitting in the one arm-chair that their -dingy sitting-room contained. "I am so happy!" she repeated, "and you -must be happy, too!" - -Mrs. Vane winced and put her thin, bismuth-whitened hands on her -daughter's head. "Happy!" she echoed, "I am only happy, Sibyl, when I -see you act. You must not think of anything but your acting. Mr. -Isaacs has been very good to us, and we owe him money." - -The girl looked up and pouted. "Money, Mother?" she cried, "what does -money matter? Love is more than money." - -"Mr. Isaacs has advanced us fifty pounds to pay off our debts and to -get a proper outfit for James. You must not forget that, Sibyl. Fifty -pounds is a very large sum. Mr. Isaacs has been most considerate." - -"He is not a gentleman, Mother, and I hate the way he talks to me," -said the girl, rising to her feet and going over to the window. - -"I don't know how we could manage without him," answered the elder -woman querulously. - -Sibyl Vane tossed her head and laughed. "We don't want him any more, -Mother. Prince Charming rules life for us now." Then she paused. A -rose shook in her blood and shadowed her cheeks. Quick breath parted -the petals of her lips. They trembled. Some southern wind of passion -swept over her and stirred the dainty folds of her dress. "I love -him," she said simply. - -"Foolish child! foolish child!" was the parrot-phrase flung in answer. -The waving of crooked, false-jewelled fingers gave grotesqueness to the -words. - -The girl laughed again. The joy of a caged bird was in her voice. Her -eyes caught the melody and echoed it in radiance, then closed for a -moment, as though to hide their secret. When they opened, the mist of -a dream had passed across them. - -Thin-lipped wisdom spoke at her from the worn chair, hinted at -prudence, quoted from that book of cowardice whose author apes the name -of common sense. She did not listen. She was free in her prison of -passion. Her prince, Prince Charming, was with her. She had called on -memory to remake him. She had sent her soul to search for him, and it -had brought him back. His kiss burned again upon her mouth. Her -eyelids were warm with his breath. - -Then wisdom altered its method and spoke of espial and discovery. This -young man might be rich. If so, marriage should be thought of. -Against the shell of her ear broke the waves of worldly cunning. The -arrows of craft shot by her. She saw the thin lips moving, and smiled. - -Suddenly she felt the need to speak. The wordy silence troubled her. -"Mother, Mother," she cried, "why does he love me so much? I know why -I love him. I love him because he is like what love himself should be. -But what does he see in me? I am not worthy of him. And yet--why, I -cannot tell--though I feel so much beneath him, I don't feel humble. I -feel proud, terribly proud. Mother, did you love my father as I love -Prince Charming?" - -The elder woman grew pale beneath the coarse powder that daubed her -cheeks, and her dry lips twitched with a spasm of pain. Sybil rushed -to her, flung her arms round her neck, and kissed her. "Forgive me, -Mother. I know it pains you to talk about our father. But it only -pains you because you loved him so much. Don't look so sad. I am as -happy to-day as you were twenty years ago. Ah! let me be happy for -ever!" - -"My child, you are far too young to think of falling in love. Besides, -what do you know of this young man? You don't even know his name. The -whole thing is most inconvenient, and really, when James is going away -to Australia, and I have so much to think of, I must say that you -should have shown more consideration. However, as I said before, if he -is rich ..." - -"Ah! Mother, Mother, let me be happy!" - -Mrs. Vane glanced at her, and with one of those false theatrical -gestures that so often become a mode of second nature to a -stage-player, clasped her in her arms. At this moment, the door opened -and a young lad with rough brown hair came into the room. He was -thick-set of figure, and his hands and feet were large and somewhat -clumsy in movement. He was not so finely bred as his sister. One -would hardly have guessed the close relationship that existed between -them. Mrs. Vane fixed her eyes on him and intensified her smile. She -mentally elevated her son to the dignity of an audience. She felt sure -that the _tableau_ was interesting. - -"You might keep some of your kisses for me, Sibyl, I think," said the -lad with a good-natured grumble. - -"Ah! but you don't like being kissed, Jim," she cried. "You are a -dreadful old bear." And she ran across the room and hugged him. - -James Vane looked into his sister's face with tenderness. "I want you -to come out with me for a walk, Sibyl. I don't suppose I shall ever -see this horrid London again. I am sure I don't want to." - -"My son, don't say such dreadful things," murmured Mrs. Vane, taking up -a tawdry theatrical dress, with a sigh, and beginning to patch it. She -felt a little disappointed that he had not joined the group. It would -have increased the theatrical picturesqueness of the situation. - -"Why not, Mother? I mean it." - -"You pain me, my son. I trust you will return from Australia in a -position of affluence. I believe there is no society of any kind in -the Colonies--nothing that I would call society--so when you have made -your fortune, you must come back and assert yourself in London." - -"Society!" muttered the lad. "I don't want to know anything about -that. I should like to make some money to take you and Sibyl off the -stage. I hate it." - -"Oh, Jim!" said Sibyl, laughing, "how unkind of you! But are you -really going for a walk with me? That will be nice! I was afraid you -were going to say good-bye to some of your friends--to Tom Hardy, who -gave you that hideous pipe, or Ned Langton, who makes fun of you for -smoking it. It is very sweet of you to let me have your last -afternoon. Where shall we go? Let us go to the park." - -"I am too shabby," he answered, frowning. "Only swell people go to the -park." - -"Nonsense, Jim," she whispered, stroking the sleeve of his coat. - -He hesitated for a moment. "Very well," he said at last, "but don't be -too long dressing." She danced out of the door. One could hear her -singing as she ran upstairs. Her little feet pattered overhead. - -He walked up and down the room two or three times. Then he turned to -the still figure in the chair. "Mother, are my things ready?" he asked. - -"Quite ready, James," she answered, keeping her eyes on her work. For -some months past she had felt ill at ease when she was alone with this -rough stern son of hers. Her shallow secret nature was troubled when -their eyes met. She used to wonder if he suspected anything. The -silence, for he made no other observation, became intolerable to her. -She began to complain. Women defend themselves by attacking, just as -they attack by sudden and strange surrenders. "I hope you will be -contented, James, with your sea-faring life," she said. "You must -remember that it is your own choice. You might have entered a -solicitor's office. Solicitors are a very respectable class, and in -the country often dine with the best families." - -"I hate offices, and I hate clerks," he replied. "But you are quite -right. I have chosen my own life. All I say is, watch over Sibyl. -Don't let her come to any harm. Mother, you must watch over her." - -"James, you really talk very strangely. Of course I watch over Sibyl." - -"I hear a gentleman comes every night to the theatre and goes behind to -talk to her. Is that right? What about that?" - -"You are speaking about things you don't understand, James. In the -profession we are accustomed to receive a great deal of most gratifying -attention. I myself used to receive many bouquets at one time. That -was when acting was really understood. As for Sibyl, I do not know at -present whether her attachment is serious or not. But there is no -doubt that the young man in question is a perfect gentleman. He is -always most polite to me. Besides, he has the appearance of being -rich, and the flowers he sends are lovely." - -"You don't know his name, though," said the lad harshly. - -"No," answered his mother with a placid expression in her face. "He -has not yet revealed his real name. I think it is quite romantic of -him. He is probably a member of the aristocracy." - -James Vane bit his lip. "Watch over Sibyl, Mother," he cried, "watch -over her." - -"My son, you distress me very much. Sibyl is always under my special -care. Of course, if this gentleman is wealthy, there is no reason why -she should not contract an alliance with him. I trust he is one of the -aristocracy. He has all the appearance of it, I must say. It might be -a most brilliant marriage for Sibyl. They would make a charming -couple. His good looks are really quite remarkable; everybody notices -them." - -The lad muttered something to himself and drummed on the window-pane -with his coarse fingers. He had just turned round to say something -when the door opened and Sibyl ran in. - -"How serious you both are!" she cried. "What is the matter?" - -"Nothing," he answered. "I suppose one must be serious sometimes. -Good-bye, Mother; I will have my dinner at five o'clock. Everything is -packed, except my shirts, so you need not trouble." - -"Good-bye, my son," she answered with a bow of strained stateliness. - -She was extremely annoyed at the tone he had adopted with her, and -there was something in his look that had made her feel afraid. - -"Kiss me, Mother," said the girl. Her flowerlike lips touched the -withered cheek and warmed its frost. - -"My child! my child!" cried Mrs. Vane, looking up to the ceiling in -search of an imaginary gallery. - -"Come, Sibyl," said her brother impatiently. He hated his mother's -affectations. - -They went out into the flickering, wind-blown sunlight and strolled -down the dreary Euston Road. The passersby glanced in wonder at the -sullen heavy youth who, in coarse, ill-fitting clothes, was in the -company of such a graceful, refined-looking girl. He was like a common -gardener walking with a rose. - -Jim frowned from time to time when he caught the inquisitive glance of -some stranger. He had that dislike of being stared at, which comes on -geniuses late in life and never leaves the commonplace. Sibyl, -however, was quite unconscious of the effect she was producing. Her -love was trembling in laughter on her lips. She was thinking of Prince -Charming, and, that she might think of him all the more, she did not -talk of him, but prattled on about the ship in which Jim was going to -sail, about the gold he was certain to find, about the wonderful -heiress whose life he was to save from the wicked, red-shirted -bushrangers. For he was not to remain a sailor, or a supercargo, or -whatever he was going to be. Oh, no! A sailor's existence was -dreadful. Fancy being cooped up in a horrid ship, with the hoarse, -hump-backed waves trying to get in, and a black wind blowing the masts -down and tearing the sails into long screaming ribands! He was to -leave the vessel at Melbourne, bid a polite good-bye to the captain, -and go off at once to the gold-fields. Before a week was over he was to -come across a large nugget of pure gold, the largest nugget that had -ever been discovered, and bring it down to the coast in a waggon -guarded by six mounted policemen. The bushrangers were to attack them -three times, and be defeated with immense slaughter. Or, no. He was -not to go to the gold-fields at all. They were horrid places, where -men got intoxicated, and shot each other in bar-rooms, and used bad -language. He was to be a nice sheep-farmer, and one evening, as he was -riding home, he was to see the beautiful heiress being carried off by a -robber on a black horse, and give chase, and rescue her. Of course, -she would fall in love with him, and he with her, and they would get -married, and come home, and live in an immense house in London. Yes, -there were delightful things in store for him. But he must be very -good, and not lose his temper, or spend his money foolishly. She was -only a year older than he was, but she knew so much more of life. He -must be sure, also, to write to her by every mail, and to say his -prayers each night before he went to sleep. God was very good, and -would watch over him. She would pray for him, too, and in a few years -he would come back quite rich and happy. - -The lad listened sulkily to her and made no answer. He was heart-sick -at leaving home. - -Yet it was not this alone that made him gloomy and morose. -Inexperienced though he was, he had still a strong sense of the danger -of Sibyl's position. This young dandy who was making love to her could -mean her no good. He was a gentleman, and he hated him for that, hated -him through some curious race-instinct for which he could not account, -and which for that reason was all the more dominant within him. He was -conscious also of the shallowness and vanity of his mother's nature, -and in that saw infinite peril for Sibyl and Sibyl's happiness. -Children begin by loving their parents; as they grow older they judge -them; sometimes they forgive them. - -His mother! He had something on his mind to ask of her, something that -he had brooded on for many months of silence. A chance phrase that he -had heard at the theatre, a whispered sneer that had reached his ears -one night as he waited at the stage-door, had set loose a train of -horrible thoughts. He remembered it as if it had been the lash of a -hunting-crop across his face. His brows knit together into a wedge-like -furrow, and with a twitch of pain he bit his underlip. - -"You are not listening to a word I am saying, Jim," cried Sibyl, "and I -am making the most delightful plans for your future. Do say something." - -"What do you want me to say?" - -"Oh! that you will be a good boy and not forget us," she answered, -smiling at him. - -He shrugged his shoulders. "You are more likely to forget me than I am -to forget you, Sibyl." - -She flushed. "What do you mean, Jim?" she asked. - -"You have a new friend, I hear. Who is he? Why have you not told me -about him? He means you no good." - -"Stop, Jim!" she exclaimed. "You must not say anything against him. I -love him." - -"Why, you don't even know his name," answered the lad. "Who is he? I -have a right to know." - -"He is called Prince Charming. Don't you like the name. Oh! you silly -boy! you should never forget it. If you only saw him, you would think -him the most wonderful person in the world. Some day you will meet -him--when you come back from Australia. You will like him so much. -Everybody likes him, and I ... love him. I wish you could come to the -theatre to-night. He is going to be there, and I am to play Juliet. -Oh! how I shall play it! Fancy, Jim, to be in love and play Juliet! -To have him sitting there! To play for his delight! I am afraid I may -frighten the company, frighten or enthrall them. To be in love is to -surpass one's self. Poor dreadful Mr. Isaacs will be shouting 'genius' -to his loafers at the bar. He has preached me as a dogma; to-night he -will announce me as a revelation. I feel it. And it is all his, his -only, Prince Charming, my wonderful lover, my god of graces. But I am -poor beside him. Poor? What does that matter? When poverty creeps in -at the door, love flies in through the window. Our proverbs want -rewriting. They were made in winter, and it is summer now; spring-time -for me, I think, a very dance of blossoms in blue skies." - -"He is a gentleman," said the lad sullenly. - -"A prince!" she cried musically. "What more do you want?" - -"He wants to enslave you." - -"I shudder at the thought of being free." - -"I want you to beware of him." - -"To see him is to worship him; to know him is to trust him." - -"Sibyl, you are mad about him." - -She laughed and took his arm. "You dear old Jim, you talk as if you -were a hundred. Some day you will be in love yourself. Then you will -know what it is. Don't look so sulky. Surely you should be glad to -think that, though you are going away, you leave me happier than I have -ever been before. Life has been hard for us both, terribly hard and -difficult. But it will be different now. You are going to a new -world, and I have found one. Here are two chairs; let us sit down and -see the smart people go by." - -They took their seats amidst a crowd of watchers. The tulip-beds -across the road flamed like throbbing rings of fire. A white -dust--tremulous cloud of orris-root it seemed--hung in the panting air. -The brightly coloured parasols danced and dipped like monstrous -butterflies. - -She made her brother talk of himself, his hopes, his prospects. He -spoke slowly and with effort. They passed words to each other as -players at a game pass counters. Sibyl felt oppressed. She could not -communicate her joy. A faint smile curving that sullen mouth was all -the echo she could win. After some time she became silent. Suddenly -she caught a glimpse of golden hair and laughing lips, and in an open -carriage with two ladies Dorian Gray drove past. - -She started to her feet. "There he is!" she cried. - -"Who?" said Jim Vane. - -"Prince Charming," she answered, looking after the victoria. - -He jumped up and seized her roughly by the arm. "Show him to me. -Which is he? Point him out. I must see him!" he exclaimed; but at -that moment the Duke of Berwick's four-in-hand came between, and when -it had left the space clear, the carriage had swept out of the park. - -"He is gone," murmured Sibyl sadly. "I wish you had seen him." - -"I wish I had, for as sure as there is a God in heaven, if he ever does -you any wrong, I shall kill him." - -She looked at him in horror. He repeated his words. They cut the air -like a dagger. The people round began to gape. A lady standing close -to her tittered. - -"Come away, Jim; come away," she whispered. He followed her doggedly -as she passed through the crowd. He felt glad at what he had said. - -When they reached the Achilles Statue, she turned round. There was -pity in her eyes that became laughter on her lips. She shook her head -at him. "You are foolish, Jim, utterly foolish; a bad-tempered boy, -that is all. How can you say such horrible things? You don't know -what you are talking about. You are simply jealous and unkind. Ah! I -wish you would fall in love. Love makes people good, and what you said -was wicked." - -"I am sixteen," he answered, "and I know what I am about. Mother is no -help to you. She doesn't understand how to look after you. I wish now -that I was not going to Australia at all. I have a great mind to chuck -the whole thing up. I would, if my articles hadn't been signed." - -"Oh, don't be so serious, Jim. You are like one of the heroes of those -silly melodramas Mother used to be so fond of acting in. I am not -going to quarrel with you. I have seen him, and oh! to see him is -perfect happiness. We won't quarrel. I know you would never harm any -one I love, would you?" - -"Not as long as you love him, I suppose," was the sullen answer. - -"I shall love him for ever!" she cried. - -"And he?" - -"For ever, too!" - -"He had better." - -She shrank from him. Then she laughed and put her hand on his arm. He -was merely a boy. - -At the Marble Arch they hailed an omnibus, which left them close to -their shabby home in the Euston Road. It was after five o'clock, and -Sibyl had to lie down for a couple of hours before acting. Jim -insisted that she should do so. He said that he would sooner part with -her when their mother was not present. She would be sure to make a -scene, and he detested scenes of every kind. - -In Sybil's own room they parted. There was jealousy in the lad's -heart, and a fierce murderous hatred of the stranger who, as it seemed -to him, had come between them. Yet, when her arms were flung round his -neck, and her fingers strayed through his hair, he softened and kissed -her with real affection. There were tears in his eyes as he went -downstairs. - -His mother was waiting for him below. She grumbled at his -unpunctuality, as he entered. He made no answer, but sat down to his -meagre meal. The flies buzzed round the table and crawled over the -stained cloth. Through the rumble of omnibuses, and the clatter of -street-cabs, he could hear the droning voice devouring each minute that -was left to him. - -After some time, he thrust away his plate and put his head in his -hands. He felt that he had a right to know. It should have been told -to him before, if it was as he suspected. Leaden with fear, his mother -watched him. Words dropped mechanically from her lips. A tattered -lace handkerchief twitched in her fingers. When the clock struck six, -he got up and went to the door. Then he turned back and looked at her. -Their eyes met. In hers he saw a wild appeal for mercy. It enraged -him. - -"Mother, I have something to ask you," he said. Her eyes wandered -vaguely about the room. She made no answer. "Tell me the truth. I -have a right to know. Were you married to my father?" - -She heaved a deep sigh. It was a sigh of relief. The terrible moment, -the moment that night and day, for weeks and months, she had dreaded, -had come at last, and yet she felt no terror. Indeed, in some measure -it was a disappointment to her. The vulgar directness of the question -called for a direct answer. The situation had not been gradually led -up to. It was crude. It reminded her of a bad rehearsal. - -"No," she answered, wondering at the harsh simplicity of life. - -"My father was a scoundrel then!" cried the lad, clenching his fists. - -She shook her head. "I knew he was not free. We loved each other very -much. If he had lived, he would have made provision for us. Don't -speak against him, my son. He was your father, and a gentleman. -Indeed, he was highly connected." - -An oath broke from his lips. "I don't care for myself," he exclaimed, -"but don't let Sibyl.... It is a gentleman, isn't it, who is in love -with her, or says he is? Highly connected, too, I suppose." - -For a moment a hideous sense of humiliation came over the woman. Her -head drooped. She wiped her eyes with shaking hands. "Sibyl has a -mother," she murmured; "I had none." - -The lad was touched. He went towards her, and stooping down, he kissed -her. "I am sorry if I have pained you by asking about my father," he -said, "but I could not help it. I must go now. Good-bye. Don't forget -that you will have only one child now to look after, and believe me -that if this man wrongs my sister, I will find out who he is, track him -down, and kill him like a dog. I swear it." - -The exaggerated folly of the threat, the passionate gesture that -accompanied it, the mad melodramatic words, made life seem more vivid -to her. She was familiar with the atmosphere. She breathed more -freely, and for the first time for many months she really admired her -son. She would have liked to have continued the scene on the same -emotional scale, but he cut her short. Trunks had to be carried down -and mufflers looked for. The lodging-house drudge bustled in and out. -There was the bargaining with the cabman. The moment was lost in -vulgar details. It was with a renewed feeling of disappointment that -she waved the tattered lace handkerchief from the window, as her son -drove away. She was conscious that a great opportunity had been -wasted. She consoled herself by telling Sibyl how desolate she felt -her life would be, now that she had only one child to look after. She -remembered the phrase. It had pleased her. Of the threat she said -nothing. It was vividly and dramatically expressed. She felt that -they would all laugh at it some day. - - - -CHAPTER 6 - -"I suppose you have heard the news, Basil?" said Lord Henry that -evening as Hallward was shown into a little private room at the Bristol -where dinner had been laid for three. - -"No, Harry," answered the artist, giving his hat and coat to the bowing -waiter. "What is it? Nothing about politics, I hope! They don't -interest me. There is hardly a single person in the House of Commons -worth painting, though many of them would be the better for a little -whitewashing." - -"Dorian Gray is engaged to be married," said Lord Henry, watching him -as he spoke. - -Hallward started and then frowned. "Dorian engaged to be married!" he -cried. "Impossible!" - -"It is perfectly true." - -"To whom?" - -"To some little actress or other." - -"I can't believe it. Dorian is far too sensible." - -"Dorian is far too wise not to do foolish things now and then, my dear -Basil." - -"Marriage is hardly a thing that one can do now and then, Harry." - -"Except in America," rejoined Lord Henry languidly. "But I didn't say -he was married. I said he was engaged to be married. There is a great -difference. I have a distinct remembrance of being married, but I have -no recollection at all of being engaged. I am inclined to think that I -never was engaged." - -"But think of Dorian's birth, and position, and wealth. It would be -absurd for him to marry so much beneath him." - -"If you want to make him marry this girl, tell him that, Basil. He is -sure to do it, then. Whenever a man does a thoroughly stupid thing, it -is always from the noblest motives." - -"I hope the girl is good, Harry. I don't want to see Dorian tied to -some vile creature, who might degrade his nature and ruin his -intellect." - -"Oh, she is better than good--she is beautiful," murmured Lord Henry, -sipping a glass of vermouth and orange-bitters. "Dorian says she is -beautiful, and he is not often wrong about things of that kind. Your -portrait of him has quickened his appreciation of the personal -appearance of other people. It has had that excellent effect, amongst -others. We are to see her to-night, if that boy doesn't forget his -appointment." - -"Are you serious?" - -"Quite serious, Basil. I should be miserable if I thought I should -ever be more serious than I am at the present moment." - -"But do you approve of it, Harry?" asked the painter, walking up and -down the room and biting his lip. "You can't approve of it, possibly. -It is some silly infatuation." - -"I never approve, or disapprove, of anything now. It is an absurd -attitude to take towards life. We are not sent into the world to air -our moral prejudices. I never take any notice of what common people -say, and I never interfere with what charming people do. If a -personality fascinates me, whatever mode of expression that personality -selects is absolutely delightful to me. Dorian Gray falls in love with -a beautiful girl who acts Juliet, and proposes to marry her. Why not? -If he wedded Messalina, he would be none the less interesting. You -know I am not a champion of marriage. The real drawback to marriage is -that it makes one unselfish. And unselfish people are colourless. -They lack individuality. Still, there are certain temperaments that -marriage makes more complex. They retain their egotism, and add to it -many other egos. They are forced to have more than one life. They -become more highly organized, and to be highly organized is, I should -fancy, the object of man's existence. Besides, every experience is of -value, and whatever one may say against marriage, it is certainly an -experience. I hope that Dorian Gray will make this girl his wife, -passionately adore her for six months, and then suddenly become -fascinated by some one else. He would be a wonderful study." - -"You don't mean a single word of all that, Harry; you know you don't. -If Dorian Gray's life were spoiled, no one would be sorrier than -yourself. You are much better than you pretend to be." - -Lord Henry laughed. "The reason we all like to think so well of others -is that we are all afraid for ourselves. The basis of optimism is -sheer terror. We think that we are generous because we credit our -neighbour with the possession of those virtues that are likely to be a -benefit to us. We praise the banker that we may overdraw our account, -and find good qualities in the highwayman in the hope that he may spare -our pockets. I mean everything that I have said. I have the greatest -contempt for optimism. As for a spoiled life, no life is spoiled but -one whose growth is arrested. If you want to mar a nature, you have -merely to reform it. As for marriage, of course that would be silly, -but there are other and more interesting bonds between men and women. -I will certainly encourage them. They have the charm of being -fashionable. But here is Dorian himself. He will tell you more than I -can." - -"My dear Harry, my dear Basil, you must both congratulate me!" said the -lad, throwing off his evening cape with its satin-lined wings and -shaking each of his friends by the hand in turn. "I have never been so -happy. Of course, it is sudden--all really delightful things are. And -yet it seems to me to be the one thing I have been looking for all my -life." He was flushed with excitement and pleasure, and looked -extraordinarily handsome. - -"I hope you will always be very happy, Dorian," said Hallward, "but I -don't quite forgive you for not having let me know of your engagement. -You let Harry know." - -"And I don't forgive you for being late for dinner," broke in Lord -Henry, putting his hand on the lad's shoulder and smiling as he spoke. -"Come, let us sit down and try what the new _chef_ here is like, and then -you will tell us how it all came about." - -"There is really not much to tell," cried Dorian as they took their -seats at the small round table. "What happened was simply this. After -I left you yesterday evening, Harry, I dressed, had some dinner at that -little Italian restaurant in Rupert Street you introduced me to, and -went down at eight o'clock to the theatre. Sibyl was playing Rosalind. -Of course, the scenery was dreadful and the Orlando absurd. But Sibyl! -You should have seen her! When she came on in her boy's clothes, she -was perfectly wonderful. She wore a moss-coloured velvet jerkin with -cinnamon sleeves, slim, brown, cross-gartered hose, a dainty little -green cap with a hawk's feather caught in a jewel, and a hooded cloak -lined with dull red. She had never seemed to me more exquisite. She -had all the delicate grace of that Tanagra figurine that you have in -your studio, Basil. Her hair clustered round her face like dark leaves -round a pale rose. As for her acting--well, you shall see her -to-night. She is simply a born artist. I sat in the dingy box -absolutely enthralled. I forgot that I was in London and in the -nineteenth century. I was away with my love in a forest that no man -had ever seen. After the performance was over, I went behind and spoke -to her. As we were sitting together, suddenly there came into her eyes -a look that I had never seen there before. My lips moved towards hers. -We kissed each other. I can't describe to you what I felt at that -moment. It seemed to me that all my life had been narrowed to one -perfect point of rose-coloured joy. She trembled all over and shook -like a white narcissus. Then she flung herself on her knees and kissed -my hands. I feel that I should not tell you all this, but I can't help -it. Of course, our engagement is a dead secret. She has not even told -her own mother. I don't know what my guardians will say. Lord Radley -is sure to be furious. I don't care. I shall be of age in less than a -year, and then I can do what I like. I have been right, Basil, haven't -I, to take my love out of poetry and to find my wife in Shakespeare's -plays? Lips that Shakespeare taught to speak have whispered their -secret in my ear. I have had the arms of Rosalind around me, and -kissed Juliet on the mouth." - -"Yes, Dorian, I suppose you were right," said Hallward slowly. - -"Have you seen her to-day?" asked Lord Henry. - -Dorian Gray shook his head. "I left her in the forest of Arden; I -shall find her in an orchard in Verona." - -Lord Henry sipped his champagne in a meditative manner. "At what -particular point did you mention the word marriage, Dorian? And what -did she say in answer? Perhaps you forgot all about it." - -"My dear Harry, I did not treat it as a business transaction, and I did -not make any formal proposal. I told her that I loved her, and she -said she was not worthy to be my wife. Not worthy! Why, the whole -world is nothing to me compared with her." - -"Women are wonderfully practical," murmured Lord Henry, "much more -practical than we are. In situations of that kind we often forget to -say anything about marriage, and they always remind us." - -Hallward laid his hand upon his arm. "Don't, Harry. You have annoyed -Dorian. He is not like other men. He would never bring misery upon -any one. His nature is too fine for that." - -Lord Henry looked across the table. "Dorian is never annoyed with me," -he answered. "I asked the question for the best reason possible, for -the only reason, indeed, that excuses one for asking any -question--simple curiosity. I have a theory that it is always the -women who propose to us, and not we who propose to the women. Except, -of course, in middle-class life. But then the middle classes are not -modern." - -Dorian Gray laughed, and tossed his head. "You are quite incorrigible, -Harry; but I don't mind. It is impossible to be angry with you. When -you see Sibyl Vane, you will feel that the man who could wrong her -would be a beast, a beast without a heart. I cannot understand how any -one can wish to shame the thing he loves. I love Sibyl Vane. I want -to place her on a pedestal of gold and to see the world worship the -woman who is mine. What is marriage? An irrevocable vow. You mock at -it for that. Ah! don't mock. It is an irrevocable vow that I want to -take. Her trust makes me faithful, her belief makes me good. When I -am with her, I regret all that you have taught me. I become different -from what you have known me to be. I am changed, and the mere touch of -Sibyl Vane's hand makes me forget you and all your wrong, fascinating, -poisonous, delightful theories." - -"And those are ...?" asked Lord Henry, helping himself to some salad. - -"Oh, your theories about life, your theories about love, your theories -about pleasure. All your theories, in fact, Harry." - -"Pleasure is the only thing worth having a theory about," he answered -in his slow melodious voice. "But I am afraid I cannot claim my theory -as my own. It belongs to Nature, not to me. Pleasure is Nature's -test, her sign of approval. When we are happy, we are always good, but -when we are good, we are not always happy." - -"Ah! but what do you mean by good?" cried Basil Hallward. - -"Yes," echoed Dorian, leaning back in his chair and looking at Lord -Henry over the heavy clusters of purple-lipped irises that stood in the -centre of the table, "what do you mean by good, Harry?" - -"To be good is to be in harmony with one's self," he replied, touching -the thin stem of his glass with his pale, fine-pointed fingers. -"Discord is to be forced to be in harmony with others. One's own -life--that is the important thing. As for the lives of one's -neighbours, if one wishes to be a prig or a Puritan, one can flaunt -one's moral views about them, but they are not one's concern. Besides, -individualism has really the higher aim. Modern morality consists in -accepting the standard of one's age. I consider that for any man of -culture to accept the standard of his age is a form of the grossest -immorality." - -"But, surely, if one lives merely for one's self, Harry, one pays a -terrible price for doing so?" suggested the painter. - -"Yes, we are overcharged for everything nowadays. I should fancy that -the real tragedy of the poor is that they can afford nothing but -self-denial. Beautiful sins, like beautiful things, are the privilege -of the rich." - -"One has to pay in other ways but money." - -"What sort of ways, Basil?" - -"Oh! I should fancy in remorse, in suffering, in ... well, in the -consciousness of degradation." - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "My dear fellow, mediaeval art is -charming, but mediaeval emotions are out of date. One can use them in -fiction, of course. But then the only things that one can use in -fiction are the things that one has ceased to use in fact. Believe me, -no civilized man ever regrets a pleasure, and no uncivilized man ever -knows what a pleasure is." - -"I know what pleasure is," cried Dorian Gray. "It is to adore some -one." - -"That is certainly better than being adored," he answered, toying with -some fruits. "Being adored is a nuisance. Women treat us just as -humanity treats its gods. They worship us, and are always bothering us -to do something for them." - -"I should have said that whatever they ask for they had first given to -us," murmured the lad gravely. "They create love in our natures. They -have a right to demand it back." - -"That is quite true, Dorian," cried Hallward. - -"Nothing is ever quite true," said Lord Henry. - -"This is," interrupted Dorian. "You must admit, Harry, that women give -to men the very gold of their lives." - -"Possibly," he sighed, "but they invariably want it back in such very -small change. That is the worry. Women, as some witty Frenchman once -put it, inspire us with the desire to do masterpieces and always -prevent us from carrying them out." - -"Harry, you are dreadful! I don't know why I like you so much." - -"You will always like me, Dorian," he replied. "Will you have some -coffee, you fellows? Waiter, bring coffee, and _fine-champagne_, and -some cigarettes. No, don't mind the cigarettes--I have some. Basil, I -can't allow you to smoke cigars. You must have a cigarette. A -cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, -and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want? Yes, Dorian, -you will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you -have never had the courage to commit." - -"What nonsense you talk, Harry!" cried the lad, taking a light from a -fire-breathing silver dragon that the waiter had placed on the table. -"Let us go down to the theatre. When Sibyl comes on the stage you will -have a new ideal of life. She will represent something to you that you -have never known." - -"I have known everything," said Lord Henry, with a tired look in his -eyes, "but I am always ready for a new emotion. I am afraid, however, -that, for me at any rate, there is no such thing. Still, your -wonderful girl may thrill me. I love acting. It is so much more real -than life. Let us go. Dorian, you will come with me. I am so sorry, -Basil, but there is only room for two in the brougham. You must follow -us in a hansom." - -They got up and put on their coats, sipping their coffee standing. The -painter was silent and preoccupied. There was a gloom over him. He -could not bear this marriage, and yet it seemed to him to be better -than many other things that might have happened. After a few minutes, -they all passed downstairs. He drove off by himself, as had been -arranged, and watched the flashing lights of the little brougham in -front of him. A strange sense of loss came over him. He felt that -Dorian Gray would never again be to him all that he had been in the -past. Life had come between them.... His eyes darkened, and the -crowded flaring streets became blurred to his eyes. When the cab drew -up at the theatre, it seemed to him that he had grown years older. - - - -CHAPTER 7 - -For some reason or other, the house was crowded that night, and the fat -Jew manager who met them at the door was beaming from ear to ear with -an oily tremulous smile. He escorted them to their box with a sort of -pompous humility, waving his fat jewelled hands and talking at the top -of his voice. Dorian Gray loathed him more than ever. He felt as if -he had come to look for Miranda and had been met by Caliban. Lord -Henry, upon the other hand, rather liked him. At least he declared he -did, and insisted on shaking him by the hand and assuring him that he -was proud to meet a man who had discovered a real genius and gone -bankrupt over a poet. Hallward amused himself with watching the faces -in the pit. The heat was terribly oppressive, and the huge sunlight -flamed like a monstrous dahlia with petals of yellow fire. The youths -in the gallery had taken off their coats and waistcoats and hung them -over the side. They talked to each other across the theatre and shared -their oranges with the tawdry girls who sat beside them. Some women -were laughing in the pit. Their voices were horribly shrill and -discordant. The sound of the popping of corks came from the bar. - -"What a place to find one's divinity in!" said Lord Henry. - -"Yes!" answered Dorian Gray. "It was here I found her, and she is -divine beyond all living things. When she acts, you will forget -everything. These common rough people, with their coarse faces and -brutal gestures, become quite different when she is on the stage. They -sit silently and watch her. They weep and laugh as she wills them to -do. She makes them as responsive as a violin. She spiritualizes them, -and one feels that they are of the same flesh and blood as one's self." - -"The same flesh and blood as one's self! Oh, I hope not!" exclaimed -Lord Henry, who was scanning the occupants of the gallery through his -opera-glass. - -"Don't pay any attention to him, Dorian," said the painter. "I -understand what you mean, and I believe in this girl. Any one you love -must be marvellous, and any girl who has the effect you describe must -be fine and noble. To spiritualize one's age--that is something worth -doing. If this girl can give a soul to those who have lived without -one, if she can create the sense of beauty in people whose lives have -been sordid and ugly, if she can strip them of their selfishness and -lend them tears for sorrows that are not their own, she is worthy of -all your adoration, worthy of the adoration of the world. This -marriage is quite right. I did not think so at first, but I admit it -now. The gods made Sibyl Vane for you. Without her you would have -been incomplete." - -"Thanks, Basil," answered Dorian Gray, pressing his hand. "I knew that -you would understand me. Harry is so cynical, he terrifies me. But -here is the orchestra. It is quite dreadful, but it only lasts for -about five minutes. Then the curtain rises, and you will see the girl -to whom I am going to give all my life, to whom I have given everything -that is good in me." - -A quarter of an hour afterwards, amidst an extraordinary turmoil of -applause, Sibyl Vane stepped on to the stage. Yes, she was certainly -lovely to look at--one of the loveliest creatures, Lord Henry thought, -that he had ever seen. There was something of the fawn in her shy -grace and startled eyes. A faint blush, like the shadow of a rose in a -mirror of silver, came to her cheeks as she glanced at the crowded -enthusiastic house. She stepped back a few paces and her lips seemed -to tremble. Basil Hallward leaped to his feet and began to applaud. -Motionless, and as one in a dream, sat Dorian Gray, gazing at her. -Lord Henry peered through his glasses, murmuring, "Charming! charming!" - -The scene was the hall of Capulet's house, and Romeo in his pilgrim's -dress had entered with Mercutio and his other friends. The band, such -as it was, struck up a few bars of music, and the dance began. Through -the crowd of ungainly, shabbily dressed actors, Sibyl Vane moved like a -creature from a finer world. Her body swayed, while she danced, as a -plant sways in the water. The curves of her throat were the curves of -a white lily. Her hands seemed to be made of cool ivory. - -Yet she was curiously listless. She showed no sign of joy when her -eyes rested on Romeo. The few words she had to speak-- - - Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, - Which mannerly devotion shows in this; - For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch, - And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss-- - -with the brief dialogue that follows, were spoken in a thoroughly -artificial manner. The voice was exquisite, but from the point of view -of tone it was absolutely false. It was wrong in colour. It took away -all the life from the verse. It made the passion unreal. - -Dorian Gray grew pale as he watched her. He was puzzled and anxious. -Neither of his friends dared to say anything to him. She seemed to -them to be absolutely incompetent. They were horribly disappointed. - -Yet they felt that the true test of any Juliet is the balcony scene of -the second act. They waited for that. If she failed there, there was -nothing in her. - -She looked charming as she came out in the moonlight. That could not -be denied. But the staginess of her acting was unbearable, and grew -worse as she went on. Her gestures became absurdly artificial. She -overemphasized everything that she had to say. The beautiful passage-- - - Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face, - Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek - For that which thou hast heard me speak to-night-- - -was declaimed with the painful precision of a schoolgirl who has been -taught to recite by some second-rate professor of elocution. When she -leaned over the balcony and came to those wonderful lines-- - - Although I joy in thee, - I have no joy of this contract to-night: - It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden; - Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be - Ere one can say, "It lightens." Sweet, good-night! - This bud of love by summer's ripening breath - May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet-- - -she spoke the words as though they conveyed no meaning to her. It was -not nervousness. Indeed, so far from being nervous, she was absolutely -self-contained. It was simply bad art. She was a complete failure. - -Even the common uneducated audience of the pit and gallery lost their -interest in the play. They got restless, and began to talk loudly and -to whistle. The Jew manager, who was standing at the back of the -dress-circle, stamped and swore with rage. The only person unmoved was -the girl herself. - -When the second act was over, there came a storm of hisses, and Lord -Henry got up from his chair and put on his coat. "She is quite -beautiful, Dorian," he said, "but she can't act. Let us go." - -"I am going to see the play through," answered the lad, in a hard -bitter voice. "I am awfully sorry that I have made you waste an -evening, Harry. I apologize to you both." - -"My dear Dorian, I should think Miss Vane was ill," interrupted -Hallward. "We will come some other night." - -"I wish she were ill," he rejoined. "But she seems to me to be simply -callous and cold. She has entirely altered. Last night she was a -great artist. This evening she is merely a commonplace mediocre -actress." - -"Don't talk like that about any one you love, Dorian. Love is a more -wonderful thing than art." - -"They are both simply forms of imitation," remarked Lord Henry. "But -do let us go. Dorian, you must not stay here any longer. It is not -good for one's morals to see bad acting. Besides, I don't suppose you -will want your wife to act, so what does it matter if she plays Juliet -like a wooden doll? She is very lovely, and if she knows as little -about life as she does about acting, she will be a delightful -experience. There are only two kinds of people who are really -fascinating--people who know absolutely everything, and people who know -absolutely nothing. Good heavens, my dear boy, don't look so tragic! -The secret of remaining young is never to have an emotion that is -unbecoming. Come to the club with Basil and myself. We will smoke -cigarettes and drink to the beauty of Sibyl Vane. She is beautiful. -What more can you want?" - -"Go away, Harry," cried the lad. "I want to be alone. Basil, you must -go. Ah! can't you see that my heart is breaking?" The hot tears came -to his eyes. His lips trembled, and rushing to the back of the box, he -leaned up against the wall, hiding his face in his hands. - -"Let us go, Basil," said Lord Henry with a strange tenderness in his -voice, and the two young men passed out together. - -A few moments afterwards the footlights flared up and the curtain rose -on the third act. Dorian Gray went back to his seat. He looked pale, -and proud, and indifferent. The play dragged on, and seemed -interminable. Half of the audience went out, tramping in heavy boots -and laughing. The whole thing was a _fiasco_. The last act was played -to almost empty benches. The curtain went down on a titter and some -groans. - -As soon as it was over, Dorian Gray rushed behind the scenes into the -greenroom. The girl was standing there alone, with a look of triumph -on her face. Her eyes were lit with an exquisite fire. There was a -radiance about her. Her parted lips were smiling over some secret of -their own. - -When he entered, she looked at him, and an expression of infinite joy -came over her. "How badly I acted to-night, Dorian!" she cried. - -"Horribly!" he answered, gazing at her in amazement. "Horribly! It -was dreadful. Are you ill? You have no idea what it was. You have no -idea what I suffered." - -The girl smiled. "Dorian," she answered, lingering over his name with -long-drawn music in her voice, as though it were sweeter than honey to -the red petals of her mouth. "Dorian, you should have understood. But -you understand now, don't you?" - -"Understand what?" he asked, angrily. - -"Why I was so bad to-night. Why I shall always be bad. Why I shall -never act well again." - -He shrugged his shoulders. "You are ill, I suppose. When you are ill -you shouldn't act. You make yourself ridiculous. My friends were -bored. I was bored." - -She seemed not to listen to him. She was transfigured with joy. An -ecstasy of happiness dominated her. - -"Dorian, Dorian," she cried, "before I knew you, acting was the one -reality of my life. It was only in the theatre that I lived. I -thought that it was all true. I was Rosalind one night and Portia the -other. The joy of Beatrice was my joy, and the sorrows of Cordelia -were mine also. I believed in everything. The common people who acted -with me seemed to me to be godlike. The painted scenes were my world. -I knew nothing but shadows, and I thought them real. You came--oh, my -beautiful love!--and you freed my soul from prison. You taught me what -reality really is. To-night, for the first time in my life, I saw -through the hollowness, the sham, the silliness of the empty pageant in -which I had always played. To-night, for the first time, I became -conscious that the Romeo was hideous, and old, and painted, that the -moonlight in the orchard was false, that the scenery was vulgar, and -that the words I had to speak were unreal, were not my words, were not -what I wanted to say. You had brought me something higher, something -of which all art is but a reflection. You had made me understand what -love really is. My love! My love! Prince Charming! Prince of life! -I have grown sick of shadows. You are more to me than all art can ever -be. What have I to do with the puppets of a play? When I came on -to-night, I could not understand how it was that everything had gone -from me. I thought that I was going to be wonderful. I found that I -could do nothing. Suddenly it dawned on my soul what it all meant. -The knowledge was exquisite to me. I heard them hissing, and I smiled. -What could they know of love such as ours? Take me away, Dorian--take -me away with you, where we can be quite alone. I hate the stage. I -might mimic a passion that I do not feel, but I cannot mimic one that -burns me like fire. Oh, Dorian, Dorian, you understand now what it -signifies? Even if I could do it, it would be profanation for me to -play at being in love. You have made me see that." - -He flung himself down on the sofa and turned away his face. "You have -killed my love," he muttered. - -She looked at him in wonder and laughed. He made no answer. She came -across to him, and with her little fingers stroked his hair. She knelt -down and pressed his hands to her lips. He drew them away, and a -shudder ran through him. - -Then he leaped up and went to the door. "Yes," he cried, "you have -killed my love. You used to stir my imagination. Now you don't even -stir my curiosity. You simply produce no effect. I loved you because -you were marvellous, because you had genius and intellect, because you -realized the dreams of great poets and gave shape and substance to the -shadows of art. You have thrown it all away. You are shallow and -stupid. My God! how mad I was to love you! What a fool I have been! -You are nothing to me now. I will never see you again. I will never -think of you. I will never mention your name. You don't know what you -were to me, once. Why, once ... Oh, I can't bear to think of it! I -wish I had never laid eyes upon you! You have spoiled the romance of -my life. How little you can know of love, if you say it mars your art! -Without your art, you are nothing. I would have made you famous, -splendid, magnificent. The world would have worshipped you, and you -would have borne my name. What are you now? A third-rate actress with -a pretty face." - -The girl grew white, and trembled. She clenched her hands together, -and her voice seemed to catch in her throat. "You are not serious, -Dorian?" she murmured. "You are acting." - -"Acting! I leave that to you. You do it so well," he answered -bitterly. - -She rose from her knees and, with a piteous expression of pain in her -face, came across the room to him. She put her hand upon his arm and -looked into his eyes. He thrust her back. "Don't touch me!" he cried. - -A low moan broke from her, and she flung herself at his feet and lay -there like a trampled flower. "Dorian, Dorian, don't leave me!" she -whispered. "I am so sorry I didn't act well. I was thinking of you -all the time. But I will try--indeed, I will try. It came so suddenly -across me, my love for you. I think I should never have known it if -you had not kissed me--if we had not kissed each other. Kiss me again, -my love. Don't go away from me. I couldn't bear it. Oh! don't go -away from me. My brother ... No; never mind. He didn't mean it. He -was in jest.... But you, oh! can't you forgive me for to-night? I will -work so hard and try to improve. Don't be cruel to me, because I love -you better than anything in the world. After all, it is only once that -I have not pleased you. But you are quite right, Dorian. I should -have shown myself more of an artist. It was foolish of me, and yet I -couldn't help it. Oh, don't leave me, don't leave me." A fit of -passionate sobbing choked her. She crouched on the floor like a -wounded thing, and Dorian Gray, with his beautiful eyes, looked down at -her, and his chiselled lips curled in exquisite disdain. There is -always something ridiculous about the emotions of people whom one has -ceased to love. Sibyl Vane seemed to him to be absurdly melodramatic. -Her tears and sobs annoyed him. - -"I am going," he said at last in his calm clear voice. "I don't wish -to be unkind, but I can't see you again. You have disappointed me." - -She wept silently, and made no answer, but crept nearer. Her little -hands stretched blindly out, and appeared to be seeking for him. He -turned on his heel and left the room. In a few moments he was out of -the theatre. - -Where he went to he hardly knew. He remembered wandering through dimly -lit streets, past gaunt, black-shadowed archways and evil-looking -houses. Women with hoarse voices and harsh laughter had called after -him. Drunkards had reeled by, cursing and chattering to themselves -like monstrous apes. He had seen grotesque children huddled upon -door-steps, and heard shrieks and oaths from gloomy courts. - -As the dawn was just breaking, he found himself close to Covent Garden. -The darkness lifted, and, flushed with faint fires, the sky hollowed -itself into a perfect pearl. Huge carts filled with nodding lilies -rumbled slowly down the polished empty street. The air was heavy with -the perfume of the flowers, and their beauty seemed to bring him an -anodyne for his pain. He followed into the market and watched the men -unloading their waggons. A white-smocked carter offered him some -cherries. He thanked him, wondered why he refused to accept any money -for them, and began to eat them listlessly. They had been plucked at -midnight, and the coldness of the moon had entered into them. A long -line of boys carrying crates of striped tulips, and of yellow and red -roses, defiled in front of him, threading their way through the huge, -jade-green piles of vegetables. Under the portico, with its grey, -sun-bleached pillars, loitered a troop of draggled bareheaded girls, -waiting for the auction to be over. Others crowded round the swinging -doors of the coffee-house in the piazza. The heavy cart-horses slipped -and stamped upon the rough stones, shaking their bells and trappings. -Some of the drivers were lying asleep on a pile of sacks. Iris-necked -and pink-footed, the pigeons ran about picking up seeds. - -After a little while, he hailed a hansom and drove home. For a few -moments he loitered upon the doorstep, looking round at the silent -square, with its blank, close-shuttered windows and its staring blinds. -The sky was pure opal now, and the roofs of the houses glistened like -silver against it. From some chimney opposite a thin wreath of smoke -was rising. It curled, a violet riband, through the nacre-coloured air. - -In the huge gilt Venetian lantern, spoil of some Doge's barge, that -hung from the ceiling of the great, oak-panelled hall of entrance, -lights were still burning from three flickering jets: thin blue petals -of flame they seemed, rimmed with white fire. He turned them out and, -having thrown his hat and cape on the table, passed through the library -towards the door of his bedroom, a large octagonal chamber on the -ground floor that, in his new-born feeling for luxury, he had just had -decorated for himself and hung with some curious Renaissance tapestries -that had been discovered stored in a disused attic at Selby Royal. As -he was turning the handle of the door, his eye fell upon the portrait -Basil Hallward had painted of him. He started back as if in surprise. -Then he went on into his own room, looking somewhat puzzled. After he -had taken the button-hole out of his coat, he seemed to hesitate. -Finally, he came back, went over to the picture, and examined it. In -the dim arrested light that struggled through the cream-coloured silk -blinds, the face appeared to him to be a little changed. The -expression looked different. One would have said that there was a -touch of cruelty in the mouth. It was certainly strange. - -He turned round and, walking to the window, drew up the blind. The -bright dawn flooded the room and swept the fantastic shadows into dusky -corners, where they lay shuddering. But the strange expression that he -had noticed in the face of the portrait seemed to linger there, to be -more intensified even. The quivering ardent sunlight showed him the -lines of cruelty round the mouth as clearly as if he had been looking -into a mirror after he had done some dreadful thing. - -He winced and, taking up from the table an oval glass framed in ivory -Cupids, one of Lord Henry's many presents to him, glanced hurriedly -into its polished depths. No line like that warped his red lips. What -did it mean? - -He rubbed his eyes, and came close to the picture, and examined it -again. There were no signs of any change when he looked into the -actual painting, and yet there was no doubt that the whole expression -had altered. It was not a mere fancy of his own. The thing was -horribly apparent. - -He threw himself into a chair and began to think. Suddenly there -flashed across his mind what he had said in Basil Hallward's studio the -day the picture had been finished. Yes, he remembered it perfectly. -He had uttered a mad wish that he himself might remain young, and the -portrait grow old; that his own beauty might be untarnished, and the -face on the canvas bear the burden of his passions and his sins; that -the painted image might be seared with the lines of suffering and -thought, and that he might keep all the delicate bloom and loveliness -of his then just conscious boyhood. Surely his wish had not been -fulfilled? Such things were impossible. It seemed monstrous even to -think of them. And, yet, there was the picture before him, with the -touch of cruelty in the mouth. - -Cruelty! Had he been cruel? It was the girl's fault, not his. He had -dreamed of her as a great artist, had given his love to her because he -had thought her great. Then she had disappointed him. She had been -shallow and unworthy. And, yet, a feeling of infinite regret came over -him, as he thought of her lying at his feet sobbing like a little -child. He remembered with what callousness he had watched her. Why -had he been made like that? Why had such a soul been given to him? -But he had suffered also. During the three terrible hours that the -play had lasted, he had lived centuries of pain, aeon upon aeon of -torture. His life was well worth hers. She had marred him for a -moment, if he had wounded her for an age. Besides, women were better -suited to bear sorrow than men. They lived on their emotions. They -only thought of their emotions. When they took lovers, it was merely -to have some one with whom they could have scenes. Lord Henry had told -him that, and Lord Henry knew what women were. 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. - -Yet it was watching him, with its beautiful marred face and its cruel -smile. Its bright hair gleamed in the early sunlight. Its blue eyes -met his own. A sense of infinite pity, not for himself, but for the -painted image of himself, came over him. It had altered already, and -would alter more. Its gold would wither into grey. Its red and white -roses would die. For every sin that he committed, a stain would fleck -and wreck its fairness. But he would not sin. The picture, changed or -unchanged, would be to him the visible emblem of conscience. He would -resist temptation. He would not see Lord Henry any more--would not, at -any rate, listen to those subtle poisonous theories that in Basil -Hallward's garden had first stirred within him the passion for -impossible things. He would go back to Sibyl Vane, make her amends, -marry her, try to love her again. Yes, it was his duty to do so. She -must have suffered more than he had. Poor child! He had been selfish -and cruel to her. The fascination that she had exercised over him -would return. They would be happy together. His life with her would -be beautiful and pure. - -He got up from his chair and drew a large screen right in front of the -portrait, shuddering as he glanced at it. "How horrible!" he murmured -to himself, and he walked across to the window and opened it. When he -stepped out on to the grass, he drew a deep breath. The fresh morning -air seemed to drive away all his sombre passions. He thought only of -Sibyl. A faint echo of his love came back to him. He repeated her -name over and over again. The birds that were singing in the -dew-drenched garden seemed to be telling the flowers about her. - - - -CHAPTER 8 - -It was long past noon when he awoke. His valet had crept several times -on tiptoe into the room to see if he was stirring, and had wondered -what made his young master sleep so late. Finally his bell sounded, -and Victor came in softly with a cup of tea, and a pile of letters, on -a small tray of old Sevres china, and drew back the olive-satin -curtains, with their shimmering blue lining, that hung in front of the -three tall windows. - -"Monsieur has well slept this morning," he said, smiling. - -"What o'clock is it, Victor?" asked Dorian Gray drowsily. - -"One hour and a quarter, Monsieur." - -How late it was! He sat up, and having sipped some tea, turned over -his letters. One of them was from Lord Henry, and had been brought by -hand that morning. He hesitated for a moment, and then put it aside. -The others he opened listlessly. They contained the usual collection -of cards, invitations to dinner, tickets for private views, programmes -of charity concerts, and the like that are showered on fashionable -young men every morning during the season. There was a rather heavy -bill for a chased silver Louis-Quinze toilet-set that he had not yet -had the courage to send on to his guardians, who were extremely -old-fashioned people and did not realize that we live in an age when -unnecessary things are our only necessities; and there were several -very courteously worded communications from Jermyn Street money-lenders -offering to advance any sum of money at a moment's notice and at the -most reasonable rates of interest. - -After about ten minutes he got up, and throwing on an elaborate -dressing-gown of silk-embroidered cashmere wool, passed into the -onyx-paved bathroom. The cool water refreshed him after his long -sleep. He seemed to have forgotten all that he had gone through. A -dim sense of having taken part in some strange tragedy came to him once -or twice, but there was the unreality of a dream about it. - -As soon as he was dressed, he went into the library and sat down to a -light French breakfast that had been laid out for him on a small round -table close to the open window. It was an exquisite day. The warm air -seemed laden with spices. A bee flew in and buzzed round the -blue-dragon bowl that, filled with sulphur-yellow roses, stood before -him. He felt perfectly happy. - -Suddenly his eye fell on the screen that he had placed in front of the -portrait, and he started. - -"Too cold for Monsieur?" asked his valet, putting an omelette on the -table. "I shut the window?" - -Dorian shook his head. "I am not cold," he murmured. - -Was it all true? Had the portrait really changed? Or had it been -simply his own imagination that had made him see a look of evil where -there had been a look of joy? Surely a painted canvas could not alter? -The thing was absurd. It would serve as a tale to tell Basil some day. -It would make him smile. - -And, yet, how vivid was his recollection of the whole thing! First in -the dim twilight, and then in the bright dawn, he had seen the touch of -cruelty round the warped lips. He almost dreaded his valet leaving the -room. He knew that when he was alone he would have to examine the -portrait. He was afraid of certainty. When the coffee and cigarettes -had been brought and the man turned to go, he felt a wild desire to -tell him to remain. As the door was closing behind him, he called him -back. The man stood waiting for his orders. Dorian looked at him for -a moment. "I am not at home to any one, Victor," he said with a sigh. -The man bowed and retired. - -Then he rose from the table, lit a cigarette, and flung himself down on -a luxuriously cushioned couch that stood facing the screen. The screen -was an old one, of gilt Spanish leather, stamped and wrought with a -rather florid Louis-Quatorze pattern. He scanned it curiously, -wondering if ever before it had concealed the secret of a man's life. - -Should he move it aside, after all? Why not let it stay there? What -was the use of knowing? If the thing was true, it was terrible. If it -was not true, why trouble about it? But what if, by some fate or -deadlier chance, eyes other than his spied behind and saw the horrible -change? What should he do if Basil Hallward came and asked to look at -his own picture? Basil would be sure to do that. No; the thing had to -be examined, and at once. Anything would be better than this dreadful -state of doubt. - -He got up and locked both doors. At least he would be alone when he -looked upon the mask of his shame. Then he drew the screen aside and -saw himself face to face. It was perfectly true. The portrait had -altered. - -As he often remembered afterwards, and always with no small wonder, he -found himself at first gazing at the portrait with a feeling of almost -scientific interest. That such a change should have taken place was -incredible to him. And yet it was a fact. Was there some subtle -affinity between the chemical atoms that shaped themselves into form -and colour on the canvas and the soul that was within him? Could it be -that what that soul thought, they realized?--that what it dreamed, they -made true? Or was there some other, more terrible reason? He -shuddered, and felt afraid, and, going back to the couch, lay there, -gazing at the picture in sickened horror. - -One thing, however, he felt that it had done for him. It had made him -conscious how unjust, how cruel, he had been to Sibyl Vane. It was not -too late to make reparation for that. She could still be his wife. -His unreal and selfish love would yield to some higher influence, would -be transformed into some nobler passion, and the portrait that Basil -Hallward had painted of him would be a guide to him through life, would -be to him what holiness is to some, and conscience to others, and the -fear of God to us all. There were opiates for remorse, drugs that -could lull the moral sense to sleep. But here was a visible symbol of -the degradation of sin. Here was an ever-present sign of the ruin men -brought upon their souls. - -Three o'clock struck, and four, and the half-hour rang its double -chime, but Dorian Gray did not stir. He was trying to gather up the -scarlet threads of life and to weave them into a pattern; to find his -way through the sanguine labyrinth of passion through which he was -wandering. He did not know what to do, or what to think. Finally, he -went over to the table and wrote a passionate letter to the girl he had -loved, imploring her forgiveness and accusing himself of madness. He -covered page after page with wild words of sorrow and wilder words of -pain. There is a luxury in self-reproach. When we blame ourselves, we -feel that no one else has a right to blame us. It is the confession, -not the priest, that gives us absolution. When Dorian had finished the -letter, he felt that he had been forgiven. - -Suddenly there came a knock to the door, and he heard Lord Henry's -voice outside. "My dear boy, I must see you. Let me in at once. I -can't bear your shutting yourself up like this." - -He made no answer at first, but remained quite still. The knocking -still continued and grew louder. Yes, it was better to let Lord Henry -in, and to explain to him the new life he was going to lead, to quarrel -with him if it became necessary to quarrel, to part if parting was -inevitable. He jumped up, drew the screen hastily across the picture, -and unlocked the door. - -"I am so sorry for it all, Dorian," said Lord Henry as he entered. -"But you must not think too much about it." - -"Do you mean about Sibyl Vane?" asked the lad. - -"Yes, of course," answered Lord Henry, sinking into a chair and slowly -pulling off his yellow gloves. "It is dreadful, from one point of -view, but it was not your fault. Tell me, did you go behind and see -her, after the play was over?" - -"Yes." - -"I felt sure you had. Did you make a scene with her?" - -"I was brutal, Harry--perfectly brutal. But it is all right now. I am -not sorry for anything that has happened. It has taught me to know -myself better." - -"Ah, Dorian, I am so glad you take it in that way! I was afraid I -would find you plunged in remorse and tearing that nice curly hair of -yours." - -"I have got through all that," said Dorian, shaking his head and -smiling. "I am perfectly happy now. I know what conscience is, to -begin with. It is not what you told me it was. It is the divinest -thing in us. Don't sneer at it, Harry, any more--at least not before -me. I want to be good. I can't bear the idea of my soul being -hideous." - -"A very charming artistic basis for ethics, Dorian! I congratulate you -on it. But how are you going to begin?" - -"By marrying Sibyl Vane." - -"Marrying Sibyl Vane!" cried Lord Henry, standing up and looking at him -in perplexed amazement. "But, my dear Dorian--" - -"Yes, Harry, I know what you are going to say. Something dreadful -about marriage. Don't say it. Don't ever say things of that kind to -me again. Two days ago I asked Sibyl to marry me. I am not going to -break my word to her. She is to be my wife." - -"Your wife! Dorian! ... Didn't you get my letter? I wrote to you this -morning, and sent the note down by my own man." - -"Your letter? Oh, yes, I remember. I have not read it yet, Harry. I -was afraid there might be something in it that I wouldn't like. You -cut life to pieces with your epigrams." - -"You know nothing then?" - -"What do you mean?" - -Lord Henry walked across the room, and sitting down by Dorian Gray, -took both his hands in his own and held them tightly. "Dorian," he -said, "my letter--don't be frightened--was to tell you that Sibyl Vane -is dead." - -A cry of pain broke from the lad's lips, and he leaped to his feet, -tearing his hands away from Lord Henry's grasp. "Dead! Sibyl dead! -It is not true! It is a horrible lie! How dare you say it?" - -"It is quite true, Dorian," said Lord Henry, gravely. "It is in all -the morning papers. I wrote down to you to ask you not to see any one -till I came. There will have to be an inquest, of course, and you must -not be mixed up in it. Things like that make a man fashionable in -Paris. But in London people are so prejudiced. Here, one should never -make one's _debut_ with a scandal. One should reserve that to give an -interest to one's old age. I suppose they don't know your name at the -theatre? If they don't, it is all right. Did any one see you going -round to her room? That is an important point." - -Dorian did not answer for a few moments. He was dazed with horror. -Finally he stammered, in a stifled voice, "Harry, did you say an -inquest? What did you mean by that? Did Sibyl--? Oh, Harry, I can't -bear it! But be quick. Tell me everything at once." - -"I have no doubt it was not an accident, Dorian, though it must be put -in that way to the public. It seems that as she was leaving the -theatre with her mother, about half-past twelve or so, she said she had -forgotten something upstairs. They waited some time for her, but she -did not come down again. They ultimately found her lying dead on the -floor of her dressing-room. She had swallowed something by mistake, -some dreadful thing they use at theatres. I don't know what it was, -but it had either prussic acid or white lead in it. I should fancy it -was prussic acid, as she seems to have died instantaneously." - -"Harry, Harry, it is terrible!" cried the lad. - -"Yes; it is very tragic, of course, but you must not get yourself mixed -up in it. I see by _The Standard_ that she was seventeen. I should have -thought she was almost younger than that. She looked such a child, and -seemed to know so little about acting. Dorian, you mustn't let this -thing get on your nerves. You must come and dine with me, and -afterwards we will look in at the opera. It is a Patti night, and -everybody will be there. You can come to my sister's box. She has got -some smart women with her." - -"So I have murdered Sibyl Vane," said Dorian Gray, half to himself, -"murdered her as surely as if I had cut her little throat with a knife. -Yet the roses are not less lovely for all that. The birds sing just as -happily in my garden. And to-night I am to dine with you, and then go -on to the opera, and sup somewhere, I suppose, afterwards. How -extraordinarily dramatic life is! If I had read all this in a book, -Harry, I think I would have wept over it. Somehow, now that it has -happened actually, and to me, it seems far too wonderful for tears. -Here is the first passionate love-letter I have ever written in my -life. Strange, that my first passionate love-letter should have been -addressed to a dead girl. Can they feel, I wonder, those white silent -people we call the dead? Sibyl! Can she feel, or know, or listen? -Oh, Harry, how I loved her once! It seems years ago to me now. She -was everything to me. Then came that dreadful night--was it really -only last night?--when she played so badly, and my heart almost broke. -She explained it all to me. It was terribly pathetic. But I was not -moved a bit. I thought her shallow. Suddenly something happened that -made me afraid. I can't tell you what it was, but it was terrible. I -said I would go back to her. I felt I had done wrong. And now she is -dead. My God! My God! Harry, what shall I do? You don't know the -danger I am in, and there is nothing to keep me straight. She would -have done that for me. She had no right to kill herself. It was -selfish of her." - -"My dear Dorian," answered Lord Henry, taking a cigarette from his case -and producing a gold-latten matchbox, "the only way a woman can ever -reform a man is by boring him so completely that he loses all possible -interest in life. If you had married this girl, you would have been -wretched. Of course, you would have treated her kindly. One can -always be kind to people about whom one cares nothing. But she would -have soon found out that you were absolutely indifferent to her. And -when a woman finds that out about her husband, she either becomes -dreadfully dowdy, or wears very smart bonnets that some other woman's -husband has to pay for. I say nothing about the social mistake, which -would have been abject--which, of course, I would not have allowed--but -I assure you that in any case the whole thing would have been an -absolute failure." - -"I suppose it would," muttered the lad, walking up and down the room -and looking horribly pale. "But I thought it was my duty. It is not -my fault that this terrible tragedy has prevented my doing what was -right. I remember your saying once that there is a fatality about good -resolutions--that they are always made too late. Mine certainly were." - -"Good resolutions are useless attempts to interfere with scientific -laws. Their origin is pure vanity. Their result is absolutely _nil_. -They give us, now and then, some of those luxurious sterile emotions -that have a certain charm for the weak. That is all that can be said -for them. They are simply cheques that men draw on a bank where they -have no account." - -"Harry," cried Dorian Gray, coming over and sitting down beside him, -"why is it that I cannot feel this tragedy as much as I want to? I -don't think I am heartless. Do you?" - -"You have done too many foolish things during the last fortnight to be -entitled to give yourself that name, Dorian," answered Lord Henry with -his sweet melancholy smile. - -The lad frowned. "I don't like that explanation, Harry," he rejoined, -"but I am glad you don't think I am heartless. I am nothing of the -kind. I know I am not. And yet I must admit that this thing that has -happened does not affect me as it should. It seems to me to be simply -like a wonderful ending to a wonderful play. It has all the terrible -beauty of a Greek tragedy, a tragedy in which I took a great part, but -by which I have not been wounded." - -"It is an interesting question," said Lord Henry, who found an -exquisite pleasure in playing on the lad's unconscious egotism, "an -extremely interesting question. I fancy that the true explanation is -this: It often happens that the real tragedies of life occur in such -an inartistic manner that they hurt us by their crude violence, their -absolute incoherence, their absurd want of meaning, their entire lack -of style. They affect us just as vulgarity affects us. They give us -an impression of sheer brute force, and we revolt against that. -Sometimes, however, a tragedy that possesses artistic elements of -beauty crosses our lives. If these elements of beauty are real, the -whole thing simply appeals to our sense of dramatic effect. Suddenly -we find that we are no longer the actors, but the spectators of the -play. Or rather we are both. We watch ourselves, and the mere wonder -of the spectacle enthralls us. In the present case, what is it that -has really happened? Some one has killed herself for love of you. I -wish that I had ever had such an experience. It would have made me in -love with love for the rest of my life. The people who have adored -me--there have not been very many, but there have been some--have -always insisted on living on, long after I had ceased to care for them, -or they to care for me. They have become stout and tedious, and when I -meet them, they go in at once for reminiscences. That awful memory of -woman! What a fearful thing it is! And what an utter intellectual -stagnation it reveals! One should absorb the colour of life, but one -should never remember its details. Details are always vulgar." - -"I must sow poppies in my garden," sighed Dorian. - -"There is no necessity," rejoined his companion. "Life has always -poppies in her hands. Of course, now and then things linger. I once -wore nothing but violets all through one season, as a form of artistic -mourning for a romance that would not die. Ultimately, however, it did -die. I forget what killed it. I think it was her proposing to -sacrifice the whole world for me. That is always a dreadful moment. -It fills one with the terror of eternity. Well--would you believe -it?--a week ago, at Lady Hampshire's, I found myself seated at dinner -next the lady in question, and she insisted on going over the whole -thing again, and digging up the past, and raking up the future. I had -buried my romance in a bed of asphodel. She dragged it out again and -assured me that I had spoiled her life. I am bound to state that she -ate an enormous dinner, so I did not feel any anxiety. But what a lack -of taste she showed! The one charm of the past is that it is the past. -But women never know when the curtain has fallen. They always want a -sixth act, and as soon as the interest of the play is entirely over, -they propose to continue it. If they were allowed their own way, every -comedy would have a tragic ending, and every tragedy would culminate in -a farce. They are charmingly artificial, but they have no sense of -art. You are more fortunate than I am. I assure you, Dorian, that not -one of the women I have known would have done for me what Sibyl Vane -did for you. Ordinary women always console themselves. Some of them -do it by going in for sentimental colours. Never trust a woman who -wears mauve, whatever her age may be, or a woman over thirty-five who -is fond of pink ribbons. It always means that they have a history. -Others find a great consolation in suddenly discovering the good -qualities of their husbands. They flaunt their conjugal felicity in -one's face, as if it were the most fascinating of sins. Religion -consoles some. Its mysteries have all the charm of a flirtation, a -woman once told me, and I can quite understand it. Besides, nothing -makes one so vain as being told that one is a sinner. Conscience makes -egotists of us all. Yes; there is really no end to the consolations -that women find in modern life. Indeed, I have not mentioned the most -important one." - -"What is that, Harry?" said the lad listlessly. - -"Oh, the obvious consolation. Taking some one else's admirer when one -loses one's own. In good society that always whitewashes a woman. But -really, Dorian, how different Sibyl Vane must have been from all the -women one meets! There is something to me quite beautiful about her -death. I am glad I am living in a century when such wonders happen. -They make one believe in the reality of the things we all play with, -such as romance, passion, and love." - -"I was terribly cruel to her. You forget that." - -"I am afraid that women appreciate cruelty, downright cruelty, more -than anything else. They have wonderfully primitive instincts. We -have emancipated them, but they remain slaves looking for their -masters, all the same. They love being dominated. I am sure you were -splendid. I have never seen you really and absolutely angry, but I can -fancy how delightful you looked. And, after all, you said something to -me the day before yesterday that seemed to me at the time to be merely -fanciful, but that I see now was absolutely true, and it holds the key -to everything." - -"What was that, Harry?" - -"You said to me that Sibyl Vane represented to you all the heroines of -romance--that she was Desdemona one night, and Ophelia the other; that -if she died as Juliet, she came to life as Imogen." - -"She will never come to life again now," muttered the lad, burying his -face in his hands. - -"No, she will never come to life. She has played her last part. But -you must think of that lonely death in the tawdry dressing-room simply -as a strange lurid fragment from some Jacobean tragedy, as a wonderful -scene from Webster, or Ford, or Cyril Tourneur. The girl never really -lived, and so she has never really died. To you at least she was -always a dream, a phantom that flitted through Shakespeare's plays and -left them lovelier for its presence, a reed through which Shakespeare's -music sounded richer and more full of joy. The moment she touched -actual life, she marred it, and it marred her, and so she passed away. -Mourn for Ophelia, if you like. Put ashes on your head because -Cordelia was strangled. Cry out against Heaven because the daughter of -Brabantio died. But don't waste your tears over Sibyl Vane. She was -less real than they are." - -There was a silence. The evening darkened in the room. Noiselessly, -and with silver feet, the shadows crept in from the garden. The -colours faded wearily out of things. - -After some time Dorian Gray looked up. "You have explained me to -myself, Harry," he murmured with something of a sigh of relief. "I -felt all that you have said, but somehow I was afraid of it, and I -could not express it to myself. How well you know me! But we will not -talk again of what has happened. It has been a marvellous experience. -That is all. I wonder if life has still in store for me anything as -marvellous." - -"Life has everything in store for you, Dorian. There is nothing that -you, with your extraordinary good looks, will not be able to do." - -"But suppose, Harry, I became haggard, and old, and wrinkled? What -then?" - -"Ah, then," said Lord Henry, rising to go, "then, my dear Dorian, you -would have to fight for your victories. As it is, they are brought to -you. No, you must keep your good looks. We live in an age that reads -too much to be wise, and that thinks too much to be beautiful. We -cannot spare you. And now you had better dress and drive down to the -club. We are rather late, as it is." - -"I think I shall join you at the opera, Harry. I feel too tired to eat -anything. What is the number of your sister's box?" - -"Twenty-seven, I believe. It is on the grand tier. You will see her -name on the door. But I am sorry you won't come and dine." - -"I don't feel up to it," said Dorian listlessly. "But I am awfully -obliged to you for all that you have said to me. You are certainly my -best friend. No one has ever understood me as you have." - -"We are only at the beginning of our friendship, Dorian," answered Lord -Henry, shaking him by the hand. "Good-bye. I shall see you before -nine-thirty, I hope. Remember, Patti is singing." - -As he closed the door behind him, Dorian Gray touched the bell, and in -a few minutes Victor appeared with the lamps and drew the blinds down. -He waited impatiently for him to go. The man seemed to take an -interminable time over everything. - -As soon as he had left, he rushed to the screen and drew it back. No; -there was no further change in the picture. It had received the news -of Sibyl Vane's death before he had known of it himself. It was -conscious of the events of life as they occurred. The vicious cruelty -that marred the fine lines of the mouth had, no doubt, appeared at the -very moment that the girl had drunk the poison, whatever it was. Or -was it indifferent to results? Did it merely take cognizance of what -passed within the soul? He wondered, and hoped that some day he would -see the change taking place before his very eyes, shuddering as he -hoped it. - -Poor Sibyl! What a romance it had all been! She had often mimicked -death on the stage. Then Death himself had touched her and taken her -with him. How had she played that dreadful last scene? Had she cursed -him, as she died? No; she had died for love of him, and love would -always be a sacrament to him now. She had atoned for everything by the -sacrifice she had made of her life. He would not think any more of -what she had made him go through, on that horrible night at the -theatre. When he thought of her, it would be as a wonderful tragic -figure sent on to the world's stage to show the supreme reality of -love. A wonderful tragic figure? Tears came to his eyes as he -remembered her childlike look, and winsome fanciful ways, and shy -tremulous grace. He brushed them away hastily and looked again at the -picture. - -He felt that the time had really come for making his choice. Or had -his choice already been made? Yes, life had decided that for -him--life, and his own infinite curiosity about life. Eternal youth, -infinite passion, pleasures subtle and secret, wild joys and wilder -sins--he was to have all these things. The portrait was to bear the -burden of his shame: that was all. - -A feeling of pain crept over him as he thought of the desecration that -was in store for the fair face on the canvas. Once, in boyish mockery -of Narcissus, he had kissed, or feigned to kiss, those painted lips -that now smiled so cruelly at him. Morning after morning he had sat -before the portrait wondering at its beauty, almost enamoured of it, as -it seemed to him at times. Was it to alter now with every mood to -which he yielded? Was it to become a monstrous and loathsome thing, to -be hidden away in a locked room, to be shut out from the sunlight that -had so often touched to brighter gold the waving wonder of its hair? -The pity of it! the pity of it! - -For a moment, he thought of praying that the horrible sympathy that -existed between him and the picture might cease. It had changed in -answer to a prayer; perhaps in answer to a prayer it might remain -unchanged. And yet, who, that knew anything about life, would -surrender the chance of remaining always young, however fantastic that -chance might be, or with what fateful consequences it might be fraught? -Besides, was it really under his control? Had it indeed been prayer -that had produced the substitution? Might there not be some curious -scientific reason for it all? If thought could exercise its influence -upon a living organism, might not thought exercise an influence upon -dead and inorganic things? Nay, without thought or conscious desire, -might not things external to ourselves vibrate in unison with our moods -and passions, atom calling to atom in secret love or strange affinity? -But the reason was of no importance. He would never again tempt by a -prayer any terrible power. If the picture was to alter, it was to -alter. That was all. Why inquire too closely into it? - -For there would be a real pleasure in watching it. He would be able to -follow his mind into its secret places. This portrait would be to him -the most magical of mirrors. As it had revealed to him his own body, -so it would reveal to him his own soul. And when winter came upon it, -he would still be standing where spring trembles on the verge of -summer. When the blood crept from its face, and left behind a pallid -mask of chalk with leaden eyes, he would keep the glamour of boyhood. -Not one blossom of his loveliness would ever fade. Not one pulse of -his life would ever weaken. Like the gods of the Greeks, he would be -strong, and fleet, and joyous. What did it matter what happened to the -coloured image on the canvas? He would be safe. That was everything. - -He drew the screen back into its former place in front of the picture, -smiling as he did so, and passed into his bedroom, where his valet was -already waiting for him. An hour later he was at the opera, and Lord -Henry was leaning over his chair. - - - -CHAPTER 9 - -As he was sitting at breakfast next morning, Basil Hallward was shown -into the room. - -"I am so glad I have found you, Dorian," he said gravely. "I called -last night, and they told me you were at the opera. Of course, I knew -that was impossible. But I wish you had left word where you had really -gone to. I passed a dreadful evening, half afraid that one tragedy -might be followed by another. I think you might have telegraphed for -me when you heard of it first. I read of it quite by chance in a late -edition of _The Globe_ that I picked up at the club. I came here at once -and was miserable at not finding you. I can't tell you how -heart-broken I am about the whole thing. I know what you must suffer. -But where were you? Did you go down and see the girl's mother? For a -moment I thought of following you there. They gave the address in the -paper. Somewhere in the Euston Road, isn't it? But I was afraid of -intruding upon a sorrow that I could not lighten. Poor woman! What a -state she must be in! And her only child, too! What did she say about -it all?" - -"My dear Basil, how do I know?" murmured Dorian Gray, sipping some -pale-yellow wine from a delicate, gold-beaded bubble of Venetian glass -and looking dreadfully bored. "I was at the opera. You should have -come on there. I met Lady Gwendolen, Harry's sister, for the first -time. We were in her box. She is perfectly charming; and Patti sang -divinely. Don't talk about horrid subjects. If one doesn't talk about -a thing, it has never happened. It is simply expression, as Harry -says, that gives reality to things. I may mention that she was not the -woman's only child. There is a son, a charming fellow, I believe. But -he is not on the stage. He is a sailor, or something. And now, tell -me about yourself and what you are painting." - -"You went to the opera?" said Hallward, speaking very slowly and with a -strained touch of pain in his voice. "You went to the opera while -Sibyl Vane was lying dead in some sordid lodging? You can talk to me -of other women being charming, and of Patti singing divinely, before -the girl you loved has even the quiet of a grave to sleep in? Why, -man, there are horrors in store for that little white body of hers!" - -"Stop, Basil! I won't hear it!" cried Dorian, leaping to his feet. -"You must not tell me about things. What is done is done. What is -past is past." - -"You call yesterday the past?" - -"What has the actual lapse of time got to do with it? It is only -shallow people who require years to get rid of an emotion. A man who -is master of himself can end a sorrow as easily as he can invent a -pleasure. I don't want to be at the mercy of my emotions. I want to -use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them." - -"Dorian, this is horrible! Something has changed you completely. You -look exactly the same wonderful boy who, day after day, used to come -down to my studio to sit for his picture. But you were simple, -natural, and affectionate then. You were the most unspoiled creature -in the whole world. Now, I don't know what has come over you. You -talk as if you had no heart, no pity in you. It is all Harry's -influence. I see that." - -The lad flushed up and, going to the window, looked out for a few -moments on the green, flickering, sun-lashed garden. "I owe a great -deal to Harry, Basil," he said at last, "more than I owe to you. You -only taught me to be vain." - -"Well, I am punished for that, Dorian--or shall be some day." - -"I don't know what you mean, Basil," he exclaimed, turning round. "I -don't know what you want. What do you want?" - -"I want the Dorian Gray I used to paint," said the artist sadly. - -"Basil," said the lad, going over to him and putting his hand on his -shoulder, "you have come too late. Yesterday, when I heard that Sibyl -Vane had killed herself--" - -"Killed herself! Good heavens! is there no doubt about that?" cried -Hallward, looking up at him with an expression of horror. - -"My dear Basil! Surely you don't think it was a vulgar accident? Of -course she killed herself." - -The elder man buried his face in his hands. "How fearful," he -muttered, and a shudder ran through him. - -"No," said Dorian Gray, "there is nothing fearful about it. It is one -of the great romantic tragedies of the age. As a rule, people who act -lead the most commonplace lives. They are good husbands, or faithful -wives, or something tedious. You know what I mean--middle-class virtue -and all that kind of thing. How different Sibyl was! She lived her -finest tragedy. She was always a heroine. The last night she -played--the night you saw her--she acted badly because she had known -the reality of love. When she knew its unreality, she died, as Juliet -might have died. She passed again into the sphere of art. There is -something of the martyr about her. Her death has all the pathetic -uselessness of martyrdom, all its wasted beauty. But, as I was saying, -you must not think I have not suffered. If you had come in yesterday -at a particular moment--about half-past five, perhaps, or a quarter to -six--you would have found me in tears. Even Harry, who was here, who -brought me the news, in fact, had no idea what I was going through. I -suffered immensely. Then it passed away. I cannot repeat an emotion. -No one can, except sentimentalists. And you are awfully unjust, Basil. -You come down here to console me. That is charming of you. You find -me consoled, and you are furious. How like a sympathetic person! You -remind me of a story Harry told me about a certain philanthropist who -spent twenty years of his life in trying to get some grievance -redressed, or some unjust law altered--I forget exactly what it was. -Finally he succeeded, and nothing could exceed his disappointment. He -had absolutely nothing to do, almost died of _ennui_, and became a -confirmed misanthrope. And besides, my dear old Basil, if you really -want to console me, teach me rather to forget what has happened, or to -see it from a proper artistic point of view. Was it not Gautier who -used to write about _la consolation des arts_? I remember picking up a -little vellum-covered book in your studio one day and chancing on that -delightful phrase. Well, I am not like that young man you told me of -when we were down at Marlow together, the young man who used to say -that yellow satin could console one for all the miseries of life. I -love beautiful things that one can touch and handle. Old brocades, -green bronzes, lacquer-work, carved ivories, exquisite surroundings, -luxury, pomp--there is much to be got from all these. But the artistic -temperament that they create, or at any rate reveal, is still more to -me. To become the spectator of one's own life, as Harry says, is to -escape the suffering of life. I know you are surprised at my talking -to you like this. You have not realized how I have developed. I was a -schoolboy when you knew me. I am a man now. I have new passions, new -thoughts, new ideas. I am different, but you must not like me less. I -am changed, but you must always be my friend. Of course, I am very -fond of Harry. But I know that you are better than he is. You are not -stronger--you are too much afraid of life--but you are better. And how -happy we used to be together! Don't leave me, Basil, and don't quarrel -with me. I am what I am. There is nothing more to be said." - -The painter felt strangely moved. The lad was infinitely dear to him, -and his personality had been the great turning point in his art. He -could not bear the idea of reproaching him any more. After all, his -indifference was probably merely a mood that would pass away. There -was so much in him that was good, so much in him that was noble. - -"Well, Dorian," he said at length, with a sad smile, "I won't speak to -you again about this horrible thing, after to-day. I only trust your -name won't be mentioned in connection with it. The inquest is to take -place this afternoon. Have they summoned you?" - -Dorian shook his head, and a look of annoyance passed over his face at -the mention of the word "inquest." There was something so crude and -vulgar about everything of the kind. "They don't know my name," he -answered. - -"But surely she did?" - -"Only my Christian name, and that I am quite sure she never mentioned -to any one. She told me once that they were all rather curious to -learn who I was, and that she invariably told them my name was Prince -Charming. It was pretty of her. You must do me a drawing of Sibyl, -Basil. I should like to have something more of her than the memory of -a few kisses and some broken pathetic words." - -"I will try and do something, Dorian, if it would please you. But you -must come and sit to me yourself again. I can't get on without you." - -"I can never sit to you again, Basil. It is impossible!" he exclaimed, -starting back. - -The painter stared at him. "My dear boy, what nonsense!" he cried. -"Do you mean to say you don't like what I did of you? Where is it? -Why have you pulled the screen in front of it? Let me look at it. It -is the best thing I have ever done. Do take the screen away, Dorian. -It is simply disgraceful of your servant hiding my work like that. I -felt the room looked different as I came in." - -"My servant has nothing to do with it, Basil. You don't imagine I let -him arrange my room for me? He settles my flowers for me -sometimes--that is all. No; I did it myself. The light was too strong -on the portrait." - -"Too strong! Surely not, my dear fellow? It is an admirable place for -it. Let me see it." And Hallward walked towards the corner of the -room. - -A cry of terror broke from Dorian Gray's lips, and he rushed between -the painter and the screen. "Basil," he said, looking very pale, "you -must not look at it. I don't wish you to." - -"Not look at my own work! You are not serious. Why shouldn't I look -at it?" exclaimed Hallward, laughing. - -"If you try to look at it, Basil, on my word of honour I will never -speak to you again as long as I live. I am quite serious. I don't -offer any explanation, and you are not to ask for any. But, remember, -if you touch this screen, everything is over between us." - -Hallward was thunderstruck. He looked at Dorian Gray in absolute -amazement. He had never seen him like this before. The lad was -actually pallid with rage. His hands were clenched, and the pupils of -his eyes were like disks of blue fire. He was trembling all over. - -"Dorian!" - -"Don't speak!" - -"But what is the matter? Of course I won't look at it if you don't -want me to," he said, rather coldly, turning on his heel and going over -towards the window. "But, really, it seems rather absurd that I -shouldn't see my own work, especially as I am going to exhibit it in -Paris in the autumn. I shall probably have to give it another coat of -varnish before that, so I must see it some day, and why not to-day?" - -"To exhibit it! You want to exhibit it?" exclaimed Dorian Gray, a -strange sense of terror creeping over him. Was the world going to be -shown his secret? Were people to gape at the mystery of his life? -That was impossible. Something--he did not know what--had to be done -at once. - -"Yes; I don't suppose you will object to that. Georges Petit is going -to collect all my best pictures for a special exhibition in the Rue de -Seze, which will open the first week in October. The portrait will -only be away a month. I should think you could easily spare it for -that time. In fact, you are sure to be out of town. And if you keep -it always behind a screen, you can't care much about it." - -Dorian Gray passed his hand over his forehead. There were beads of -perspiration there. He felt that he was on the brink of a horrible -danger. "You told me a month ago that you would never exhibit it," he -cried. "Why have you changed your mind? You people who go in for -being consistent have just as many moods as others have. The only -difference is that your moods are rather meaningless. You can't have -forgotten that you assured me most solemnly that nothing in the world -would induce you to send it to any exhibition. You told Harry exactly -the same thing." He stopped suddenly, and a gleam of light came into -his eyes. He remembered that Lord Henry had said to him once, half -seriously and half in jest, "If you want to have a strange quarter of -an hour, get Basil to tell you why he won't exhibit your picture. He -told me why he wouldn't, and it was a revelation to me." Yes, perhaps -Basil, too, had his secret. He would ask him and try. - -"Basil," he said, coming over quite close and looking him straight in -the face, "we have each of us a secret. Let me know yours, and I shall -tell you mine. What was your reason for refusing to exhibit my -picture?" - -The painter shuddered in spite of himself. "Dorian, if I told you, you -might like me less than you do, and you would certainly laugh at me. I -could not bear your doing either of those two things. If you wish me -never to look at your picture again, I am content. I have always you -to look at. If you wish the best work I have ever done to be hidden -from the world, I am satisfied. Your friendship is dearer to me than -any fame or reputation." - -"No, Basil, you must tell me," insisted Dorian Gray. "I think I have a -right to know." His feeling of terror had passed away, and curiosity -had taken its place. He was determined to find out Basil Hallward's -mystery. - -"Let us sit down, Dorian," said the painter, looking troubled. "Let us -sit down. And just answer me one question. Have you noticed in the -picture something curious?--something that probably at first did not -strike you, but that revealed itself to you suddenly?" - -"Basil!" cried the lad, clutching the arms of his chair with trembling -hands and gazing at him with wild startled eyes. - -"I see you did. Don't speak. Wait till you hear what I have to say. -Dorian, from the moment I met you, your personality had the most -extraordinary influence over me. I was dominated, soul, brain, and -power, by you. You became to me the visible incarnation of that unseen -ideal whose memory haunts us artists like an exquisite dream. I -worshipped you. I grew jealous of every one to whom you spoke. I -wanted to have you all to myself. I was only happy when I was with -you. When you were away from me, you were still present in my art.... -Of course, I never let you know anything about this. It would have -been impossible. You would not have understood it. I hardly -understood it myself. I only knew that I had seen perfection face to -face, and that the world had become wonderful to my eyes--too -wonderful, perhaps, for in such mad worships there is peril, the peril -of losing them, no less than the peril of keeping them.... Weeks and -weeks went on, and I grew more and more absorbed in you. Then came a -new development. I had drawn you as Paris in dainty armour, and as -Adonis with huntsman's cloak and polished boar-spear. Crowned with -heavy lotus-blossoms you had sat on the prow of Adrian's barge, gazing -across the green turbid Nile. You had leaned over the still pool of -some Greek woodland and seen in the water's silent silver the marvel of -your own face. And it had all been what art should be--unconscious, -ideal, and remote. One day, a fatal day I sometimes think, I -determined to paint a wonderful portrait of you as you actually are, -not in the costume of dead ages, but in your own dress and in your own -time. Whether it was the realism of the method, or the mere wonder of -your own personality, thus directly presented to me without mist or -veil, I cannot tell. But I know that as I worked at it, every flake -and film of colour seemed to me to reveal my secret. I grew afraid -that others would know of my idolatry. I felt, Dorian, that I had told -too much, that I had put too much of myself into it. Then it was that -I resolved never to allow the picture to be exhibited. You were a -little annoyed; but then you did not realize all that it meant to me. -Harry, to whom I talked about it, laughed at me. But I did not mind -that. When the picture was finished, and I sat alone with it, I felt -that I was right.... Well, after a few days the thing left my studio, -and as soon as I had got rid of the intolerable fascination of its -presence, it seemed to me that I had been foolish in imagining that I -had seen anything in it, more than that you were extremely good-looking -and that I could paint. Even now I cannot help feeling that it is a -mistake to think that the passion one feels in creation is ever really -shown in the work one creates. Art is always more abstract than we -fancy. Form and colour tell us of form and colour--that is all. It -often seems to me that art conceals the artist far more completely than -it ever reveals him. And so when I got this offer from Paris, I -determined to make your portrait the principal thing in my exhibition. -It never occurred to me that you would refuse. I see now that you were -right. The picture cannot be shown. You must not be angry with me, -Dorian, for what I have told you. As I said to Harry, once, you are -made to be worshipped." - -Dorian Gray drew a long breath. The colour came back to his cheeks, -and a smile played about his lips. The peril was over. He was safe -for the time. Yet he could not help feeling infinite pity for the -painter who had just made this strange confession to him, and wondered -if he himself would ever be so dominated by the personality of a -friend. Lord Henry had the charm of being very dangerous. But that -was all. He was too clever and too cynical to be really fond of. -Would there ever be some one who would fill him with a strange -idolatry? Was that one of the things that life had in store? - -"It is extraordinary to me, Dorian," said Hallward, "that you should -have seen this in the portrait. Did you really see it?" - -"I saw something in it," he answered, "something that seemed to me very -curious." - -"Well, you don't mind my looking at the thing now?" - -Dorian shook his head. "You must not ask me that, Basil. I could not -possibly let you stand in front of that picture." - -"You will some day, surely?" - -"Never." - -"Well, perhaps you are right. And now good-bye, Dorian. You have been -the one person in my life who has really influenced my art. Whatever I -have done that is good, I owe to you. Ah! you don't know what it cost -me to tell you all that I have told you." - -"My dear Basil," said Dorian, "what have you told me? Simply that you -felt that you admired me too much. That is not even a compliment." - -"It was not intended as a compliment. It was a confession. Now that I -have made it, something seems to have gone out of me. Perhaps one -should never put one's worship into words." - -"It was a very disappointing confession." - -"Why, what did you expect, Dorian? You didn't see anything else in the -picture, did you? There was nothing else to see?" - -"No; there was nothing else to see. Why do you ask? But you mustn't -talk about worship. It is foolish. You and I are friends, Basil, and -we must always remain so." - -"You have got Harry," said the painter sadly. - -"Oh, Harry!" cried the lad, with a ripple of laughter. "Harry spends -his days in saying what is incredible and his evenings in doing what is -improbable. Just the sort of life I would like to lead. But still I -don't think I would go to Harry if I were in trouble. I would sooner -go to you, Basil." - -"You will sit to me again?" - -"Impossible!" - -"You spoil my life as an artist by refusing, Dorian. No man comes -across two ideal things. Few come across one." - -"I can't explain it to you, Basil, but I must never sit to you again. -There is something fatal about a portrait. It has a life of its own. -I will come and have tea with you. That will be just as pleasant." - -"Pleasanter for you, I am afraid," murmured Hallward regretfully. "And -now good-bye. I am sorry you won't let me look at the picture once -again. But that can't be helped. I quite understand what you feel -about it." - -As he left the room, Dorian Gray smiled to himself. Poor Basil! How -little he knew of the true reason! And how strange it was that, -instead of having been forced to reveal his own secret, he had -succeeded, almost by chance, in wresting a secret from his friend! How -much that strange confession explained to him! The painter's absurd -fits of jealousy, his wild devotion, his extravagant panegyrics, his -curious reticences--he understood them all now, and he felt sorry. -There seemed to him to be something tragic in a friendship so coloured -by romance. - -He sighed and touched the bell. The portrait must be hidden away at -all costs. He could not run such a risk of discovery again. It had -been mad of him to have allowed the thing to remain, even for an hour, -in a room to which any of his friends had access. - - - -CHAPTER 10 - -When his servant entered, he looked at him steadfastly and wondered if -he had thought of peering behind the screen. The man was quite -impassive and waited for his orders. Dorian lit a cigarette and walked -over to the glass and glanced into it. He could see the reflection of -Victor's face perfectly. It was like a placid mask of servility. -There was nothing to be afraid of, there. Yet he thought it best to be -on his guard. - -Speaking very slowly, he told him to tell the house-keeper that he -wanted to see her, and then to go to the frame-maker and ask him to -send two of his men round at once. It seemed to him that as the man -left the room his eyes wandered in the direction of the screen. Or was -that merely his own fancy? - -After a few moments, in her black silk dress, with old-fashioned thread -mittens on her wrinkled hands, Mrs. Leaf bustled into the library. He -asked her for the key of the schoolroom. - -"The old schoolroom, Mr. Dorian?" she exclaimed. "Why, it is full of -dust. I must get it arranged and put straight before you go into it. -It is not fit for you to see, sir. It is not, indeed." - -"I don't want it put straight, Leaf. I only want the key." - -"Well, sir, you'll be covered with cobwebs if you go into it. Why, it -hasn't been opened for nearly five years--not since his lordship died." - -He winced at the mention of his grandfather. He had hateful memories -of him. "That does not matter," he answered. "I simply want to see -the place--that is all. Give me the key." - -"And here is the key, sir," said the old lady, going over the contents -of her bunch with tremulously uncertain hands. "Here is the key. I'll -have it off the bunch in a moment. But you don't think of living up -there, sir, and you so comfortable here?" - -"No, no," he cried petulantly. "Thank you, Leaf. That will do." - -She lingered for a few moments, and was garrulous over some detail of -the household. He sighed and told her to manage things as she thought -best. She left the room, wreathed in smiles. - -As the door closed, Dorian put the key in his pocket and looked round -the room. His eye fell on a large, purple satin coverlet heavily -embroidered with gold, a splendid piece of late seventeenth-century -Venetian work that his grandfather had found in a convent near Bologna. -Yes, that would serve to wrap the dreadful thing in. It had perhaps -served often as a pall for the dead. Now it was to hide something that -had a corruption of its own, worse than the corruption of death -itself--something that would breed horrors and yet would never die. -What the worm was to the corpse, his sins would be to the painted image -on the canvas. They would mar its beauty and eat away its grace. They -would defile it and make it shameful. And yet the thing would still -live on. It would be always alive. - -He shuddered, and for a moment he regretted that he had not told Basil -the true reason why he had wished to hide the picture away. Basil -would have helped him to resist Lord Henry's influence, and the still -more poisonous influences that came from his own temperament. The love -that he bore him--for it was really love--had nothing in it that was -not noble and intellectual. It was not that mere physical admiration -of beauty that is born of the senses and that dies when the senses -tire. It was such love as Michelangelo had known, and Montaigne, and -Winckelmann, and Shakespeare himself. Yes, Basil could have saved him. -But it was too late now. The past could always be annihilated. -Regret, denial, or forgetfulness could do that. But the future was -inevitable. There were passions in him that would find their terrible -outlet, dreams that would make the shadow of their evil real. - -He took up from the couch the great purple-and-gold texture that -covered it, and, holding it in his hands, passed behind the screen. -Was the face on the canvas viler than before? It seemed to him that it -was unchanged, and yet his loathing of it was intensified. Gold hair, -blue eyes, and rose-red lips--they all were there. It was simply the -expression that had altered. That was horrible in its cruelty. -Compared to what he saw in it of censure or rebuke, how shallow Basil's -reproaches about Sibyl Vane had been!--how shallow, and of what little -account! His own soul was looking out at him from the canvas and -calling him to judgement. A look of pain came across him, and he flung -the rich pall over the picture. As he did so, a knock came to the -door. He passed out as his servant entered. - -"The persons are here, Monsieur." - -He felt that the man must be got rid of at once. He must not be -allowed to know where the picture was being taken to. There was -something sly about him, and he had thoughtful, treacherous eyes. -Sitting down at the writing-table he scribbled a note to Lord Henry, -asking him to send him round something to read and reminding him that -they were to meet at eight-fifteen that evening. - -"Wait for an answer," he said, handing it to him, "and show the men in -here." - -In two or three minutes there was another knock, and Mr. Hubbard -himself, the celebrated frame-maker of South Audley Street, came in -with a somewhat rough-looking young assistant. Mr. Hubbard was a -florid, red-whiskered little man, whose admiration for art was -considerably tempered by the inveterate impecuniosity of most of the -artists who dealt with him. As a rule, he never left his shop. He -waited for people to come to him. But he always made an exception in -favour of Dorian Gray. There was something about Dorian that charmed -everybody. It was a pleasure even to see him. - -"What can I do for you, Mr. Gray?" he said, rubbing his fat freckled -hands. "I thought I would do myself the honour of coming round in -person. I have just got a beauty of a frame, sir. Picked it up at a -sale. Old Florentine. Came from Fonthill, I believe. Admirably -suited for a religious subject, Mr. Gray." - -"I am so sorry you have given yourself the trouble of coming round, Mr. -Hubbard. I shall certainly drop in and look at the frame--though I -don't go in much at present for religious art--but to-day I only want a -picture carried to the top of the house for me. It is rather heavy, so -I thought I would ask you to lend me a couple of your men." - -"No trouble at all, Mr. Gray. I am delighted to be of any service to -you. Which is the work of art, sir?" - -"This," replied Dorian, moving the screen back. "Can you move it, -covering and all, just as it is? I don't want it to get scratched -going upstairs." - -"There will be no difficulty, sir," said the genial frame-maker, -beginning, with the aid of his assistant, to unhook the picture from -the long brass chains by which it was suspended. "And, now, where -shall we carry it to, Mr. Gray?" - -"I will show you the way, Mr. Hubbard, if you will kindly follow me. -Or perhaps you had better go in front. I am afraid it is right at the -top of the house. We will go up by the front staircase, as it is -wider." - -He held the door open for them, and they passed out into the hall and -began the ascent. The elaborate character of the frame had made the -picture extremely bulky, and now and then, in spite of the obsequious -protests of Mr. Hubbard, who had the true tradesman's spirited dislike -of seeing a gentleman doing anything useful, Dorian put his hand to it -so as to help them. - -"Something of a load to carry, sir," gasped the little man when they -reached the top landing. And he wiped his shiny forehead. - -"I am afraid it is rather heavy," murmured Dorian as he unlocked the -door that opened into the room that was to keep for him the curious -secret of his life and hide his soul from the eyes of men. - -He had not entered the place for more than four years--not, indeed, -since he had used it first as a play-room when he was a child, and then -as a study when he grew somewhat older. It was a large, -well-proportioned room, which had been specially built by the last Lord -Kelso for the use of the little grandson whom, for his strange likeness -to his mother, and also for other reasons, he had always hated and -desired to keep at a distance. It appeared to Dorian to have but -little changed. There was the huge Italian _cassone_, with its -fantastically painted panels and its tarnished gilt mouldings, in which -he had so often hidden himself as a boy. There the satinwood book-case -filled with his dog-eared schoolbooks. On the wall behind it was -hanging the same ragged Flemish tapestry where a faded king and queen -were playing chess in a garden, while a company of hawkers rode by, -carrying hooded birds on their gauntleted wrists. How well he -remembered it all! Every moment of his lonely childhood came back to -him as he looked round. He recalled the stainless purity of his boyish -life, and it seemed horrible to him that it was here the fatal portrait -was to be hidden away. How little he had thought, in those dead days, -of all that was in store for him! - -But there was no other place in the house so secure from prying eyes as -this. He had the key, and no one else could enter it. Beneath its -purple pall, the face painted on the canvas could grow bestial, sodden, -and unclean. What did it matter? No one could see it. He himself -would not see it. Why should he watch the hideous corruption of his -soul? He kept his youth--that was enough. And, besides, might not -his nature grow finer, after all? There was no reason that the future -should be so full of shame. Some love might come across his life, and -purify him, and shield him from those sins that seemed to be already -stirring in spirit and in flesh--those curious unpictured sins whose -very mystery lent them their subtlety and their charm. Perhaps, some -day, the cruel look would have passed away from the scarlet sensitive -mouth, and he might show to the world Basil Hallward's masterpiece. - -No; that was impossible. Hour by hour, and week by week, the thing -upon the canvas was growing old. It might escape the hideousness of -sin, but the hideousness of age was in store for it. The cheeks would -become hollow or flaccid. Yellow crow's feet would creep round the -fading eyes and make them horrible. The hair would lose its -brightness, the mouth would gape or droop, would be foolish or gross, -as the mouths of old men are. There would be the wrinkled throat, the -cold, blue-veined hands, the twisted body, that he remembered in the -grandfather who had been so stern to him in his boyhood. The picture -had to be concealed. There was no help for it. - -"Bring it in, Mr. Hubbard, please," he said, wearily, turning round. -"I am sorry I kept you so long. I was thinking of something else." - -"Always glad to have a rest, Mr. Gray," answered the frame-maker, who -was still gasping for breath. "Where shall we put it, sir?" - -"Oh, anywhere. Here: this will do. I don't want to have it hung up. -Just lean it against the wall. Thanks." - -"Might one look at the work of art, sir?" - -Dorian started. "It would not interest you, Mr. Hubbard," he said, -keeping his eye on the man. He felt ready to leap upon him and fling -him to the ground if he dared to lift the gorgeous hanging that -concealed the secret of his life. "I shan't trouble you any more now. -I am much obliged for your kindness in coming round." - -"Not at all, not at all, Mr. Gray. Ever ready to do anything for you, -sir." And Mr. Hubbard tramped downstairs, followed by the assistant, -who glanced back at Dorian with a look of shy wonder in his rough -uncomely face. He had never seen any one so marvellous. - -When the sound of their footsteps had died away, Dorian locked the door -and put the key in his pocket. He felt safe now. No one would ever -look upon the horrible thing. No eye but his would ever see his shame. - -On reaching the library, he found that it was just after five o'clock -and that the tea had been already brought up. On a little table of -dark perfumed wood thickly incrusted with nacre, a present from Lady -Radley, his guardian's wife, a pretty professional invalid who had -spent the preceding winter in Cairo, was lying a note from Lord Henry, -and beside it was a book bound in yellow paper, the cover slightly torn -and the edges soiled. A copy of the third edition of _The St. James's -Gazette_ had been placed on the tea-tray. It was evident that Victor had -returned. He wondered if he had met the men in the hall as they were -leaving the house and had wormed out of them what they had been doing. -He would be sure to miss the picture--had no doubt missed it already, -while he had been laying the tea-things. The screen had not been set -back, and a blank space was visible on the wall. Perhaps some night he -might find him creeping upstairs and trying to force the door of the -room. It was a horrible thing to have a spy in one's house. He had -heard of rich men who had been blackmailed all their lives by some -servant who had read a letter, or overheard a conversation, or picked -up a card with an address, or found beneath a pillow a withered flower -or a shred of crumpled lace. - -He sighed, and having poured himself out some tea, opened Lord Henry's -note. It was simply to say that he sent him round the evening paper, -and a book that might interest him, and that he would be at the club at -eight-fifteen. He opened _The St. James's_ languidly, and looked through -it. A red pencil-mark on the fifth page caught his eye. It drew -attention to the following paragraph: - - -INQUEST ON AN ACTRESS.--An inquest was held this morning at the Bell -Tavern, Hoxton Road, by Mr. Danby, the District Coroner, on the body of -Sibyl Vane, a young actress recently engaged at the Royal Theatre, -Holborn. A verdict of death by misadventure was returned. -Considerable sympathy was expressed for the mother of the deceased, who -was greatly affected during the giving of her own evidence, and that of -Dr. Birrell, who had made the post-mortem examination of the deceased. - - -He frowned, and tearing the paper in two, went across the room and -flung the pieces away. How ugly it all was! And how horribly real -ugliness made things! He felt a little annoyed with Lord Henry for -having sent him the report. And it was certainly stupid of him to have -marked it with red pencil. Victor might have read it. The man knew -more than enough English for that. - -Perhaps he had read it and had begun to suspect something. And, yet, -what did it matter? What had Dorian Gray to do with Sibyl Vane's -death? There was nothing to fear. Dorian Gray had not killed her. - -His eye fell on the yellow book that Lord Henry had sent him. What was -it, he wondered. He went towards the little, pearl-coloured octagonal -stand that had always looked to him like the work of some strange -Egyptian bees that wrought in silver, and taking up the volume, flung -himself into an arm-chair and began to turn over the leaves. After a -few minutes he became absorbed. It was the strangest book that he had -ever read. It seemed to him that in exquisite raiment, and to the -delicate sound of flutes, the sins of the world were passing in dumb -show before him. Things that he had dimly dreamed of were suddenly -made real to him. Things of which he had never dreamed were gradually -revealed. - -It was a novel without a plot and with only one character, being, -indeed, simply a psychological study of a certain young Parisian who -spent his life trying to realize in the nineteenth century all the -passions and modes of thought that belonged to every century except his -own, and to sum up, as it were, in himself the various moods through -which the world-spirit had ever passed, loving for their mere -artificiality those renunciations that men have unwisely called virtue, -as much as those natural rebellions that wise men still call sin. The -style in which it was written was that curious jewelled style, vivid -and obscure at once, full of _argot_ and of archaisms, of technical -expressions and of elaborate paraphrases, that characterizes the work -of some of the finest artists of the French school of _Symbolistes_. -There were in it metaphors as monstrous as orchids and as subtle in -colour. The life of the senses was described in the terms of mystical -philosophy. One hardly knew at times whether one was reading the -spiritual ecstasies of some mediaeval saint or the morbid confessions -of a modern sinner. It was a poisonous book. The heavy odour of -incense seemed to cling about its pages and to trouble the brain. The -mere cadence of the sentences, the subtle monotony of their music, so -full as it was of complex refrains and movements elaborately repeated, -produced in the mind of the lad, as he passed from chapter to chapter, -a form of reverie, a malady of dreaming, that made him unconscious of -the falling day and creeping shadows. - -Cloudless, and pierced by one solitary star, a copper-green sky gleamed -through the windows. He read on by its wan light till he could read no -more. Then, after his valet had reminded him several times of the -lateness of the hour, he got up, and going into the next room, placed -the book on the little Florentine table that always stood at his -bedside and began to dress for dinner. - -It was almost nine o'clock before he reached the club, where he found -Lord Henry sitting alone, in the morning-room, looking very much bored. - -"I am so sorry, Harry," he cried, "but really it is entirely your -fault. That book you sent me so fascinated me that I forgot how the -time was going." - -"Yes, I thought you would like it," replied his host, rising from his -chair. - -"I didn't say I liked it, Harry. I said it fascinated me. There is a -great difference." - -"Ah, you have discovered that?" murmured Lord Henry. And they passed -into the dining-room. - - - -CHAPTER 11 - -For years, Dorian Gray could not free himself from the influence of -this book. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that he never -sought to free himself from it. He procured from Paris no less than -nine large-paper copies of the first edition, and had them bound in -different colours, so that they might suit his various moods and the -changing fancies of a nature over which he seemed, at times, to have -almost entirely lost control. The hero, the wonderful young Parisian -in whom the romantic and the scientific temperaments were so strangely -blended, became to him a kind of prefiguring type of himself. And, -indeed, the whole book seemed to him to contain the story of his own -life, written before he had lived it. - -In one point he was more fortunate than the novel's fantastic hero. He -never knew--never, indeed, had any cause to know--that somewhat -grotesque dread of mirrors, and polished metal surfaces, and still -water which came upon the young Parisian so early in his life, and was -occasioned by the sudden decay of a beau that had once, apparently, -been so remarkable. It was with an almost cruel joy--and perhaps in -nearly every joy, as certainly in every pleasure, cruelty has its -place--that he used to read the latter part of the book, with its -really tragic, if somewhat overemphasized, account of the sorrow and -despair of one who had himself lost what in others, and the world, he -had most dearly valued. - -For the wonderful beauty that had so fascinated Basil Hallward, and -many others besides him, seemed never to leave him. Even those who had -heard the most evil things against him--and from time to time strange -rumours about his mode of life crept through London and became the -chatter of the clubs--could not believe anything to his dishonour when -they saw him. He had always the look of one who had kept himself -unspotted from the world. Men who talked grossly became silent when -Dorian Gray entered the room. There was something in the purity of his -face that rebuked them. His mere presence seemed to recall to them the -memory of the innocence that they had tarnished. They wondered how one -so charming and graceful as he was could have escaped the stain of an -age that was at once sordid and sensual. - -Often, on returning home from one of those mysterious and prolonged -absences that gave rise to such strange conjecture among those who were -his friends, or thought that they were so, he himself would creep -upstairs to the locked room, open the door with the key that never left -him now, and stand, with a mirror, in front of the portrait that Basil -Hallward had painted of him, looking now at the evil and aging face on -the canvas, and now at the fair young face that laughed back at him -from the polished glass. The very sharpness of the contrast used to -quicken his sense of pleasure. He grew more and more enamoured of his -own beauty, more and more interested in the corruption of his own soul. -He would examine with minute care, and sometimes with a monstrous and -terrible delight, the hideous lines that seared the wrinkling forehead -or crawled around the heavy sensual mouth, wondering sometimes which -were the more horrible, the signs of sin or the signs of age. He would -place his white hands beside the coarse bloated hands of the picture, -and smile. He mocked the misshapen body and the failing limbs. - -There were moments, indeed, at night, when, lying sleepless in his own -delicately scented chamber, or in the sordid room of the little -ill-famed tavern near the docks which, under an assumed name and in -disguise, it was his habit to frequent, he would think of the ruin he -had brought upon his soul with a pity that was all the more poignant -because it was purely selfish. But moments such as these were rare. -That curiosity about life which Lord Henry had first stirred in him, as -they sat together in the garden of their friend, seemed to increase -with gratification. The more he knew, the more he desired to know. He -had mad hungers that grew more ravenous as he fed them. - -Yet he was not really reckless, at any rate in his relations to -society. Once or twice every month during the winter, and on each -Wednesday evening while the season lasted, he would throw open to the -world his beautiful house and have the most celebrated musicians of the -day to charm his guests with the wonders of their art. His little -dinners, in the settling of which Lord Henry always assisted him, were -noted as much for the careful selection and placing of those invited, -as for the exquisite taste shown in the decoration of the table, with -its subtle symphonic arrangements of exotic flowers, and embroidered -cloths, and antique plate of gold and silver. Indeed, there were many, -especially among the very young men, who saw, or fancied that they saw, -in Dorian Gray the true realization of a type of which they had often -dreamed in Eton or Oxford days, a type that was to combine something of -the real culture of the scholar with all the grace and distinction and -perfect manner of a citizen of the world. To them he seemed to be of -the company of those whom Dante describes as having sought to "make -themselves perfect by the worship of beauty." Like Gautier, he was one -for whom "the visible world existed." - -And, certainly, to him life itself was the first, the greatest, of the -arts, and for it all the other arts seemed to be but a preparation. -Fashion, by which what is really fantastic becomes for a moment -universal, and dandyism, which, in its own way, is an attempt to assert -the absolute modernity of beauty, had, of course, their fascination for -him. His mode of dressing, and the particular styles that from time to -time he affected, had their marked influence on the young exquisites of -the Mayfair balls and Pall Mall club windows, who copied him in -everything that he did, and tried to reproduce the accidental charm of -his graceful, though to him only half-serious, fopperies. - -For, while he was but too ready to accept the position that was almost -immediately offered to him on his coming of age, and found, indeed, a -subtle pleasure in the thought that he might really become to the -London of his own day what to imperial Neronian Rome the author of the -Satyricon once had been, yet in his inmost heart he desired to be -something more than a mere _arbiter elegantiarum_, to be consulted on the -wearing of a jewel, or the knotting of a necktie, or the conduct of a -cane. He sought to elaborate some new scheme of life that would have -its reasoned philosophy and its ordered principles, and find in the -spiritualizing of the senses its highest realization. - -The worship of the senses has often, and with much justice, been -decried, men feeling a natural instinct of terror about passions and -sensations that seem stronger than themselves, and that they are -conscious of sharing with the less highly organized forms of existence. -But it appeared to Dorian Gray that the true nature of the senses had -never been understood, and that they had remained savage and animal -merely because the world had sought to starve them into submission or -to kill them by pain, instead of aiming at making them elements of a -new spirituality, of which a fine instinct for beauty was to be the -dominant characteristic. As he looked back upon man moving through -history, he was haunted by a feeling of loss. So much had been -surrendered! and to such little purpose! There had been mad wilful -rejections, monstrous forms of self-torture and self-denial, whose -origin was fear and whose result was a degradation infinitely more -terrible than that fancied degradation from which, in their ignorance, -they had sought to escape; Nature, in her wonderful irony, driving out -the anchorite to feed with the wild animals of the desert and giving to -the hermit the beasts of the field as his companions. - -Yes: there was to be, as Lord Henry had prophesied, a new Hedonism -that was to recreate life and to save it from that harsh uncomely -puritanism that is having, in our own day, its curious revival. It was -to have its service of the intellect, certainly, yet it was never to -accept any theory or system that would involve the sacrifice of any -mode of passionate experience. Its aim, indeed, was to be experience -itself, and not the fruits of experience, sweet or bitter as they might -be. Of the asceticism that deadens the senses, as of the vulgar -profligacy that dulls them, it was to know nothing. But it was to -teach man to concentrate himself upon the moments of a life that is -itself but a moment. - -There are few of us who have not sometimes wakened before dawn, either -after one of those dreamless nights that make us almost enamoured of -death, or one of those nights of horror and misshapen joy, when through -the chambers of the brain sweep phantoms more terrible than reality -itself, and instinct with that vivid life that lurks in all grotesques, -and that lends to Gothic art its enduring vitality, this art being, one -might fancy, especially the art of those whose minds have been troubled -with the malady of reverie. Gradually white fingers creep through the -curtains, and they appear to tremble. In black fantastic shapes, dumb -shadows crawl into the corners of the room and crouch there. Outside, -there is the stirring of birds among the leaves, or the sound of men -going forth to their work, or the sigh and sob of the wind coming down -from the hills and wandering round the silent house, as though it -feared to wake the sleepers and yet must needs call forth sleep from -her purple cave. Veil after veil of thin dusky gauze is lifted, and by -degrees the forms and colours of things are restored to them, and we -watch the dawn remaking the world in its antique pattern. The wan -mirrors get back their mimic life. The flameless tapers stand where we -had left them, and beside them lies the half-cut book that we had been -studying, or the wired flower that we had worn at the ball, or the -letter that we had been afraid to read, or that we had read too often. -Nothing seems to us changed. Out of the unreal shadows of the night -comes back the real life that we had known. We have to resume it where -we had left off, and there steals over us a terrible sense of the -necessity for the continuance of energy in the same wearisome round of -stereotyped habits, or a wild longing, it may be, that our eyelids -might open some morning upon a world that had been refashioned anew in -the darkness for our pleasure, a world in which things would have fresh -shapes and colours, and be changed, or have other secrets, a world in -which the past would have little or no place, or survive, at any rate, -in no conscious form of obligation or regret, the remembrance even of -joy having its bitterness and the memories of pleasure their pain. - -It was the creation of such worlds as these that seemed to Dorian Gray -to be the true object, or amongst the true objects, of life; and in his -search for sensations that would be at once new and delightful, and -possess that element of strangeness that is so essential to romance, he -would often adopt certain modes of thought that he knew to be really -alien to his nature, abandon himself to their subtle influences, and -then, having, as it were, caught their colour and satisfied his -intellectual curiosity, leave them with that curious indifference that -is not incompatible with a real ardour of temperament, and that, -indeed, according to certain modern psychologists, is often a condition -of it. - -It was rumoured of him once that he was about to join the Roman -Catholic communion, and certainly the Roman ritual had always a great -attraction for him. The daily sacrifice, more awful really than all -the sacrifices of the antique world, stirred him as much by its superb -rejection of the evidence of the senses as by the primitive simplicity -of its elements and the eternal pathos of the human tragedy that it -sought to symbolize. He loved to kneel down on the cold marble -pavement and watch the priest, in his stiff flowered dalmatic, slowly -and with white hands moving aside the veil of the tabernacle, or -raising aloft the jewelled, lantern-shaped monstrance with that pallid -wafer that at times, one would fain think, is indeed the "_panis -caelestis_," the bread of angels, or, robed in the garments of the -Passion of Christ, breaking the Host into the chalice and smiting his -breast for his sins. The fuming censers that the grave boys, in their -lace and scarlet, tossed into the air like great gilt flowers had their -subtle fascination for him. As he passed out, he used to look with -wonder at the black confessionals and long to sit in the dim shadow of -one of them and listen to men and women whispering through the worn -grating the true story of their lives. - -But he never fell into the error of arresting his intellectual -development by any formal acceptance of creed or system, or of -mistaking, for a house in which to live, an inn that is but suitable -for the sojourn of a night, or for a few hours of a night in which -there are no stars and the moon is in travail. Mysticism, with its -marvellous power of making common things strange to us, and the subtle -antinomianism that always seems to accompany it, moved him for a -season; and for a season he inclined to the materialistic doctrines of -the _Darwinismus_ movement in Germany, and found a curious pleasure in -tracing the thoughts and passions of men to some pearly cell in the -brain, or some white nerve in the body, delighting in the conception of -the absolute dependence of the spirit on certain physical conditions, -morbid or healthy, normal or diseased. Yet, as has been said of him -before, no theory of life seemed to him to be of any importance -compared with life itself. He felt keenly conscious of how barren all -intellectual speculation is when separated from action and experiment. -He knew that the senses, no less than the soul, have their spiritual -mysteries to reveal. - -And so he would now study perfumes and the secrets of their -manufacture, distilling heavily scented oils and burning odorous gums -from the East. He saw that there was no mood of the mind that had not -its counterpart in the sensuous life, and set himself to discover their -true relations, wondering what there was in frankincense that made one -mystical, and in ambergris that stirred one's passions, and in violets -that woke the memory of dead romances, and in musk that troubled the -brain, and in champak that stained the imagination; and seeking often -to elaborate a real psychology of perfumes, and to estimate the several -influences of sweet-smelling roots and scented, pollen-laden flowers; -of aromatic balms and of dark and fragrant woods; of spikenard, that -sickens; of hovenia, that makes men mad; and of aloes, that are said to -be able to expel melancholy from the soul. - -At another time he devoted himself entirely to music, and in a long -latticed room, with a vermilion-and-gold ceiling and walls of -olive-green lacquer, he used to give curious concerts in which mad -gipsies tore wild music from little zithers, or grave, yellow-shawled -Tunisians plucked at the strained strings of monstrous lutes, while -grinning Negroes beat monotonously upon copper drums and, crouching -upon scarlet mats, slim turbaned Indians blew through long pipes of -reed or brass and charmed--or feigned to charm--great hooded snakes and -horrible horned adders. The harsh intervals and shrill discords of -barbaric music stirred him at times when Schubert's grace, and Chopin's -beautiful sorrows, and the mighty harmonies of Beethoven himself, fell -unheeded on his ear. He collected together from all parts of the world -the strangest instruments that could be found, either in the tombs of -dead nations or among the few savage tribes that have survived contact -with Western civilizations, and loved to touch and try them. He had -the mysterious _juruparis_ of the Rio Negro Indians, that women are not -allowed to look at and that even youths may not see till they have been -subjected to fasting and scourging, and the earthen jars of the -Peruvians that have the shrill cries of birds, and flutes of human -bones such as Alfonso de Ovalle heard in Chile, and the sonorous green -jaspers that are found near Cuzco and give forth a note of singular -sweetness. He had painted gourds filled with pebbles that rattled when -they were shaken; the long _clarin_ of the Mexicans, into which the -performer does not blow, but through which he inhales the air; the -harsh _ture_ of the Amazon tribes, that is sounded by the sentinels who -sit all day long in high trees, and can be heard, it is said, at a -distance of three leagues; the _teponaztli_, that has two vibrating -tongues of wood and is beaten with sticks that are smeared with an -elastic gum obtained from the milky juice of plants; the _yotl_-bells of -the Aztecs, that are hung in clusters like grapes; and a huge -cylindrical drum, covered with the skins of great serpents, like the -one that Bernal Diaz saw when he went with Cortes into the Mexican -temple, and of whose doleful sound he has left us so vivid a -description. The fantastic character of these instruments fascinated -him, and he felt a curious delight in the thought that art, like -Nature, has her monsters, things of bestial shape and with hideous -voices. Yet, after some time, he wearied of them, and would sit in his -box at the opera, either alone or with Lord Henry, listening in rapt -pleasure to "Tannhauser" and seeing in the prelude to that great work -of art a presentation of the tragedy of his own soul. - -On one occasion he took up the study of jewels, and appeared at a -costume ball as Anne de Joyeuse, Admiral of France, in a dress covered -with five hundred and sixty pearls. This taste enthralled him for -years, and, indeed, may be said never to have left him. He would often -spend a whole day settling and resettling in their cases the various -stones that he had collected, such as the olive-green chrysoberyl that -turns red by lamplight, the cymophane with its wirelike line of silver, -the pistachio-coloured peridot, rose-pink and wine-yellow topazes, -carbuncles of fiery scarlet with tremulous, four-rayed stars, flame-red -cinnamon-stones, orange and violet spinels, and amethysts with their -alternate layers of ruby and sapphire. He loved the red gold of the -sunstone, and the moonstone's pearly whiteness, and the broken rainbow -of the milky opal. He procured from Amsterdam three emeralds of -extraordinary size and richness of colour, and had a turquoise _de la -vieille roche_ that was the envy of all the connoisseurs. - -He discovered wonderful stories, also, about jewels. In Alphonso's -Clericalis Disciplina a serpent was mentioned with eyes of real -jacinth, and in the romantic history of Alexander, the Conqueror of -Emathia was said to have found in the vale of Jordan snakes "with -collars of real emeralds growing on their backs." There was a gem in -the brain of the dragon, Philostratus told us, and "by the exhibition -of golden letters and a scarlet robe" the monster could be thrown into -a magical sleep and slain. According to the great alchemist, Pierre de -Boniface, the diamond rendered a man invisible, and the agate of India -made him eloquent. The cornelian appeased anger, and the hyacinth -provoked sleep, and the amethyst drove away the fumes of wine. The -garnet cast out demons, and the hydropicus deprived the moon of her -colour. The selenite waxed and waned with the moon, and the meloceus, -that discovers thieves, could be affected only by the blood of kids. -Leonardus Camillus had seen a white stone taken from the brain of a -newly killed toad, that was a certain antidote against poison. The -bezoar, that was found in the heart of the Arabian deer, was a charm -that could cure the plague. In the nests of Arabian birds was the -aspilates, that, according to Democritus, kept the wearer from any -danger by fire. - -The King of Ceilan rode through his city with a large ruby in his hand, -as the ceremony of his coronation. The gates of the palace of John the -Priest were "made of sardius, with the horn of the horned snake -inwrought, so that no man might bring poison within." Over the gable -were "two golden apples, in which were two carbuncles," so that the -gold might shine by day and the carbuncles by night. In Lodge's -strange romance 'A Margarite of America', it was stated that in the -chamber of the queen one could behold "all the chaste ladies of the -world, inchased out of silver, looking through fair mirrours of -chrysolites, carbuncles, sapphires, and greene emeraults." Marco Polo -had seen the inhabitants of Zipangu place rose-coloured pearls in the -mouths of the dead. A sea-monster had been enamoured of the pearl that -the diver brought to King Perozes, and had slain the thief, and mourned -for seven moons over its loss. When the Huns lured the king into the -great pit, he flung it away--Procopius tells the story--nor was it ever -found again, though the Emperor Anastasius offered five hundred-weight -of gold pieces for it. The King of Malabar had shown to a certain -Venetian a rosary of three hundred and four pearls, one for every god -that he worshipped. - -When the Duke de Valentinois, son of Alexander VI, visited Louis XII of -France, his horse was loaded with gold leaves, according to Brantome, -and his cap had double rows of rubies that threw out a great light. -Charles of England had ridden in stirrups hung with four hundred and -twenty-one diamonds. Richard II had a coat, valued at thirty thousand -marks, which was covered with balas rubies. Hall described Henry VIII, -on his way to the Tower previous to his coronation, as wearing "a -jacket of raised gold, the placard embroidered with diamonds and other -rich stones, and a great bauderike about his neck of large balasses." -The favourites of James I wore ear-rings of emeralds set in gold -filigrane. Edward II gave to Piers Gaveston a suit of red-gold armour -studded with jacinths, a collar of gold roses set with -turquoise-stones, and a skull-cap _parseme_ with pearls. Henry II wore -jewelled gloves reaching to the elbow, and had a hawk-glove sewn with -twelve rubies and fifty-two great orients. The ducal hat of Charles -the Rash, the last Duke of Burgundy of his race, was hung with -pear-shaped pearls and studded with sapphires. - -How exquisite life had once been! How gorgeous in its pomp and -decoration! Even to read of the luxury of the dead was wonderful. - -Then he turned his attention to embroideries and to the tapestries that -performed the office of frescoes in the chill rooms of the northern -nations of Europe. As he investigated the subject--and he always had -an extraordinary faculty of becoming absolutely absorbed for the moment -in whatever he took up--he was almost saddened by the reflection of the -ruin that time brought on beautiful and wonderful things. He, at any -rate, had escaped that. Summer followed summer, and the yellow -jonquils bloomed and died many times, and nights of horror repeated the -story of their shame, but he was unchanged. No winter marred his face -or stained his flowerlike bloom. How different it was with material -things! Where had they passed to? Where was the great crocus-coloured -robe, on which the gods fought against the giants, that had been worked -by brown girls for the pleasure of Athena? Where the huge velarium -that Nero had stretched across the Colosseum at Rome, that Titan sail -of purple on which was represented the starry sky, and Apollo driving a -chariot drawn by white, gilt-reined steeds? He longed to see the -curious table-napkins wrought for the Priest of the Sun, on which were -displayed all the dainties and viands that could be wanted for a feast; -the mortuary cloth of King Chilperic, with its three hundred golden -bees; the fantastic robes that excited the indignation of the Bishop of -Pontus and were figured with "lions, panthers, bears, dogs, forests, -rocks, hunters--all, in fact, that a painter can copy from nature"; and -the coat that Charles of Orleans once wore, on the sleeves of which -were embroidered the verses of a song beginning "_Madame, je suis tout -joyeux_," the musical accompaniment of the words being wrought in gold -thread, and each note, of square shape in those days, formed with four -pearls. He read of the room that was prepared at the palace at Rheims -for the use of Queen Joan of Burgundy and was decorated with "thirteen -hundred and twenty-one parrots, made in broidery, and blazoned with the -king's arms, and five hundred and sixty-one butterflies, whose wings -were similarly ornamented with the arms of the queen, the whole worked -in gold." Catherine de Medicis had a mourning-bed made for her of -black velvet powdered with crescents and suns. Its curtains were of -damask, with leafy wreaths and garlands, figured upon a gold and silver -ground, and fringed along the edges with broideries of pearls, and it -stood in a room hung with rows of the queen's devices in cut black -velvet upon cloth of silver. Louis XIV had gold embroidered caryatides -fifteen feet high in his apartment. The state bed of Sobieski, King of -Poland, was made of Smyrna gold brocade embroidered in turquoises with -verses from the Koran. Its supports were of silver gilt, beautifully -chased, and profusely set with enamelled and jewelled medallions. It -had been taken from the Turkish camp before Vienna, and the standard of -Mohammed had stood beneath the tremulous gilt of its canopy. - -And so, for a whole year, he sought to accumulate the most exquisite -specimens that he could find of textile and embroidered work, getting -the dainty Delhi muslins, finely wrought with gold-thread palmates and -stitched over with iridescent beetles' wings; the Dacca gauzes, that -from their transparency are known in the East as "woven air," and -"running water," and "evening dew"; strange figured cloths from Java; -elaborate yellow Chinese hangings; books bound in tawny satins or fair -blue silks and wrought with _fleurs-de-lis_, birds and images; veils of -_lacis_ worked in Hungary point; Sicilian brocades and stiff Spanish -velvets; Georgian work, with its gilt coins, and Japanese _Foukousas_, -with their green-toned golds and their marvellously plumaged birds. - -He had a special passion, also, for ecclesiastical vestments, as indeed -he had for everything connected with the service of the Church. In the -long cedar chests that lined the west gallery of his house, he had -stored away many rare and beautiful specimens of what is really the -raiment of the Bride of Christ, who must wear purple and jewels and -fine linen that she may hide the pallid macerated body that is worn by -the suffering that she seeks for and wounded by self-inflicted pain. -He possessed a gorgeous cope of crimson silk and gold-thread damask, -figured with a repeating pattern of golden pomegranates set in -six-petalled formal blossoms, beyond which on either side was the -pine-apple device wrought in seed-pearls. The orphreys were divided -into panels representing scenes from the life of the Virgin, and the -coronation of the Virgin was figured in coloured silks upon the hood. -This was Italian work of the fifteenth century. Another cope was of -green velvet, embroidered with heart-shaped groups of acanthus-leaves, -from which spread long-stemmed white blossoms, the details of which -were picked out with silver thread and coloured crystals. The morse -bore a seraph's head in gold-thread raised work. The orphreys were -woven in a diaper of red and gold silk, and were starred with -medallions of many saints and martyrs, among whom was St. Sebastian. -He had chasubles, also, of amber-coloured silk, and blue silk and gold -brocade, and yellow silk damask and cloth of gold, figured with -representations of the Passion and Crucifixion of Christ, and -embroidered with lions and peacocks and other emblems; dalmatics of -white satin and pink silk damask, decorated with tulips and dolphins -and _fleurs-de-lis_; altar frontals of crimson velvet and blue linen; and -many corporals, chalice-veils, and sudaria. In the mystic offices to -which such things were put, there was something that quickened his -imagination. - -For these treasures, and everything that he collected in his lovely -house, were to be to him means of forgetfulness, modes by which he -could escape, for a season, from the fear that seemed to him at times -to be almost too great to be borne. Upon the walls of the lonely -locked room where he had spent so much of his boyhood, he had hung with -his own hands the terrible portrait whose changing features showed him -the real degradation of his life, and in front of it had draped the -purple-and-gold pall as a curtain. For weeks he would not go there, -would forget the hideous painted thing, and get back his light heart, -his wonderful joyousness, his passionate absorption in mere existence. -Then, suddenly, some night he would creep out of the house, go down to -dreadful places near Blue Gate Fields, and stay there, day after day, -until he was driven away. On his return he would sit in front of the -picture, sometimes loathing it and himself, but filled, at other -times, with that pride of individualism that is half the -fascination of sin, and smiling with secret pleasure at the misshapen -shadow that had to bear the burden that should have been his own. - -After a few years he could not endure to be long out of England, and -gave up the villa that he had shared at Trouville with Lord Henry, as -well as the little white walled-in house at Algiers where they had more -than once spent the winter. He hated to be separated from the picture -that was such a part of his life, and was also afraid that during his -absence some one might gain access to the room, in spite of the -elaborate bars that he had caused to be placed upon the door. - -He was quite conscious that this would tell them nothing. It was true -that the portrait still preserved, under all the foulness and ugliness -of the face, its marked likeness to himself; but what could they learn -from that? He would laugh at any one who tried to taunt him. He had -not painted it. What was it to him how vile and full of shame it -looked? Even if he told them, would they believe it? - -Yet he was afraid. Sometimes when he was down at his great house in -Nottinghamshire, entertaining the fashionable young men of his own rank -who were his chief companions, and astounding the county by the wanton -luxury and gorgeous splendour of his mode of life, he would suddenly -leave his guests and rush back to town to see that the door had not -been tampered with and that the picture was still there. What if it -should be stolen? The mere thought made him cold with horror. Surely -the world would know his secret then. Perhaps the world already -suspected it. - -For, while he fascinated many, there were not a few who distrusted him. -He was very nearly blackballed at a West End club of which his birth -and social position fully entitled him to become a member, and it was -said that on one occasion, when he was brought by a friend into the -smoking-room of the Churchill, the Duke of Berwick and another -gentleman got up in a marked manner and went out. Curious stories -became current about him after he had passed his twenty-fifth year. It -was rumoured that he had been seen brawling with foreign sailors in a -low den in the distant parts of Whitechapel, and that he consorted with -thieves and coiners and knew the mysteries of their trade. His -extraordinary absences became notorious, and, when he used to reappear -again in society, men would whisper to each other in corners, or pass -him with a sneer, or look at him with cold searching eyes, as though -they were determined to discover his secret. - -Of such insolences and attempted slights he, of course, took no notice, -and in the opinion of most people his frank debonair manner, his -charming boyish smile, and the infinite grace of that wonderful youth -that seemed never to leave him, were in themselves a sufficient answer -to the calumnies, for so they termed them, that were circulated about -him. It was remarked, however, that some of those who had been most -intimate with him appeared, after a time, to shun him. Women who had -wildly adored him, and for his sake had braved all social censure and -set convention at defiance, were seen to grow pallid with shame or -horror if Dorian Gray entered the room. - -Yet these whispered scandals only increased in the eyes of many his -strange and dangerous charm. His great wealth was a certain element of -security. Society--civilized society, at least--is never very ready to -believe anything to the detriment of those who are both rich and -fascinating. It feels instinctively that manners are of more -importance than morals, and, in its opinion, the highest respectability -is of much less value than the possession of a good _chef_. And, after -all, it is a very poor consolation to be told that the man who has -given one a bad dinner, or poor wine, is irreproachable in his private -life. Even the cardinal virtues cannot atone for half-cold _entrees_, as -Lord Henry remarked once, in a discussion on the subject, and there is -possibly a good deal to be said for his view. For the canons of good -society are, or should be, the same as the canons of art. Form is -absolutely essential to it. It should have the dignity of a ceremony, -as well as its unreality, and should combine the insincere character of -a romantic play with the wit and beauty that make such plays delightful -to us. Is insincerity such a terrible thing? I think not. It is -merely a method by which we can multiply our personalities. - -Such, at any rate, was Dorian Gray's opinion. He used to wonder at the -shallow psychology of those who conceive the ego in man as a thing -simple, permanent, reliable, and of one essence. To him, man was a -being with myriad lives and myriad sensations, a complex multiform -creature that bore within itself strange legacies of thought and -passion, and whose very flesh was tainted with the monstrous maladies -of the dead. He loved to stroll through the gaunt cold picture-gallery -of his country house and look at the various portraits of those whose -blood flowed in his veins. Here was Philip Herbert, described by -Francis Osborne, in his Memoires on the Reigns of Queen Elizabeth and -King James, as one who was "caressed by the Court for his handsome -face, which kept him not long company." Was it young Herbert's life -that he sometimes led? Had some strange poisonous germ crept from body -to body till it had reached his own? Was it some dim sense of that -ruined grace that had made him so suddenly, and almost without cause, -give utterance, in Basil Hallward's studio, to the mad prayer that had -so changed his life? Here, in gold-embroidered red doublet, jewelled -surcoat, and gilt-edged ruff and wristbands, stood Sir Anthony Sherard, -with his silver-and-black armour piled at his feet. What had this -man's legacy been? Had the lover of Giovanna of Naples bequeathed him -some inheritance of sin and shame? Were his own actions merely the -dreams that the dead man had not dared to realize? Here, from the -fading canvas, smiled Lady Elizabeth Devereux, in her gauze hood, pearl -stomacher, and pink slashed sleeves. A flower was in her right hand, -and her left clasped an enamelled collar of white and damask roses. On -a table by her side lay a mandolin and an apple. There were large -green rosettes upon her little pointed shoes. He knew her life, and -the strange stories that were told about her lovers. Had he something -of her temperament in him? These oval, heavy-lidded eyes seemed to -look curiously at him. What of George Willoughby, with his powdered -hair and fantastic patches? How evil he looked! The face was -saturnine and swarthy, and the sensual lips seemed to be twisted with -disdain. Delicate lace ruffles fell over the lean yellow hands that -were so overladen with rings. He had been a macaroni of the eighteenth -century, and the friend, in his youth, of Lord Ferrars. What of the -second Lord Beckenham, the companion of the Prince Regent in his -wildest days, and one of the witnesses at the secret marriage with Mrs. -Fitzherbert? How proud and handsome he was, with his chestnut curls -and insolent pose! What passions had he bequeathed? The world had -looked upon him as infamous. He had led the orgies at Carlton House. -The star of the Garter glittered upon his breast. Beside him hung the -portrait of his wife, a pallid, thin-lipped woman in black. Her blood, -also, stirred within him. How curious it all seemed! And his mother -with her Lady Hamilton face and her moist, wine-dashed lips--he knew -what he had got from her. He had got from her his beauty, and his -passion for the beauty of others. She laughed at him in her loose -Bacchante dress. There were vine leaves in her hair. The purple -spilled from the cup she was holding. The carnations of the painting -had withered, but the eyes were still wonderful in their depth and -brilliancy of colour. They seemed to follow him wherever he went. - -Yet one had ancestors in literature as well as in one's own race, -nearer perhaps in type and temperament, many of them, and certainly -with an influence of which one was more absolutely conscious. There -were times when it appeared to Dorian Gray that the whole of history -was merely the record of his own life, not as he had lived it in act -and circumstance, but as his imagination had created it for him, as it -had been in his brain and in his passions. He felt that he had known -them all, those strange terrible figures that had passed across the -stage of the world and made sin so marvellous and evil so full of -subtlety. It seemed to him that in some mysterious way their lives had -been his own. - -The hero of the wonderful novel that had so influenced his life had -himself known this curious fancy. In the seventh chapter he tells how, -crowned with laurel, lest lightning might strike him, he had sat, as -Tiberius, in a garden at Capri, reading the shameful books of -Elephantis, while dwarfs and peacocks strutted round him and the -flute-player mocked the swinger of the censer; and, as Caligula, had -caroused with the green-shirted jockeys in their stables and supped in -an ivory manger with a jewel-frontleted horse; and, as Domitian, had -wandered through a corridor lined with marble mirrors, looking round -with haggard eyes for the reflection of the dagger that was to end his -days, and sick with that ennui, that terrible _taedium vitae_, that comes -on those to whom life denies nothing; and had peered through a clear -emerald at the red shambles of the circus and then, in a litter of -pearl and purple drawn by silver-shod mules, been carried through the -Street of Pomegranates to a House of Gold and heard men cry on Nero -Caesar as he passed by; and, as Elagabalus, had painted his face with -colours, and plied the distaff among the women, and brought the Moon -from Carthage and given her in mystic marriage to the Sun. - -Over and over again Dorian used to read this fantastic chapter, and the -two chapters immediately following, in which, as in some curious -tapestries or cunningly wrought enamels, were pictured the awful and -beautiful forms of those whom vice and blood and weariness had made -monstrous or mad: Filippo, Duke of Milan, who slew his wife and -painted her lips with a scarlet poison that her lover might suck death -from the dead thing he fondled; Pietro Barbi, the Venetian, known as -Paul the Second, who sought in his vanity to assume the title of -Formosus, and whose tiara, valued at two hundred thousand florins, was -bought at the price of a terrible sin; Gian Maria Visconti, who used -hounds to chase living men and whose murdered body was covered with -roses by a harlot who had loved him; the Borgia on his white horse, -with Fratricide riding beside him and his mantle stained with the blood -of Perotto; Pietro Riario, the young Cardinal Archbishop of Florence, -child and minion of Sixtus IV, whose beauty was equalled only by his -debauchery, and who received Leonora of Aragon in a pavilion of white -and crimson silk, filled with nymphs and centaurs, and gilded a boy -that he might serve at the feast as Ganymede or Hylas; Ezzelin, whose -melancholy could be cured only by the spectacle of death, and who had a -passion for red blood, as other men have for red wine--the son of the -Fiend, as was reported, and one who had cheated his father at dice when -gambling with him for his own soul; Giambattista Cibo, who in mockery -took the name of Innocent and into whose torpid veins the blood of -three lads was infused by a Jewish doctor; Sigismondo Malatesta, the -lover of Isotta and the lord of Rimini, whose effigy was burned at Rome -as the enemy of God and man, who strangled Polyssena with a napkin, and -gave poison to Ginevra d'Este in a cup of emerald, and in honour of a -shameful passion built a pagan church for Christian worship; Charles -VI, who had so wildly adored his brother's wife that a leper had warned -him of the insanity that was coming on him, and who, when his brain had -sickened and grown strange, could only be soothed by Saracen cards -painted with the images of love and death and madness; and, in his -trimmed jerkin and jewelled cap and acanthuslike curls, Grifonetto -Baglioni, who slew Astorre with his bride, and Simonetto with his page, -and whose comeliness was such that, as he lay dying in the yellow -piazza of Perugia, those who had hated him could not choose but weep, -and Atalanta, who had cursed him, blessed him. - -There was a horrible fascination in them all. He saw them at night, -and they troubled his imagination in the day. The Renaissance knew of -strange manners of poisoning--poisoning by a helmet and a lighted -torch, by an embroidered glove and a jewelled fan, by a gilded pomander -and by an amber chain. Dorian Gray had been poisoned by a book. There -were moments when he looked on evil simply as a mode through which he -could realize his conception of the beautiful. - - - -CHAPTER 12 - -It was on the ninth of November, the eve of his own thirty-eighth -birthday, as he often remembered afterwards. - -He was walking home about eleven o'clock from Lord Henry's, where he -had been dining, and was wrapped in heavy furs, as the night was cold -and foggy. At the corner of Grosvenor Square and South Audley Street, -a man passed him in the mist, walking very fast and with the collar of -his grey ulster turned up. He had a bag in his hand. Dorian -recognized him. It was Basil Hallward. A strange sense of fear, for -which he could not account, came over him. He made no sign of -recognition and went on quickly in the direction of his own house. - -But Hallward had seen him. Dorian heard him first stopping on the -pavement and then hurrying after him. In a few moments, his hand was -on his arm. - -"Dorian! What an extraordinary piece of luck! I have been waiting for -you in your library ever since nine o'clock. Finally I took pity on -your tired servant and told him to go to bed, as he let me out. I am -off to Paris by the midnight train, and I particularly wanted to see -you before I left. I thought it was you, or rather your fur coat, as -you passed me. But I wasn't quite sure. Didn't you recognize me?" - -"In this fog, my dear Basil? Why, I can't even recognize Grosvenor -Square. I believe my house is somewhere about here, but I don't feel -at all certain about it. I am sorry you are going away, as I have not -seen you for ages. But I suppose you will be back soon?" - -"No: I am going to be out of England for six months. I intend to take -a studio in Paris and shut myself up till I have finished a great -picture I have in my head. However, it wasn't about myself I wanted to -talk. Here we are at your door. Let me come in for a moment. I have -something to say to you." - -"I shall be charmed. But won't you miss your train?" said Dorian Gray -languidly as he passed up the steps and opened the door with his -latch-key. - -The lamplight struggled out through the fog, and Hallward looked at his -watch. "I have heaps of time," he answered. "The train doesn't go -till twelve-fifteen, and it is only just eleven. In fact, I was on my -way to the club to look for you, when I met you. You see, I shan't -have any delay about luggage, as I have sent on my heavy things. All I -have with me is in this bag, and I can easily get to Victoria in twenty -minutes." - -Dorian looked at him and smiled. "What a way for a fashionable painter -to travel! A Gladstone bag and an ulster! Come in, or the fog will -get into the house. And mind you don't talk about anything serious. -Nothing is serious nowadays. At least nothing should be." - -Hallward shook his head, as he entered, and followed Dorian into the -library. There was a bright wood fire blazing in the large open -hearth. The lamps were lit, and an open Dutch silver spirit-case -stood, with some siphons of soda-water and large cut-glass tumblers, on -a little marqueterie table. - -"You see your servant made me quite at home, Dorian. He gave me -everything I wanted, including your best gold-tipped cigarettes. He is -a most hospitable creature. I like him much better than the Frenchman -you used to have. What has become of the Frenchman, by the bye?" - -Dorian shrugged his shoulders. "I believe he married Lady Radley's -maid, and has established her in Paris as an English dressmaker. -Anglomania is very fashionable over there now, I hear. It seems silly -of the French, doesn't it? But--do you know?--he was not at all a bad -servant. I never liked him, but I had nothing to complain about. One -often imagines things that are quite absurd. He was really very -devoted to me and seemed quite sorry when he went away. Have another -brandy-and-soda? Or would you like hock-and-seltzer? I always take -hock-and-seltzer myself. There is sure to be some in the next room." - -"Thanks, I won't have anything more," said the painter, taking his cap -and coat off and throwing them on the bag that he had placed in the -corner. "And now, my dear fellow, I want to speak to you seriously. -Don't frown like that. You make it so much more difficult for me." - -"What is it all about?" cried Dorian in his petulant way, flinging -himself down on the sofa. "I hope it is not about myself. I am tired -of myself to-night. I should like to be somebody else." - -"It is about yourself," answered Hallward in his grave deep voice, "and -I must say it to you. I shall only keep you half an hour." - -Dorian sighed and lit a cigarette. "Half an hour!" he murmured. - -"It is not much to ask of you, Dorian, and it is entirely for your own -sake that I am speaking. I think it right that you should know that -the most dreadful things are being said against you in London." - -"I don't wish to know anything about them. I love scandals about other -people, but scandals about myself don't interest me. They have not got -the charm of novelty." - -"They must interest you, Dorian. Every gentleman is interested in his -good name. You don't want people to talk of you as something vile and -degraded. Of course, you have your position, and your wealth, and all -that kind of thing. But position and wealth are not everything. Mind -you, I don't believe these rumours at all. At least, I can't believe -them when I see you. Sin is a thing that writes itself across a man's -face. It cannot be concealed. People talk sometimes of secret vices. -There are no such things. If a wretched man has a vice, it shows -itself in the lines of his mouth, the droop of his eyelids, the -moulding of his hands even. Somebody--I won't mention his name, but -you know him--came to me last year to have his portrait done. I had -never seen him before, and had never heard anything about him at the -time, though I have heard a good deal since. He offered an extravagant -price. I refused him. There was something in the shape of his fingers -that I hated. I know now that I was quite right in what I fancied -about him. His life is dreadful. But you, Dorian, with your pure, -bright, innocent face, and your marvellous untroubled youth--I can't -believe anything against you. And yet I see you very seldom, and you -never come down to the studio now, and when I am away from you, and I -hear all these hideous things that people are whispering about you, I -don't know what to say. Why is it, Dorian, that a man like the Duke of -Berwick leaves the room of a club when you enter it? Why is it that so -many gentlemen in London will neither go to your house or invite you to -theirs? You used to be a friend of Lord Staveley. I met him at dinner -last week. Your name happened to come up in conversation, in -connection with the miniatures you have lent to the exhibition at the -Dudley. Staveley curled his lip and said that you might have the most -artistic tastes, but that you were a man whom no pure-minded girl -should be allowed to know, and whom no chaste woman should sit in the -same room with. I reminded him that I was a friend of yours, and asked -him what he meant. He told me. He told me right out before everybody. -It was horrible! Why is your friendship so fatal to young men? There -was that wretched boy in the Guards who committed suicide. You were -his great friend. There was Sir Henry Ashton, who had to leave England -with a tarnished name. You and he were inseparable. What about Adrian -Singleton and his dreadful end? What about Lord Kent's only son and -his career? I met his father yesterday in St. James's Street. He -seemed broken with shame and sorrow. What about the young Duke of -Perth? What sort of life has he got now? What gentleman would -associate with him?" - -"Stop, Basil. You are talking about things of which you know nothing," -said Dorian Gray, biting his lip, and with a note of infinite contempt -in his voice. "You ask me why Berwick leaves a room when I enter it. -It is because I know everything about his life, not because he knows -anything about mine. With such blood as he has in his veins, how could -his record be clean? You ask me about Henry Ashton and young Perth. -Did I teach the one his vices, and the other his debauchery? If Kent's -silly son takes his wife from the streets, what is that to me? If -Adrian Singleton writes his friend's name across a bill, am I his -keeper? I know how people chatter in England. The middle classes air -their moral prejudices over their gross dinner-tables, and whisper -about what they call the profligacies of their betters in order to try -and pretend that they are in smart society and on intimate terms with -the people they slander. In this country, it is enough for a man to -have distinction and brains for every common tongue to wag against him. -And what sort of lives do these people, who pose as being moral, lead -themselves? My dear fellow, you forget that we are in the native land -of the hypocrite." - -"Dorian," cried Hallward, "that is not the question. England is bad -enough I know, and English society is all wrong. That is the reason -why I want you to be fine. You have not been fine. One has a right to -judge of a man by the effect he has over his friends. Yours seem to -lose all sense of honour, of goodness, of purity. You have filled them -with a madness for pleasure. They have gone down into the depths. You -led them there. Yes: you led them there, and yet you can smile, as -you are smiling now. And there is worse behind. I know you and Harry -are inseparable. Surely for that reason, if for none other, you should -not have made his sister's name a by-word." - -"Take care, Basil. You go too far." - -"I must speak, and you must listen. You shall listen. When you met -Lady Gwendolen, not a breath of scandal had ever touched her. Is there -a single decent woman in London now who would drive with her in the -park? Why, even her children are not allowed to live with her. Then -there are other stories--stories that you have been seen creeping at -dawn out of dreadful houses and slinking in disguise into the foulest -dens in London. Are they true? Can they be true? When I first heard -them, I laughed. I hear them now, and they make me shudder. What -about your country-house and the life that is led there? Dorian, you -don't know what is said about you. I won't tell you that I don't want -to preach to you. I remember Harry saying once that every man who -turned himself into an amateur curate for the moment always began by -saying that, and then proceeded to break his word. I do want to preach -to you. I want you to lead such a life as will make the world respect -you. I want you to have a clean name and a fair record. I want you to -get rid of the dreadful people you associate with. Don't shrug your -shoulders like that. Don't be so indifferent. You have a wonderful -influence. Let it be for good, not for evil. They say that you -corrupt every one with whom you become intimate, and that it is quite -sufficient for you to enter a house for shame of some kind to follow -after. I don't know whether it is so or not. How should I know? But -it is said of you. I am told things that it seems impossible to doubt. -Lord Gloucester was one of my greatest friends at Oxford. He showed me -a letter that his wife had written to him when she was dying alone in -her villa at Mentone. Your name was implicated in the most terrible -confession I ever read. I told him that it was absurd--that I knew you -thoroughly and that you were incapable of anything of the kind. Know -you? I wonder do I know you? Before I could answer that, I should -have to see your soul." - -"To see my soul!" muttered Dorian Gray, starting up from the sofa and -turning almost white from fear. - -"Yes," answered Hallward gravely, and with deep-toned sorrow in his -voice, "to see your soul. But only God can do that." - -A bitter laugh of mockery broke from the lips of the younger man. "You -shall see it yourself, to-night!" he cried, seizing a lamp from the -table. "Come: it is your own handiwork. Why shouldn't you look at -it? You can tell the world all about it afterwards, if you choose. -Nobody would believe you. If they did believe you, they would like me -all the better for it. I know the age better than you do, though you -will prate about it so tediously. Come, I tell you. You have -chattered enough about corruption. Now you shall look on it face to -face." - -There was the madness of pride in every word he uttered. He stamped -his foot upon the ground in his boyish insolent manner. He felt a -terrible joy at the thought that some one else was to share his secret, -and that the man who had painted the portrait that was the origin of -all his shame was to be burdened for the rest of his life with the -hideous memory of what he had done. - -"Yes," he continued, coming closer to him and looking steadfastly into -his stern eyes, "I shall show you my soul. You shall see the thing -that you fancy only God can see." - -Hallward started back. "This is blasphemy, Dorian!" he cried. "You -must not say things like that. They are horrible, and they don't mean -anything." - -"You think so?" He laughed again. - -"I know so. As for what I said to you to-night, I said it for your -good. You know I have been always a stanch friend to you." - -"Don't touch me. Finish what you have to say." - -A twisted flash of pain shot across the painter's face. He paused for -a moment, and a wild feeling of pity came over him. After all, what -right had he to pry into the life of Dorian Gray? If he had done a -tithe of what was rumoured about him, how much he must have suffered! -Then he straightened himself up, and walked over to the fire-place, and -stood there, looking at the burning logs with their frostlike ashes and -their throbbing cores of flame. - -"I am waiting, Basil," said the young man in a hard clear voice. - -He turned round. "What I have to say is this," he cried. "You must -give me some answer to these horrible charges that are made against -you. If you tell me that they are absolutely untrue from beginning to -end, I shall believe you. Deny them, Dorian, deny them! Can't you see -what I am going through? My God! don't tell me that you are bad, and -corrupt, and shameful." - -Dorian Gray smiled. There was a curl of contempt in his lips. "Come -upstairs, Basil," he said quietly. "I keep a diary of my life from day -to day, and it never leaves the room in which it is written. I shall -show it to you if you come with me." - -"I shall come with you, Dorian, if you wish it. I see I have missed my -train. That makes no matter. I can go to-morrow. But don't ask me to -read anything to-night. All I want is a plain answer to my question." - -"That shall be given to you upstairs. I could not give it here. You -will not have to read long." - - - -CHAPTER 13 - -He passed out of the room and began the ascent, Basil Hallward -following close behind. They walked softly, as men do instinctively at -night. The lamp cast fantastic shadows on the wall and staircase. A -rising wind made some of the windows rattle. - -When they reached the top landing, Dorian set the lamp down on the -floor, and taking out the key, turned it in the lock. "You insist on -knowing, Basil?" he asked in a low voice. - -"Yes." - -"I am delighted," he answered, smiling. Then he added, somewhat -harshly, "You are the one man in the world who is entitled to know -everything about me. You have had more to do with my life than you -think"; and, taking up the lamp, he opened the door and went in. A -cold current of air passed them, and the light shot up for a moment in -a flame of murky orange. He shuddered. "Shut the door behind you," he -whispered, as he placed the lamp on the table. - -Hallward glanced round him with a puzzled expression. The room looked -as if it had not been lived in for years. A faded Flemish tapestry, a -curtained picture, an old Italian _cassone_, and an almost empty -book-case--that was all that it seemed to contain, besides a chair and -a table. As Dorian Gray was lighting a half-burned candle that was -standing on the mantelshelf, he saw that the whole place was covered -with dust and that the carpet was in holes. A mouse ran scuffling -behind the wainscoting. There was a damp odour of mildew. - -"So you think that it is only God who sees the soul, Basil? Draw that -curtain back, and you will see mine." - -The voice that spoke was cold and cruel. "You are mad, Dorian, or -playing a part," muttered Hallward, frowning. - -"You won't? Then I must do it myself," said the young man, and he tore -the curtain from its rod and flung it on the ground. - -An exclamation of horror broke from the painter's lips as he saw in the -dim light the hideous face on the canvas grinning at him. There was -something in its expression that filled him with disgust and loathing. -Good heavens! it was Dorian Gray's own face that he was looking at! -The horror, whatever it was, had not yet entirely spoiled that -marvellous beauty. There was still some gold in the thinning hair and -some scarlet on the sensual mouth. The sodden eyes had kept something -of the loveliness of their blue, the noble curves had not yet -completely passed away from chiselled nostrils and from plastic throat. -Yes, it was Dorian himself. But who had done it? He seemed to -recognize his own brushwork, and the frame was his own design. The -idea was monstrous, yet he felt afraid. He seized the lighted candle, -and held it to the picture. In the left-hand corner was his own name, -traced in long letters of bright vermilion. - -It was some foul parody, some infamous ignoble satire. He had never -done that. Still, it was his own picture. He knew it, and he felt as -if his blood had changed in a moment from fire to sluggish ice. His -own picture! What did it mean? Why had it altered? He turned and -looked at Dorian Gray with the eyes of a sick man. His mouth twitched, -and his parched tongue seemed unable to articulate. He passed his hand -across his forehead. It was dank with clammy sweat. - -The young man was leaning against the mantelshelf, watching him with -that strange expression that one sees on the faces of those who are -absorbed in a play when some great artist is acting. There was neither -real sorrow in it nor real joy. There was simply the passion of the -spectator, with perhaps a flicker of triumph in his eyes. He had taken -the flower out of his coat, and was smelling it, or pretending to do so. - -"What does this mean?" cried Hallward, at last. His own voice sounded -shrill and curious in his ears. - -"Years ago, when I was a boy," said Dorian Gray, crushing the flower in -his hand, "you met me, flattered me, and taught me to be vain of my -good looks. One day you introduced me to a friend of yours, who -explained to me the wonder of youth, and you finished a portrait of me -that revealed to me the wonder of beauty. In a mad moment that, even -now, I don't know whether I regret or not, I made a wish, perhaps you -would call it a prayer...." - -"I remember it! Oh, how well I remember it! No! the thing is -impossible. The room is damp. Mildew has got into the canvas. The -paints I used had some wretched mineral poison in them. I tell you the -thing is impossible." - -"Ah, what is impossible?" murmured the young man, going over to the -window and leaning his forehead against the cold, mist-stained glass. - -"You told me you had destroyed it." - -"I was wrong. It has destroyed me." - -"I don't believe it is my picture." - -"Can't you see your ideal in it?" said Dorian bitterly. - -"My ideal, as you call it..." - -"As you called it." - -"There was nothing evil in it, nothing shameful. You were to me such -an ideal as I shall never meet again. This is the face of a satyr." - -"It is the face of my soul." - -"Christ! what a thing I must have worshipped! It has the eyes of a -devil." - -"Each of us has heaven and hell in him, Basil," cried Dorian with a -wild gesture of despair. - -Hallward turned again to the portrait and gazed at it. "My God! If it -is true," he exclaimed, "and this is what you have done with your life, -why, you must be worse even than those who talk against you fancy you -to be!" He held the light up again to the canvas and examined it. The -surface seemed to be quite undisturbed and as he had left it. It was -from within, apparently, that the foulness and horror had come. -Through some strange quickening of inner life the leprosies of sin were -slowly eating the thing away. The rotting of a corpse in a watery -grave was not so fearful. - -His hand shook, and the candle fell from its socket on the floor and -lay there sputtering. He placed his foot on it and put it out. Then -he flung himself into the rickety chair that was standing by the table -and buried his face in his hands. - -"Good God, Dorian, what a lesson! What an awful lesson!" There was no -answer, but he could hear the young man sobbing at the window. "Pray, -Dorian, pray," he murmured. "What is it that one was taught to say in -one's boyhood? 'Lead us not into temptation. Forgive us our sins. -Wash away our iniquities.' Let us say that together. The prayer of -your pride has been answered. The prayer of your repentance will be -answered also. I worshipped you too much. I am punished for it. You -worshipped yourself too much. We are both punished." - -Dorian Gray turned slowly around and looked at him with tear-dimmed -eyes. "It is too late, Basil," he faltered. - -"It is never too late, Dorian. Let us kneel down and try if we cannot -remember a prayer. Isn't there a verse somewhere, 'Though your sins be -as scarlet, yet I will make them as white as snow'?" - -"Those words mean nothing to me now." - -"Hush! Don't say that. You have done enough evil in your life. My -God! Don't you see that accursed thing leering at us?" - -Dorian Gray glanced at the picture, and suddenly an uncontrollable -feeling of hatred for Basil Hallward came over him, as though it had -been suggested to him by the image on the canvas, whispered into his -ear by those grinning lips. The mad passions of a hunted animal -stirred within him, and he loathed the man who was seated at the table, -more than in his whole life he had ever loathed anything. He glanced -wildly around. Something glimmered on the top of the painted chest -that faced him. His eye fell on it. He knew what it was. It was a -knife that he had brought up, some days before, to cut a piece of cord, -and had forgotten to take away with him. He moved slowly towards it, -passing Hallward as he did so. As soon as he got behind him, he seized -it and turned round. Hallward stirred in his chair as if he was going -to rise. He rushed at him and dug the knife into the great vein that -is behind the ear, crushing the man's head down on the table and -stabbing again and again. - -There was a stifled groan and the horrible sound of some one choking -with blood. Three times the outstretched arms shot up convulsively, -waving grotesque, stiff-fingered hands in the air. He stabbed him -twice more, but the man did not move. Something began to trickle on -the floor. He waited for a moment, still pressing the head down. Then -he threw the knife on the table, and listened. - -He could hear nothing, but the drip, drip on the threadbare carpet. He -opened the door and went out on the landing. The house was absolutely -quiet. No one was about. For a few seconds he stood bending over the -balustrade and peering down into the black seething well of darkness. -Then he took out the key and returned to the room, locking himself in -as he did so. - -The thing was still seated in the chair, straining over the table with -bowed head, and humped back, and long fantastic arms. Had it not been -for the red jagged tear in the neck and the clotted black pool that was -slowly widening on the table, one would have said that the man was -simply asleep. - -How quickly it had all been done! He felt strangely calm, and walking -over to the window, opened it and stepped out on the balcony. The wind -had blown the fog away, and the sky was like a monstrous peacock's -tail, starred with myriads of golden eyes. He looked down and saw the -policeman going his rounds and flashing the long beam of his lantern on -the doors of the silent houses. The crimson spot of a prowling hansom -gleamed at the corner and then vanished. A woman in a fluttering shawl -was creeping slowly by the railings, staggering as she went. Now and -then she stopped and peered back. Once, she began to sing in a hoarse -voice. The policeman strolled over and said something to her. She -stumbled away, laughing. A bitter blast swept across the square. The -gas-lamps flickered and became blue, and the leafless trees shook their -black iron branches to and fro. He shivered and went back, closing the -window behind him. - -Having reached the door, he turned the key and opened it. He did not -even glance at the murdered man. He felt that the secret of the whole -thing was not to realize the situation. The friend who had painted the -fatal portrait to which all his misery had been due had gone out of his -life. That was enough. - -Then he remembered the lamp. It was a rather curious one of Moorish -workmanship, made of dull silver inlaid with arabesques of burnished -steel, and studded with coarse turquoises. Perhaps it might be missed -by his servant, and questions would be asked. He hesitated for a -moment, then he turned back and took it from the table. He could not -help seeing the dead thing. How still it was! How horribly white the -long hands looked! It was like a dreadful wax image. - -Having locked the door behind him, he crept quietly downstairs. The -woodwork creaked and seemed to cry out as if in pain. He stopped -several times and waited. No: everything was still. It was merely -the sound of his own footsteps. - -When he reached the library, he saw the bag and coat in the corner. -They must be hidden away somewhere. He unlocked a secret press that -was in the wainscoting, a press in which he kept his own curious -disguises, and put them into it. He could easily burn them afterwards. -Then he pulled out his watch. It was twenty minutes to two. - -He sat down and began to think. Every year--every month, almost--men -were strangled in England for what he had done. There had been a -madness of murder in the air. Some red star had come too close to the -earth.... And yet, what evidence was there against him? Basil Hallward -had left the house at eleven. No one had seen him come in again. Most -of the servants were at Selby Royal. His valet had gone to bed.... -Paris! Yes. It was to Paris that Basil had gone, and by the midnight -train, as he had intended. With his curious reserved habits, it would -be months before any suspicions would be roused. Months! Everything -could be destroyed long before then. - -A sudden thought struck him. He put on his fur coat and hat and went -out into the hall. There he paused, hearing the slow heavy tread of -the policeman on the pavement outside and seeing the flash of the -bull's-eye reflected in the window. He waited and held his breath. - -After a few moments he drew back the latch and slipped out, shutting -the door very gently behind him. Then he began ringing the bell. In -about five minutes his valet appeared, half-dressed and looking very -drowsy. - -"I am sorry to have had to wake you up, Francis," he said, stepping in; -"but I had forgotten my latch-key. What time is it?" - -"Ten minutes past two, sir," answered the man, looking at the clock and -blinking. - -"Ten minutes past two? How horribly late! You must wake me at nine -to-morrow. I have some work to do." - -"All right, sir." - -"Did any one call this evening?" - -"Mr. Hallward, sir. He stayed here till eleven, and then he went away -to catch his train." - -"Oh! I am sorry I didn't see him. Did he leave any message?" - -"No, sir, except that he would write to you from Paris, if he did not -find you at the club." - -"That will do, Francis. Don't forget to call me at nine to-morrow." - -"No, sir." - -The man shambled down the passage in his slippers. - -Dorian Gray threw his hat and coat upon the table and passed into the -library. For a quarter of an hour he walked up and down the room, -biting his lip and thinking. Then he took down the Blue Book from one -of the shelves and began to turn over the leaves. "Alan Campbell, 152, -Hertford Street, Mayfair." Yes; that was the man he wanted. - - - -CHAPTER 14 - -At nine o'clock the next morning his servant came in with a cup of -chocolate on a tray and opened the shutters. Dorian was sleeping quite -peacefully, lying on his right side, with one hand underneath his -cheek. He looked like a boy who had been tired out with play, or study. - -The man had to touch him twice on the shoulder before he woke, and as -he opened his eyes a faint smile passed across his lips, as though he -had been lost in some delightful dream. Yet he had not dreamed at all. -His night had been untroubled by any images of pleasure or of pain. -But youth smiles without any reason. It is one of its chiefest charms. - -He turned round, and leaning upon his elbow, began to sip his -chocolate. The mellow November sun came streaming into the room. The -sky was bright, and there was a genial warmth in the air. It was -almost like a morning in May. - -Gradually the events of the preceding night crept with silent, -blood-stained feet into his brain and reconstructed themselves there -with terrible distinctness. He winced at the memory of all that he had -suffered, and for a moment the same curious feeling of loathing for -Basil Hallward that had made him kill him as he sat in the chair came -back to him, and he grew cold with passion. The dead man was still -sitting there, too, and in the sunlight now. How horrible that was! -Such hideous things were for the darkness, not for the day. - -He felt that if he brooded on what he had gone through he would sicken -or grow mad. There were sins whose fascination was more in the memory -than in the doing of them, strange triumphs that gratified the pride -more than the passions, and gave to the intellect a quickened sense of -joy, greater than any joy they brought, or could ever bring, to the -senses. But this was not one of them. It was a thing to be driven out -of the mind, to be drugged with poppies, to be strangled lest it might -strangle one itself. - -When the half-hour struck, he passed his hand across his forehead, and -then got up hastily and dressed himself with even more than his usual -care, giving a good deal of attention to the choice of his necktie and -scarf-pin and changing his rings more than once. He spent a long time -also over breakfast, tasting the various dishes, talking to his valet -about some new liveries that he was thinking of getting made for the -servants at Selby, and going through his correspondence. At some of -the letters, he smiled. Three of them bored him. One he read several -times over and then tore up with a slight look of annoyance in his -face. "That awful thing, a woman's memory!" as Lord Henry had once -said. - -After he had drunk his cup of black coffee, he wiped his lips slowly -with a napkin, motioned to his servant to wait, and going over to the -table, sat down and wrote two letters. One he put in his pocket, the -other he handed to the valet. - -"Take this round to 152, Hertford Street, Francis, and if Mr. Campbell -is out of town, get his address." - -As soon as he was alone, he lit a cigarette and began sketching upon a -piece of paper, drawing first flowers and bits of architecture, and -then human faces. Suddenly he remarked that every face that he drew -seemed to have a fantastic likeness to Basil Hallward. He frowned, and -getting up, went over to the book-case and took out a volume at hazard. -He was determined that he would not think about what had happened until -it became absolutely necessary that he should do so. - -When he had stretched himself on the sofa, he looked at the title-page -of the book. It was Gautier's Emaux et Camees, Charpentier's -Japanese-paper edition, with the Jacquemart etching. The binding was -of citron-green leather, with a design of gilt trellis-work and dotted -pomegranates. It had been given to him by Adrian Singleton. As he -turned over the pages, his eye fell on the poem about the hand of -Lacenaire, the cold yellow hand "_du supplice encore mal lavee_," with -its downy red hairs and its "_doigts de faune_." He glanced at his own -white taper fingers, shuddering slightly in spite of himself, and -passed on, till he came to those lovely stanzas upon Venice: - - Sur une gamme chromatique, - Le sein de perles ruisselant, - La Venus de l'Adriatique - Sort de l'eau son corps rose et blanc. - - Les domes, sur l'azur des ondes - Suivant la phrase au pur contour, - S'enflent comme des gorges rondes - Que souleve un soupir d'amour. - - L'esquif aborde et me depose, - Jetant son amarre au pilier, - Devant une facade rose, - Sur le marbre d'un escalier. - - -How exquisite they were! As one read them, one seemed to be floating -down the green water-ways of the pink and pearl city, seated in a black -gondola with silver prow and trailing curtains. The mere lines looked -to him like those straight lines of turquoise-blue that follow one as -one pushes out to the Lido. The sudden flashes of colour reminded him -of the gleam of the opal-and-iris-throated birds that flutter round the -tall honeycombed Campanile, or stalk, with such stately grace, through -the dim, dust-stained arcades. Leaning back with half-closed eyes, he -kept saying over and over to himself: - - "Devant une facade rose, - Sur le marbre d'un escalier." - -The whole of Venice was in those two lines. He remembered the autumn -that he had passed there, and a wonderful love that had stirred him to -mad delightful follies. There was romance in every place. But Venice, -like Oxford, had kept the background for romance, and, to the true -romantic, background was everything, or almost everything. Basil had -been with him part of the time, and had gone wild over Tintoret. Poor -Basil! What a horrible way for a man to die! - -He sighed, and took up the volume again, and tried to forget. He read -of the swallows that fly in and out of the little _cafe_ at Smyrna where -the Hadjis sit counting their amber beads and the turbaned merchants -smoke their long tasselled pipes and talk gravely to each other; he -read of the Obelisk in the Place de la Concorde that weeps tears of -granite in its lonely sunless exile and longs to be back by the hot, -lotus-covered Nile, where there are Sphinxes, and rose-red ibises, and -white vultures with gilded claws, and crocodiles with small beryl eyes -that crawl over the green steaming mud; he began to brood over those -verses which, drawing music from kiss-stained marble, tell of that -curious statue that Gautier compares to a contralto voice, the "_monstre -charmant_" that couches in the porphyry-room of the Louvre. But after a -time the book fell from his hand. He grew nervous, and a horrible fit -of terror came over him. What if Alan Campbell should be out of -England? Days would elapse before he could come back. Perhaps he -might refuse to come. What could he do then? Every moment was of -vital importance. - -They had been great friends once, five years before--almost -inseparable, indeed. Then the intimacy had come suddenly to an end. -When they met in society now, it was only Dorian Gray who smiled: Alan -Campbell never did. - -He was an extremely clever young man, though he had no real -appreciation of the visible arts, and whatever little sense of the -beauty of poetry he possessed he had gained entirely from Dorian. His -dominant intellectual passion was for science. At Cambridge he had -spent a great deal of his time working in the laboratory, and had taken -a good class in the Natural Science Tripos of his year. Indeed, he was -still devoted to the study of chemistry, and had a laboratory of his -own in which he used to shut himself up all day long, greatly to the -annoyance of his mother, who had set her heart on his standing for -Parliament and had a vague idea that a chemist was a person who made up -prescriptions. He was an excellent musician, however, as well, and -played both the violin and the piano better than most amateurs. In -fact, it was music that had first brought him and Dorian Gray -together--music and that indefinable attraction that Dorian seemed to -be able to exercise whenever he wished--and, indeed, exercised often -without being conscious of it. They had met at Lady Berkshire's the -night that Rubinstein played there, and after that used to be always -seen together at the opera and wherever good music was going on. For -eighteen months their intimacy lasted. Campbell was always either at -Selby Royal or in Grosvenor Square. To him, as to many others, Dorian -Gray was the type of everything that is wonderful and fascinating in -life. Whether or not a quarrel had taken place between them no one -ever knew. But suddenly people remarked that they scarcely spoke when -they met and that Campbell seemed always to go away early from any -party at which Dorian Gray was present. He had changed, too--was -strangely melancholy at times, appeared almost to dislike hearing -music, and would never himself play, giving as his excuse, when he was -called upon, that he was so absorbed in science that he had no time -left in which to practise. And this was certainly true. Every day he -seemed to become more interested in biology, and his name appeared once -or twice in some of the scientific reviews in connection with certain -curious experiments. - -This was the man Dorian Gray was waiting for. Every second he kept -glancing at the clock. As the minutes went by he became horribly -agitated. At last he got up and began to pace up and down the room, -looking like a beautiful caged thing. He took long stealthy strides. -His hands were curiously cold. - -The suspense became unbearable. Time seemed to him to be crawling with -feet of lead, while he by monstrous winds was being swept towards the -jagged edge of some black cleft of precipice. He knew what was waiting -for him there; saw it, indeed, and, shuddering, crushed with dank hands -his burning lids as though he would have robbed the very brain of sight -and driven the eyeballs back into their cave. It was useless. The -brain had its own food on which it battened, and the imagination, made -grotesque by terror, twisted and distorted as a living thing by pain, -danced like some foul puppet on a stand and grinned through moving -masks. Then, suddenly, time stopped for him. Yes: that blind, -slow-breathing thing crawled no more, and horrible thoughts, time being -dead, raced nimbly on in front, and dragged a hideous future from its -grave, and showed it to him. He stared at it. Its very horror made -him stone. - -At last the door opened and his servant entered. He turned glazed eyes -upon him. - -"Mr. Campbell, sir," said the man. - -A sigh of relief broke from his parched lips, and the colour came back -to his cheeks. - -"Ask him to come in at once, Francis." He felt that he was himself -again. His mood of cowardice had passed away. - -The man bowed and retired. In a few moments, Alan Campbell walked in, -looking very stern and rather pale, his pallor being intensified by his -coal-black hair and dark eyebrows. - -"Alan! This is kind of you. I thank you for coming." - -"I had intended never to enter your house again, Gray. But you said it -was a matter of life and death." His voice was hard and cold. He -spoke with slow deliberation. There was a look of contempt in the -steady searching gaze that he turned on Dorian. He kept his hands in -the pockets of his Astrakhan coat, and seemed not to have noticed the -gesture with which he had been greeted. - -"Yes: it is a matter of life and death, Alan, and to more than one -person. Sit down." - -Campbell took a chair by the table, and Dorian sat opposite to him. -The two men's eyes met. In Dorian's there was infinite pity. He knew -that what he was going to do was dreadful. - -After a strained moment of silence, he leaned across and said, very -quietly, but watching the effect of each word upon the face of him he -had sent for, "Alan, in a locked room at the top of this house, a room -to which nobody but myself has access, a dead man is seated at a table. -He has been dead ten hours now. Don't stir, and don't look at me like -that. Who the man is, why he died, how he died, are matters that do -not concern you. What you have to do is this--" - -"Stop, Gray. I don't want to know anything further. Whether what you -have told me is true or not true doesn't concern me. I entirely -decline to be mixed up in your life. Keep your horrible secrets to -yourself. They don't interest me any more." - -"Alan, they will have to interest you. This one will have to interest -you. I am awfully sorry for you, Alan. But I can't help myself. You -are the one man who is able to save me. I am forced to bring you into -the matter. I have no option. Alan, you are scientific. You know -about chemistry and things of that kind. You have made experiments. -What you have got to do is to destroy the thing that is upstairs--to -destroy it so that not a vestige of it will be left. Nobody saw this -person come into the house. Indeed, at the present moment he is -supposed to be in Paris. He will not be missed for months. When he is -missed, there must be no trace of him found here. You, Alan, you must -change him, and everything that belongs to him, into a handful of ashes -that I may scatter in the air." - -"You are mad, Dorian." - -"Ah! I was waiting for you to call me Dorian." - -"You are mad, I tell you--mad to imagine that I would raise a finger to -help you, mad to make this monstrous confession. I will have nothing -to do with this matter, whatever it is. Do you think I am going to -peril my reputation for you? What is it to me what devil's work you -are up to?" - -"It was suicide, Alan." - -"I am glad of that. But who drove him to it? You, I should fancy." - -"Do you still refuse to do this for me?" - -"Of course I refuse. I will have absolutely nothing to do with it. I -don't care what shame comes on you. You deserve it all. I should not -be sorry to see you disgraced, publicly disgraced. How dare you ask -me, of all men in the world, to mix myself up in this horror? I should -have thought you knew more about people's characters. Your friend Lord -Henry Wotton can't have taught you much about psychology, whatever else -he has taught you. Nothing will induce me to stir a step to help you. -You have come to the wrong man. Go to some of your friends. Don't -come to me." - -"Alan, it was murder. I killed him. You don't know what he had made -me suffer. Whatever my life is, he had more to do with the making or -the marring of it than poor Harry has had. He may not have intended -it, the result was the same." - -"Murder! Good God, Dorian, is that what you have come to? I shall not -inform upon you. It is not my business. Besides, without my stirring -in the matter, you are certain to be arrested. Nobody ever commits a -crime without doing something stupid. But I will have nothing to do -with it." - -"You must have something to do with it. Wait, wait a moment; listen to -me. Only listen, Alan. All I ask of you is to perform a certain -scientific experiment. You go to hospitals and dead-houses, and the -horrors that you do there don't affect you. If in some hideous -dissecting-room or fetid laboratory you found this man lying on a -leaden table with red gutters scooped out in it for the blood to flow -through, you would simply look upon him as an admirable subject. You -would not turn a hair. You would not believe that you were doing -anything wrong. On the contrary, you would probably feel that you were -benefiting the human race, or increasing the sum of knowledge in the -world, or gratifying intellectual curiosity, or something of that kind. -What I want you to do is merely what you have often done before. -Indeed, to destroy a body must be far less horrible than what you are -accustomed to work at. And, remember, it is the only piece of evidence -against me. If it is discovered, I am lost; and it is sure to be -discovered unless you help me." - -"I have no desire to help you. You forget that. I am simply -indifferent to the whole thing. It has nothing to do with me." - -"Alan, I entreat you. Think of the position I am in. Just before you -came I almost fainted with terror. You may know terror yourself some -day. No! don't think of that. Look at the matter purely from the -scientific point of view. You don't inquire where the dead things on -which you experiment come from. Don't inquire now. I have told you -too much as it is. But I beg of you to do this. We were friends once, -Alan." - -"Don't speak about those days, Dorian--they are dead." - -"The dead linger sometimes. The man upstairs will not go away. He is -sitting at the table with bowed head and outstretched arms. Alan! -Alan! If you don't come to my assistance, I am ruined. Why, they will -hang me, Alan! Don't you understand? They will hang me for what I -have done." - -"There is no good in prolonging this scene. I absolutely refuse to do -anything in the matter. It is insane of you to ask me." - -"You refuse?" - -"Yes." - -"I entreat you, Alan." - -"It is useless." - -The same look of pity came into Dorian Gray's eyes. Then he stretched -out his hand, took a piece of paper, and wrote something on it. He -read it over twice, folded it carefully, and pushed it across the -table. Having done this, he got up and went over to the window. - -Campbell looked at him in surprise, and then took up the paper, and -opened it. As he read it, his face became ghastly pale and he fell -back in his chair. A horrible sense of sickness came over him. He -felt as if his heart was beating itself to death in some empty hollow. - -After two or three minutes of terrible silence, Dorian turned round and -came and stood behind him, putting his hand upon his shoulder. - -"I am so sorry for you, Alan," he murmured, "but you leave me no -alternative. I have a letter written already. Here it is. You see -the address. If you don't help me, I must send it. If you don't help -me, I will send it. You know what the result will be. But you are -going to help me. It is impossible for you to refuse now. I tried to -spare you. You will do me the justice to admit that. You were stern, -harsh, offensive. You treated me as no man has ever dared to treat -me--no living man, at any rate. I bore it all. Now it is for me to -dictate terms." - -Campbell buried his face in his hands, and a shudder passed through him. - -"Yes, it is my turn to dictate terms, Alan. You know what they are. -The thing is quite simple. Come, don't work yourself into this fever. -The thing has to be done. Face it, and do it." - -A groan broke from Campbell's lips and he shivered all over. The -ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece seemed to him to be dividing -time into separate atoms of agony, each of which was too terrible to be -borne. He felt as if an iron ring was being slowly tightened round his -forehead, as if the disgrace with which he was threatened had already -come upon him. The hand upon his shoulder weighed like a hand of lead. -It was intolerable. It seemed to crush him. - -"Come, Alan, you must decide at once." - -"I cannot do it," he said, mechanically, as though words could alter -things. - -"You must. You have no choice. Don't delay." - -He hesitated a moment. "Is there a fire in the room upstairs?" - -"Yes, there is a gas-fire with asbestos." - -"I shall have to go home and get some things from the laboratory." - -"No, Alan, you must not leave the house. Write out on a sheet of -notepaper what you want and my servant will take a cab and bring the -things back to you." - -Campbell scrawled a few lines, blotted them, and addressed an envelope -to his assistant. Dorian took the note up and read it carefully. Then -he rang the bell and gave it to his valet, with orders to return as -soon as possible and to bring the things with him. - -As the hall door shut, Campbell started nervously, and having got up -from the chair, went over to the chimney-piece. He was shivering with a -kind of ague. For nearly twenty minutes, neither of the men spoke. A -fly buzzed noisily about the room, and the ticking of the clock was -like the beat of a hammer. - -As the chime struck one, Campbell turned round, and looking at Dorian -Gray, saw that his eyes were filled with tears. There was something in -the purity and refinement of that sad face that seemed to enrage him. -"You are infamous, absolutely infamous!" he muttered. - -"Hush, Alan. You have saved my life," said Dorian. - -"Your life? Good heavens! what a life that is! You have gone from -corruption to corruption, and now you have culminated in crime. In -doing what I am going to do--what you force me to do--it is not of your -life that I am thinking." - -"Ah, Alan," murmured Dorian with a sigh, "I wish you had a thousandth -part of the pity for me that I have for you." He turned away as he -spoke and stood looking out at the garden. Campbell made no answer. - -After about ten minutes a knock came to the door, and the servant -entered, carrying a large mahogany chest of chemicals, with a long coil -of steel and platinum wire and two rather curiously shaped iron clamps. - -"Shall I leave the things here, sir?" he asked Campbell. - -"Yes," said Dorian. "And I am afraid, Francis, that I have another -errand for you. What is the name of the man at Richmond who supplies -Selby with orchids?" - -"Harden, sir." - -"Yes--Harden. You must go down to Richmond at once, see Harden -personally, and tell him to send twice as many orchids as I ordered, -and to have as few white ones as possible. In fact, I don't want any -white ones. It is a lovely day, Francis, and Richmond is a very pretty -place--otherwise I wouldn't bother you about it." - -"No trouble, sir. At what time shall I be back?" - -Dorian looked at Campbell. "How long will your experiment take, Alan?" -he said in a calm indifferent voice. The presence of a third person in -the room seemed to give him extraordinary courage. - -Campbell frowned and bit his lip. "It will take about five hours," he -answered. - -"It will be time enough, then, if you are back at half-past seven, -Francis. Or stay: just leave my things out for dressing. You can -have the evening to yourself. I am not dining at home, so I shall not -want you." - -"Thank you, sir," said the man, leaving the room. - -"Now, Alan, there is not a moment to be lost. How heavy this chest is! -I'll take it for you. You bring the other things." He spoke rapidly -and in an authoritative manner. Campbell felt dominated by him. They -left the room together. - -When they reached the top landing, Dorian took out the key and turned -it in the lock. Then he stopped, and a troubled look came into his -eyes. He shuddered. "I don't think I can go in, Alan," he murmured. - -"It is nothing to me. I don't require you," said Campbell coldly. - -Dorian half opened the door. As he did so, he saw the face of his -portrait leering in the sunlight. On the floor in front of it the torn -curtain was lying. He remembered that the night before he had -forgotten, for the first time in his life, to hide the fatal canvas, -and was about to rush forward, when he drew back with a shudder. - -What was that loathsome red dew that gleamed, wet and glistening, on -one of the hands, as though the canvas had sweated blood? How horrible -it was!--more horrible, it seemed to him for the moment, than the -silent thing that he knew was stretched across the table, the thing -whose grotesque misshapen shadow on the spotted carpet showed him that -it had not stirred, but was still there, as he had left it. - -He heaved a deep breath, opened the door a little wider, and with -half-closed eyes and averted head, walked quickly in, determined that -he would not look even once upon the dead man. Then, stooping down and -taking up the gold-and-purple hanging, he flung it right over the -picture. - -There he stopped, feeling afraid to turn round, and his eyes fixed -themselves on the intricacies of the pattern before him. He heard -Campbell bringing in the heavy chest, and the irons, and the other -things that he had required for his dreadful work. He began to wonder -if he and Basil Hallward had ever met, and, if so, what they had -thought of each other. - -"Leave me now," said a stern voice behind him. - -He turned and hurried out, just conscious that the dead man had been -thrust back into the chair and that Campbell was gazing into a -glistening yellow face. As he was going downstairs, he heard the key -being turned in the lock. - -It was long after seven when Campbell came back into the library. He -was pale, but absolutely calm. "I have done what you asked me to do," -he muttered. "And now, good-bye. Let us never see each other again." - -"You have saved me from ruin, Alan. I cannot forget that," said Dorian -simply. - -As soon as Campbell had left, he went upstairs. There was a horrible -smell of nitric acid in the room. But the thing that had been sitting -at the table was gone. - - - -CHAPTER 15 - -That evening, at eight-thirty, exquisitely dressed and wearing a large -button-hole of Parma violets, Dorian Gray was ushered into Lady -Narborough's drawing-room by bowing servants. His forehead was -throbbing with maddened nerves, and he felt wildly excited, but his -manner as he bent over his hostess's hand was as easy and graceful as -ever. Perhaps one never seems so much at one's ease as when one has to -play a part. Certainly no one looking at Dorian Gray that night could -have believed that he had passed through a tragedy as horrible as any -tragedy of our age. Those finely shaped fingers could never have -clutched a knife for sin, nor those smiling lips have cried out on God -and goodness. He himself could not help wondering at the calm of his -demeanour, and for a moment felt keenly the terrible pleasure of a -double life. - -It was a small party, got up rather in a hurry by Lady Narborough, who -was a very clever woman with what Lord Henry used to describe as the -remains of really remarkable ugliness. She had proved an excellent -wife to one of our most tedious ambassadors, and having buried her -husband properly in a marble mausoleum, which she had herself designed, -and married off her daughters to some rich, rather elderly men, she -devoted herself now to the pleasures of French fiction, French cookery, -and French _esprit_ when she could get it. - -Dorian was one of her especial favourites, and she always told him that -she was extremely glad she had not met him in early life. "I know, my -dear, I should have fallen madly in love with you," she used to say, -"and thrown my bonnet right over the mills for your sake. It is most -fortunate that you were not thought of at the time. As it was, our -bonnets were so unbecoming, and the mills were so occupied in trying to -raise the wind, that I never had even a flirtation with anybody. -However, that was all Narborough's fault. He was dreadfully -short-sighted, and there is no pleasure in taking in a husband who -never sees anything." - -Her guests this evening were rather tedious. The fact was, as she -explained to Dorian, behind a very shabby fan, one of her married -daughters had come up quite suddenly to stay with her, and, to make -matters worse, had actually brought her husband with her. "I think it -is most unkind of her, my dear," she whispered. "Of course I go and -stay with them every summer after I come from Homburg, but then an old -woman like me must have fresh air sometimes, and besides, I really wake -them up. You don't know what an existence they lead down there. It is -pure unadulterated country life. They get up early, because they have -so much to do, and go to bed early, because they have so little to -think about. There has not been a scandal in the neighbourhood since -the time of Queen Elizabeth, and consequently they all fall asleep -after dinner. You shan't sit next either of them. You shall sit by me -and amuse me." - -Dorian murmured a graceful compliment and looked round the room. Yes: -it was certainly a tedious party. Two of the people he had never seen -before, and the others consisted of Ernest Harrowden, one of those -middle-aged mediocrities so common in London clubs who have no enemies, -but are thoroughly disliked by their friends; Lady Ruxton, an -overdressed woman of forty-seven, with a hooked nose, who was always -trying to get herself compromised, but was so peculiarly plain that to -her great disappointment no one would ever believe anything against -her; Mrs. Erlynne, a pushing nobody, with a delightful lisp and -Venetian-red hair; Lady Alice Chapman, his hostess's daughter, a dowdy -dull girl, with one of those characteristic British faces that, once -seen, are never remembered; and her husband, a red-cheeked, -white-whiskered creature who, like so many of his class, was under the -impression that inordinate joviality can atone for an entire lack of -ideas. - -He was rather sorry he had come, till Lady Narborough, looking at the -great ormolu gilt clock that sprawled in gaudy curves on the -mauve-draped mantelshelf, exclaimed: "How horrid of Henry Wotton to be -so late! I sent round to him this morning on chance and he promised -faithfully not to disappoint me." - -It was some consolation that Harry was to be there, and when the door -opened and he heard his slow musical voice lending charm to some -insincere apology, he ceased to feel bored. - -But at dinner he could not eat anything. Plate after plate went away -untasted. Lady Narborough kept scolding him for what she called "an -insult to poor Adolphe, who invented the _menu_ specially for you," and -now and then Lord Henry looked across at him, wondering at his silence -and abstracted manner. From time to time the butler filled his glass -with champagne. He drank eagerly, and his thirst seemed to increase. - -"Dorian," said Lord Henry at last, as the _chaud-froid_ was being handed -round, "what is the matter with you to-night? You are quite out of -sorts." - -"I believe he is in love," cried Lady Narborough, "and that he is -afraid to tell me for fear I should be jealous. He is quite right. I -certainly should." - -"Dear Lady Narborough," murmured Dorian, smiling, "I have not been in -love for a whole week--not, in fact, since Madame de Ferrol left town." - -"How you men can fall in love with that woman!" exclaimed the old lady. -"I really cannot understand it." - -"It is simply because she remembers you when you were a little girl, -Lady Narborough," said Lord Henry. "She is the one link between us and -your short frocks." - -"She does not remember my short frocks at all, Lord Henry. But I -remember her very well at Vienna thirty years ago, and how _decolletee_ -she was then." - -"She is still _decolletee_," he answered, taking an olive in his long -fingers; "and when she is in a very smart gown she looks like an -_edition de luxe_ of a bad French novel. She is really wonderful, and -full of surprises. Her capacity for family affection is extraordinary. -When her third husband died, her hair turned quite gold from grief." - -"How can you, Harry!" cried Dorian. - -"It is a most romantic explanation," laughed the hostess. "But her -third husband, Lord Henry! You don't mean to say Ferrol is the fourth?" - -"Certainly, Lady Narborough." - -"I don't believe a word of it." - -"Well, ask Mr. Gray. He is one of her most intimate friends." - -"Is it true, Mr. Gray?" - -"She assures me so, Lady Narborough," said Dorian. "I asked her -whether, like Marguerite de Navarre, she had their hearts embalmed and -hung at her girdle. She told me she didn't, because none of them had -had any hearts at all." - -"Four husbands! Upon my word that is _trop de zele_." - -"_Trop d'audace_, I tell her," said Dorian. - -"Oh! she is audacious enough for anything, my dear. And what is Ferrol -like? I don't know him." - -"The husbands of very beautiful women belong to the criminal classes," -said Lord Henry, sipping his wine. - -Lady Narborough hit him with her fan. "Lord Henry, I am not at all -surprised that the world says that you are extremely wicked." - -"But what world says that?" asked Lord Henry, elevating his eyebrows. -"It can only be the next world. This world and I are on excellent -terms." - -"Everybody I know says you are very wicked," cried the old lady, -shaking her head. - -Lord Henry looked serious for some moments. "It is perfectly -monstrous," he said, at last, "the way people go about nowadays saying -things against one behind one's back that are absolutely and entirely -true." - -"Isn't he incorrigible?" cried Dorian, leaning forward in his chair. - -"I hope so," said his hostess, laughing. "But really, if you all -worship Madame de Ferrol in this ridiculous way, I shall have to marry -again so as to be in the fashion." - -"You will never marry again, Lady Narborough," broke in Lord Henry. -"You were far too happy. When a woman marries again, it is because she -detested her first husband. When a man marries again, it is because he -adored his first wife. Women try their luck; men risk theirs." - -"Narborough wasn't perfect," cried the old lady. - -"If he had been, you would not have loved him, my dear lady," was the -rejoinder. "Women love us for our defects. If we have enough of them, -they will forgive us everything, even our intellects. You will never -ask me to dinner again after saying this, I am afraid, Lady Narborough, -but it is quite true." - -"Of course it is true, Lord Henry. If we women did not love you for -your defects, where would you all be? Not one of you would ever be -married. You would be a set of unfortunate bachelors. Not, however, -that that would alter you much. Nowadays all the married men live like -bachelors, and all the bachelors like married men." - -"_Fin de siecle_," murmured Lord Henry. - -"_Fin du globe_," answered his hostess. - -"I wish it were _fin du globe_," said Dorian with a sigh. "Life is a -great disappointment." - -"Ah, my dear," cried Lady Narborough, putting on her gloves, "don't -tell me that you have exhausted life. When a man says that one knows -that life has exhausted him. Lord Henry is very wicked, and I -sometimes wish that I had been; but you are made to be good--you look -so good. I must find you a nice wife. Lord Henry, don't you think -that Mr. Gray should get married?" - -"I am always telling him so, Lady Narborough," said Lord Henry with a -bow. - -"Well, we must look out for a suitable match for him. I shall go -through Debrett carefully to-night and draw out a list of all the -eligible young ladies." - -"With their ages, Lady Narborough?" asked Dorian. - -"Of course, with their ages, slightly edited. But nothing must be done -in a hurry. I want it to be what _The Morning Post_ calls a suitable -alliance, and I want you both to be happy." - -"What nonsense people talk about happy marriages!" exclaimed Lord -Henry. "A man can be happy with any woman, as long as he does not love -her." - -"Ah! what a cynic you are!" cried the old lady, pushing back her chair -and nodding to Lady Ruxton. "You must come and dine with me soon -again. You are really an admirable tonic, much better than what Sir -Andrew prescribes for me. You must tell me what people you would like -to meet, though. I want it to be a delightful gathering." - -"I like men who have a future and women who have a past," he answered. -"Or do you think that would make it a petticoat party?" - -"I fear so," she said, laughing, as she stood up. "A thousand pardons, -my dear Lady Ruxton," she added, "I didn't see you hadn't finished your -cigarette." - -"Never mind, Lady Narborough. I smoke a great deal too much. I am -going to limit myself, for the future." - -"Pray don't, Lady Ruxton," said Lord Henry. "Moderation is a fatal -thing. Enough is as bad as a meal. More than enough is as good as a -feast." - -Lady Ruxton glanced at him curiously. "You must come and explain that -to me some afternoon, Lord Henry. It sounds a fascinating theory," she -murmured, as she swept out of the room. - -"Now, mind you don't stay too long over your politics and scandal," -cried Lady Narborough from the door. "If you do, we are sure to -squabble upstairs." - -The men laughed, and Mr. Chapman got up solemnly from the foot of the -table and came up to the top. Dorian Gray changed his seat and went -and sat by Lord Henry. Mr. Chapman began to talk in a loud voice about -the situation in the House of Commons. He guffawed at his adversaries. -The word _doctrinaire_--word full of terror to the British -mind--reappeared from time to time between his explosions. An -alliterative prefix served as an ornament of oratory. He hoisted the -Union Jack on the pinnacles of thought. The inherited stupidity of the -race--sound English common sense he jovially termed it--was shown to be -the proper bulwark for society. - -A smile curved Lord Henry's lips, and he turned round and looked at -Dorian. - -"Are you better, my dear fellow?" he asked. "You seemed rather out of -sorts at dinner." - -"I am quite well, Harry. I am tired. That is all." - -"You were charming last night. The little duchess is quite devoted to -you. She tells me she is going down to Selby." - -"She has promised to come on the twentieth." - -"Is Monmouth to be there, too?" - -"Oh, yes, Harry." - -"He bores me dreadfully, almost as much as he bores her. She is very -clever, too clever for a woman. She lacks the indefinable charm of -weakness. It is the feet of clay that make the gold of the image -precious. Her feet are very pretty, but they are not feet of clay. -White porcelain feet, if you like. They have been through the fire, -and what fire does not destroy, it hardens. She has had experiences." - -"How long has she been married?" asked Dorian. - -"An eternity, she tells me. I believe, according to the peerage, it is -ten years, but ten years with Monmouth must have been like eternity, -with time thrown in. Who else is coming?" - -"Oh, the Willoughbys, Lord Rugby and his wife, our hostess, Geoffrey -Clouston, the usual set. I have asked Lord Grotrian." - -"I like him," said Lord Henry. "A great many people don't, but I find -him charming. He atones for being occasionally somewhat overdressed by -being always absolutely over-educated. He is a very modern type." - -"I don't know if he will be able to come, Harry. He may have to go to -Monte Carlo with his father." - -"Ah! what a nuisance people's people are! Try and make him come. By -the way, Dorian, you ran off very early last night. You left before -eleven. What did you do afterwards? Did you go straight home?" - -Dorian glanced at him hurriedly and frowned. - -"No, Harry," he said at last, "I did not get home till nearly three." - -"Did you go to the club?" - -"Yes," he answered. Then he bit his lip. "No, I don't mean that. I -didn't go to the club. I walked about. I forget what I did.... How -inquisitive you are, Harry! You always want to know what one has been -doing. I always want to forget what I have been doing. I came in at -half-past two, if you wish to know the exact time. I had left my -latch-key at home, and my servant had to let me in. If you want any -corroborative evidence on the subject, you can ask him." - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "My dear fellow, as if I cared! -Let us go up to the drawing-room. No sherry, thank you, Mr. Chapman. -Something has happened to you, Dorian. Tell me what it is. You are -not yourself to-night." - -"Don't mind me, Harry. I am irritable, and out of temper. I shall -come round and see you to-morrow, or next day. Make my excuses to Lady -Narborough. I shan't go upstairs. I shall go home. I must go home." - -"All right, Dorian. I dare say I shall see you to-morrow at tea-time. -The duchess is coming." - -"I will try to be there, Harry," he said, leaving the room. As he -drove back to his own house, he was conscious that the sense of terror -he thought he had strangled had come back to him. Lord Henry's casual -questioning had made him lose his nerve for the moment, and he wanted -his nerve still. Things that were dangerous had to be destroyed. He -winced. He hated the idea of even touching them. - -Yet it had to be done. He realized that, and when he had locked the -door of his library, he opened the secret press into which he had -thrust Basil Hallward's coat and bag. A huge fire was blazing. He -piled another log on it. The smell of the singeing clothes and burning -leather was horrible. It took him three-quarters of an hour to consume -everything. At the end he felt faint and sick, and having lit some -Algerian pastilles in a pierced copper brazier, he bathed his hands and -forehead with a cool musk-scented vinegar. - -Suddenly he started. His eyes grew strangely bright, and he gnawed -nervously at his underlip. Between two of the windows stood a large -Florentine cabinet, made out of ebony and inlaid with ivory and blue -lapis. He watched it as though it were a thing that could fascinate -and make afraid, as though it held something that he longed for and yet -almost loathed. His breath quickened. A mad craving came over him. -He lit a cigarette and then threw it away. His eyelids drooped till -the long fringed lashes almost touched his cheek. But he still watched -the cabinet. At last he got up from the sofa on which he had been -lying, went over to it, and having unlocked it, touched some hidden -spring. A triangular drawer passed slowly out. His fingers moved -instinctively towards it, dipped in, and closed on something. It was a -small Chinese box of black and gold-dust lacquer, elaborately wrought, -the sides patterned with curved waves, and the silken cords hung with -round crystals and tasselled in plaited metal threads. He opened it. -Inside was a green paste, waxy in lustre, the odour curiously heavy and -persistent. - -He hesitated for some moments, with a strangely immobile smile upon his -face. Then shivering, though the atmosphere of the room was terribly -hot, he drew himself up and glanced at the clock. It was twenty -minutes to twelve. He put the box back, shutting the cabinet doors as -he did so, and went into his bedroom. - -As midnight was striking bronze blows upon the dusky air, Dorian Gray, -dressed commonly, and with a muffler wrapped round his throat, crept -quietly out of his house. In Bond Street he found a hansom with a good -horse. He hailed it and in a low voice gave the driver an address. - -The man shook his head. "It is too far for me," he muttered. - -"Here is a sovereign for you," said Dorian. "You shall have another if -you drive fast." - -"All right, sir," answered the man, "you will be there in an hour," and -after his fare had got in he turned his horse round and drove rapidly -towards the river. - - - -CHAPTER 16 - -A cold rain began to fall, and the blurred street-lamps looked ghastly -in the dripping mist. The public-houses were just closing, and dim men -and women were clustering in broken groups round their doors. From -some of the bars came the sound of horrible laughter. In others, -drunkards brawled and screamed. - -Lying back in the hansom, with his hat pulled over his forehead, Dorian -Gray watched with listless eyes the sordid shame of the great city, and -now and then he repeated to himself the words that Lord Henry had said -to him on the first day they had met, "To cure the soul by means of the -senses, and the senses by means of the soul." Yes, that was the -secret. He had often tried it, and would try it again now. There were -opium dens where one could buy oblivion, dens of horror where the -memory of old sins could be destroyed by the madness of sins that were -new. - -The moon hung low in the sky like a yellow skull. From time to time a -huge misshapen cloud stretched a long arm across and hid it. The -gas-lamps grew fewer, and the streets more narrow and gloomy. Once the -man lost his way and had to drive back half a mile. A steam rose from -the horse as it splashed up the puddles. The sidewindows of the hansom -were clogged with a grey-flannel mist. - -"To cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses by means of -the soul!" How the words rang in his ears! His soul, certainly, was -sick to death. Was it true that the senses could cure it? Innocent -blood had been spilled. What could atone for that? Ah! for that there -was no atonement; but though forgiveness was impossible, forgetfulness -was possible still, and he was determined to forget, to stamp the thing -out, to crush it as one would crush the adder that had stung one. -Indeed, what right had Basil to have spoken to him as he had done? Who -had made him a judge over others? He had said things that were -dreadful, horrible, not to be endured. - -On and on plodded the hansom, going slower, it seemed to him, at each -step. He thrust up the trap and called to the man to drive faster. -The hideous hunger for opium began to gnaw at him. His throat burned -and his delicate hands twitched nervously together. He struck at the -horse madly with his stick. The driver laughed and whipped up. He -laughed in answer, and the man was silent. - -The way seemed interminable, and the streets like the black web of some -sprawling spider. The monotony became unbearable, and as the mist -thickened, he felt afraid. - -Then they passed by lonely brickfields. The fog was lighter here, and -he could see the strange, bottle-shaped kilns with their orange, -fanlike tongues of fire. A dog barked as they went by, and far away in -the darkness some wandering sea-gull screamed. The horse stumbled in a -rut, then swerved aside and broke into a gallop. - -After some time they left the clay road and rattled again over -rough-paven streets. Most of the windows were dark, but now and then -fantastic shadows were silhouetted against some lamplit blind. He -watched them curiously. They moved like monstrous marionettes and made -gestures like live things. He hated them. A dull rage was in his -heart. As they turned a corner, a woman yelled something at them from -an open door, and two men ran after the hansom for about a hundred -yards. The driver beat at them with his whip. - -It is said that passion makes one think in a circle. Certainly with -hideous iteration the bitten lips of Dorian Gray shaped and reshaped -those subtle words that dealt with soul and sense, till he had found in -them the full expression, as it were, of his mood, and justified, by -intellectual approval, passions that without such justification would -still have dominated his temper. From cell to cell of his brain crept -the one thought; and the wild desire to live, most terrible of all -man's appetites, quickened into force each trembling nerve and fibre. -Ugliness that had once been hateful to him because it made things real, -became dear to him now for that very reason. Ugliness was the one -reality. The coarse brawl, the loathsome den, the crude violence of -disordered life, the very vileness of thief and outcast, were more -vivid, in their intense actuality of impression, than all the gracious -shapes of art, the dreamy shadows of song. They were what he needed -for forgetfulness. In three days he would be free. - -Suddenly the man drew up with a jerk at the top of a dark lane. Over -the low roofs and jagged chimney-stacks of the houses rose the black -masts of ships. Wreaths of white mist clung like ghostly sails to the -yards. - -"Somewhere about here, sir, ain't it?" he asked huskily through the -trap. - -Dorian started and peered round. "This will do," he answered, and -having got out hastily and given the driver the extra fare he had -promised him, he walked quickly in the direction of the quay. Here and -there a lantern gleamed at the stern of some huge merchantman. The -light shook and splintered in the puddles. A red glare came from an -outward-bound steamer that was coaling. The slimy pavement looked like -a wet mackintosh. - -He hurried on towards the left, glancing back now and then to see if he -was being followed. In about seven or eight minutes he reached a small -shabby house that was wedged in between two gaunt factories. In one of -the top-windows stood a lamp. He stopped and gave a peculiar knock. - -After a little time he heard steps in the passage and the chain being -unhooked. The door opened quietly, and he went in without saying a -word to the squat misshapen figure that flattened itself into the -shadow as he passed. At the end of the hall hung a tattered green -curtain that swayed and shook in the gusty wind which had followed him -in from the street. He dragged it aside and entered a long low room -which looked as if it had once been a third-rate dancing-saloon. Shrill -flaring gas-jets, dulled and distorted in the fly-blown mirrors that -faced them, were ranged round the walls. Greasy reflectors of ribbed -tin backed them, making quivering disks of light. The floor was -covered with ochre-coloured sawdust, trampled here and there into mud, -and stained with dark rings of spilled liquor. Some Malays were -crouching by a little charcoal stove, playing with bone counters and -showing their white teeth as they chattered. In one corner, with his -head buried in his arms, a sailor sprawled over a table, and by the -tawdrily painted bar that ran across one complete side stood two -haggard women, mocking an old man who was brushing the sleeves of his -coat with an expression of disgust. "He thinks he's got red ants on -him," laughed one of them, as Dorian passed by. The man looked at her -in terror and began to whimper. - -At the end of the room there was a little staircase, leading to a -darkened chamber. As Dorian hurried up its three rickety steps, the -heavy odour of opium met him. He heaved a deep breath, and his -nostrils quivered with pleasure. When he entered, a young man with -smooth yellow hair, who was bending over a lamp lighting a long thin -pipe, looked up at him and nodded in a hesitating manner. - -"You here, Adrian?" muttered Dorian. - -"Where else should I be?" he answered, listlessly. "None of the chaps -will speak to me now." - -"I thought you had left England." - -"Darlington is not going to do anything. My brother paid the bill at -last. George doesn't speak to me either.... I don't care," he added -with a sigh. "As long as one has this stuff, one doesn't want friends. -I think I have had too many friends." - -Dorian winced and looked round at the grotesque things that lay in such -fantastic postures on the ragged mattresses. The twisted limbs, the -gaping mouths, the staring lustreless eyes, fascinated him. He knew in -what strange heavens they were suffering, and what dull hells were -teaching them the secret of some new joy. They were better off than he -was. He was prisoned in thought. Memory, like a horrible malady, was -eating his soul away. From time to time he seemed to see the eyes of -Basil Hallward looking at him. Yet he felt he could not stay. The -presence of Adrian Singleton troubled him. He wanted to be where no -one would know who he was. He wanted to escape from himself. - -"I am going on to the other place," he said after a pause. - -"On the wharf?" - -"Yes." - -"That mad-cat is sure to be there. They won't have her in this place -now." - -Dorian shrugged his shoulders. "I am sick of women who love one. -Women who hate one are much more interesting. Besides, the stuff is -better." - -"Much the same." - -"I like it better. Come and have something to drink. I must have -something." - -"I don't want anything," murmured the young man. - -"Never mind." - -Adrian Singleton rose up wearily and followed Dorian to the bar. A -half-caste, in a ragged turban and a shabby ulster, grinned a hideous -greeting as he thrust a bottle of brandy and two tumblers in front of -them. The women sidled up and began to chatter. Dorian turned his -back on them and said something in a low voice to Adrian Singleton. - -A crooked smile, like a Malay crease, writhed across the face of one of -the women. "We are very proud to-night," she sneered. - -"For God's sake don't talk to me," cried Dorian, stamping his foot on -the ground. "What do you want? Money? Here it is. Don't ever talk -to me again." - -Two red sparks flashed for a moment in the woman's sodden eyes, then -flickered out and left them dull and glazed. She tossed her head and -raked the coins off the counter with greedy fingers. Her companion -watched her enviously. - -"It's no use," sighed Adrian Singleton. "I don't care to go back. -What does it matter? I am quite happy here." - -"You will write to me if you want anything, won't you?" said Dorian, -after a pause. - -"Perhaps." - -"Good night, then." - -"Good night," answered the young man, passing up the steps and wiping -his parched mouth with a handkerchief. - -Dorian walked to the door with a look of pain in his face. As he drew -the curtain aside, a hideous laugh broke from the painted lips of the -woman who had taken his money. "There goes the devil's bargain!" she -hiccoughed, in a hoarse voice. - -"Curse you!" he answered, "don't call me that." - -She snapped her fingers. "Prince Charming is what you like to be -called, ain't it?" she yelled after him. - -The drowsy sailor leaped to his feet as she spoke, and looked wildly -round. The sound of the shutting of the hall door fell on his ear. He -rushed out as if in pursuit. - -Dorian Gray hurried along the quay through the drizzling rain. His -meeting with Adrian Singleton had strangely moved him, and he wondered -if the ruin of that young life was really to be laid at his door, as -Basil Hallward had said to him with such infamy of insult. He bit his -lip, and for a few seconds his eyes grew sad. Yet, after all, what did -it matter to him? One's days were too brief to take the burden of -another's errors on one's shoulders. Each man lived his own life and -paid his own price for living it. The only pity was one had to pay so -often for a single fault. One had to pay over and over again, indeed. -In her dealings with man, destiny never closed her accounts. - -There are moments, psychologists tell us, when the passion for sin, or -for what the world calls sin, so dominates a nature that every fibre of -the body, as every cell of the brain, seems to be instinct with fearful -impulses. Men and women at such moments lose the freedom of their -will. They move to their terrible end as automatons move. Choice is -taken from them, and conscience is either killed, or, if it lives at -all, lives but to give rebellion its fascination and disobedience its -charm. For all sins, as theologians weary not of reminding us, are -sins of disobedience. When that high spirit, that morning star of -evil, fell from heaven, it was as a rebel that he fell. - -Callous, concentrated on evil, with stained mind, and soul hungry for -rebellion, Dorian Gray hastened on, quickening his step as he went, but -as he darted aside into a dim archway, that had served him often as a -short cut to the ill-famed place where he was going, he felt himself -suddenly seized from behind, and before he had time to defend himself, -he was thrust back against the wall, with a brutal hand round his -throat. - -He struggled madly for life, and by a terrible effort wrenched the -tightening fingers away. In a second he heard the click of a revolver, -and saw the gleam of a polished barrel, pointing straight at his head, -and the dusky form of a short, thick-set man facing him. - -"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 to-night 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 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. - - - -CHAPTER 17 - -A week later Dorian Gray was sitting in the conservatory at Selby -Royal, talking to the pretty Duchess of Monmouth, who with her husband, -a jaded-looking man of sixty, was amongst his guests. It was tea-time, -and the mellow light of the huge, lace-covered lamp that stood on the -table lit up the delicate china and hammered silver of the service at -which the duchess was presiding. Her white hands were moving daintily -among the cups, and her full red lips were smiling at something that -Dorian had whispered to her. Lord Henry was lying back in a -silk-draped wicker chair, looking at them. On a peach-coloured divan -sat Lady Narborough, pretending to listen to the duke's description of -the last Brazilian beetle that he had added to his collection. Three -young men in elaborate smoking-suits were handing tea-cakes to some of -the women. The house-party consisted of twelve people, and there were -more expected to arrive on the next day. - -"What are you two talking about?" said Lord Henry, strolling over to -the table and putting his cup down. "I hope Dorian has told you about -my plan for rechristening everything, Gladys. It is a delightful idea." - -"But I don't want to be rechristened, Harry," rejoined the duchess, -looking up at him with her wonderful eyes. "I am quite satisfied with -my own name, and I am sure Mr. Gray should be satisfied with his." - -"My dear Gladys, I would not alter either name for the world. They are -both perfect. I was thinking chiefly of flowers. Yesterday I cut an -orchid, for my button-hole. It was a marvellous spotted thing, as -effective as the seven deadly sins. In a thoughtless moment I asked -one of the gardeners what it was called. He told me it was a fine -specimen of _Robinsoniana_, or something dreadful of that kind. It is a -sad truth, but we have lost the faculty of giving lovely names to -things. Names are everything. I never quarrel with actions. My one -quarrel is with words. That is the reason I hate vulgar realism in -literature. The man who could call a spade a spade should be compelled -to use one. It is the only thing he is fit for." - -"Then what should we call you, Harry?" she asked. - -"His name is Prince Paradox," said Dorian. - -"I recognize him in a flash," exclaimed the duchess. - -"I won't hear of it," laughed Lord Henry, sinking into a chair. "From -a label there is no escape! I refuse the title." - -"Royalties may not abdicate," fell as a warning from pretty lips. - -"You wish me to defend my throne, then?" - -"Yes." - -"I give the truths of to-morrow." - -"I prefer the mistakes of to-day," she answered. - -"You disarm me, Gladys," he cried, catching the wilfulness of her mood. - -"Of your shield, Harry, not of your spear." - -"I never tilt against beauty," he said, with a wave of his hand. - -"That is your error, Harry, believe me. You value beauty far too much." - -"How can you say that? I admit that I think that it is better to be -beautiful than to be good. But on the other hand, no one is more ready -than I am to acknowledge that it is better to be good than to be ugly." - -"Ugliness is one of the seven deadly sins, then?" cried the duchess. -"What becomes of your simile about the orchid?" - -"Ugliness is one of the seven deadly virtues, Gladys. You, as a good -Tory, must not underrate them. Beer, the Bible, and the seven deadly -virtues have made our England what she is." - -"You don't like your country, then?" she asked. - -"I live in it." - -"That you may censure it the better." - -"Would you have me take the verdict of Europe on it?" he inquired. - -"What do they say of us?" - -"That Tartuffe has emigrated to England and opened a shop." - -"Is that yours, Harry?" - -"I give it to you." - -"I could not use it. It is too true." - -"You need not be afraid. Our countrymen never recognize a description." - -"They are practical." - -"They are more cunning than practical. When they make up their ledger, -they balance stupidity by wealth, and vice by hypocrisy." - -"Still, we have done great things." - -"Great things have been thrust on us, Gladys." - -"We have carried their burden." - -"Only as far as the Stock Exchange." - -She shook her head. "I believe in the race," she cried. - -"It represents the survival of the pushing." - -"It has development." - -"Decay fascinates me more." - -"What of art?" she asked. - -"It is a malady." - -"Love?" - -"An illusion." - -"Religion?" - -"The fashionable substitute for belief." - -"You are a sceptic." - -"Never! Scepticism is the beginning of faith." - -"What are you?" - -"To define is to limit." - -"Give me a clue." - -"Threads snap. You would lose your way in the labyrinth." - -"You bewilder me. Let us talk of some one else." - -"Our host is a delightful topic. Years ago he was christened Prince -Charming." - -"Ah! don't remind me of that," cried Dorian Gray. - -"Our host is rather horrid this evening," answered the duchess, -colouring. "I believe he thinks that Monmouth married me on purely -scientific principles as the best specimen he could find of a modern -butterfly." - -"Well, I hope he won't stick pins into you, Duchess," laughed Dorian. - -"Oh! my maid does that already, Mr. Gray, when she is annoyed with me." - -"And what does she get annoyed with you about, Duchess?" - -"For the most trivial things, Mr. Gray, I assure you. Usually because -I come in at ten minutes to nine and tell her that I must be dressed by -half-past eight." - -"How unreasonable of her! You should give her warning." - -"I daren't, Mr. Gray. Why, she invents hats for me. You remember the -one I wore at Lady Hilstone's garden-party? You don't, but it is nice -of you to pretend that you do. Well, she made it out of nothing. All -good hats are made out of nothing." - -"Like all good reputations, Gladys," interrupted Lord Henry. "Every -effect that one produces gives one an enemy. To be popular one must be -a mediocrity." - -"Not with women," said the duchess, shaking her head; "and women rule -the world. I assure you we can't bear mediocrities. We women, as some -one says, love with our ears, just as you men love with your eyes, if -you ever love at all." - -"It seems to me that we never do anything else," murmured Dorian. - -"Ah! then, you never really love, Mr. Gray," answered the duchess with -mock sadness. - -"My dear Gladys!" cried Lord Henry. "How can you say that? Romance -lives by repetition, and repetition converts an appetite into an art. -Besides, each time that one loves is the only time one has ever loved. -Difference of object does not alter singleness of passion. It merely -intensifies it. We can have in life but one great experience at best, -and the secret of life is to reproduce that experience as often as -possible." - -"Even when one has been wounded by it, Harry?" asked the duchess after -a pause. - -"Especially when one has been wounded by it," answered Lord Henry. - -The duchess turned and looked at Dorian Gray with a curious expression -in her eyes. "What do you say to that, Mr. Gray?" she inquired. - -Dorian hesitated for a moment. Then he threw his head back and -laughed. "I always agree with Harry, Duchess." - -"Even when he is wrong?" - -"Harry is never wrong, Duchess." - -"And does his philosophy make you happy?" - -"I have never searched for happiness. Who wants happiness? I have -searched for pleasure." - -"And found it, Mr. Gray?" - -"Often. Too often." - -The duchess sighed. "I am searching for peace," she said, "and if I -don't go and dress, I shall have none this evening." - -"Let me get you some orchids, Duchess," cried Dorian, starting to his -feet and walking down the conservatory. - -"You are flirting disgracefully with him," said Lord Henry to his -cousin. "You had better take care. He is very fascinating." - -"If he were not, there would be no battle." - -"Greek meets Greek, then?" - -"I am on the side of the Trojans. They fought for a woman." - -"They were defeated." - -"There are worse things than capture," she answered. - -"You gallop with a loose rein." - -"Pace gives life," was the _riposte_. - -"I shall write it in my diary to-night." - -"What?" - -"That a burnt child loves the fire." - -"I am not even singed. My wings are untouched." - -"You use them for everything, except flight." - -"Courage has passed from men to women. It is a new experience for us." - -"You have a rival." - -"Who?" - -He laughed. "Lady Narborough," he whispered. "She perfectly adores -him." - -"You fill me with apprehension. The appeal to antiquity is fatal to us -who are romanticists." - -"Romanticists! You have all the methods of science." - -"Men have educated us." - -"But not explained you." - -"Describe us as a sex," was her challenge. - -"Sphinxes without secrets." - -She looked at him, smiling. "How long Mr. Gray is!" she said. "Let us -go and help him. I have not yet told him the colour of my frock." - -"Ah! you must suit your frock to his flowers, Gladys." - -"That would be a premature surrender." - -"Romantic art begins with its climax." - -"I must keep an opportunity for retreat." - -"In the Parthian manner?" - -"They found safety in the desert. I could not do that." - -"Women are not always allowed a choice," he answered, but hardly had he -finished the sentence before from the far end of the conservatory came -a stifled groan, followed by the dull sound of a heavy fall. Everybody -started up. The duchess stood motionless in horror. And with fear in -his eyes, Lord Henry rushed through the flapping palms to find Dorian -Gray lying face downwards on the tiled floor in a deathlike swoon. - -He was carried at once into the blue drawing-room and laid upon one of -the sofas. After a short time, he came to himself and looked round -with a dazed expression. - -"What has happened?" he asked. "Oh! I remember. Am I safe here, -Harry?" He began to tremble. - -"My dear Dorian," answered Lord Henry, "you merely fainted. That was -all. You must have overtired yourself. You had better not come down -to dinner. I will take your place." - -"No, I will come down," he said, struggling to his feet. "I would -rather come down. I must not be alone." - -He went to his room and dressed. There was a wild recklessness of -gaiety in his manner as he sat at table, but now and then a thrill of -terror ran through him when he remembered that, pressed against the -window of the conservatory, like a white handkerchief, he had seen the -face of James Vane watching him. - - - -CHAPTER 18 - -The next day he did not leave the house, and, indeed, spent most of the -time in his own room, sick with a wild terror of dying, and yet -indifferent to life itself. The consciousness of being hunted, snared, -tracked down, had begun to dominate him. If the tapestry did but -tremble in the wind, he shook. The dead leaves that were blown against -the leaded panes seemed to him like his own wasted resolutions and wild -regrets. When he closed his eyes, he saw again the sailor's face -peering through the mist-stained glass, and horror seemed once more to -lay its hand upon his heart. - -But perhaps it had been only his fancy that had called vengeance out of -the night and set the hideous shapes of punishment before him. Actual -life was chaos, but there was something terribly logical in the -imagination. It was the imagination that set remorse to dog the feet -of sin. It was the imagination that made each crime bear its misshapen -brood. In the common world of fact the wicked were not punished, nor -the good rewarded. Success was given to the strong, failure thrust -upon the weak. That was all. Besides, had any stranger been prowling -round the house, he would have been seen by the servants or the -keepers. Had any foot-marks been found on the flower-beds, the -gardeners would have reported it. Yes, it had been merely fancy. -Sibyl Vane's brother had not come back to kill him. He had sailed away -in his ship to founder in some winter sea. From him, at any rate, he -was safe. Why, the man did not know who he was, could not know who he -was. The mask of youth had saved him. - -And yet if it had been merely an illusion, how terrible it was to think -that conscience could raise such fearful phantoms, and give them -visible form, and make them move before one! What sort of life would -his be if, day and night, shadows of his crime were to peer at him from -silent corners, to mock him from secret places, to whisper in his ear -as he sat at the feast, to wake him with icy fingers as he lay asleep! -As the thought crept through his brain, he grew pale with terror, and -the air seemed to him to have become suddenly colder. Oh! in what a -wild hour of madness he had killed his friend! How ghastly the mere -memory of the scene! He saw it all again. Each hideous detail came -back to him with added horror. Out of the black cave of time, terrible -and swathed in scarlet, rose the image of his sin. When Lord Henry -came in at six o'clock, he found him crying as one whose heart will -break. - -It was not till the third day that he ventured to go out. There was -something in the clear, pine-scented air of that winter morning that -seemed to bring him back his joyousness and his ardour for life. But -it was not merely the physical conditions of environment that had -caused the change. His own nature had revolted against the excess of -anguish that had sought to maim and mar the perfection of its calm. -With subtle and finely wrought temperaments it is always so. Their -strong passions must either bruise or bend. They either slay the man, -or themselves die. Shallow sorrows and shallow loves live on. The -loves and sorrows that are great are destroyed by their own plenitude. -Besides, he had convinced himself that he had been the victim of a -terror-stricken imagination, and looked back now on his fears with -something of pity and not a little of contempt. - -After breakfast, he walked with the duchess for an hour in the garden -and then drove across the park to join the shooting-party. The crisp -frost lay like salt upon the grass. The sky was an inverted cup of -blue metal. A thin film of ice bordered the flat, reed-grown lake. - -At the corner of the pine-wood he caught sight of Sir Geoffrey -Clouston, the duchess's brother, jerking two spent cartridges out of -his gun. He jumped from the cart, and having told the groom to take -the mare home, made his way towards his guest through the withered -bracken and rough undergrowth. - -"Have you had good sport, Geoffrey?" he asked. - -"Not very good, Dorian. I think most of the birds have gone to the -open. I dare say it will be better after lunch, when we get to new -ground." - -Dorian strolled along by his side. The keen aromatic air, the brown -and red lights that glimmered in the wood, the hoarse cries of the -beaters ringing out from time to time, and the sharp snaps of the guns -that followed, fascinated him and filled him with a sense of delightful -freedom. He was dominated by the carelessness of happiness, by the -high indifference of joy. - -Suddenly from a lumpy tussock of old grass some twenty yards in front -of them, with black-tipped ears erect and long hinder limbs throwing it -forward, started a hare. It bolted for a thicket of alders. Sir -Geoffrey put his gun to his shoulder, but there was something in the -animal's grace of movement that strangely charmed Dorian Gray, and he -cried out at once, "Don't shoot it, Geoffrey. Let it live." - -"What nonsense, Dorian!" laughed his companion, and as the hare bounded -into the thicket, he fired. There were two cries heard, the cry of a -hare in pain, which is dreadful, the cry of a man in agony, which is -worse. - -"Good heavens! I have hit a beater!" exclaimed Sir Geoffrey. "What an -ass the man was to get in front of the guns! Stop shooting there!" he -called out at the top of his voice. "A man is hurt." - -The head-keeper came running up with a stick in his hand. - -"Where, sir? Where is he?" he shouted. At the same time, the firing -ceased along the line. - -"Here," answered Sir Geoffrey angrily, hurrying towards the thicket. -"Why on earth don't you keep your men back? Spoiled my shooting for -the day." - -Dorian watched them as they plunged into the alder-clump, brushing the -lithe swinging branches aside. In a few moments they emerged, dragging -a body after them into the sunlight. He turned away in horror. It -seemed to him that misfortune followed wherever he went. He heard Sir -Geoffrey ask if the man was really dead, and the affirmative answer of -the keeper. The wood seemed to him to have become suddenly alive with -faces. There was the trampling of myriad feet and the low buzz of -voices. A great copper-breasted pheasant came beating through the -boughs overhead. - -After a few moments--that were to him, in his perturbed state, like -endless hours of pain--he felt a hand laid on his shoulder. He started -and looked round. - -"Dorian," said Lord Henry, "I had better tell them that the shooting is -stopped for to-day. It would not look well to go on." - -"I wish it were stopped for ever, Harry," he answered bitterly. "The -whole thing is hideous and cruel. Is the man ...?" - -He could not finish the sentence. - -"I am afraid so," rejoined Lord Henry. "He got the whole charge of -shot in his chest. He must have died almost instantaneously. Come; -let us go home." - -They walked side by side in the direction of the avenue for nearly -fifty yards without speaking. Then Dorian looked at Lord Henry and -said, with a heavy sigh, "It is a bad omen, Harry, a very bad omen." - -"What is?" asked Lord Henry. "Oh! this accident, I suppose. My dear -fellow, it can't be helped. It was the man's own fault. Why did he -get in front of the guns? Besides, it is nothing to us. It is rather -awkward for Geoffrey, of course. It does not do to pepper beaters. It -makes people think that one is a wild shot. And Geoffrey is not; he -shoots very straight. But there is no use talking about the matter." - -Dorian shook his head. "It is a bad omen, Harry. I feel as if -something horrible were going to happen to some of us. To myself, -perhaps," he added, passing his hand over his eyes, with a gesture of -pain. - -The elder man laughed. "The only horrible thing in the world is _ennui_, -Dorian. That is the one sin for which there is no forgiveness. But we -are not likely to suffer from it unless these fellows keep chattering -about this thing at dinner. I must tell them that the subject is to be -tabooed. As for omens, there is no such thing as an omen. Destiny -does not send us heralds. She is too wise or too cruel for that. -Besides, what on earth could happen to you, Dorian? You have -everything in the world that a man can want. There is no one who would -not be delighted to change places with you." - -"There is no one with whom I would not change places, Harry. Don't -laugh like that. I am telling you the truth. The wretched peasant who -has just died is better off than I am. I have no terror of death. It -is the coming of death that terrifies me. Its monstrous wings seem to -wheel in the leaden air around me. Good heavens! don't you see a man -moving behind the trees there, watching me, waiting for me?" - -Lord Henry looked in the direction in which the trembling gloved hand -was pointing. "Yes," he said, smiling, "I see the gardener waiting for -you. I suppose he wants to ask you what flowers you wish to have on -the table to-night. How absurdly nervous you are, my dear fellow! You -must come and see my doctor, when we get back to town." - -Dorian heaved a sigh of relief as he saw the gardener approaching. The -man touched his hat, glanced for a moment at Lord Henry in a hesitating -manner, and then produced a letter, which he handed to his master. -"Her Grace told me to wait for an answer," he murmured. - -Dorian put the letter into his pocket. "Tell her Grace that I am -coming in," he said, coldly. The man turned round and went rapidly in -the direction of the house. - -"How fond women are of doing dangerous things!" laughed Lord Henry. -"It is one of the qualities in them that I admire most. A woman will -flirt with anybody in the world as long as other people are looking on." - -"How fond you are of saying dangerous things, Harry! In the present -instance, you are quite astray. I like the duchess very much, but I -don't love her." - -"And the duchess loves you very much, but she likes you less, so you -are excellently matched." - -"You are talking scandal, Harry, and there is never any basis for -scandal." - -"The basis of every scandal is an immoral certainty," said Lord Henry, -lighting a cigarette. - -"You would sacrifice anybody, Harry, for the sake of an epigram." - -"The world goes to the altar of its own accord," was the answer. - -"I wish I could love," cried Dorian Gray with a deep note of pathos in -his voice. "But I seem to have lost the passion and forgotten the -desire. I am too much concentrated on myself. My own personality has -become a burden to me. I want to escape, to go away, to forget. It -was silly of me to come down here at all. I think I shall send a wire -to Harvey to have the yacht got ready. On a yacht one is safe." - -"Safe from what, Dorian? You are in some trouble. Why not tell me -what it is? You know I would help you." - -"I can't tell you, Harry," he answered sadly. "And I dare say it is -only a fancy of mine. This unfortunate accident has upset me. I have -a horrible presentiment that something of the kind may happen to me." - -"What nonsense!" - -"I hope it is, but I can't help feeling it. Ah! here is the duchess, -looking like Artemis in a tailor-made gown. You see we have come back, -Duchess." - -"I have heard all about it, Mr. Gray," she answered. "Poor Geoffrey is -terribly upset. And it seems that you asked him not to shoot the hare. -How curious!" - -"Yes, it was very curious. I don't know what made me say it. Some -whim, I suppose. It looked the loveliest of little live things. But I -am sorry they told you about the man. It is a hideous subject." - -"It is an annoying subject," broke in Lord Henry. "It has no -psychological value at all. Now if Geoffrey had done the thing on -purpose, how interesting he would be! I should like to know some one -who had committed a real murder." - -"How horrid of you, Harry!" cried the duchess. "Isn't it, Mr. Gray? -Harry, Mr. Gray is ill again. He is going to faint." - -Dorian drew himself up with an effort and smiled. "It is nothing, -Duchess," he murmured; "my nerves are dreadfully out of order. That is -all. I am afraid I walked too far this morning. I didn't hear what -Harry said. Was it very bad? You must tell me some other time. I -think I must go and lie down. You will excuse me, won't you?" - -They had reached the great flight of steps that led from the -conservatory on to the terrace. As the glass door closed behind -Dorian, Lord Henry turned and looked at the duchess with his slumberous -eyes. "Are you very much in love with him?" he asked. - -She did not answer for some time, but stood gazing at the landscape. -"I wish I knew," she said at last. - -He shook his head. "Knowledge would be fatal. It is the uncertainty -that charms one. A mist makes things wonderful." - -"One may lose one's way." - -"All ways end at the same point, my dear Gladys." - -"What is that?" - -"Disillusion." - -"It was my _debut_ in life," she sighed. - -"It came to you crowned." - -"I am tired of strawberry leaves." - -"They become you." - -"Only in public." - -"You would miss them," said Lord Henry. - -"I will not part with a petal." - -"Monmouth has ears." - -"Old age is dull of hearing." - -"Has he never been jealous?" - -"I wish he had been." - -He glanced about as if in search of something. "What are you looking -for?" she inquired. - -"The button from your foil," he answered. "You have dropped it." - -She laughed. "I have still the mask." - -"It makes your eyes lovelier," was his reply. - -She laughed again. Her teeth showed like white seeds in a scarlet -fruit. - -Upstairs, in his own room, Dorian Gray was lying on a sofa, with terror -in every tingling fibre of his body. Life had suddenly become too -hideous a burden for him to bear. The dreadful death of the unlucky -beater, shot in the thicket like a wild animal, had seemed to him to -pre-figure death for himself also. He had nearly swooned at what Lord -Henry had said in a chance mood of cynical jesting. - -At five o'clock he rang his bell for his servant and gave him orders to -pack his things for the night-express to town, and to have the brougham -at the door by eight-thirty. He was determined not to sleep another -night at Selby Royal. It was an ill-omened place. Death walked there -in the sunlight. The grass of the forest had been spotted with blood. - -Then he wrote a note to Lord Henry, telling him that he was going up to -town to consult his doctor and asking him to entertain his guests in -his absence. As he was putting it into the envelope, a knock came to -the door, and his valet informed him that the head-keeper wished to see -him. He frowned and bit his lip. "Send him in," he muttered, after -some moments' hesitation. - -As soon as the man entered, Dorian pulled his chequebook out of a -drawer and spread it out before him. - -"I suppose you have come about the unfortunate accident of this -morning, Thornton?" he said, taking up a pen. - -"Yes, sir," answered the gamekeeper. - -"Was the poor fellow married? Had he any people dependent on him?" -asked Dorian, looking bored. "If so, I should not like them to be left -in want, and will send them any sum of money you may think necessary." - -"We don't know who he is, sir. That is what I took the liberty of -coming to you about." - -"Don't know who he is?" said Dorian, listlessly. "What do you mean? -Wasn't he one of your men?" - -"No, sir. Never saw him before. Seems like a sailor, sir." - -The pen dropped from Dorian Gray's hand, and he felt as if his heart -had suddenly stopped beating. "A sailor?" he cried out. "Did you say -a sailor?" - -"Yes, sir. He looks as if he had been a sort of sailor; tattooed on -both arms, and that kind of thing." - -"Was there anything found on him?" said Dorian, leaning forward and -looking at the man with startled eyes. "Anything that would tell his -name?" - -"Some money, sir--not much, and a six-shooter. There was no name of any -kind. A decent-looking man, sir, but rough-like. A sort of sailor we -think." - -Dorian started to his feet. A terrible hope fluttered past him. He -clutched at it madly. "Where is the body?" he exclaimed. "Quick! I -must see it at once." - -"It is in an empty stable in the Home Farm, sir. The folk don't like -to have that sort of thing in their houses. They say a corpse brings -bad luck." - -"The Home Farm! Go there at once and meet me. Tell one of the grooms -to bring my horse round. No. Never mind. I'll go to the stables -myself. It will save time." - -In less than a quarter of an hour, Dorian Gray was galloping down the -long avenue as hard as he could go. The trees seemed to sweep past him -in spectral procession, and wild shadows to fling themselves across his -path. Once the mare swerved at a white gate-post and nearly threw him. -He lashed her across the neck with his crop. She cleft the dusky air -like an arrow. The stones flew from her hoofs. - -At last he reached the Home Farm. Two men were loitering in the yard. -He leaped from the saddle and threw the reins to one of them. In the -farthest stable a light was glimmering. Something seemed to tell him -that the body was there, and he hurried to the door and put his hand -upon the latch. - -There he paused for a moment, feeling that he was on the brink of a -discovery that would either make or mar his life. Then he thrust the -door open and entered. - -On a heap of sacking in the far corner was lying the dead body of a man -dressed in a coarse shirt and a pair of blue trousers. A spotted -handkerchief had been placed over the face. A coarse candle, stuck in -a bottle, sputtered beside it. - -Dorian Gray shuddered. He felt that his could not be the hand to take -the handkerchief away, and called out to one of the farm-servants to -come to him. - -"Take that thing off the face. I wish to see it," he said, clutching -at the door-post for support. - -When the farm-servant had done so, he stepped forward. A cry of joy -broke from his lips. The man who had been shot in the thicket was -James Vane. - -He stood there for some minutes looking at the dead body. As he rode -home, his eyes were full of tears, for he knew he was safe. - - - -CHAPTER 19 - -"There is no use your telling me that you are going to be good," cried -Lord Henry, dipping his white fingers into a red copper bowl filled -with rose-water. "You are quite perfect. Pray, don't change." - -Dorian Gray shook his head. "No, Harry, I have done too many dreadful -things in my life. I am not going to do any more. I began my good -actions yesterday." - -"Where were you yesterday?" - -"In the country, Harry. I was staying at a little inn by myself." - -"My dear boy," said Lord Henry, smiling, "anybody can be good in the -country. There are no temptations there. That is the reason why -people who live out of town are so absolutely uncivilized. -Civilization is not by any means an easy thing to attain to. There are -only two ways by which man can reach it. One is by being cultured, the -other by being corrupt. Country people have no opportunity of being -either, so they stagnate." - -"Culture and corruption," echoed Dorian. "I have known something of -both. It seems terrible to me now that they should ever be found -together. For I have a new ideal, Harry. I am going to alter. I -think I have altered." - -"You have not yet told me what your good action was. Or did you say -you had done more than one?" asked his companion as he spilled into his -plate a little crimson pyramid of seeded strawberries and, through a -perforated, shell-shaped spoon, snowed white sugar upon them. - -"I can tell you, Harry. It is not a story I could tell to any one -else. I spared somebody. It sounds vain, but you understand what I -mean. She was quite beautiful and wonderfully like Sibyl Vane. I -think it was that which first attracted me to her. You remember Sibyl, -don't you? How long ago that seems! Well, Hetty was not one of our -own class, of course. She was simply a girl in a village. But I -really loved her. I am quite sure that I loved her. All during this -wonderful May that we have been having, I used to run down and see her -two or three times a week. Yesterday she met me in a little orchard. -The apple-blossoms kept tumbling down on her hair, and she was -laughing. We were to have gone away together this morning at dawn. -Suddenly I determined to leave her as flowerlike as I had found her." - -"I should think the novelty of the emotion must have given you a thrill -of real pleasure, Dorian," interrupted Lord Henry. "But I can finish -your idyll for you. You gave her good advice and broke her heart. -That was the beginning of your reformation." - -"Harry, you are horrible! You mustn't say these dreadful things. -Hetty's heart is not broken. Of course, she cried and all that. But -there is no disgrace upon her. She can live, like Perdita, in her -garden of mint and marigold." - -"And weep over a faithless Florizel," said Lord Henry, laughing, as he -leaned back in his chair. "My dear Dorian, you have the most curiously -boyish moods. Do you think this girl will ever be really content now -with any one of her own rank? I suppose she will be married some day -to a rough carter or a grinning ploughman. Well, the fact of having -met you, and loved you, will teach her to despise her husband, and she -will be wretched. From a moral point of view, I cannot say that I -think much of your great renunciation. Even as a beginning, it is -poor. Besides, how do you know that Hetty isn't floating at the -present moment in some starlit mill-pond, with lovely water-lilies -round her, like Ophelia?" - -"I can't bear this, Harry! You mock at everything, and then suggest -the most serious tragedies. I am sorry I told you now. I don't care -what you say to me. I know I was right in acting as I did. Poor -Hetty! As I rode past the farm this morning, I saw her white face at -the window, like a spray of jasmine. Don't let us talk about it any -more, and don't try to persuade me that the first good action I have -done for years, the first little bit of self-sacrifice I have ever -known, is really a sort of sin. I want to be better. I am going to be -better. Tell me something about yourself. What is going on in town? -I have not been to the club for days." - -"The people are still discussing poor Basil's disappearance." - -"I should have thought they had got tired of that by this time," said -Dorian, pouring himself out some wine and frowning slightly. - -"My dear boy, they have only been talking about it for six weeks, and -the British public are really not equal to the mental strain of having -more than one topic every three months. They have been very fortunate -lately, however. They have had my own divorce-case and Alan Campbell's -suicide. Now they have got the mysterious disappearance of an artist. -Scotland Yard still insists that the man in the grey ulster who left -for Paris by the midnight train on the ninth of November was poor -Basil, and the French police declare that Basil never arrived in Paris -at all. I suppose in about a fortnight we shall be told that he has -been seen in San Francisco. It is an odd thing, but every one who -disappears is said to be seen at San Francisco. It must be a -delightful city, and possess all the attractions of the next world." - -"What do you think has happened to Basil?" asked Dorian, holding up his -Burgundy against the light and wondering how it was that he could -discuss the matter so calmly. - -"I have not the slightest idea. If Basil chooses to hide himself, it -is no business of mine. If he is dead, I don't want to think about -him. Death is the only thing that ever terrifies me. I hate it." - -"Why?" said the younger man wearily. - -"Because," said Lord Henry, passing beneath his nostrils the gilt -trellis of an open vinaigrette box, "one can survive everything -nowadays except that. Death and vulgarity are the only two facts in -the nineteenth century that one cannot explain away. Let us have our -coffee in the music-room, Dorian. You must play Chopin to me. The man -with whom my wife ran away played Chopin exquisitely. Poor Victoria! -I was very fond of her. The house is rather lonely without her. Of -course, married life is merely a habit, a bad habit. But then one -regrets the loss even of one's worst habits. Perhaps one regrets them -the most. They are such an essential part of one's personality." - -Dorian said nothing, but rose from the table, and passing into the next -room, sat down to the piano and let his fingers stray across the white -and black ivory of the keys. After the coffee had been brought in, he -stopped, and looking over at Lord Henry, said, "Harry, did it ever -occur to you that Basil was murdered?" - -Lord Henry yawned. "Basil was very popular, and always wore a -Waterbury watch. Why should he have been murdered? He was not clever -enough to have enemies. Of course, he had a wonderful genius for -painting. But a man can paint like Velasquez and yet be as dull as -possible. Basil was really rather dull. He only interested me once, -and that was when he told me, years ago, that he had a wild adoration -for you and that you were the dominant motive of his art." - -"I was very fond of Basil," said Dorian with a note of sadness in his -voice. "But don't people say that he was murdered?" - -"Oh, some of the papers do. It does not seem to me to be at all -probable. I know there are dreadful places in Paris, but Basil was not -the sort of man to have gone to them. He had no curiosity. It was his -chief defect." - -"What would you say, Harry, if I told you that I had murdered Basil?" -said the younger man. He watched him intently after he had spoken. - -"I would say, my dear fellow, that you were posing for a character that -doesn't suit you. All crime is vulgar, just as all vulgarity is crime. -It is not in you, Dorian, to commit a murder. I am sorry if I hurt -your vanity by saying so, but I assure you it is true. Crime belongs -exclusively to the lower orders. I don't blame them in the smallest -degree. I should fancy that crime was to them what art is to us, -simply a method of procuring extraordinary sensations." - -"A method of procuring sensations? Do you think, then, that a man who -has once committed a murder could possibly do the same crime again? -Don't tell me that." - -"Oh! anything becomes a pleasure if one does it too often," cried Lord -Henry, laughing. "That is one of the most important secrets of life. -I should fancy, however, that murder is always a mistake. One should -never do anything that one cannot talk about after dinner. But let us -pass from poor Basil. I wish I could believe that he had come to such -a really romantic end as you suggest, but I can't. I dare say he fell -into the Seine off an omnibus and that the conductor hushed up the -scandal. Yes: I should fancy that was his end. I see him lying now -on his back under those dull-green waters, with the heavy barges -floating over him and long weeds catching in his hair. Do you know, I -don't think he would have done much more good work. During the last -ten years his painting had gone off very much." - -Dorian heaved a sigh, and Lord Henry strolled across the room and began -to stroke the head of a curious Java parrot, a large, grey-plumaged -bird with pink crest and tail, that was balancing itself upon a bamboo -perch. As his pointed fingers touched it, it dropped the white scurf -of crinkled lids over black, glasslike eyes and began to sway backwards -and forwards. - -"Yes," he continued, turning round and taking his handkerchief out of -his pocket; "his painting had quite gone off. It seemed to me to have -lost something. It had lost an ideal. When you and he ceased to be -great friends, he ceased to be a great artist. What was it separated -you? I suppose he bored you. If so, he never forgave you. It's a -habit bores have. By the way, what has become of that wonderful -portrait he did of you? I don't think I have ever seen it since he -finished it. Oh! I remember your telling me years ago that you had -sent it down to Selby, and that it had got mislaid or stolen on the -way. You never got it back? What a pity! it was really a -masterpiece. I remember I wanted to buy it. I wish I had now. It -belonged to Basil's best period. Since then, his work was that curious -mixture of bad painting and good intentions that always entitles a man -to be called a representative British artist. Did you advertise for -it? You should." - -"I forget," said Dorian. "I suppose I did. But I never really liked -it. I am sorry I sat for it. The memory of the thing is hateful to -me. Why do you talk of it? It used to remind me of those curious -lines in some play--Hamlet, I think--how do they run?-- - - "Like the painting of a sorrow, - A face without a heart." - -Yes: that is what it was like." - -Lord Henry laughed. "If a man treats life artistically, his brain is -his heart," he answered, sinking into an arm-chair. - -Dorian Gray shook his head and struck some soft chords on the piano. -"'Like the painting of a sorrow,'" he repeated, "'a face without a -heart.'" - -The elder man lay back and looked at him with half-closed eyes. "By -the way, Dorian," he said after a pause, "'what does it profit a man if -he gain the whole world and lose--how does the quotation run?--his own -soul'?" - -The music jarred, and Dorian Gray started and stared at his friend. -"Why do you ask me that, Harry?" - -"My dear fellow," said Lord Henry, elevating his eyebrows in surprise, -"I asked you because I thought you might be able to give me an answer. -That is all. I was going through the park last Sunday, and close by -the Marble Arch there stood a little crowd of shabby-looking people -listening to some vulgar street-preacher. As I passed by, I heard the -man yelling out that question to his audience. It struck me as being -rather dramatic. London is very rich in curious effects of that kind. -A wet Sunday, an uncouth Christian in a mackintosh, a ring of sickly -white faces under a broken roof of dripping umbrellas, and a wonderful -phrase flung into the air by shrill hysterical lips--it was really very -good in its way, quite a suggestion. I thought of telling the prophet -that art had a soul, but that man had not. I am afraid, however, he -would not have understood me." - -"Don't, Harry. The soul is a terrible reality. It can be bought, and -sold, and bartered away. It can be poisoned, or made perfect. There -is a soul in each one of us. I know it." - -"Do you feel quite sure of that, Dorian?" - -"Quite sure." - -"Ah! then it must be an illusion. The things one feels absolutely -certain about are never true. That is the fatality of faith, and the -lesson of romance. How grave you are! Don't be so serious. What have -you or I to do with the superstitions of our age? No: we have given -up our belief in the soul. Play me something. Play me a nocturne, -Dorian, and, as you play, tell me, in a low voice, how you have kept -your youth. You must have some secret. I am only ten years older than -you are, and I am wrinkled, and worn, and yellow. You are really -wonderful, Dorian. You have never looked more charming than you do -to-night. You remind me of the day I saw you first. You were rather -cheeky, very shy, and absolutely extraordinary. You have changed, of -course, but not in appearance. I wish you would tell me your secret. -To get back my youth I would do anything in the world, except take -exercise, get up early, or be respectable. Youth! There is nothing -like it. It's absurd to talk of the ignorance of youth. The only -people to whose opinions I listen now with any respect are people much -younger than myself. They seem in front of me. Life has revealed to -them her latest wonder. As for the aged, I always contradict the aged. -I do it on principle. If you ask them their opinion on something that -happened yesterday, they solemnly give you the opinions current in -1820, when people wore high stocks, believed in everything, and knew -absolutely nothing. How lovely that thing you are playing is! I -wonder, did Chopin write it at Majorca, with the sea weeping round the -villa and the salt spray dashing against the panes? It is marvellously -romantic. What a blessing it is that there is one art left to us that -is not imitative! Don't stop. I want music to-night. It seems to me -that you are the young Apollo and that I am Marsyas listening to you. -I have sorrows, Dorian, of my own, that even you know nothing of. The -tragedy of old age is not that one is old, but that one is young. I am -amazed sometimes at my own sincerity. Ah, Dorian, how happy you are! -What an exquisite life you have had! You have drunk deeply of -everything. You have crushed the grapes against your palate. Nothing -has been hidden from you. And it has all been to you no more than the -sound of music. It has not marred you. You are still the same." - -"I am not the same, Harry." - -"Yes, you are the same. I wonder what the rest of your life will be. -Don't spoil it by renunciations. At present you are a perfect type. -Don't make yourself incomplete. You are quite flawless now. You need -not shake your head: you know you are. Besides, Dorian, don't deceive -yourself. Life is not governed by will or intention. Life is a -question of nerves, and fibres, and slowly built-up cells in which -thought hides itself and passion has its dreams. You may fancy -yourself safe and think yourself strong. But a chance tone of colour -in a room or a morning sky, a particular perfume that you had once -loved and that brings subtle memories with it, a line from a forgotten -poem that you had come across again, a cadence from a piece of music -that you had ceased to play--I tell you, Dorian, that it is on things -like these that our lives depend. Browning writes about that -somewhere; but our own senses will imagine them for us. There are -moments when the odour of _lilas blanc_ passes suddenly across me, and I -have to live the strangest month of my life over again. I wish I could -change places with you, Dorian. The world has cried out against us -both, but it has always worshipped you. It always will worship you. -You are the type of what the age is searching for, and what it is -afraid it has found. I am so glad that you have never done anything, -never carved a statue, or painted a picture, or produced anything -outside of yourself! Life has been your art. You have set yourself to -music. Your days are your sonnets." - -Dorian rose up from the piano and passed his hand through his hair. -"Yes, life has been exquisite," he murmured, "but I am not going to -have the same life, Harry. And you must not say these extravagant -things to me. You don't know everything about me. I think that if you -did, even you would turn from me. You laugh. Don't laugh." - -"Why have you stopped playing, Dorian? Go back and give me the -nocturne over again. Look at that great, honey-coloured moon that -hangs in the dusky air. She is waiting for you to charm her, and if -you play she will come closer to the earth. You won't? Let us go to -the club, then. It has been a charming evening, and we must end it -charmingly. There is some one at White's who wants immensely to know -you--young Lord Poole, Bournemouth's eldest son. He has already copied -your neckties, and has begged me to introduce him to you. He is quite -delightful and rather reminds me of you." - -"I hope not," said Dorian with a sad look in his eyes. "But I am tired -to-night, Harry. I shan't go to the club. It is nearly eleven, and I -want to go to bed early." - -"Do stay. You have never played so well as to-night. There was -something in your touch that was wonderful. It had more expression -than I had ever heard from it before." - -"It is because I am going to be good," he answered, smiling. "I am a -little changed already." - -"You cannot change to me, Dorian," said Lord Henry. "You and I will -always be friends." - -"Yet you poisoned me with a book once. I should not forgive that. -Harry, promise me that you will never lend that book to any one. It -does harm." - -"My dear boy, you are really beginning to moralize. You will soon be -going about like the converted, and the revivalist, warning people -against all the sins of which you have grown tired. You are much too -delightful to do that. Besides, it is no use. You and I are what we -are, and will be what we will be. As for being poisoned by a book, -there is no such thing as that. Art has no influence upon action. It -annihilates the desire to act. It is superbly sterile. The books that -the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame. -That is all. But we won't discuss literature. Come round to-morrow. I -am going to ride at eleven. We might go together, and I will take you -to lunch afterwards with Lady Branksome. She is a charming woman, and -wants to consult you about some tapestries she is thinking of buying. -Mind you come. Or shall we lunch with our little duchess? She says -she never sees you now. Perhaps you are tired of Gladys? I thought -you would be. Her clever tongue gets on one's nerves. Well, in any -case, be here at eleven." - -"Must I really come, Harry?" - -"Certainly. The park is quite lovely now. I don't think there have -been such lilacs since the year I met you." - -"Very well. I shall be here at eleven," said Dorian. "Good night, -Harry." As he reached the door, he hesitated for a moment, as if he -had something more to say. Then he sighed and went out. - - - -CHAPTER 20 - -It was a lovely night, so warm that he threw his coat over his arm and -did not even put his silk scarf round his throat. As he strolled home, -smoking his cigarette, two young men in evening dress passed him. He -heard one of them whisper to the other, "That is Dorian Gray." He -remembered how pleased he used to be when he was pointed out, or stared -at, or talked about. He was tired of hearing his own name now. Half -the charm of the little village where he had been so often lately was -that no one knew who he was. He had often told the girl whom he had -lured to love him that he was poor, and she had believed him. He had -told her once that he was wicked, and she had laughed at him and -answered that wicked people were always very old and very ugly. What a -laugh she had!--just like a thrush singing. And how pretty she had -been in her cotton dresses and her large hats! She knew nothing, but -she had everything that he had lost. - -When he reached home, he found his servant waiting up for him. He sent -him to bed, and threw himself down on the sofa in the library, and -began to think over some of the things that Lord Henry had said to him. - -Was it really true that one could never change? He felt a wild longing -for the unstained purity of his boyhood--his rose-white boyhood, as -Lord Henry had once called it. He knew that he had tarnished himself, -filled his mind with corruption and given horror to his fancy; that he -had been an evil influence to others, and had experienced a terrible -joy in being so; and that of the lives that had crossed his own, it had -been the fairest and the most full of promise that he had brought to -shame. But was it all irretrievable? Was there no hope for him? - -Ah! in what a monstrous moment of pride and passion he had prayed that -the portrait should bear the burden of his days, and he keep the -unsullied splendour of eternal youth! All his failure had been due to -that. Better for him that each sin of his life had brought its sure -swift penalty along with it. There was purification in punishment. -Not "Forgive us our sins" but "Smite us for our iniquities" should be -the prayer of man to a most just God. - -The curiously carved mirror that Lord Henry had given to him, so many -years ago now, was standing on the table, and the white-limbed Cupids -laughed round it as of old. He took it up, as he had done on that -night of horror when he had first noted the change in the fatal -picture, and with wild, tear-dimmed eyes looked into its polished -shield. Once, some one who had terribly loved him had written to him a -mad letter, ending with these idolatrous words: "The world is changed -because you are made of ivory and gold. The curves of your lips -rewrite history." The phrases came back to his memory, and he repeated -them over and over to himself. Then he loathed his own beauty, and -flinging the mirror on the floor, crushed it into silver splinters -beneath his heel. It was his beauty that had ruined him, his beauty -and the youth that he had prayed for. But for those two things, his -life might have been free from stain. His beauty had been to him but a -mask, his youth but a mockery. What was youth at best? A green, an -unripe time, a time of shallow moods, and sickly thoughts. Why had he -worn its livery? Youth had spoiled him. - -It was better not to think of the past. Nothing could alter that. It -was of himself, and of his own future, that he had to think. James -Vane was hidden in a nameless grave in Selby churchyard. Alan Campbell -had shot himself one night in his laboratory, but had not revealed the -secret that he had been forced to know. The excitement, such as it -was, over Basil Hallward's disappearance would soon pass away. It was -already waning. He was perfectly safe there. Nor, indeed, was it the -death of Basil Hallward that weighed most upon his mind. It was the -living death of his own soul that troubled him. Basil had painted the -portrait that had marred his life. He could not forgive him that. It -was the portrait that had done everything. Basil had said things to -him that were unbearable, and that he had yet borne with patience. The -murder had been simply the madness of a moment. As for Alan Campbell, -his suicide had been his own act. He had chosen to do it. It was -nothing to him. - -A new life! That was what he wanted. That was what he was waiting -for. Surely he had begun it already. He had spared one innocent -thing, at any rate. He would never again tempt innocence. He would be -good. - -As he thought of Hetty Merton, he began to wonder if the portrait in -the locked room had changed. Surely it was not still so horrible as it -had been? Perhaps if his life became pure, he would be able to expel -every sign of evil passion from the face. Perhaps the signs of evil -had already gone away. He would go and look. - -He took the lamp from the table and crept upstairs. As he unbarred the -door, a smile of joy flitted across his strangely young-looking face -and lingered for a moment about his lips. Yes, he would be good, and -the hideous thing that he had hidden away would no longer be a terror -to him. He felt as if the load had been lifted from him already. - -He went in quietly, locking the door behind him, as was his custom, and -dragged the purple hanging from the portrait. A cry of pain and -indignation broke from him. He could see no change, save that in the -eyes there was a look of cunning and in the mouth the curved wrinkle of -the hypocrite. The thing was still loathsome--more loathsome, if -possible, than before--and the scarlet dew that spotted the hand seemed -brighter, and more like blood newly spilled. Then he trembled. Had it -been merely vanity that had made him do his one good deed? Or the -desire for a new sensation, as Lord Henry had hinted, with his mocking -laugh? Or that passion to act a part that sometimes makes us do things -finer than we are ourselves? Or, perhaps, all these? And why was the -red stain larger than it had been? It seemed to have crept like a -horrible disease over the wrinkled fingers. There was blood on the -painted feet, as though the thing had dripped--blood even on the hand -that had not held the knife. Confess? Did it mean that he was to -confess? To give himself up and be put to death? He laughed. He felt -that the idea was monstrous. Besides, even if he did confess, who -would believe him? There was no trace of the murdered man anywhere. -Everything belonging to him had been destroyed. He himself had burned -what had been below-stairs. The world would simply say that he was mad. -They would shut him up if he persisted in his story.... Yet it was -his duty to confess, to suffer public shame, and to make public -atonement. There was a God who called upon men to tell their sins to -earth as well as to heaven. Nothing that he could do would cleanse him -till he had told his own sin. His sin? He shrugged his shoulders. -The death of Basil Hallward seemed very little to him. He was thinking -of Hetty Merton. For it was an unjust mirror, this mirror of his soul -that he was looking at. Vanity? Curiosity? Hypocrisy? Had there -been nothing more in his renunciation than that? There had been -something more. At least he thought so. But who could tell? ... No. -There had been nothing more. Through vanity he had spared her. In -hypocrisy he had worn the mask of goodness. For curiosity's sake he -had tried the denial of self. He recognized that now. - -But this murder--was it to dog him all his life? Was he always to be -burdened by his past? Was he really to confess? Never. There was -only one bit of evidence left against him. The picture itself--that -was evidence. He would destroy it. Why had he kept it so long? Once -it had given him pleasure to watch it changing and growing old. Of -late he had felt no such pleasure. It had kept him awake at night. -When he had been away, he had been filled with terror lest other eyes -should look upon it. It had brought melancholy across his passions. -Its mere memory had marred many moments of joy. It had been like -conscience to him. Yes, it had been conscience. He would destroy it. - -He looked round and saw the knife that had stabbed Basil Hallward. He -had cleaned it many times, till there was no stain left upon it. It -was bright, and glistened. As it had killed the painter, so it would -kill the painter's work, and all that that meant. It would kill the -past, and when that was dead, he would be free. It would kill this -monstrous soul-life, and without its hideous warnings, he would be at -peace. He seized the thing, and stabbed the picture with it. - -There was a cry heard, and a crash. The cry was so horrible in its -agony that the frightened servants woke and crept out of their rooms. -Two gentlemen, who were passing in the square below, stopped and looked -up at the great house. They walked on till they met a policeman and -brought him back. The man rang the bell several times, but there was -no answer. Except for a light in one of the top windows, the house was -all dark. After a time, he went away and stood in an adjoining portico -and watched. - -"Whose house is that, Constable?" asked the elder of the two gentlemen. - -"Mr. Dorian Gray's, sir," answered the policeman. - -They looked at each other, as they walked away, and sneered. One of -them was Sir Henry Ashton's uncle. - -Inside, in the servants' part of the house, the half-clad domestics -were talking in low whispers to each other. Old Mrs. Leaf was crying -and wringing her hands. Francis was as pale as death. - -After about a quarter of an hour, he got the coachman and one of the -footmen and crept upstairs. They knocked, but there was no reply. -They called out. Everything was still. Finally, after vainly trying -to force the door, they got on the roof and dropped down on to the -balcony. The windows yielded easily--their bolts were old. - -When they entered, they found hanging upon the wall a splendid portrait -of their master as they had last seen him, in all the wonder of his -exquisite youth and beauty. Lying on the floor was a dead man, in -evening dress, with a knife in his heart. He was withered, wrinkled, -and loathsome of visage. It was not till they had examined the rings -that they recognized who it was. - - - - - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY *** - -***** This file should be named 174.txt or 174.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - https://www.gutenberg.org/1/7/174/ - -Produced by Judith Boss. HTML version by Al Haines. - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net - - -Title: The Picture of Dorian Gray - -Author: Oscar Wilde - -Release Date: June 9, 2008 [EBook #174] -[This file last updated on July 2 2011] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY *** - - - - -Produced by Judith Boss. HTML version by Al Haines. - - - - - -</pre> - - -<BR><BR> - -<H1 ALIGN="center"> -The Picture of Dorian Gray -</H1> - -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -by -</H3> - -<H2 ALIGN="center"> -Oscar Wilde -</H2> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<H2 ALIGN="center"> -CONTENTS -</H2> - -<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="100%"> -<TR> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="25%"> -<A HREF="#chap00">PREFACE</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="25%"> -<A HREF="#chap01">CHAPTER 1</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="25%"> -<A HREF="#chap02">CHAPTER 2</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="25%"> -<A HREF="#chap03">CHAPTER 3</A> -</TD> -</TR> - -<TR> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap04">CHAPTER 4</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap05">CHAPTER 5</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap06">CHAPTER 6</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap07">CHAPTER 7</A> -</TD> -</TR> - -<TR> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap08">CHAPTER 8</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap09">CHAPTER 9</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap10">CHAPTER 10</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap11">CHAPTER 11</A> -</TD> -</TR> - -<TR> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap12">CHAPTER 12</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap13">CHAPTER 13</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap14">CHAPTER 14</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap15">CHAPTER 15</A> -</TD> -</TR> - -<TR> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap16">CHAPTER 16</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap17">CHAPTER 17</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap18">CHAPTER 18</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap19">CHAPTER 19</A> -</TD> -</TR> - -<TR> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> -<A HREF="#chap20">CHAPTER 20</A> -</TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> </TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> </TD> -<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> </TD> -</TR> - -</TABLE> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap00"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -THE PREFACE -</H3> - -<P> -The artist is the creator of beautiful things. To reveal art and -conceal the artist is art's aim. The critic is he who can translate -into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful -things. -</P> - -<P> -The highest as the lowest form of criticism is a mode of autobiography. -Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without -being charming. This is a fault. -</P> - -<P> -Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the -cultivated. For these there is hope. They are the elect to whom -beautiful things mean only beauty. -</P> - -<P> -There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well -written, or badly written. That is all. -</P> - -<P> -The nineteenth century dislike of realism is the rage of Caliban seeing -his own face in a glass. -</P> - -<P> -The nineteenth century dislike of romanticism is the rage of Caliban -not seeing his own face in a glass. The moral life of man forms part -of the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality of art consists -in the perfect use of an imperfect medium. No artist desires to prove -anything. Even things that are true can be proved. No artist has -ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in an artist is an -unpardonable mannerism of style. No artist is ever morbid. The artist -can express everything. Thought and language are to the artist -instruments of an art. Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for -an art. From the point of view of form, the type of all the arts is -the art of the musician. From the point of view of feeling, the -actor's craft is the type. All art is at once surface and symbol. -Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. Those who read -the symbol do so at their peril. It is the spectator, and not life, -that art really mirrors. Diversity of opinion about a work of art -shows that the work is new, complex, and vital. When critics disagree, -the artist is in accord with himself. We can forgive a man for making -a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for -making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely. -</P> - -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -All art is quite useless.<BR> -OSCAR WILDE -</H3> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap01"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 1 -</H3> - -<P> -The studio was filled with the rich odour of roses, and when the light -summer wind stirred amidst the trees of the garden, there came through -the open door the heavy scent of the lilac, or the more delicate -perfume of the pink-flowering thorn. -</P> - -<P> -From the corner of the divan of Persian saddle-bags on which he was -lying, smoking, as was his custom, innumerable cigarettes, Lord Henry -Wotton could just catch the gleam of the honey-sweet and honey-coloured -blossoms of a laburnum, whose tremulous branches seemed hardly able to -bear the burden of a beauty so flamelike as theirs; and now and then -the fantastic shadows of birds in flight flitted across the long -tussore-silk curtains that were stretched in front of the huge window, -producing a kind of momentary Japanese effect, and making him think of -those pallid, jade-faced painters of Tokyo who, through the medium of -an art that is necessarily immobile, seek to convey the sense of -swiftness and motion. The sullen murmur of the bees shouldering their -way through the long unmown grass, or circling with monotonous -insistence round the dusty gilt horns of the straggling woodbine, -seemed to make the stillness more oppressive. The dim roar of London -was like the bourdon note of a distant organ. -</P> - -<P> -In the centre of the room, clamped to an upright easel, stood the -full-length portrait of a young man of extraordinary personal beauty, -and in front of it, some little distance away, was sitting the artist -himself, Basil Hallward, whose sudden disappearance some years ago -caused, at the time, such public excitement and gave rise to so many -strange conjectures. -</P> - -<P> -As the painter looked at the gracious and comely form he had so -skilfully mirrored in his art, a smile of pleasure passed across his -face, and seemed about to linger there. But he suddenly started up, -and closing his eyes, placed his fingers upon the lids, as though he -sought to imprison within his brain some curious dream from which he -feared he might awake. -</P> - -<P> -"It is your best work, Basil, the best thing you have ever done," said -Lord Henry languidly. "You must certainly send it next year to the -Grosvenor. The Academy is too large and too vulgar. Whenever I have -gone there, there have been either so many people that I have not been -able to see the pictures, which was dreadful, or so many pictures that -I have not been able to see the people, which was worse. The Grosvenor -is really the only place." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't think I shall send it anywhere," he answered, tossing his head -back in that odd way that used to make his friends laugh at him at -Oxford. "No, I won't send it anywhere." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry elevated his eyebrows and looked at him in amazement through -the thin blue wreaths of smoke that curled up in such fanciful whorls -from his heavy, opium-tainted cigarette. "Not send it anywhere? My -dear fellow, why? Have you any reason? What odd chaps you painters -are! You do anything in the world to gain a reputation. As soon as -you have one, you seem to want to throw it away. It is silly of you, -for there is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, -and that is not being talked about. A portrait like this would set you -far above all the young men in England, and make the old men quite -jealous, if old men are ever capable of any emotion." -</P> - -<P> -"I know you will laugh at me," he replied, "but I really can't exhibit -it. I have put too much of myself into it." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry stretched himself out on the divan and laughed. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, I knew you would; but it is quite true, all the same." -</P> - -<P> -"Too much of yourself in it! Upon my word, Basil, I didn't know you -were so vain; and I really can't see any resemblance between you, with -your rugged strong face and your coal-black hair, and this young -Adonis, who looks as if he was made out of ivory and rose-leaves. Why, -my dear Basil, he is a Narcissus, and you--well, of course you have an -intellectual expression and all that. But beauty, real beauty, ends -where an intellectual expression begins. Intellect is in itself a mode -of exaggeration, and destroys the harmony of any face. The moment one -sits down to think, one becomes all nose, or all forehead, or something -horrid. Look at the successful men in any of the learned professions. -How perfectly hideous they are! Except, of course, in the Church. But -then in the Church they don't think. A bishop keeps on saying at the -age of eighty what he was told to say when he was a boy of eighteen, -and as a natural consequence he always looks absolutely delightful. -Your mysterious young friend, whose name you have never told me, but -whose picture really fascinates me, never thinks. I feel quite sure of -that. He is some brainless beautiful creature who should be always -here in winter when we have no flowers to look at, and always here in -summer when we want something to chill our intelligence. Don't flatter -yourself, Basil: you are not in the least like him." -</P> - -<P> -"You don't understand me, Harry," answered the artist. "Of course I am -not like him. I know that perfectly well. Indeed, I should be sorry -to look like him. You shrug your shoulders? I am telling you the -truth. There is a fatality about all physical and intellectual -distinction, the sort of fatality that seems to dog through history the -faltering steps of kings. It is better not to be different from one's -fellows. The ugly and the stupid have the best of it in this world. -They can sit at their ease and gape at the play. If they know nothing -of victory, they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat. They -live as we all should live--undisturbed, indifferent, and without -disquiet. They neither bring ruin upon others, nor ever receive it -from alien hands. Your rank and wealth, Harry; my brains, such as they -are--my art, whatever it may be worth; Dorian Gray's good looks--we -shall all suffer for what the gods have given us, suffer terribly." -</P> - -<P> -"Dorian Gray? Is that his name?" asked Lord Henry, walking across the -studio towards Basil Hallward. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, that is his name. I didn't intend to tell it to you." -</P> - -<P> -"But why not?" -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, I can't explain. When I like people immensely, I never tell their -names to any one. It is like surrendering a part of them. I have -grown to love secrecy. It seems to be the one thing that can make -modern life mysterious or marvellous to us. The commonest thing is -delightful if one only hides it. When I leave town now I never tell my -people where I am going. If I did, I would lose all my pleasure. It -is a silly habit, I dare say, but somehow it seems to bring a great -deal of romance into one's life. I suppose you think me awfully -foolish about it?" -</P> - -<P> -"Not at all," answered Lord Henry, "not at all, my dear Basil. You -seem to forget that I am married, and the one charm of marriage is that -it makes a life of deception absolutely necessary for both parties. I -never know where my wife is, and my wife never knows what I am doing. -When we meet--we do meet occasionally, when we dine out together, or go -down to the Duke's--we tell each other the most absurd stories with the -most serious faces. My wife is very good at it--much better, in fact, -than I am. She never gets confused over her dates, and I always do. -But when she does find me out, she makes no row at all. I sometimes -wish she would; but she merely laughs at me." -</P> - -<P> -"I hate the way you talk about your married life, Harry," said Basil -Hallward, strolling towards the door that led into the garden. "I -believe that you are really a very good husband, but that you are -thoroughly ashamed of your own virtues. You are an extraordinary -fellow. You never say a moral thing, and you never do a wrong thing. -Your cynicism is simply a pose." -</P> - -<P> -"Being natural is simply a pose, and the most irritating pose I know," -cried Lord Henry, laughing; and the two young men went out into the -garden together and ensconced themselves on a long bamboo seat that -stood in the shade of a tall laurel bush. The sunlight slipped over -the polished leaves. In the grass, white daisies were tremulous. -</P> - -<P> -After a pause, Lord Henry pulled out his watch. "I am afraid I must be -going, Basil," he murmured, "and before I go, I insist on your -answering a question I put to you some time ago." -</P> - -<P> -"What is that?" said the painter, keeping his eyes fixed on the ground. -</P> - -<P> -"You know quite well." -</P> - -<P> -"I do not, Harry." -</P> - -<P> -"Well, I will tell you what it is. I want you to explain to me why you -won't exhibit Dorian Gray's picture. I want the real reason." -</P> - -<P> -"I told you the real reason." -</P> - -<P> -"No, you did not. You said it was because there was too much of -yourself in it. Now, that is childish." -</P> - -<P> -"Harry," said Basil Hallward, looking him straight in the face, "every -portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not -of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. It is -not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on -the coloured canvas, reveals himself. The reason I will not exhibit -this picture is that I am afraid that I have shown in it the secret of -my own soul." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry laughed. "And what is that?" he asked. -</P> - -<P> -"I will tell you," said Hallward; but an expression of perplexity came -over his face. -</P> - -<P> -"I am all expectation, Basil," continued his companion, glancing at him. -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, there is really very little to tell, Harry," answered the painter; -"and I am afraid you will hardly understand it. Perhaps you will -hardly believe it." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry smiled, and leaning down, plucked a pink-petalled daisy from -the grass and examined it. "I am quite sure I shall understand it," he -replied, gazing intently at the little golden, white-feathered disk, -"and as for believing things, I can believe anything, provided that it -is quite incredible." -</P> - -<P> -The wind shook some blossoms from the trees, and the heavy -lilac-blooms, with their clustering stars, moved to and fro in the -languid air. A grasshopper began to chirrup by the wall, and like a -blue thread a long thin dragon-fly floated past on its brown gauze -wings. Lord Henry felt as if he could hear Basil Hallward's heart -beating, and wondered what was coming. -</P> - -<P> -"The story is simply this," said the painter after some time. "Two -months ago I went to a crush at Lady Brandon's. You know we poor -artists have to show ourselves in society from time to time, just to -remind the public that we are not savages. With an evening coat and a -white tie, as you told me once, anybody, even a stock-broker, can gain -a reputation for being civilized. Well, after I had been in the room -about ten minutes, talking to huge overdressed dowagers and tedious -academicians, I suddenly became conscious that some one was looking at -me. I turned half-way round and saw Dorian Gray for the first time. -When our eyes met, I felt that I was growing pale. A curious sensation -of terror came over me. I knew that I had come face to face with some -one whose mere personality was so fascinating that, if I allowed it to -do so, it would absorb my whole nature, my whole soul, my very art -itself. I did not want any external influence in my life. You know -yourself, Harry, how independent I am by nature. I have always been my -own master; had at least always been so, till I met Dorian Gray. -Then--but I don't know how to explain it to you. Something seemed to -tell me that I was on the verge of a terrible crisis in my life. I had -a strange feeling that fate had in store for me exquisite joys and -exquisite sorrows. I grew afraid and turned to quit the room. It was -not conscience that made me do so: it was a sort of cowardice. I take -no credit to myself for trying to escape." -</P> - -<P> -"Conscience and cowardice are really the same things, Basil. -Conscience is the trade-name of the firm. That is all." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't believe that, Harry, and I don't believe you do either. -However, whatever was my motive--and it may have been pride, for I used -to be very proud--I certainly struggled to the door. There, of course, -I stumbled against Lady Brandon. 'You are not going to run away so -soon, Mr. Hallward?' she screamed out. You know her curiously shrill -voice?" -</P> - -<P> -"Yes; she is a peacock in everything but beauty," said Lord Henry, -pulling the daisy to bits with his long nervous fingers. -</P> - -<P> -"I could not get rid of her. She brought me up to royalties, and -people with stars and garters, and elderly ladies with gigantic tiaras -and parrot noses. She spoke of me as her dearest friend. I had only -met her once before, but she took it into her head to lionize me. I -believe some picture of mine had made a great success at the time, at -least had been chattered about in the penny newspapers, which is the -nineteenth-century standard of immortality. Suddenly I found myself -face to face with the young man whose personality had so strangely -stirred me. We were quite close, almost touching. Our eyes met again. -It was reckless of me, but I asked Lady Brandon to introduce me to him. -Perhaps it was not so reckless, after all. It was simply inevitable. -We would have spoken to each other without any introduction. I am sure -of that. Dorian told me so afterwards. He, too, felt that we were -destined to know each other." -</P> - -<P> -"And how did Lady Brandon describe this wonderful young man?" asked his -companion. "I know she goes in for giving a rapid precis of all her -guests. I remember her bringing me up to a truculent and red-faced old -gentleman covered all over with orders and ribbons, and hissing into my -ear, in a tragic whisper which must have been perfectly audible to -everybody in the room, the most astounding details. I simply fled. I -like to find out people for myself. But Lady Brandon treats her guests -exactly as an auctioneer treats his goods. She either explains them -entirely away, or tells one everything about them except what one wants -to know." -</P> - -<P> -"Poor Lady Brandon! You are hard on her, Harry!" said Hallward -listlessly. -</P> - -<P> -"My dear fellow, she tried to found a salon, and only succeeded in -opening a restaurant. How could I admire her? But tell me, what did -she say about Mr. Dorian Gray?" -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, something like, 'Charming boy--poor dear mother and I absolutely -inseparable. Quite forget what he does--afraid he--doesn't do -anything--oh, yes, plays the piano--or is it the violin, dear Mr. -Gray?' Neither of us could help laughing, and we became friends at -once." -</P> - -<P> -"Laughter is not at all a bad beginning for a friendship, and it is far -the best ending for one," said the young lord, plucking another daisy. -</P> - -<P> -Hallward shook his head. "You don't understand what friendship is, -Harry," he murmured--"or what enmity is, for that matter. You like -every one; that is to say, you are indifferent to every one." -</P> - -<P> -"How horribly unjust of you!" cried Lord Henry, tilting his hat back -and looking up at the little clouds that, like ravelled skeins of -glossy white silk, were drifting across the hollowed turquoise of the -summer sky. "Yes; horribly unjust of you. I make a great difference -between people. I choose my friends for their good looks, my -acquaintances for their good characters, and my enemies for their good -intellects. A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies. -I have not got one who is a fool. They are all men of some -intellectual power, and consequently they all appreciate me. Is that -very vain of me? I think it is rather vain." -</P> - -<P> -"I should think it was, Harry. But according to your category I must -be merely an acquaintance." -</P> - -<P> -"My dear old Basil, you are much more than an acquaintance." -</P> - -<P> -"And much less than a friend. A sort of brother, I suppose?" -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, brothers! I don't care for brothers. My elder brother won't die, -and my younger brothers seem never to do anything else." -</P> - -<P> -"Harry!" exclaimed Hallward, frowning. -</P> - -<P> -"My dear fellow, I am not quite serious. But I can't help detesting my -relations. I suppose it comes from the fact that none of us can stand -other people having the same faults as ourselves. I quite sympathize -with the rage of the English democracy against what they call the vices -of the upper orders. The masses feel that drunkenness, stupidity, and -immorality should be their own special property, and that if any one of -us makes an ass of himself, he is poaching on their preserves. When -poor Southwark got into the divorce court, their indignation was quite -magnificent. And yet I don't suppose that ten per cent of the -proletariat live correctly." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't agree with a single word that you have said, and, what is -more, Harry, I feel sure you don't either." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry stroked his pointed brown beard and tapped the toe of his -patent-leather boot with a tasselled ebony cane. "How English you are -Basil! That is the second time you have made that observation. If one -puts forward an idea to a true Englishman--always a rash thing to -do--he never dreams of considering whether the idea is right or wrong. -The only thing he considers of any importance is whether one believes -it oneself. Now, the value of an idea has nothing whatsoever to do -with the sincerity of the man who expresses it. Indeed, the -probabilities are that the more insincere the man is, the more purely -intellectual will the idea be, as in that case it will not be coloured -by either his wants, his desires, or his prejudices. However, I don't -propose to discuss politics, sociology, or metaphysics with you. I -like persons better than principles, and I like persons with no -principles better than anything else in the world. Tell me more about -Mr. Dorian Gray. How often do you see him?" -</P> - -<P> -"Every day. I couldn't be happy if I didn't see him every day. He is -absolutely necessary to me." -</P> - -<P> -"How extraordinary! I thought you would never care for anything but -your art." -</P> - -<P> -"He is all my art to me now," said the painter gravely. "I sometimes -think, Harry, that there are only two eras of any importance in the -world's history. The first is the appearance of a new medium for art, -and the second is the appearance of a new personality for art also. -What the invention of oil-painting was to the Venetians, the face of -Antinous was to late Greek sculpture, and the face of Dorian Gray will -some day be to me. It is not merely that I paint from him, draw from -him, sketch from him. Of course, I have done all that. But he is much -more to me than a model or a sitter. I won't tell you that I am -dissatisfied with what I have done of him, or that his beauty is such -that art cannot express it. There is nothing that art cannot express, -and I know that the work I have done, since I met Dorian Gray, is good -work, is the best work of my life. But in some curious way--I wonder -will you understand me?--his personality has suggested to me an -entirely new manner in art, an entirely new mode of style. I see -things differently, I think of them differently. I can now recreate -life in a way that was hidden from me before. 'A dream of form in days -of thought'--who is it who says that? I forget; but it is what Dorian -Gray has been to me. The merely visible presence of this lad--for he -seems to me little more than a lad, though he is really over -twenty--his merely visible presence--ah! I wonder can you realize all -that that means? Unconsciously he defines for me the lines of a fresh -school, a school that is to have in it all the passion of the romantic -spirit, all the perfection of the spirit that is Greek. The harmony of -soul and body--how much that is! We in our madness have separated the -two, and have invented a realism that is vulgar, an ideality that is -void. Harry! if you only knew what Dorian Gray is to me! You remember -that landscape of mine, for which Agnew offered me such a huge price -but which I would not part with? It is one of the best things I have -ever done. And why is it so? Because, while I was painting it, Dorian -Gray sat beside me. Some subtle influence passed from him to me, and -for the first time in my life I saw in the plain woodland the wonder I -had always looked for and always missed." -</P> - -<P> -"Basil, this is extraordinary! I must see Dorian Gray." -</P> - -<P> -Hallward got up from the seat and walked up and down the garden. After -some time he came back. "Harry," he said, "Dorian Gray is to me simply -a motive in art. You might see nothing in him. I see everything in -him. He is never more present in my work than when no image of him is -there. He is a suggestion, as I have said, of a new manner. I find -him in the curves of certain lines, in the loveliness and subtleties of -certain colours. That is all." -</P> - -<P> -"Then why won't you exhibit his portrait?" asked Lord Henry. -</P> - -<P> -"Because, without intending it, I have put into it some expression of -all this curious artistic idolatry, of which, of course, I have never -cared to speak to him. He knows nothing about it. He shall never know -anything about it. But the world might guess it, and I will not bare -my soul to their shallow prying eyes. My heart shall never be put -under their microscope. There is too much of myself in the thing, -Harry--too much of myself!" -</P> - -<P> -"Poets are not so scrupulous as you are. They know how useful passion -is for publication. Nowadays a broken heart will run to many editions." -</P> - -<P> -"I hate them for it," cried Hallward. "An artist should create -beautiful things, but should put nothing of his own life into them. We -live in an age when men treat art as if it were meant to be a form of -autobiography. We have lost the abstract sense of beauty. Some day I -will show the world what it is; and for that reason the world shall -never see my portrait of Dorian Gray." -</P> - -<P> -"I think you are wrong, Basil, but I won't argue with you. It is only -the intellectually lost who ever argue. Tell me, is Dorian Gray very -fond of you?" -</P> - -<P> -The painter considered for a few moments. "He likes me," he answered -after a pause; "I know he likes me. Of course I flatter him -dreadfully. I find a strange pleasure in saying things to him that I -know I shall be sorry for having said. As a rule, he is charming to -me, and we sit in the studio and talk of a thousand things. Now and -then, however, he is horribly thoughtless, and seems to take a real -delight in giving me pain. Then I feel, Harry, that I have given away -my whole soul to some one who treats it as if it were a flower to put -in his coat, a bit of decoration to charm his vanity, an ornament for a -summer's day." -</P> - -<P> -"Days in summer, Basil, are apt to linger," murmured Lord Henry. -"Perhaps you will tire sooner than he will. It is a sad thing to think -of, but there is no doubt that genius lasts longer than beauty. That -accounts for the fact that we all take such pains to over-educate -ourselves. In the wild struggle for existence, we want to have -something that endures, and so we fill our minds with rubbish and -facts, in the silly hope of keeping our place. The thoroughly -well-informed man--that is the modern ideal. And the mind of the -thoroughly well-informed man is a dreadful thing. It is like a -bric-a-brac shop, all monsters and dust, with everything priced above -its proper value. I think you will tire first, all the same. Some day -you will look at your friend, and he will seem to you to be a little -out of drawing, or you won't like his tone of colour, or something. -You will bitterly reproach him in your own heart, and seriously think -that he has behaved very badly to you. The next time he calls, you -will be perfectly cold and indifferent. It will be a great pity, for -it will alter you. What you have told me is quite a romance, a romance -of art one might call it, and the worst of having a romance of any kind -is that it leaves one so unromantic." -</P> - -<P> -"Harry, don't talk like that. As long as I live, the personality of -Dorian Gray will dominate me. You can't feel what I feel. You change -too often." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah, my dear Basil, that is exactly why I can feel it. Those who are -faithful know only the trivial side of love: it is the faithless who -know love's tragedies." And Lord Henry struck a light on a dainty -silver case and began to smoke a cigarette with a self-conscious and -satisfied air, as if he had summed up the world in a phrase. There was -a rustle of chirruping sparrows in the green lacquer leaves of the ivy, -and the blue cloud-shadows chased themselves across the grass like -swallows. How pleasant it was in the garden! And how delightful other -people's emotions were!--much more delightful than their ideas, it -seemed to him. One's own soul, and the passions of one's -friends--those were the fascinating things in life. He pictured to -himself with silent amusement the tedious luncheon that he had missed -by staying so long with Basil Hallward. Had he gone to his aunt's, he -would have been sure to have met Lord Goodbody there, and the whole -conversation would have been about the feeding of the poor and the -necessity for model lodging-houses. Each class would have preached the -importance of those virtues, for whose exercise there was no necessity -in their own lives. The rich would have spoken on the value of thrift, -and the idle grown eloquent over the dignity of labour. It was -charming to have escaped all that! As he thought of his aunt, an idea -seemed to strike him. He turned to Hallward and said, "My dear fellow, -I have just remembered." -</P> - -<P> -"Remembered what, Harry?" -</P> - -<P> -"Where I heard the name of Dorian Gray." -</P> - -<P> -"Where was it?" asked Hallward, with a slight frown. -</P> - -<P> -"Don't look so angry, Basil. It was at my aunt, Lady Agatha's. She -told me she had discovered a wonderful young man who was going to help -her in the East End, and that his name was Dorian Gray. I am bound to -state that she never told me he was good-looking. Women have no -appreciation of good looks; at least, good women have not. She said -that he was very earnest and had a beautiful nature. I at once -pictured to myself a creature with spectacles and lank hair, horribly -freckled, and tramping about on huge feet. I wish I had known it was -your friend." -</P> - -<P> -"I am very glad you didn't, Harry." -</P> - -<P> -"Why?" -</P> - -<P> -"I don't want you to meet him." -</P> - -<P> -"You don't want me to meet him?" -</P> - -<P> -"No." -</P> - -<P> -"Mr. Dorian Gray is in the studio, sir," said the butler, coming into -the garden. -</P> - -<P> -"You must introduce me now," cried Lord Henry, laughing. -</P> - -<P> -The painter turned to his servant, who stood blinking in the sunlight. -"Ask Mr. Gray to wait, Parker: I shall be in in a few moments." The -man bowed and went up the walk. -</P> - -<P> -Then he looked at Lord Henry. "Dorian Gray is my dearest friend," he -said. "He has a simple and a beautiful nature. Your aunt was quite -right in what she said of him. Don't spoil him. Don't try to -influence him. Your influence would be bad. The world is wide, and -has many marvellous people in it. Don't take away from me the one -person who gives to my art whatever charm it possesses: my life as an -artist depends on him. Mind, Harry, I trust you." He spoke very -slowly, and the words seemed wrung out of him almost against his will. -</P> - -<P> -"What nonsense you talk!" said Lord Henry, smiling, and taking Hallward -by the arm, he almost led him into the house. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap02"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 2 -</H3> - -<P> -As they entered they saw Dorian Gray. He was seated at the piano, with -his back to them, turning over the pages of a volume of Schumann's -"Forest Scenes." "You must lend me these, Basil," he cried. "I want -to learn them. They are perfectly charming." -</P> - -<P> -"That entirely depends on how you sit to-day, Dorian." -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, I am tired of sitting, and I don't want a life-sized portrait of -myself," answered the lad, swinging round on the music-stool in a -wilful, petulant manner. When he caught sight of Lord Henry, a faint -blush coloured his cheeks for a moment, and he started up. "I beg your -pardon, Basil, but I didn't know you had any one with you." -</P> - -<P> -"This is Lord Henry Wotton, Dorian, an old Oxford friend of mine. I -have just been telling him what a capital sitter you were, and now you -have spoiled everything." -</P> - -<P> -"You have not spoiled my pleasure in meeting you, Mr. Gray," said Lord -Henry, stepping forward and extending his hand. "My aunt has often -spoken to me about you. You are one of her favourites, and, I am -afraid, one of her victims also." -</P> - -<P> -"I am in Lady Agatha's black books at present," answered Dorian with a -funny look of penitence. "I promised to go to a club in Whitechapel -with her last Tuesday, and I really forgot all about it. We were to -have played a duet together--three duets, I believe. I don't know what -she will say to me. I am far too frightened to call." -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, I will make your peace with my aunt. She is quite devoted to you. -And I don't think it really matters about your not being there. The -audience probably thought it was a duet. When Aunt Agatha sits down to -the piano, she makes quite enough noise for two people." -</P> - -<P> -"That is very horrid to her, and not very nice to me," answered Dorian, -laughing. -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry looked at him. Yes, he was certainly wonderfully handsome, -with his finely curved scarlet lips, his frank blue eyes, his crisp -gold hair. There was something in his face that made one trust him at -once. All the candour of youth was there, as well as all youth's -passionate purity. One felt that he had kept himself unspotted from -the world. No wonder Basil Hallward worshipped him. -</P> - -<P> -"You are too charming to go in for philanthropy, Mr. Gray--far too -charming." And Lord Henry flung himself down on the divan and opened -his cigarette-case. -</P> - -<P> -The painter had been busy mixing his colours and getting his brushes -ready. He was looking worried, and when he heard Lord Henry's last -remark, he glanced at him, hesitated for a moment, and then said, -"Harry, I want to finish this picture to-day. Would you think it -awfully rude of me if I asked you to go away?" -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry smiled and looked at Dorian Gray. "Am I to go, Mr. Gray?" -he asked. -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, please don't, Lord Henry. I see that Basil is in one of his sulky -moods, and I can't bear him when he sulks. Besides, I want you to tell -me why I should not go in for philanthropy." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't know that I shall tell you that, Mr. Gray. It is so tedious a -subject that one would have to talk seriously about it. But I -certainly shall not run away, now that you have asked me to stop. You -don't really mind, Basil, do you? You have often told me that you -liked your sitters to have some one to chat to." -</P> - -<P> -Hallward bit his lip. "If Dorian wishes it, of course you must stay. -Dorian's whims are laws to everybody, except himself." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry took up his hat and gloves. "You are very pressing, Basil, -but I am afraid I must go. I have promised to meet a man at the -Orleans. Good-bye, Mr. Gray. Come and see me some afternoon in Curzon -Street. I am nearly always at home at five o'clock. Write to me when -you are coming. I should be sorry to miss you." -</P> - -<P> -"Basil," cried Dorian Gray, "if Lord Henry Wotton goes, I shall go, -too. You never open your lips while you are painting, and it is -horribly dull standing on a platform and trying to look pleasant. Ask -him to stay. I insist upon it." -</P> - -<P> -"Stay, Harry, to oblige Dorian, and to oblige me," said Hallward, -gazing intently at his picture. "It is quite true, I never talk when I -am working, and never listen either, and it must be dreadfully tedious -for my unfortunate sitters. I beg you to stay." -</P> - -<P> -"But what about my man at the Orleans?" -</P> - -<P> -The painter laughed. "I don't think there will be any difficulty about -that. Sit down again, Harry. And now, Dorian, get up on the platform, -and don't move about too much, or pay any attention to what Lord Henry -says. He has a very bad influence over all his friends, with the -single exception of myself." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray stepped up on the dais with the air of a young Greek -martyr, and made a little moue of discontent to Lord Henry, to whom he -had rather taken a fancy. He was so unlike Basil. They made a -delightful contrast. And he had such a beautiful voice. After a few -moments he said to him, "Have you really a very bad influence, Lord -Henry? As bad as Basil says?" -</P> - -<P> -"There is no such thing as a good influence, Mr. Gray. All influence -is immoral--immoral from the scientific point of view." -</P> - -<P> -"Why?" -</P> - -<P> -"Because to influence a person is to give him one's own soul. He does -not think his natural thoughts, or burn with his natural passions. His -virtues are not real to him. His sins, if there are such things as -sins, are borrowed. He becomes an echo of some one else's music, an -actor of a part that has not been written for him. The aim of life is -self-development. To realize one's nature perfectly--that is what each -of us is here for. People are afraid of themselves, nowadays. They -have forgotten the highest of all duties, the duty that one owes to -one's self. Of course, they are charitable. They feed the hungry and -clothe the beggar. But their own souls starve, and are naked. Courage -has gone out of our race. Perhaps we never really had it. The terror -of society, which is the basis of morals, the terror of God, which is -the secret of religion--these are the two things that govern us. And -yet--" -</P> - -<P> -"Just turn your head a little more to the right, Dorian, like a good -boy," said the painter, deep in his work and conscious only that a look -had come into the lad's face that he had never seen there before. -</P> - -<P> -"And yet," continued Lord Henry, in his low, musical voice, and with -that graceful wave of the hand that was always so characteristic of -him, and that he had even in his Eton days, "I believe that if one man -were to live out his life fully and completely, were to give form to -every feeling, expression to every thought, reality to every dream--I -believe that the world would gain such a fresh impulse of joy that we -would forget all the maladies of mediaevalism, and return to the -Hellenic ideal--to something finer, richer than the Hellenic ideal, it -may be. But the bravest man amongst us is afraid of himself. The -mutilation of the savage has its tragic survival in the self-denial -that mars our lives. We are punished for our refusals. Every impulse -that we strive to strangle broods in the mind and poisons us. The body -sins once, and has done with its sin, for action is a mode of -purification. Nothing remains then but the recollection of a pleasure, -or the luxury of a regret. The only way to get rid of a temptation is -to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for -the things it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its -monstrous laws have made monstrous and unlawful. It has been said that -the great events of the world take place in the brain. It is in the -brain, and the brain only, that the great sins of the world take place -also. You, Mr. Gray, you yourself, with your rose-red youth and your -rose-white boyhood, you have had passions that have made you afraid, -thoughts that have filled you with terror, day-dreams and sleeping -dreams whose mere memory might stain your cheek with shame--" -</P> - -<P> -"Stop!" faltered Dorian Gray, "stop! you bewilder me. I don't know -what to say. There is some answer to you, but I cannot find it. Don't -speak. Let me think. Or, rather, let me try not to think." -</P> - -<P> -For nearly ten minutes he stood there, motionless, with parted lips and -eyes strangely bright. He was dimly conscious that entirely fresh -influences were at work within him. Yet they seemed to him to have -come really from himself. The few words that Basil's friend had said -to him--words spoken by chance, no doubt, and with wilful paradox in -them--had touched some secret chord that had never been touched before, -but that he felt was now vibrating and throbbing to curious pulses. -</P> - -<P> -Music had stirred him like that. Music had troubled him many times. -But music was not articulate. It was not a new world, but rather -another chaos, that it created in us. Words! Mere words! How -terrible they were! How clear, and vivid, and cruel! One could not -escape from them. And yet what a subtle magic there was in them! They -seemed to be able to give a plastic form to formless things, and to -have a music of their own as sweet as that of viol or of lute. Mere -words! Was there anything so real as words? -</P> - -<P> -Yes; there had been things in his boyhood that he had not understood. -He understood them now. Life suddenly became fiery-coloured to him. -It seemed to him that he had been walking in fire. Why had he not -known it? -</P> - -<P> -With his subtle smile, Lord Henry watched him. He knew the precise -psychological moment when to say nothing. He felt intensely -interested. He was amazed at the sudden impression that his words had -produced, and, remembering a book that he had read when he was sixteen, -a book which had revealed to him much that he had not known before, he -wondered whether Dorian Gray was passing through a similar experience. -He had merely shot an arrow into the air. Had it hit the mark? How -fascinating the lad was! -</P> - -<P> -Hallward painted away with that marvellous bold touch of his, that had -the true refinement and perfect delicacy that in art, at any rate comes -only from strength. He was unconscious of the silence. -</P> - -<P> -"Basil, I am tired of standing," cried Dorian Gray suddenly. "I must -go out and sit in the garden. The air is stifling here." -</P> - -<P> -"My dear fellow, I am so sorry. When I am painting, I can't think of -anything else. But you never sat better. You were perfectly still. -And I have caught the effect I wanted--the half-parted lips and the -bright look in the eyes. I don't know what Harry has been saying to -you, but he has certainly made you have the most wonderful expression. -I suppose he has been paying you compliments. You mustn't believe a -word that he says." -</P> - -<P> -"He has certainly not been paying me compliments. Perhaps that is the -reason that I don't believe anything he has told me." -</P> - -<P> -"You know you believe it all," said Lord Henry, looking at him with his -dreamy languorous eyes. "I will go out to the garden with you. It is -horribly hot in the studio. Basil, let us have something iced to -drink, something with strawberries in it." -</P> - -<P> -"Certainly, Harry. Just touch the bell, and when Parker comes I will -tell him what you want. I have got to work up this background, so I -will join you later on. Don't keep Dorian too long. I have never been -in better form for painting than I am to-day. This is going to be my -masterpiece. It is my masterpiece as it stands." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry went out to the garden and found Dorian Gray burying his -face in the great cool lilac-blossoms, feverishly drinking in their -perfume as if it had been wine. He came close to him and put his hand -upon his shoulder. "You are quite right to do that," he murmured. -"Nothing can cure the soul but the senses, just as nothing can cure the -senses but the soul." -</P> - -<P> -The lad started and drew back. He was bareheaded, and the leaves had -tossed his rebellious curls and tangled all their gilded threads. -There was a look of fear in his eyes, such as people have when they are -suddenly awakened. His finely chiselled nostrils quivered, and some -hidden nerve shook the scarlet of his lips and left them trembling. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes," continued Lord Henry, "that is one of the great secrets of -life--to cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses by means -of the soul. You are a wonderful creation. You know more than you -think you know, just as you know less than you want to know." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray frowned and turned his head away. He could not help liking -the tall, graceful young man who was standing by him. His romantic, -olive-coloured face and worn expression interested him. There was -something in his low languid voice that was absolutely fascinating. -His cool, white, flowerlike hands, even, had a curious charm. They -moved, as he spoke, like music, and seemed to have a language of their -own. But he felt afraid of him, and ashamed of being afraid. Why had -it been left for a stranger to reveal him to himself? He had known -Basil Hallward for months, but the friendship between them had never -altered him. Suddenly there had come some one across his life who -seemed to have disclosed to him life's mystery. And, yet, what was -there to be afraid of? He was not a schoolboy or a girl. It was -absurd to be frightened. -</P> - -<P> -"Let us go and sit in the shade," said Lord Henry. "Parker has brought -out the drinks, and if you stay any longer in this glare, you will be -quite spoiled, and Basil will never paint you again. You really must -not allow yourself to become sunburnt. It would be unbecoming." -</P> - -<P> -"What can it matter?" cried Dorian Gray, laughing, as he sat down on -the seat at the end of the garden. -</P> - -<P> -"It should matter everything to you, Mr. Gray." -</P> - -<P> -"Why?" -</P> - -<P> -"Because you have the most marvellous youth, and youth is the one thing -worth having." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't feel that, Lord Henry." -</P> - -<P> -"No, you don't feel it now. Some day, when you are old and wrinkled -and ugly, when thought has seared your forehead with its lines, and -passion branded your lips with its hideous fires, you will feel it, you -will feel it terribly. Now, wherever you go, you charm the world. -Will it always be so? ... You have a wonderfully beautiful face, Mr. -Gray. Don't frown. You have. And beauty is a form of genius--is -higher, indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. It is of the -great facts of the world, like sunlight, or spring-time, or the -reflection in dark waters of that silver shell we call the moon. It -cannot be questioned. It has its divine right of sovereignty. It -makes princes of those who have it. You smile? Ah! when you have lost -it you won't smile.... People say sometimes that beauty is only -superficial. That may be so, but at least it is not so superficial as -thought is. To me, beauty is the wonder of wonders. It is only -shallow people who do not judge by appearances. The true mystery of -the world is the visible, not the invisible.... Yes, Mr. Gray, the -gods have been good to you. But what the gods give they quickly take -away. You have only a few years in which to live really, perfectly, -and fully. When your youth goes, your beauty will go with it, and then -you will suddenly discover that there are no triumphs left for you, or -have to content yourself with those mean triumphs that the memory of -your past will make more bitter than defeats. Every month as it wanes -brings you nearer to something dreadful. Time is jealous of you, and -wars against your lilies and your roses. You will become sallow, and -hollow-cheeked, and dull-eyed. You will suffer horribly.... Ah! -realize your youth while you have it. Don't squander the gold of your -days, listening to the tedious, trying to improve the hopeless failure, -or giving away your life to the ignorant, the common, and the vulgar. -These are the sickly aims, the false ideals, of our age. Live! Live -the wonderful life that is in you! Let nothing be lost upon you. Be -always searching for new sensations. Be afraid of nothing.... A new -Hedonism--that is what our century wants. You might be its visible -symbol. With your personality there is nothing you could not do. The -world belongs to you for a season.... The moment I met you I saw that -you were quite unconscious of what you really are, of what you really -might be. There was so much in you that charmed me that I felt I must -tell you something about yourself. I thought how tragic it would be if -you were wasted. For there is such a little time that your youth will -last--such a little time. The common hill-flowers wither, but they -blossom again. The laburnum will be as yellow next June as it is now. -In a month there will be purple stars on the clematis, and year after -year the green night of its leaves will hold its purple stars. But we -never get back our youth. The pulse of joy that beats in us at twenty -becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail, our senses rot. We degenerate into -hideous puppets, haunted by the memory of the passions of which we were -too much afraid, and the exquisite temptations that we had not the -courage to yield to. Youth! Youth! There is absolutely nothing in -the world but youth!" -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray listened, open-eyed and wondering. The spray of lilac fell -from his hand upon the gravel. A furry bee came and buzzed round it -for a moment. Then it began to scramble all over the oval stellated -globe of the tiny blossoms. He watched it with that strange interest -in trivial things that we try to develop when things of high import -make us afraid, or when we are stirred by some new emotion for which we -cannot find expression, or when some thought that terrifies us lays -sudden siege to the brain and calls on us to yield. After a time the -bee flew away. He saw it creeping into the stained trumpet of a Tyrian -convolvulus. The flower seemed to quiver, and then swayed gently to -and fro. -</P> - -<P> -Suddenly the painter appeared at the door of the studio and made -staccato signs for them to come in. They turned to each other and -smiled. -</P> - -<P> -"I am waiting," he cried. "Do come in. The light is quite perfect, -and you can bring your drinks." -</P> - -<P> -They rose up and sauntered down the walk together. Two green-and-white -butterflies fluttered past them, and in the pear-tree at the corner of -the garden a thrush began to sing. -</P> - -<P> -"You are glad you have met me, Mr. Gray," said Lord Henry, looking at -him. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, I am glad now. I wonder shall I always be glad?" -</P> - -<P> -"Always! That is a dreadful word. It makes me shudder when I hear it. -Women are so fond of using it. They spoil every romance by trying to -make it last for ever. It is a meaningless word, too. The only -difference between a caprice and a lifelong passion is that the caprice -lasts a little longer." -</P> - -<P> -As they entered the studio, Dorian Gray put his hand upon Lord Henry's -arm. "In that case, let our friendship be a caprice," he murmured, -flushing at his own boldness, then stepped up on the platform and -resumed his pose. -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry flung himself into a large wicker arm-chair and watched him. -The sweep and dash of the brush on the canvas made the only sound that -broke the stillness, except when, now and then, Hallward stepped back -to look at his work from a distance. In the slanting beams that -streamed through the open doorway the dust danced and was golden. The -heavy scent of the roses seemed to brood over everything. -</P> - -<P> -After about a quarter of an hour Hallward stopped painting, looked for -a long time at Dorian Gray, and then for a long time at the picture, -biting the end of one of his huge brushes and frowning. "It is quite -finished," he cried at last, and stooping down he wrote his name in -long vermilion letters on the left-hand corner of the canvas. -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry came over and examined the picture. It was certainly a -wonderful work of art, and a wonderful likeness as well. -</P> - -<P> -"My dear fellow, I congratulate you most warmly," he said. "It is the -finest portrait of modern times. Mr. Gray, come over and look at -yourself." -</P> - -<P> -The lad started, as if awakened from some dream. -</P> - -<P> -"Is it really finished?" he murmured, stepping down from the platform. -</P> - -<P> -"Quite finished," said the painter. "And you have sat splendidly -to-day. I am awfully obliged to you." -</P> - -<P> -"That is entirely due to me," broke in Lord Henry. "Isn't it, Mr. -Gray?" -</P> - -<P> -Dorian made no answer, but passed listlessly in front of his picture -and turned towards it. When he saw it he drew back, and his cheeks -flushed for a moment with pleasure. A look of joy came into his eyes, -as if he had recognized himself for the first time. He stood there -motionless and in wonder, dimly conscious that Hallward was speaking to -him, but not catching the meaning of his words. The sense of his own -beauty came on him like a revelation. He had never felt it before. -Basil Hallward's compliments had seemed to him to be merely the -charming exaggeration of friendship. He had listened to them, laughed -at them, forgotten them. They had not influenced his nature. Then had -come Lord Henry Wotton with his strange panegyric on youth, his -terrible warning of its brevity. That had stirred him at the time, and -now, as he stood gazing at the shadow of his own loveliness, the full -reality of the description flashed across him. Yes, there would be a -day when his face would be wrinkled and wizen, his eyes dim and -colourless, the grace of his figure broken and deformed. The scarlet -would pass away from his lips and the gold steal from his hair. The -life that was to make his soul would mar his body. He would become -dreadful, hideous, and uncouth. -</P> - -<P> -As he thought of it, a sharp pang of pain struck through him like a -knife and made each delicate fibre of his nature quiver. His eyes -deepened into amethyst, and across them came a mist of tears. He felt -as if a hand of ice had been laid upon his heart. -</P> - -<P> -"Don't you like it?" cried Hallward at last, stung a little by the -lad's silence, not understanding what it meant. -</P> - -<P> -"Of course he likes it," said Lord Henry. "Who wouldn't like it? It -is one of the greatest things in modern art. I will give you anything -you like to ask for it. I must have it." -</P> - -<P> -"It is not my property, Harry." -</P> - -<P> -"Whose property is it?" -</P> - -<P> -"Dorian's, of course," answered the painter. -</P> - -<P> -"He is a very lucky fellow." -</P> - -<P> -"How sad it is!" murmured Dorian Gray with his eyes still fixed upon -his own portrait. "How sad it is! I shall grow old, and horrible, and -dreadful. But this picture will remain always young. It will never be -older than this particular day of June.... If it were only the other -way! If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was -to grow old! For that--for that--I would give everything! Yes, there -is nothing in the whole world I would not give! I would give my soul -for that!" -</P> - -<P> -"You would hardly care for such an arrangement, Basil," cried Lord -Henry, laughing. "It would be rather hard lines on your work." -</P> - -<P> -"I should object very strongly, Harry," said Hallward. -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray turned and looked at him. "I believe you would, Basil. -You like your art better than your friends. I am no more to you than a -green bronze figure. Hardly as much, I dare say." -</P> - -<P> -The painter stared in amazement. It was so unlike Dorian to speak like -that. What had happened? He seemed quite angry. His face was flushed -and his cheeks burning. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes," he continued, "I am less to you than your ivory Hermes or your -silver Faun. You will like them always. How long will you like me? -Till I have my first wrinkle, I suppose. I know, now, that when one -loses one's good looks, whatever they may be, one loses everything. -Your picture has taught me that. Lord Henry Wotton is perfectly right. -Youth is the only thing worth having. When I find that I am growing -old, I shall kill myself." -</P> - -<P> -Hallward turned pale and caught his hand. "Dorian! Dorian!" he cried, -"don't talk like that. I have never had such a friend as you, and I -shall never have such another. You are not jealous of material things, -are you?--you who are finer than any of them!" -</P> - -<P> -"I am jealous of everything whose beauty does not die. I am jealous of -the portrait you have painted of me. Why should it keep what I must -lose? Every moment that passes takes something from me and gives -something to it. Oh, if it were only the other way! If the picture -could change, and I could be always what I am now! Why did you paint -it? It will mock me some day--mock me horribly!" The hot tears welled -into his eyes; he tore his hand away and, flinging himself on the -divan, he buried his face in the cushions, as though he was praying. -</P> - -<P> -"This is your doing, Harry," said the painter bitterly. -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "It is the real Dorian Gray--that -is all." -</P> - -<P> -"It is not." -</P> - -<P> -"If it is not, what have I to do with it?" -</P> - -<P> -"You should have gone away when I asked you," he muttered. -</P> - -<P> -"I stayed when you asked me," was Lord Henry's answer. -</P> - -<P> -"Harry, I can't quarrel with my two best friends at once, but between -you both you have made me hate the finest piece of work I have ever -done, and I will destroy it. What is it but canvas and colour? I will -not let it come across our three lives and mar them." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray lifted his golden head from the pillow, and with pallid -face and tear-stained eyes, looked at him as he walked over to the deal -painting-table that was set beneath the high curtained window. What -was he doing there? His fingers were straying about among the litter -of tin tubes and dry brushes, seeking for something. Yes, it was for -the long palette-knife, with its thin blade of lithe steel. He had -found it at last. He was going to rip up the canvas. -</P> - -<P> -With a stifled sob the lad leaped from the couch, and, rushing over to -Hallward, tore the knife out of his hand, and flung it to the end of -the studio. "Don't, Basil, don't!" he cried. "It would be murder!" -</P> - -<P> -"I am glad you appreciate my work at last, Dorian," said the painter -coldly when he had recovered from his surprise. "I never thought you -would." -</P> - -<P> -"Appreciate it? I am in love with it, Basil. It is part of myself. I -feel that." -</P> - -<P> -"Well, as soon as you are dry, you shall be varnished, and framed, and -sent home. Then you can do what you like with yourself." And he walked -across the room and rang the bell for tea. "You will have tea, of -course, Dorian? And so will you, Harry? Or do you object to such -simple pleasures?" -</P> - -<P> -"I adore simple pleasures," said Lord Henry. "They are the last refuge -of the complex. But I don't like scenes, except on the stage. What -absurd fellows you are, both of you! I wonder who it was defined man -as a rational animal. It was the most premature definition ever given. -Man is many things, but he is not rational. I am glad he is not, after -all--though I wish you chaps would not squabble over the picture. You -had much better let me have it, Basil. This silly boy doesn't really -want it, and I really do." -</P> - -<P> -"If you let any one have it but me, Basil, I shall never forgive you!" -cried Dorian Gray; "and I don't allow people to call me a silly boy." -</P> - -<P> -"You know the picture is yours, Dorian. I gave it to you before it -existed." -</P> - -<P> -"And you know you have been a little silly, Mr. Gray, and that you -don't really object to being reminded that you are extremely young." -</P> - -<P> -"I should have objected very strongly this morning, Lord Henry." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! this morning! You have lived since then." -</P> - -<P> -There came a knock at the door, and the butler entered with a laden -tea-tray and set it down upon a small Japanese table. There was a -rattle of cups and saucers and the hissing of a fluted Georgian urn. -Two globe-shaped china dishes were brought in by a page. Dorian Gray -went over and poured out the tea. The two men sauntered languidly to -the table and examined what was under the covers. -</P> - -<P> -"Let us go to the theatre to-night," said Lord Henry. "There is sure -to be something on, somewhere. I have promised to dine at White's, but -it is only with an old friend, so I can send him a wire to say that I -am ill, or that I am prevented from coming in consequence of a -subsequent engagement. I think that would be a rather nice excuse: it -would have all the surprise of candour." -</P> - -<P> -"It is such a bore putting on one's dress-clothes," muttered Hallward. -"And, when one has them on, they are so horrid." -</P> - -<P> -"Yes," answered Lord Henry dreamily, "the costume of the nineteenth -century is detestable. It is so sombre, so depressing. Sin is the -only real colour-element left in modern life." -</P> - -<P> -"You really must not say things like that before Dorian, Harry." -</P> - -<P> -"Before which Dorian? The one who is pouring out tea for us, or the -one in the picture?" -</P> - -<P> -"Before either." -</P> - -<P> -"I should like to come to the theatre with you, Lord Henry," said the -lad. -</P> - -<P> -"Then you shall come; and you will come, too, Basil, won't you?" -</P> - -<P> -"I can't, really. I would sooner not. I have a lot of work to do." -</P> - -<P> -"Well, then, you and I will go alone, Mr. Gray." -</P> - -<P> -"I should like that awfully." -</P> - -<P> -The painter bit his lip and walked over, cup in hand, to the picture. -"I shall stay with the real Dorian," he said, sadly. -</P> - -<P> -"Is it the real Dorian?" cried the original of the portrait, strolling -across to him. "Am I really like that?" -</P> - -<P> -"Yes; you are just like that." -</P> - -<P> -"How wonderful, Basil!" -</P> - -<P> -"At least you are like it in appearance. But it will never alter," -sighed Hallward. "That is something." -</P> - -<P> -"What a fuss people make about fidelity!" exclaimed Lord Henry. "Why, -even in love it is purely a question for physiology. It has nothing to -do with our own will. Young men want to be faithful, and are not; old -men want to be faithless, and cannot: that is all one can say." -</P> - -<P> -"Don't go to the theatre to-night, Dorian," said Hallward. "Stop and -dine with me." -</P> - -<P> -"I can't, Basil." -</P> - -<P> -"Why?" -</P> - -<P> -"Because I have promised Lord Henry Wotton to go with him." -</P> - -<P> -"He won't like you the better for keeping your promises. He always -breaks his own. I beg you not to go." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray laughed and shook his head. -</P> - -<P> -"I entreat you." -</P> - -<P> -The lad hesitated, and looked over at Lord Henry, who was watching them -from the tea-table with an amused smile. -</P> - -<P> -"I must go, Basil," he answered. -</P> - -<P> -"Very well," said Hallward, and he went over and laid down his cup on -the tray. "It is rather late, and, as you have to dress, you had -better lose no time. Good-bye, Harry. Good-bye, Dorian. Come and see -me soon. Come to-morrow." -</P> - -<P> -"Certainly." -</P> - -<P> -"You won't forget?" -</P> - -<P> -"No, of course not," cried Dorian. -</P> - -<P> -"And ... Harry!" -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, Basil?" -</P> - -<P> -"Remember what I asked you, when we were in the garden this morning." -</P> - -<P> -"I have forgotten it." -</P> - -<P> -"I trust you." -</P> - -<P> -"I wish I could trust myself," said Lord Henry, laughing. "Come, Mr. -Gray, my hansom is outside, and I can drop you at your own place. -Good-bye, Basil. It has been a most interesting afternoon." -</P> - -<P> -As the door closed behind them, the painter flung himself down on a -sofa, and a look of pain came into his face. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap03"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 3 -</H3> - -<P> -At half-past twelve next day Lord Henry Wotton strolled from Curzon -Street over to the Albany to call on his uncle, Lord Fermor, a genial -if somewhat rough-mannered old bachelor, whom the outside world called -selfish because it derived no particular benefit from him, but who was -considered generous by Society as he fed the people who amused him. -His father had been our ambassador at Madrid when Isabella was young -and Prim unthought of, but had retired from the diplomatic service in a -capricious moment of annoyance on not being offered the Embassy at -Paris, a post to which he considered that he was fully entitled by -reason of his birth, his indolence, the good English of his dispatches, -and his inordinate passion for pleasure. The son, who had been his -father's secretary, had resigned along with his chief, somewhat -foolishly as was thought at the time, and on succeeding some months -later to the title, had set himself to the serious study of the great -aristocratic art of doing absolutely nothing. He had two large town -houses, but preferred to live in chambers as it was less trouble, and -took most of his meals at his club. He paid some attention to the -management of his collieries in the Midland counties, excusing himself -for this taint of industry on the ground that the one advantage of -having coal was that it enabled a gentleman to afford the decency of -burning wood on his own hearth. In politics he was a Tory, except when -the Tories were in office, during which period he roundly abused them -for being a pack of Radicals. He was a hero to his valet, who bullied -him, and a terror to most of his relations, whom he bullied in turn. -Only England could have produced him, and he always said that the -country was going to the dogs. His principles were out of date, but -there was a good deal to be said for his prejudices. -</P> - -<P> -When Lord Henry entered the room, he found his uncle sitting in a rough -shooting-coat, smoking a cheroot and grumbling over The Times. "Well, -Harry," said the old gentleman, "what brings you out so early? I -thought you dandies never got up till two, and were not visible till -five." -</P> - -<P> -"Pure family affection, I assure you, Uncle George. I want to get -something out of you." -</P> - -<P> -"Money, I suppose," said Lord Fermor, making a wry face. "Well, sit -down and tell me all about it. Young people, nowadays, imagine that -money is everything." -</P> - -<P> -"Yes," murmured Lord Henry, settling his button-hole in his coat; "and -when they grow older they know it. But I don't want money. It is only -people who pay their bills who want that, Uncle George, and I never pay -mine. Credit is the capital of a younger son, and one lives charmingly -upon it. Besides, I always deal with Dartmoor's tradesmen, and -consequently they never bother me. What I want is information: not -useful information, of course; useless information." -</P> - -<P> -"Well, I can tell you anything that is in an English Blue Book, Harry, -although those fellows nowadays write a lot of nonsense. When I was in -the Diplomatic, things were much better. But I hear they let them in -now by examination. What can you expect? Examinations, sir, are pure -humbug from beginning to end. If a man is a gentleman, he knows quite -enough, and if he is not a gentleman, whatever he knows is bad for him." -</P> - -<P> -"Mr. Dorian Gray does not belong to Blue Books, Uncle George," said -Lord Henry languidly. -</P> - -<P> -"Mr. Dorian Gray? Who is he?" asked Lord Fermor, knitting his bushy -white eyebrows. -</P> - -<P> -"That is what I have come to learn, Uncle George. Or rather, I know -who he is. He is the last Lord Kelso's grandson. His mother was a -Devereux, Lady Margaret Devereux. I want you to tell me about his -mother. What was she like? Whom did she marry? You have known nearly -everybody in your time, so you might have known her. I am very much -interested in Mr. Gray at present. I have only just met him." -</P> - -<P> -"Kelso's grandson!" echoed the old gentleman. "Kelso's grandson! ... -Of course.... I knew his mother intimately. I believe I was at her -christening. She was an extraordinarily beautiful girl, Margaret -Devereux, and made all the men frantic by running away with a penniless -young fellow--a mere nobody, sir, a subaltern in a foot regiment, or -something of that kind. Certainly. I remember the whole thing as if -it happened yesterday. The poor chap was killed in a duel at Spa a few -months after the marriage. There was an ugly story about it. They -said Kelso got some rascally adventurer, some Belgian brute, to insult -his son-in-law in public--paid him, sir, to do it, paid him--and that -the fellow spitted his man as if he had been a pigeon. The thing was -hushed up, but, egad, Kelso ate his chop alone at the club for some -time afterwards. He brought his daughter back with him, I was told, -and she never spoke to him again. Oh, yes; it was a bad business. The -girl died, too, died within a year. So she left a son, did she? I had -forgotten that. What sort of boy is he? If he is like his mother, he -must be a good-looking chap." -</P> - -<P> -"He is very good-looking," assented Lord Henry. -</P> - -<P> -"I hope he will fall into proper hands," continued the old man. "He -should have a pot of money waiting for him if Kelso did the right thing -by him. His mother had money, too. All the Selby property came to -her, through her grandfather. Her grandfather hated Kelso, thought him -a mean dog. He was, too. Came to Madrid once when I was there. Egad, -I was ashamed of him. The Queen used to ask me about the English noble -who was always quarrelling with the cabmen about their fares. They -made quite a story of it. I didn't dare show my face at Court for a -month. I hope he treated his grandson better than he did the jarvies." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't know," answered Lord Henry. "I fancy that the boy will be -well off. He is not of age yet. He has Selby, I know. He told me so. -And ... his mother was very beautiful?" -</P> - -<P> -"Margaret Devereux was one of the loveliest creatures I ever saw, -Harry. What on earth induced her to behave as she did, I never could -understand. She could have married anybody she chose. Carlington was -mad after her. She was romantic, though. All the women of that family -were. The men were a poor lot, but, egad! the women were wonderful. -Carlington went on his knees to her. Told me so himself. She laughed -at him, and there wasn't a girl in London at the time who wasn't after -him. And by the way, Harry, talking about silly marriages, what is -this humbug your father tells me about Dartmoor wanting to marry an -American? Ain't English girls good enough for him?" -</P> - -<P> -"It is rather fashionable to marry Americans just now, Uncle George." -</P> - -<P> -"I'll back English women against the world, Harry," said Lord Fermor, -striking the table with his fist. -</P> - -<P> -"The betting is on the Americans." -</P> - -<P> -"They don't last, I am told," muttered his uncle. -</P> - -<P> -"A long engagement exhausts them, but they are capital at a -steeplechase. They take things flying. I don't think Dartmoor has a -chance." -</P> - -<P> -"Who are her people?" grumbled the old gentleman. "Has she got any?" -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry shook his head. "American girls are as clever at concealing -their parents, as English women are at concealing their past," he said, -rising to go. -</P> - -<P> -"They are pork-packers, I suppose?" -</P> - -<P> -"I hope so, Uncle George, for Dartmoor's sake. I am told that -pork-packing is the most lucrative profession in America, after -politics." -</P> - -<P> -"Is she pretty?" -</P> - -<P> -"She behaves as if she was beautiful. Most American women do. It is -the secret of their charm." -</P> - -<P> -"Why can't these American women stay in their own country? They are -always telling us that it is the paradise for women." -</P> - -<P> -"It is. That is the reason why, like Eve, they are so excessively -anxious to get out of it," said Lord Henry. "Good-bye, Uncle George. -I shall be late for lunch, if I stop any longer. Thanks for giving me -the information I wanted. I always like to know everything about my -new friends, and nothing about my old ones." -</P> - -<P> -"Where are you lunching, Harry?" -</P> - -<P> -"At Aunt Agatha's. I have asked myself and Mr. Gray. He is her latest -protege." -</P> - -<P> -"Humph! tell your Aunt Agatha, Harry, not to bother me any more with -her charity appeals. I am sick of them. Why, the good woman thinks -that I have nothing to do but to write cheques for her silly fads." -</P> - -<P> -"All right, Uncle George, I'll tell her, but it won't have any effect. -Philanthropic people lose all sense of humanity. It is their -distinguishing characteristic." -</P> - -<P> -The old gentleman growled approvingly and rang the bell for his -servant. Lord Henry passed up the low arcade into Burlington Street -and turned his steps in the direction of Berkeley Square. -</P> - -<P> -So that was the story of Dorian Gray's parentage. Crudely as it had -been told to him, it had yet stirred him by its suggestion of a -strange, almost modern romance. A beautiful woman risking everything -for a mad passion. A few wild weeks of happiness cut short by a -hideous, treacherous crime. Months of voiceless agony, and then a -child born in pain. The mother snatched away by death, the boy left to -solitude and the tyranny of an old and loveless man. Yes; it was an -interesting background. It posed the lad, made him more perfect, as it -were. Behind every exquisite thing that existed, there was something -tragic. Worlds had to be in travail, that the meanest flower might -blow.... And how charming he had been at dinner the night before, as -with startled eyes and lips parted in frightened pleasure he had sat -opposite to him at the club, the red candleshades staining to a richer -rose the wakening wonder of his face. Talking to him was like playing -upon an exquisite violin. He answered to every touch and thrill of the -bow.... There was something terribly enthralling in the exercise of -influence. No other activity was like it. To project one's soul into -some gracious form, and let it tarry there for a moment; to hear one's -own intellectual views echoed back to one with all the added music of -passion and youth; to convey one's temperament into another as though -it were a subtle fluid or a strange perfume: there was a real joy in -that--perhaps the most satisfying joy left to us in an age so limited -and vulgar as our own, an age grossly carnal in its pleasures, and -grossly common in its aims.... He was a marvellous type, too, this lad, -whom by so curious a chance he had met in Basil's studio, or could be -fashioned into a marvellous type, at any rate. Grace was his, and the -white purity of boyhood, and beauty such as old Greek marbles kept for -us. There was nothing that one could not do with him. He could be -made a Titan or a toy. What a pity it was that such beauty was -destined to fade! ... And Basil? From a psychological point of view, -how interesting he was! The new manner in art, the fresh mode of -looking at life, suggested so strangely by the merely visible presence -of one who was unconscious of it all; the silent spirit that dwelt in -dim woodland, and walked unseen in open field, suddenly showing -herself, Dryadlike and not afraid, because in his soul who sought for -her there had been wakened that wonderful vision to which alone are -wonderful things revealed; the mere shapes and patterns of things -becoming, as it were, refined, and gaining a kind of symbolical value, -as though they were themselves patterns of some other and more perfect -form whose shadow they made real: how strange it all was! He -remembered something like it in history. Was it not Plato, that artist -in thought, who had first analyzed it? Was it not Buonarotti who had -carved it in the coloured marbles of a sonnet-sequence? But in our own -century it was strange.... Yes; he would try to be to Dorian Gray -what, without knowing it, the lad was to the painter who had fashioned -the wonderful portrait. He would seek to dominate him--had already, -indeed, half done so. He would make that wonderful spirit his own. -There was something fascinating in this son of love and death. -</P> - -<P> -Suddenly he stopped and glanced up at the houses. He found that he had -passed his aunt's some distance, and, smiling to himself, turned back. -When he entered the somewhat sombre hall, the butler told him that they -had gone in to lunch. He gave one of the footmen his hat and stick and -passed into the dining-room. -</P> - -<P> -"Late as usual, Harry," cried his aunt, shaking her head at him. -</P> - -<P> -He invented a facile excuse, and having taken the vacant seat next to -her, looked round to see who was there. Dorian bowed to him shyly from -the end of the table, a flush of pleasure stealing into his cheek. -Opposite was the Duchess of Harley, a lady of admirable good-nature and -good temper, much liked by every one who knew her, and of those ample -architectural proportions that in women who are not duchesses are -described by contemporary historians as stoutness. Next to her sat, on -her right, Sir Thomas Burdon, a Radical member of Parliament, who -followed his leader in public life and in private life followed the -best cooks, dining with the Tories and thinking with the Liberals, in -accordance with a wise and well-known rule. The post on her left was -occupied by Mr. Erskine of Treadley, an old gentleman of considerable -charm and culture, who had fallen, however, into bad habits of silence, -having, as he explained once to Lady Agatha, said everything that he -had to say before he was thirty. His own neighbour was Mrs. Vandeleur, -one of his aunt's oldest friends, a perfect saint amongst women, but so -dreadfully dowdy that she reminded one of a badly bound hymn-book. -Fortunately for him she had on the other side Lord Faudel, a most -intelligent middle-aged mediocrity, as bald as a ministerial statement -in the House of Commons, with whom she was conversing in that intensely -earnest manner which is the one unpardonable error, as he remarked once -himself, that all really good people fall into, and from which none of -them ever quite escape. -</P> - -<P> -"We are talking about poor Dartmoor, Lord Henry," cried the duchess, -nodding pleasantly to him across the table. "Do you think he will -really marry this fascinating young person?" -</P> - -<P> -"I believe she has made up her mind to propose to him, Duchess." -</P> - -<P> -"How dreadful!" exclaimed Lady Agatha. "Really, some one should -interfere." -</P> - -<P> -"I am told, on excellent authority, that her father keeps an American -dry-goods store," said Sir Thomas Burdon, looking supercilious. -</P> - -<P> -"My uncle has already suggested pork-packing, Sir Thomas." -</P> - -<P> -"Dry-goods! What are American dry-goods?" asked the duchess, raising -her large hands in wonder and accentuating the verb. -</P> - -<P> -"American novels," answered Lord Henry, helping himself to some quail. -</P> - -<P> -The duchess looked puzzled. -</P> - -<P> -"Don't mind him, my dear," whispered Lady Agatha. "He never means -anything that he says." -</P> - -<P> -"When America was discovered," said the Radical member--and he began to -give some wearisome facts. Like all people who try to exhaust a -subject, he exhausted his listeners. The duchess sighed and exercised -her privilege of interruption. "I wish to goodness it never had been -discovered at all!" she exclaimed. "Really, our girls have no chance -nowadays. It is most unfair." -</P> - -<P> -"Perhaps, after all, America never has been discovered," said Mr. -Erskine; "I myself would say that it had merely been detected." -</P> - -<P> -"Oh! but I have seen specimens of the inhabitants," answered the -duchess vaguely. "I must confess that most of them are extremely -pretty. And they dress well, too. They get all their dresses in -Paris. I wish I could afford to do the same." -</P> - -<P> -"They say that when good Americans die they go to Paris," chuckled Sir -Thomas, who had a large wardrobe of Humour's cast-off clothes. -</P> - -<P> -"Really! And where do bad Americans go to when they die?" inquired the -duchess. -</P> - -<P> -"They go to America," murmured Lord Henry. -</P> - -<P> -Sir Thomas frowned. "I am afraid that your nephew is prejudiced -against that great country," he said to Lady Agatha. "I have travelled -all over it in cars provided by the directors, who, in such matters, -are extremely civil. I assure you that it is an education to visit it." -</P> - -<P> -"But must we really see Chicago in order to be educated?" asked Mr. -Erskine plaintively. "I don't feel up to the journey." -</P> - -<P> -Sir Thomas waved his hand. "Mr. Erskine of Treadley has the world on -his shelves. We practical men like to see things, not to read about -them. The Americans are an extremely interesting people. They are -absolutely reasonable. I think that is their distinguishing -characteristic. Yes, Mr. Erskine, an absolutely reasonable people. I -assure you there is no nonsense about the Americans." -</P> - -<P> -"How dreadful!" cried Lord Henry. "I can stand brute force, but brute -reason is quite unbearable. There is something unfair about its use. -It is hitting below the intellect." -</P> - -<P> -"I do not understand you," said Sir Thomas, growing rather red. -</P> - -<P> -"I do, Lord Henry," murmured Mr. Erskine, with a smile. -</P> - -<P> -"Paradoxes are all very well in their way...." rejoined the baronet. -</P> - -<P> -"Was that a paradox?" asked Mr. Erskine. "I did not think so. Perhaps -it was. Well, the way of paradoxes is the way of truth. To test -reality we must see it on the tight rope. When the verities become -acrobats, we can judge them." -</P> - -<P> -"Dear me!" said Lady Agatha, "how you men argue! I am sure I never can -make out what you are talking about. Oh! Harry, I am quite vexed with -you. Why do you try to persuade our nice Mr. Dorian Gray to give up -the East End? I assure you he would be quite invaluable. They would -love his playing." -</P> - -<P> -"I want him to play to me," cried Lord Henry, smiling, and he looked -down the table and caught a bright answering glance. -</P> - -<P> -"But they are so unhappy in Whitechapel," continued Lady Agatha. -</P> - -<P> -"I can sympathize with everything except suffering," said Lord Henry, -shrugging his shoulders. "I cannot sympathize with that. It is too -ugly, too horrible, too distressing. There is something terribly -morbid in the modern sympathy with pain. One should sympathize with -the colour, the beauty, the joy of life. The less said about life's -sores, the better." -</P> - -<P> -"Still, the East End is a very important problem," remarked Sir Thomas -with a grave shake of the head. -</P> - -<P> -"Quite so," answered the young lord. "It is the problem of slavery, -and we try to solve it by amusing the slaves." -</P> - -<P> -The politician looked at him keenly. "What change do you propose, -then?" he asked. -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry laughed. "I don't desire to change anything in England -except the weather," he answered. "I am quite content with philosophic -contemplation. But, as the nineteenth century has gone bankrupt -through an over-expenditure of sympathy, I would suggest that we should -appeal to science to put us straight. The advantage of the emotions is -that they lead us astray, and the advantage of science is that it is -not emotional." -</P> - -<P> -"But we have such grave responsibilities," ventured Mrs. Vandeleur -timidly. -</P> - -<P> -"Terribly grave," echoed Lady Agatha. -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry looked over at Mr. Erskine. "Humanity takes itself too -seriously. It is the world's original sin. If the caveman had known -how to laugh, history would have been different." -</P> - -<P> -"You are really very comforting," warbled the duchess. "I have always -felt rather guilty when I came to see your dear aunt, for I take no -interest at all in the East End. For the future I shall be able to -look her in the face without a blush." -</P> - -<P> -"A blush is very becoming, Duchess," remarked Lord Henry. -</P> - -<P> -"Only when one is young," she answered. "When an old woman like myself -blushes, it is a very bad sign. Ah! Lord Henry, I wish you would tell -me how to become young again." -</P> - -<P> -He thought for a moment. "Can you remember any great error that you -committed in your early days, Duchess?" he asked, looking at her across -the table. -</P> - -<P> -"A great many, I fear," she cried. -</P> - -<P> -"Then commit them over again," he said gravely. "To get back one's -youth, one has merely to repeat one's follies." -</P> - -<P> -"A delightful theory!" she exclaimed. "I must put it into practice." -</P> - -<P> -"A dangerous theory!" came from Sir Thomas's tight lips. Lady Agatha -shook her head, but could not help being amused. Mr. Erskine listened. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes," he continued, "that is one of the great secrets of life. -Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and -discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are -one's mistakes." -</P> - -<P> -A laugh ran round the table. -</P> - -<P> -He played with the idea and grew wilful; tossed it into the air and -transformed it; let it escape and recaptured it; made it iridescent -with fancy and winged it with paradox. The praise of folly, as he went -on, soared into a philosophy, and philosophy herself became young, and -catching the mad music of pleasure, wearing, one might fancy, her -wine-stained robe and wreath of ivy, danced like a Bacchante over the -hills of life, and mocked the slow Silenus for being sober. Facts fled -before her like frightened forest things. Her white feet trod the huge -press at which wise Omar sits, till the seething grape-juice rose round -her bare limbs in waves of purple bubbles, or crawled in red foam over -the vat's black, dripping, sloping sides. It was an extraordinary -improvisation. He felt that the eyes of Dorian Gray were fixed on him, -and the consciousness that amongst his audience there was one whose -temperament he wished to fascinate seemed to give his wit keenness and -to lend colour to his imagination. He was brilliant, fantastic, -irresponsible. He charmed his listeners out of themselves, and they -followed his pipe, laughing. Dorian Gray never took his gaze off him, -but sat like one under a spell, smiles chasing each other over his lips -and wonder growing grave in his darkening eyes. -</P> - -<P> -At last, liveried in the costume of the age, reality entered the room -in the shape of a servant to tell the duchess that her carriage was -waiting. She wrung her hands in mock despair. "How annoying!" she -cried. "I must go. I have to call for my husband at the club, to take -him to some absurd meeting at Willis's Rooms, where he is going to be -in the chair. If I am late he is sure to be furious, and I couldn't -have a scene in this bonnet. It is far too fragile. A harsh word -would ruin it. No, I must go, dear Agatha. Good-bye, Lord Henry, you -are quite delightful and dreadfully demoralizing. I am sure I don't -know what to say about your views. You must come and dine with us some -night. Tuesday? Are you disengaged Tuesday?" -</P> - -<P> -"For you I would throw over anybody, Duchess," said Lord Henry with a -bow. -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! that is very nice, and very wrong of you," she cried; "so mind you -come"; and she swept out of the room, followed by Lady Agatha and the -other ladies. -</P> - -<P> -When Lord Henry had sat down again, Mr. Erskine moved round, and taking -a chair close to him, placed his hand upon his arm. -</P> - -<P> -"You talk books away," he said; "why don't you write one?" -</P> - -<P> -"I am too fond of reading books to care to write them, Mr. Erskine. I -should like to write a novel certainly, a novel that would be as lovely -as a Persian carpet and as unreal. But there is no literary public in -England for anything except newspapers, primers, and encyclopaedias. -Of all people in the world the English have the least sense of the -beauty of literature." -</P> - -<P> -"I fear you are right," answered Mr. Erskine. "I myself used to have -literary ambitions, but I gave them up long ago. And now, my dear -young friend, if you will allow me to call you so, may I ask if you -really meant all that you said to us at lunch?" -</P> - -<P> -"I quite forget what I said," smiled Lord Henry. "Was it all very bad?" -</P> - -<P> -"Very bad indeed. In fact I consider you extremely dangerous, and if -anything happens to our good duchess, we shall all look on you as being -primarily responsible. But I should like to talk to you about life. -The generation into which I was born was tedious. Some day, when you -are tired of London, come down to Treadley and expound to me your -philosophy of pleasure over some admirable Burgundy I am fortunate -enough to possess." -</P> - -<P> -"I shall be charmed. A visit to Treadley would be a great privilege. -It has a perfect host, and a perfect library." -</P> - -<P> -"You will complete it," answered the old gentleman with a courteous -bow. "And now I must bid good-bye to your excellent aunt. I am due at -the Athenaeum. It is the hour when we sleep there." -</P> - -<P> -"All of you, Mr. Erskine?" -</P> - -<P> -"Forty of us, in forty arm-chairs. We are practising for an English -Academy of Letters." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry laughed and rose. "I am going to the park," he cried. -</P> - -<P> -As he was passing out of the door, Dorian Gray touched him on the arm. -"Let me come with you," he murmured. -</P> - -<P> -"But I thought you had promised Basil Hallward to go and see him," -answered Lord Henry. -</P> - -<P> -"I would sooner come with you; yes, I feel I must come with you. Do -let me. And you will promise to talk to me all the time? No one talks -so wonderfully as you do." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! I have talked quite enough for to-day," said Lord Henry, smiling. -"All I want now is to look at life. You may come and look at it with -me, if you care to." -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap04"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 4 -</H3> - -<P> -One afternoon, a month later, Dorian Gray was reclining in a luxurious -arm-chair, in the little library of Lord Henry's house in Mayfair. It -was, in its way, a very charming room, with its high panelled -wainscoting of olive-stained oak, its cream-coloured frieze and ceiling -of raised plasterwork, and its brickdust felt carpet strewn with silk, -long-fringed Persian rugs. On a tiny satinwood table stood a statuette -by Clodion, and beside it lay a copy of Les Cent Nouvelles, bound for -Margaret of Valois by Clovis Eve and powdered with the gilt daisies -that Queen had selected for her device. Some large blue china jars and -parrot-tulips were ranged on the mantelshelf, and through the small -leaded panes of the window streamed the apricot-coloured light of a -summer day in London. -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry had not yet come in. He was always late on principle, his -principle being that punctuality is the thief of time. So the lad was -looking rather sulky, as with listless fingers he turned over the pages -of an elaborately illustrated edition of Manon Lescaut that he had -found in one of the book-cases. The formal monotonous ticking of the -Louis Quatorze clock annoyed him. Once or twice he thought of going -away. -</P> - -<P> -At last he heard a step outside, and the door opened. "How late you -are, Harry!" he murmured. -</P> - -<P> -"I am afraid it is not Harry, Mr. Gray," answered a shrill voice. -</P> - -<P> -He glanced quickly round and rose to his feet. "I beg your pardon. I -thought--" -</P> - -<P> -"You thought it was my husband. It is only his wife. You must let me -introduce myself. I know you quite well by your photographs. I think -my husband has got seventeen of them." -</P> - -<P> -"Not seventeen, Lady Henry?" -</P> - -<P> -"Well, eighteen, then. And I saw you with him the other night at the -opera." She laughed nervously as she spoke, and watched him with her -vague forget-me-not eyes. She was a curious woman, whose dresses -always looked as if they had been designed in a rage and put on in a -tempest. She was usually in love with somebody, and, as her passion -was never returned, she had kept all her illusions. She tried to look -picturesque, but only succeeded in being untidy. Her name was -Victoria, and she had a perfect mania for going to church. -</P> - -<P> -"That was at Lohengrin, Lady Henry, I think?" -</P> - -<P> -"Yes; it was at dear Lohengrin. I like Wagner's music better than -anybody's. It is so loud that one can talk the whole time without other -people hearing what one says. That is a great advantage, don't you -think so, Mr. Gray?" -</P> - -<P> -The same nervous staccato laugh broke from her thin lips, and her -fingers began to play with a long tortoise-shell paper-knife. -</P> - -<P> -Dorian smiled and shook his head: "I am afraid I don't think so, Lady -Henry. I never talk during music--at least, during good music. If one -hears bad music, it is one's duty to drown it in conversation." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! that is one of Harry's views, isn't it, Mr. Gray? I always hear -Harry's views from his friends. It is the only way I get to know of -them. But you must not think I don't like good music. I adore it, but -I am afraid of it. It makes me too romantic. I have simply worshipped -pianists--two at a time, sometimes, Harry tells me. I don't know what -it is about them. Perhaps it is that they are foreigners. They all -are, ain't they? Even those that are born in England become foreigners -after a time, don't they? It is so clever of them, and such a -compliment to art. Makes it quite cosmopolitan, doesn't it? You have -never been to any of my parties, have you, Mr. Gray? You must come. I -can't afford orchids, but I spare no expense in foreigners. They make -one's rooms look so picturesque. But here is Harry! Harry, I came in -to look for you, to ask you something--I forget what it was--and I -found Mr. Gray here. We have had such a pleasant chat about music. We -have quite the same ideas. No; I think our ideas are quite different. -But he has been most pleasant. I am so glad I've seen him." -</P> - -<P> -"I am charmed, my love, quite charmed," said Lord Henry, elevating his -dark, crescent-shaped eyebrows and looking at them both with an amused -smile. "So sorry I am late, Dorian. I went to look after a piece of -old brocade in Wardour Street and had to bargain for hours for it. -Nowadays people know the price of everything and the value of nothing." -</P> - -<P> -"I am afraid I must be going," exclaimed Lady Henry, breaking an -awkward silence with her silly sudden laugh. "I have promised to drive -with the duchess. Good-bye, Mr. Gray. Good-bye, Harry. You are -dining out, I suppose? So am I. Perhaps I shall see you at Lady -Thornbury's." -</P> - -<P> -"I dare say, my dear," said Lord Henry, shutting the door behind her -as, looking like a bird of paradise that had been out all night in the -rain, she flitted out of the room, leaving a faint odour of -frangipanni. Then he lit a cigarette and flung himself down on the -sofa. -</P> - -<P> -"Never marry a woman with straw-coloured hair, Dorian," he said after a -few puffs. -</P> - -<P> -"Why, Harry?" -</P> - -<P> -"Because they are so sentimental." -</P> - -<P> -"But I like sentimental people." -</P> - -<P> -"Never marry at all, Dorian. Men marry because they are tired; women, -because they are curious: both are disappointed." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't think I am likely to marry, Harry. I am too much in love. -That is one of your aphorisms. I am putting it into practice, as I do -everything that you say." -</P> - -<P> -"Who are you in love with?" asked Lord Henry after a pause. -</P> - -<P> -"With an actress," said Dorian Gray, blushing. -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "That is a rather commonplace -debut." -</P> - -<P> -"You would not say so if you saw her, Harry." -</P> - -<P> -"Who is she?" -</P> - -<P> -"Her name is Sibyl Vane." -</P> - -<P> -"Never heard of her." -</P> - -<P> -"No one has. People will some day, however. She is a genius." -</P> - -<P> -"My dear boy, no woman is a genius. Women are a decorative sex. They -never have anything to say, but they say it charmingly. Women -represent the triumph of matter over mind, just as men represent the -triumph of mind over morals." -</P> - -<P> -"Harry, how can you?" -</P> - -<P> -"My dear Dorian, it is quite true. I am analysing women at present, so -I ought to know. The subject is not so abstruse as I thought it was. -I find that, ultimately, there are only two kinds of women, the plain -and the coloured. The plain women are very useful. If you want to -gain a reputation for respectability, you have merely to take them down -to supper. The other women are very charming. They commit one -mistake, however. They paint in order to try and look young. Our -grandmothers painted in order to try and talk brilliantly. Rouge and -esprit used to go together. That is all over now. As long as a woman -can look ten years younger than her own daughter, she is perfectly -satisfied. As for conversation, there are only five women in London -worth talking to, and two of these can't be admitted into decent -society. However, tell me about your genius. How long have you known -her?" -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! Harry, your views terrify me." -</P> - -<P> -"Never mind that. How long have you known her?" -</P> - -<P> -"About three weeks." -</P> - -<P> -"And where did you come across her?" -</P> - -<P> -"I will tell you, Harry, but you mustn't be unsympathetic about it. -After all, it never would have happened if I had not met you. You -filled me with a wild desire to know everything about life. For days -after I met you, something seemed to throb in my veins. As I lounged -in the park, or strolled down Piccadilly, I used to look at every one -who passed me and wonder, with a mad curiosity, what sort of lives they -led. Some of them fascinated me. Others filled me with terror. There -was an exquisite poison in the air. I had a passion for sensations.... -Well, one evening about seven o'clock, I determined to go out in search -of some adventure. I felt that this grey monstrous London of ours, -with its myriads of people, its sordid sinners, and its splendid sins, -as you once phrased it, must have something in store for me. I fancied -a thousand things. The mere danger gave me a sense of delight. I -remembered what you had said to me on that wonderful evening when we -first dined together, about the search for beauty being the real secret -of life. I don't know what I expected, but I went out and wandered -eastward, soon losing my way in a labyrinth of grimy streets and black -grassless squares. About half-past eight I passed by an absurd little -theatre, with great flaring gas-jets and gaudy play-bills. A hideous -Jew, in the most amazing waistcoat I ever beheld in my life, was -standing at the entrance, smoking a vile cigar. He had greasy -ringlets, and an enormous diamond blazed in the centre of a soiled -shirt. 'Have a box, my Lord?' he said, when he saw me, and he took off -his hat with an air of gorgeous servility. There was something about -him, Harry, that amused me. He was such a monster. You will laugh at -me, I know, but I really went in and paid a whole guinea for the -stage-box. To the present day I can't make out why I did so; and yet if -I hadn't--my dear Harry, if I hadn't--I should have missed the greatest -romance of my life. I see you are laughing. It is horrid of you!" -</P> - -<P> -"I am not laughing, Dorian; at least I am not laughing at you. But you -should not say the greatest romance of your life. You should say the -first romance of your life. You will always be loved, and you will -always be in love with love. A grande passion is the privilege of -people who have nothing to do. That is the one use of the idle classes -of a country. Don't be afraid. There are exquisite things in store -for you. This is merely the beginning." -</P> - -<P> -"Do you think my nature so shallow?" cried Dorian Gray angrily. -</P> - -<P> -"No; I think your nature so deep." -</P> - -<P> -"How do you mean?" -</P> - -<P> -"My dear boy, the people who love only once in their lives are really -the shallow people. What they call their loyalty, and their fidelity, -I call either the lethargy of custom or their lack of imagination. -Faithfulness is to the emotional life what consistency is to the life -of the intellect--simply a confession of failure. Faithfulness! I -must analyse it some day. The passion for property is in it. There -are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that -others might pick them up. But I don't want to interrupt you. Go on -with your story." -</P> - -<P> -"Well, I found myself seated in a horrid little private box, with a -vulgar drop-scene staring me in the face. I looked out from behind the -curtain and surveyed the house. It was a tawdry affair, all Cupids and -cornucopias, like a third-rate wedding-cake. The gallery and pit were -fairly full, but the two rows of dingy stalls were quite empty, and -there was hardly a person in what I suppose they called the -dress-circle. Women went about with oranges and ginger-beer, and there -was a terrible consumption of nuts going on." -</P> - -<P> -"It must have been just like the palmy days of the British drama." -</P> - -<P> -"Just like, I should fancy, and very depressing. I began to wonder -what on earth I should do when I caught sight of the play-bill. What -do you think the play was, Harry?" -</P> - -<P> -"I should think 'The Idiot Boy', or 'Dumb but Innocent'. Our fathers -used to like that sort of piece, I believe. The longer I live, Dorian, -the more keenly I feel that whatever was good enough for our fathers is -not good enough for us. In art, as in politics, les grandperes ont -toujours tort." -</P> - -<P> -"This play was good enough for us, Harry. It was Romeo and Juliet. I -must admit that I was rather annoyed at the idea of seeing Shakespeare -done in such a wretched hole of a place. Still, I felt interested, in -a sort of way. At any rate, I determined to wait for the first act. -There was a dreadful orchestra, presided over by a young Hebrew who sat -at a cracked piano, that nearly drove me away, but at last the -drop-scene was drawn up and the play began. Romeo was a stout elderly -gentleman, with corked eyebrows, a husky tragedy voice, and a figure -like a beer-barrel. Mercutio was almost as bad. He was played by the -low-comedian, who had introduced gags of his own and was on most -friendly terms with the pit. They were both as grotesque as the -scenery, and that looked as if it had come out of a country-booth. But -Juliet! Harry, imagine a girl, hardly seventeen years of age, with a -little, flowerlike face, a small Greek head with plaited coils of -dark-brown hair, eyes that were violet wells of passion, lips that were -like the petals of a rose. She was the loveliest thing I had ever seen -in my life. You said to me once that pathos left you unmoved, but that -beauty, mere beauty, could fill your eyes with tears. I tell you, -Harry, I could hardly see this girl for the mist of tears that came -across me. And her voice--I never heard such a voice. It was very low -at first, with deep mellow notes that seemed to fall singly upon one's -ear. Then it became a little louder, and sounded like a flute or a -distant hautboy. In the garden-scene it had all the tremulous ecstasy -that one hears just before dawn when nightingales are singing. There -were moments, later on, when it had the wild passion of violins. You -know how a voice can stir one. Your voice and the voice of Sibyl Vane -are two things that I shall never forget. When I close my eyes, I hear -them, and each of them says something different. I don't know which to -follow. Why should I not love her? Harry, I do love her. She is -everything to me in life. Night after night I go to see her play. One -evening she is Rosalind, and the next evening she is Imogen. I have -seen her die in the gloom of an Italian tomb, sucking the poison from -her lover's lips. I have watched her wandering through the forest of -Arden, disguised as a pretty boy in hose and doublet and dainty cap. -She has been mad, and has come into the presence of a guilty king, and -given him rue to wear and bitter herbs to taste of. She has been -innocent, and the black hands of jealousy have crushed her reedlike -throat. I have seen her in every age and in every costume. Ordinary -women never appeal to one's imagination. They are limited to their -century. No glamour ever transfigures them. One knows their minds as -easily as one knows their bonnets. One can always find them. There is -no mystery in any of them. They ride in the park in the morning and -chatter at tea-parties in the afternoon. They have their stereotyped -smile and their fashionable manner. They are quite obvious. But an -actress! How different an actress is! Harry! why didn't you tell me -that the only thing worth loving is an actress?" -</P> - -<P> -"Because I have loved so many of them, Dorian." -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, yes, horrid people with dyed hair and painted faces." -</P> - -<P> -"Don't run down dyed hair and painted faces. There is an extraordinary -charm in them, sometimes," said Lord Henry. -</P> - -<P> -"I wish now I had not told you about Sibyl Vane." -</P> - -<P> -"You could not have helped telling me, Dorian. All through your life -you will tell me everything you do." -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, Harry, I believe that is true. I cannot help telling you things. -You have a curious influence over me. If I ever did a crime, I would -come and confess it to you. You would understand me." -</P> - -<P> -"People like you--the wilful sunbeams of life--don't commit crimes, -Dorian. But I am much obliged for the compliment, all the same. And -now tell me--reach me the matches, like a good boy--thanks--what are -your actual relations with Sibyl Vane?" -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray leaped to his feet, with flushed cheeks and burning eyes. -"Harry! Sibyl Vane is sacred!" -</P> - -<P> -"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?" -</P> - -<P> -"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." -</P> - -<P> -"I am not surprised." -</P> - -<P> -"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." -</P> - -<P> -"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." -</P> - -<P> -"Well, he seemed to think they were beyond his means," laughed Dorian. -"By this time, however, the lights were being put out in the theatre, -and I had to go. He wanted me to try some cigars that he strongly -recommended. I declined. The next night, of course, I arrived at the -place again. When he saw me, he made me a low bow and assured me that -I was a munificent patron of art. He was a most offensive brute, -though he had an extraordinary passion for Shakespeare. He told me -once, with an air of pride, that his five bankruptcies were entirely -due to 'The Bard,' as he insisted on calling him. He seemed to think -it a distinction." -</P> - -<P> -"It was a distinction, my dear Dorian--a great distinction. Most -people become bankrupt through having invested too heavily in the prose -of life. To have ruined one's self over poetry is an honour. But when -did you first speak to Miss Sibyl Vane?" -</P> - -<P> -"The third night. She had been playing Rosalind. I could not help -going round. I had thrown her some flowers, and she had looked at -me--at least I fancied that she had. The old Jew was persistent. He -seemed determined to take me behind, so I consented. It was curious my -not wanting to know her, wasn't it?" -</P> - -<P> -"No; I don't think so." -</P> - -<P> -"My dear Harry, why?" -</P> - -<P> -"I will tell you some other time. Now I want to know about the girl." -</P> - -<P> -"Sibyl? Oh, she was so shy and so gentle. There is something of a -child about her. Her eyes opened wide in exquisite wonder when I told -her what I thought of her performance, and she seemed quite unconscious -of her power. I think we were both rather nervous. The old Jew stood -grinning at the doorway of the dusty greenroom, making elaborate -speeches about us both, while we stood looking at each other like -children. He would insist on calling me 'My Lord,' so I had to assure -Sibyl that I was not anything of the kind. She said quite simply to -me, 'You look more like a prince. I must call you Prince Charming.'" -</P> - -<P> -"Upon my word, Dorian, Miss Sibyl knows how to pay compliments." -</P> - -<P> -"You don't understand her, Harry. She regarded me merely as a person -in a play. She knows nothing of life. She lives with her mother, a -faded tired woman who played Lady Capulet in a sort of magenta -dressing-wrapper on the first night, and looks as if she had seen -better days." -</P> - -<P> -"I know that look. It depresses me," murmured Lord Henry, examining -his rings. -</P> - -<P> -"The Jew wanted to tell me her history, but I said it did not interest -me." -</P> - -<P> -"You were quite right. There is always something infinitely mean about -other people's tragedies." -</P> - -<P> -"Sibyl is the only thing I care about. What is it to me where she came -from? From her little head to her little feet, she is absolutely and -entirely divine. Every night of my life I go to see her act, and every -night she is more marvellous." -</P> - -<P> -"That is the reason, I suppose, that you never dine with me now. I -thought you must have some curious romance on hand. You have; but it -is not quite what I expected." -</P> - -<P> -"My dear Harry, we either lunch or sup together every day, and I have -been to the opera with you several times," said Dorian, opening his -blue eyes in wonder. -</P> - -<P> -"You always come dreadfully late." -</P> - -<P> -"Well, I can't help going to see Sibyl play," he cried, "even if it is -only for a single act. I get hungry for her presence; and when I think -of the wonderful soul that is hidden away in that little ivory body, I -am filled with awe." -</P> - -<P> -"You can dine with me to-night, Dorian, can't you?" -</P> - -<P> -He shook his head. "To-night she is Imogen," he answered, "and -to-morrow night she will be Juliet." -</P> - -<P> -"When is she Sibyl Vane?" -</P> - -<P> -"Never." -</P> - -<P> -"I congratulate you." -</P> - -<P> -"How horrid you are! She is all the great heroines of the world in -one. She is more than an individual. You laugh, but I tell you she -has genius. I love her, and I must make her love me. You, who know -all the secrets of life, tell me how to charm Sibyl Vane to love me! I -want to make Romeo jealous. I want the dead lovers of the world to -hear our laughter and grow sad. I want a breath of our passion to stir -their dust into consciousness, to wake their ashes into pain. My God, -Harry, how I worship her!" He was walking up and down the room as he -spoke. Hectic spots of red burned on his cheeks. He was terribly -excited. -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry watched him with a subtle sense of pleasure. How different -he was now from the shy frightened boy he had met in Basil Hallward's -studio! His nature had developed like a flower, had borne blossoms of -scarlet flame. Out of its secret hiding-place had crept his soul, and -desire had come to meet it on the way. -</P> - -<P> -"And what do you propose to do?" said Lord Henry at last. -</P> - -<P> -"I want you and Basil to come with me some night and see her act. I -have not the slightest fear of the result. You are certain to -acknowledge her genius. Then we must get her out of the Jew's hands. -She is bound to him for three years--at least for two years and eight -months--from the present time. I shall have to pay him something, of -course. When all that is settled, I shall take a West End theatre and -bring her out properly. She will make the world as mad as she has made -me." -</P> - -<P> -"That would be impossible, my dear boy." -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, she will. She has not merely art, consummate art-instinct, in -her, but she has personality also; and you have often told me that it -is personalities, not principles, that move the age." -</P> - -<P> -"Well, what night shall we go?" -</P> - -<P> -"Let me see. To-day is Tuesday. Let us fix to-morrow. She plays -Juliet to-morrow." -</P> - -<P> -"All right. The Bristol at eight o'clock; and I will get Basil." -</P> - -<P> -"Not eight, Harry, please. Half-past six. We must be there before the -curtain rises. You must see her in the first act, where she meets -Romeo." -</P> - -<P> -"Half-past six! What an hour! It will be like having a meat-tea, or -reading an English novel. It must be seven. No gentleman dines before -seven. Shall you see Basil between this and then? Or shall I write to -him?" -</P> - -<P> -"Dear Basil! I have not laid eyes on him for a week. It is rather -horrid of me, as he has sent me my portrait in the most wonderful -frame, specially designed by himself, and, though I am a little jealous -of the picture for being a whole month younger than I am, I must admit -that I delight in it. Perhaps you had better write to him. I don't -want to see him alone. He says things that annoy me. He gives me good -advice." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry smiled. "People are very fond of giving away what they need -most themselves. It is what I call the depth of generosity." -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, Basil is the best of fellows, but he seems to me to be just a bit -of a Philistine. Since I have known you, Harry, I have discovered -that." -</P> - -<P> -"Basil, my dear boy, puts everything that is charming in him into his -work. The consequence is that he has nothing left for life but his -prejudices, his principles, and his common sense. The only artists I -have ever known who are personally delightful are bad artists. Good -artists exist simply in what they make, and consequently are perfectly -uninteresting in what they are. A great poet, a really great poet, is -the most unpoetical of all creatures. But inferior poets are -absolutely fascinating. The worse their rhymes are, the more -picturesque they look. The mere fact of having published a book of -second-rate sonnets makes a man quite irresistible. He lives the -poetry that he cannot write. The others write the poetry that they -dare not realize." -</P> - -<P> -"I wonder is that really so, Harry?" said Dorian Gray, putting some -perfume on his handkerchief out of a large, gold-topped bottle that -stood on the table. "It must be, if you say it. And now I am off. -Imogen is waiting for me. Don't forget about to-morrow. Good-bye." -</P> - -<P> -As he left the room, Lord Henry's heavy eyelids drooped, and he began -to think. Certainly few people had ever interested him so much as -Dorian Gray, and yet the lad's mad adoration of some one else caused -him not the slightest pang of annoyance or jealousy. He was pleased by -it. It made him a more interesting study. He had been always -enthralled by the methods of natural science, but the ordinary -subject-matter of that science had seemed to him trivial and of no -import. And so he had begun by vivisecting himself, as he had ended by -vivisecting others. Human life--that appeared to him the one thing -worth investigating. Compared to it there was nothing else of any -value. It was true that as one watched life in its curious crucible of -pain and pleasure, one could not wear over one's face a mask of glass, -nor keep the sulphurous fumes from troubling the brain and making the -imagination turbid with monstrous fancies and misshapen dreams. There -were poisons so subtle that to know their properties one had to sicken -of them. There were maladies so strange that one had to pass through -them if one sought to understand their nature. And, yet, what a great -reward one received! How wonderful the whole world became to one! To -note the curious hard logic of passion, and the emotional coloured life -of the intellect--to observe where they met, and where they separated, -at what point they were in unison, and at what point they were at -discord--there was a delight in that! What matter what the cost was? -One could never pay too high a price for any sensation. -</P> - -<P> -He was conscious--and the thought brought a gleam of pleasure into his -brown agate eyes--that it was through certain words of his, musical -words said with musical utterance, that Dorian Gray's soul had turned -to this white girl and bowed in worship before her. To a large extent -the lad was his own creation. He had made him premature. That was -something. Ordinary people waited till life disclosed to them its -secrets, but to the few, to the elect, the mysteries of life were -revealed before the veil was drawn away. Sometimes this was the effect -of art, and chiefly of the art of literature, which dealt immediately -with the passions and the intellect. But now and then a complex -personality took the place and assumed the office of art, was indeed, -in its way, a real work of art, life having its elaborate masterpieces, -just as poetry has, or sculpture, or painting. -</P> - -<P> -Yes, the lad was premature. He was gathering his harvest while it was -yet spring. The pulse and passion of youth were in him, but he was -becoming self-conscious. It was delightful to watch him. With his -beautiful face, and his beautiful soul, he was a thing to wonder at. -It was no matter how it all ended, or was destined to end. He was like -one of those gracious figures in a pageant or a play, whose joys seem -to be remote from one, but whose sorrows stir one's sense of beauty, -and whose wounds are like red roses. -</P> - -<P> -Soul and body, body and soul--how mysterious they were! There was -animalism in the soul, and the body had its moments of spirituality. -The senses could refine, and the intellect could degrade. Who could -say where the fleshly impulse ceased, or the psychical impulse began? -How shallow were the arbitrary definitions of ordinary psychologists! -And yet how difficult to decide between the claims of the various -schools! Was the soul a shadow seated in the house of sin? Or was the -body really in the soul, as Giordano Bruno thought? The separation of -spirit from matter was a mystery, and the union of spirit with matter -was a mystery also. -</P> - -<P> -He began to wonder whether we could ever make psychology so absolute a -science that each little spring of life would be revealed to us. As it -was, we always misunderstood ourselves and rarely understood others. -Experience was of no ethical value. It was merely the name men gave to -their mistakes. Moralists had, as a rule, regarded it as a mode of -warning, had claimed for it a certain ethical efficacy in the formation -of character, had praised it as something that taught us what to follow -and showed us what to avoid. But there was no motive power in -experience. It was as little of an active cause as conscience itself. -All that it really demonstrated was that our future would be the same -as our past, and that the sin we had done once, and with loathing, we -would do many times, and with joy. -</P> - -<P> -It was clear to him that the experimental method was the only method by -which one could arrive at any scientific analysis of the passions; and -certainly Dorian Gray was a subject made to his hand, and seemed to -promise rich and fruitful results. His sudden mad love for Sibyl Vane -was a psychological phenomenon of no small interest. There was no -doubt that curiosity had much to do with it, curiosity and the desire -for new experiences, yet it was not a simple, but rather a very complex -passion. What there was in it of the purely sensuous instinct of -boyhood had been transformed by the workings of the imagination, -changed into something that seemed to the lad himself to be remote from -sense, and was for that very reason all the more dangerous. It was the -passions about whose origin we deceived ourselves that tyrannized most -strongly over us. Our weakest motives were those of whose nature we -were conscious. It often happened that when we thought we were -experimenting on others we were really experimenting on ourselves. -</P> - -<P> -While Lord Henry sat dreaming on these things, a knock came to the -door, and his valet entered and reminded him it was time to dress for -dinner. He got up and looked out into the street. The sunset had -smitten into scarlet gold the upper windows of the houses opposite. -The panes glowed like plates of heated metal. The sky above was like a -faded rose. He thought of his friend's young fiery-coloured life and -wondered how it was all going to end. -</P> - -<P> -When he arrived home, about half-past twelve o'clock, he saw a telegram -lying on the hall table. He opened it and found it was from Dorian -Gray. It was to tell him that he was engaged to be married to Sibyl -Vane. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap05"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 5 -</H3> - -<P> -"Mother, Mother, I am so happy!" whispered the girl, burying her face -in the lap of the faded, tired-looking woman who, with back turned to -the shrill intrusive light, was sitting in the one arm-chair that their -dingy sitting-room contained. "I am so happy!" she repeated, "and you -must be happy, too!" -</P> - -<P> -Mrs. Vane winced and put her thin, bismuth-whitened hands on her -daughter's head. "Happy!" she echoed, "I am only happy, Sibyl, when I -see you act. You must not think of anything but your acting. Mr. -Isaacs has been very good to us, and we owe him money." -</P> - -<P> -The girl looked up and pouted. "Money, Mother?" she cried, "what does -money matter? Love is more than money." -</P> - -<P> -"Mr. Isaacs has advanced us fifty pounds to pay off our debts and to -get a proper outfit for James. You must not forget that, Sibyl. Fifty -pounds is a very large sum. Mr. Isaacs has been most considerate." -</P> - -<P> -"He is not a gentleman, Mother, and I hate the way he talks to me," -said the girl, rising to her feet and going over to the window. -</P> - -<P> -"I don't know how we could manage without him," answered the elder -woman querulously. -</P> - -<P> -Sibyl Vane tossed her head and laughed. "We don't want him any more, -Mother. Prince Charming rules life for us now." Then she paused. A -rose shook in her blood and shadowed her cheeks. Quick breath parted -the petals of her lips. They trembled. Some southern wind of passion -swept over her and stirred the dainty folds of her dress. "I love -him," she said simply. -</P> - -<P> -"Foolish child! foolish child!" was the parrot-phrase flung in answer. -The waving of crooked, false-jewelled fingers gave grotesqueness to the -words. -</P> - -<P> -The girl laughed again. The joy of a caged bird was in her voice. Her -eyes caught the melody and echoed it in radiance, then closed for a -moment, as though to hide their secret. When they opened, the mist of -a dream had passed across them. -</P> - -<P> -Thin-lipped wisdom spoke at her from the worn chair, hinted at -prudence, quoted from that book of cowardice whose author apes the name -of common sense. She did not listen. She was free in her prison of -passion. Her prince, Prince Charming, was with her. She had called on -memory to remake him. She had sent her soul to search for him, and it -had brought him back. His kiss burned again upon her mouth. Her -eyelids were warm with his breath. -</P> - -<P> -Then wisdom altered its method and spoke of espial and discovery. This -young man might be rich. If so, marriage should be thought of. -Against the shell of her ear broke the waves of worldly cunning. The -arrows of craft shot by her. She saw the thin lips moving, and smiled. -</P> - -<P> -Suddenly she felt the need to speak. The wordy silence troubled her. -"Mother, Mother," she cried, "why does he love me so much? I know why -I love him. I love him because he is like what love himself should be. -But what does he see in me? I am not worthy of him. And yet--why, I -cannot tell--though I feel so much beneath him, I don't feel humble. I -feel proud, terribly proud. Mother, did you love my father as I love -Prince Charming?" -</P> - -<P> -The elder woman grew pale beneath the coarse powder that daubed her -cheeks, and her dry lips twitched with a spasm of pain. Sybil rushed -to her, flung her arms round her neck, and kissed her. "Forgive me, -Mother. I know it pains you to talk about our father. But it only -pains you because you loved him so much. Don't look so sad. I am as -happy to-day as you were twenty years ago. Ah! let me be happy for -ever!" -</P> - -<P> -"My child, you are far too young to think of falling in love. Besides, -what do you know of this young man? You don't even know his name. The -whole thing is most inconvenient, and really, when James is going away -to Australia, and I have so much to think of, I must say that you -should have shown more consideration. However, as I said before, if he -is rich ..." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! Mother, Mother, let me be happy!" -</P> - -<P> -Mrs. Vane glanced at her, and with one of those false theatrical -gestures that so often become a mode of second nature to a -stage-player, clasped her in her arms. At this moment, the door opened -and a young lad with rough brown hair came into the room. He was -thick-set of figure, and his hands and feet were large and somewhat -clumsy in movement. He was not so finely bred as his sister. One -would hardly have guessed the close relationship that existed between -them. Mrs. Vane fixed her eyes on him and intensified her smile. She -mentally elevated her son to the dignity of an audience. She felt sure -that the tableau was interesting. -</P> - -<P> -"You might keep some of your kisses for me, Sibyl, I think," said the -lad with a good-natured grumble. -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! but you don't like being kissed, Jim," she cried. "You are a -dreadful old bear." And she ran across the room and hugged him. -</P> - -<P> -James Vane looked into his sister's face with tenderness. "I want you -to come out with me for a walk, Sibyl. I don't suppose I shall ever -see this horrid London again. I am sure I don't want to." -</P> - -<P> -"My son, don't say such dreadful things," murmured Mrs. Vane, taking up -a tawdry theatrical dress, with a sigh, and beginning to patch it. She -felt a little disappointed that he had not joined the group. It would -have increased the theatrical picturesqueness of the situation. -</P> - -<P> -"Why not, Mother? I mean it." -</P> - -<P> -"You pain me, my son. I trust you will return from Australia in a -position of affluence. I believe there is no society of any kind in -the Colonies--nothing that I would call society--so when you have made -your fortune, you must come back and assert yourself in London." -</P> - -<P> -"Society!" muttered the lad. "I don't want to know anything about -that. I should like to make some money to take you and Sibyl off the -stage. I hate it." -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, Jim!" said Sibyl, laughing, "how unkind of you! But are you -really going for a walk with me? That will be nice! I was afraid you -were going to say good-bye to some of your friends--to Tom Hardy, who -gave you that hideous pipe, or Ned Langton, who makes fun of you for -smoking it. It is very sweet of you to let me have your last -afternoon. Where shall we go? Let us go to the park." -</P> - -<P> -"I am too shabby," he answered, frowning. "Only swell people go to the -park." -</P> - -<P> -"Nonsense, Jim," she whispered, stroking the sleeve of his coat. -</P> - -<P> -He hesitated for a moment. "Very well," he said at last, "but don't be -too long dressing." She danced out of the door. One could hear her -singing as she ran upstairs. Her little feet pattered overhead. -</P> - -<P> -He walked up and down the room two or three times. Then he turned to -the still figure in the chair. "Mother, are my things ready?" he asked. -</P> - -<P> -"Quite ready, James," she answered, keeping her eyes on her work. For -some months past she had felt ill at ease when she was alone with this -rough stern son of hers. Her shallow secret nature was troubled when -their eyes met. She used to wonder if he suspected anything. The -silence, for he made no other observation, became intolerable to her. -She began to complain. Women defend themselves by attacking, just as -they attack by sudden and strange surrenders. "I hope you will be -contented, James, with your sea-faring life," she said. "You must -remember that it is your own choice. You might have entered a -solicitor's office. Solicitors are a very respectable class, and in -the country often dine with the best families." -</P> - -<P> -"I hate offices, and I hate clerks," he replied. "But you are quite -right. I have chosen my own life. All I say is, watch over Sibyl. -Don't let her come to any harm. Mother, you must watch over her." -</P> - -<P> -"James, you really talk very strangely. Of course I watch over Sibyl." -</P> - -<P> -"I hear a gentleman comes every night to the theatre and goes behind to -talk to her. Is that right? What about that?" -</P> - -<P> -"You are speaking about things you don't understand, James. In the -profession we are accustomed to receive a great deal of most gratifying -attention. I myself used to receive many bouquets at one time. That -was when acting was really understood. As for Sibyl, I do not know at -present whether her attachment is serious or not. But there is no -doubt that the young man in question is a perfect gentleman. He is -always most polite to me. Besides, he has the appearance of being -rich, and the flowers he sends are lovely." -</P> - -<P> -"You don't know his name, though," said the lad harshly. -</P> - -<P> -"No," answered his mother with a placid expression in her face. "He -has not yet revealed his real name. I think it is quite romantic of -him. He is probably a member of the aristocracy." -</P> - -<P> -James Vane bit his lip. "Watch over Sibyl, Mother," he cried, "watch -over her." -</P> - -<P> -"My son, you distress me very much. Sibyl is always under my special -care. Of course, if this gentleman is wealthy, there is no reason why -she should not contract an alliance with him. I trust he is one of the -aristocracy. He has all the appearance of it, I must say. It might be -a most brilliant marriage for Sibyl. They would make a charming -couple. His good looks are really quite remarkable; everybody notices -them." -</P> - -<P> -The lad muttered something to himself and drummed on the window-pane -with his coarse fingers. He had just turned round to say something -when the door opened and Sibyl ran in. -</P> - -<P> -"How serious you both are!" she cried. "What is the matter?" -</P> - -<P> -"Nothing," he answered. "I suppose one must be serious sometimes. -Good-bye, Mother; I will have my dinner at five o'clock. Everything is -packed, except my shirts, so you need not trouble." -</P> - -<P> -"Good-bye, my son," she answered with a bow of strained stateliness. -</P> - -<P> -She was extremely annoyed at the tone he had adopted with her, and -there was something in his look that had made her feel afraid. -</P> - -<P> -"Kiss me, Mother," said the girl. Her flowerlike lips touched the -withered cheek and warmed its frost. -</P> - -<P> -"My child! my child!" cried Mrs. Vane, looking up to the ceiling in -search of an imaginary gallery. -</P> - -<P> -"Come, Sibyl," said her brother impatiently. He hated his mother's -affectations. -</P> - -<P> -They went out into the flickering, wind-blown sunlight and strolled -down the dreary Euston Road. The passersby glanced in wonder at the -sullen heavy youth who, in coarse, ill-fitting clothes, was in the -company of such a graceful, refined-looking girl. He was like a common -gardener walking with a rose. -</P> - -<P> -Jim frowned from time to time when he caught the inquisitive glance of -some stranger. He had that dislike of being stared at, which comes on -geniuses late in life and never leaves the commonplace. Sibyl, -however, was quite unconscious of the effect she was producing. Her -love was trembling in laughter on her lips. She was thinking of Prince -Charming, and, that she might think of him all the more, she did not -talk of him, but prattled on about the ship in which Jim was going to -sail, about the gold he was certain to find, about the wonderful -heiress whose life he was to save from the wicked, red-shirted -bushrangers. For he was not to remain a sailor, or a supercargo, or -whatever he was going to be. Oh, no! A sailor's existence was -dreadful. Fancy being cooped up in a horrid ship, with the hoarse, -hump-backed waves trying to get in, and a black wind blowing the masts -down and tearing the sails into long screaming ribands! He was to -leave the vessel at Melbourne, bid a polite good-bye to the captain, -and go off at once to the gold-fields. Before a week was over he was to -come across a large nugget of pure gold, the largest nugget that had -ever been discovered, and bring it down to the coast in a waggon -guarded by six mounted policemen. The bushrangers were to attack them -three times, and be defeated with immense slaughter. Or, no. He was -not to go to the gold-fields at all. They were horrid places, where -men got intoxicated, and shot each other in bar-rooms, and used bad -language. He was to be a nice sheep-farmer, and one evening, as he was -riding home, he was to see the beautiful heiress being carried off by a -robber on a black horse, and give chase, and rescue her. Of course, -she would fall in love with him, and he with her, and they would get -married, and come home, and live in an immense house in London. Yes, -there were delightful things in store for him. But he must be very -good, and not lose his temper, or spend his money foolishly. She was -only a year older than he was, but she knew so much more of life. He -must be sure, also, to write to her by every mail, and to say his -prayers each night before he went to sleep. God was very good, and -would watch over him. She would pray for him, too, and in a few years -he would come back quite rich and happy. -</P> - -<P> -The lad listened sulkily to her and made no answer. He was heart-sick -at leaving home. -</P> - -<P> -Yet it was not this alone that made him gloomy and morose. -Inexperienced though he was, he had still a strong sense of the danger -of Sibyl's position. This young dandy who was making love to her could -mean her no good. He was a gentleman, and he hated him for that, hated -him through some curious race-instinct for which he could not account, -and which for that reason was all the more dominant within him. He was -conscious also of the shallowness and vanity of his mother's nature, -and in that saw infinite peril for Sibyl and Sibyl's happiness. -Children begin by loving their parents; as they grow older they judge -them; sometimes they forgive them. -</P> - -<P> -His mother! He had something on his mind to ask of her, something that -he had brooded on for many months of silence. A chance phrase that he -had heard at the theatre, a whispered sneer that had reached his ears -one night as he waited at the stage-door, had set loose a train of -horrible thoughts. He remembered it as if it had been the lash of a -hunting-crop across his face. His brows knit together into a wedge-like -furrow, and with a twitch of pain he bit his underlip. -</P> - -<P> -"You are not listening to a word I am saying, Jim," cried Sibyl, "and I -am making the most delightful plans for your future. Do say something." -</P> - -<P> -"What do you want me to say?" -</P> - -<P> -"Oh! that you will be a good boy and not forget us," she answered, -smiling at him. -</P> - -<P> -He shrugged his shoulders. "You are more likely to forget me than I am -to forget you, Sibyl." -</P> - -<P> -She flushed. "What do you mean, Jim?" she asked. -</P> - -<P> -"You have a new friend, I hear. Who is he? Why have you not told me -about him? He means you no good." -</P> - -<P> -"Stop, Jim!" she exclaimed. "You must not say anything against him. I -love him." -</P> - -<P> -"Why, you don't even know his name," answered the lad. "Who is he? I -have a right to know." -</P> - -<P> -"He is called Prince Charming. Don't you like the name. Oh! you silly -boy! you should never forget it. If you only saw him, you would think -him the most wonderful person in the world. Some day you will meet -him--when you come back from Australia. You will like him so much. -Everybody likes him, and I ... love him. I wish you could come to the -theatre to-night. He is going to be there, and I am to play Juliet. -Oh! how I shall play it! Fancy, Jim, to be in love and play Juliet! -To have him sitting there! To play for his delight! I am afraid I may -frighten the company, frighten or enthrall them. To be in love is to -surpass one's self. Poor dreadful Mr. Isaacs will be shouting 'genius' -to his loafers at the bar. He has preached me as a dogma; to-night he -will announce me as a revelation. I feel it. And it is all his, his -only, Prince Charming, my wonderful lover, my god of graces. But I am -poor beside him. Poor? What does that matter? When poverty creeps in -at the door, love flies in through the window. Our proverbs want -rewriting. They were made in winter, and it is summer now; spring-time -for me, I think, a very dance of blossoms in blue skies." -</P> - -<P> -"He is a gentleman," said the lad sullenly. -</P> - -<P> -"A prince!" she cried musically. "What more do you want?" -</P> - -<P> -"He wants to enslave you." -</P> - -<P> -"I shudder at the thought of being free." -</P> - -<P> -"I want you to beware of him." -</P> - -<P> -"To see him is to worship him; to know him is to trust him." -</P> - -<P> -"Sibyl, you are mad about him." -</P> - -<P> -She laughed and took his arm. "You dear old Jim, you talk as if you -were a hundred. Some day you will be in love yourself. Then you will -know what it is. Don't look so sulky. Surely you should be glad to -think that, though you are going away, you leave me happier than I have -ever been before. Life has been hard for us both, terribly hard and -difficult. But it will be different now. You are going to a new -world, and I have found one. Here are two chairs; let us sit down and -see the smart people go by." -</P> - -<P> -They took their seats amidst a crowd of watchers. The tulip-beds -across the road flamed like throbbing rings of fire. A white -dust—tremulous cloud of orris-root it seemed--hung in the panting air. -The brightly coloured parasols danced and dipped like monstrous -butterflies. -</P> - -<P> -She made her brother talk of himself, his hopes, his prospects. He -spoke slowly and with effort. They passed words to each other as -players at a game pass counters. Sibyl felt oppressed. She could not -communicate her joy. A faint smile curving that sullen mouth was all -the echo she could win. After some time she became silent. Suddenly -she caught a glimpse of golden hair and laughing lips, and in an open -carriage with two ladies Dorian Gray drove past. -</P> - -<P> -She started to her feet. "There he is!" she cried. -</P> - -<P> -"Who?" said Jim Vane. -</P> - -<P> -"Prince Charming," she answered, looking after the victoria. -</P> - -<P> -He jumped up and seized her roughly by the arm. "Show him to me. -Which is he? Point him out. I must see him!" he exclaimed; but at -that moment the Duke of Berwick's four-in-hand came between, and when -it had left the space clear, the carriage had swept out of the park. -</P> - -<P> -"He is gone," murmured Sibyl sadly. "I wish you had seen him." -</P> - -<P> -"I wish I had, for as sure as there is a God in heaven, if he ever does -you any wrong, I shall kill him." -</P> - -<P> -She looked at him in horror. He repeated his words. They cut the air -like a dagger. The people round began to gape. A lady standing close -to her tittered. -</P> - -<P> -"Come away, Jim; come away," she whispered. He followed her doggedly -as she passed through the crowd. He felt glad at what he had said. -</P> - -<P> -When they reached the Achilles Statue, she turned round. There was -pity in her eyes that became laughter on her lips. She shook her head -at him. "You are foolish, Jim, utterly foolish; a bad-tempered boy, -that is all. How can you say such horrible things? You don't know -what you are talking about. You are simply jealous and unkind. Ah! I -wish you would fall in love. Love makes people good, and what you said -was wicked." -</P> - -<P> -"I am sixteen," he answered, "and I know what I am about. Mother is no -help to you. She doesn't understand how to look after you. I wish now -that I was not going to Australia at all. I have a great mind to chuck -the whole thing up. I would, if my articles hadn't been signed." -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, don't be so serious, Jim. You are like one of the heroes of those -silly melodramas Mother used to be so fond of acting in. I am not -going to quarrel with you. I have seen him, and oh! to see him is -perfect happiness. We won't quarrel. I know you would never harm any -one I love, would you?" -</P> - -<P> -"Not as long as you love him, I suppose," was the sullen answer. -</P> - -<P> -"I shall love him for ever!" she cried. -</P> - -<P> -"And he?" -</P> - -<P> -"For ever, too!" -</P> - -<P> -"He had better." -</P> - -<P> -She shrank from him. Then she laughed and put her hand on his arm. He -was merely a boy. -</P> - -<P> -At the Marble Arch they hailed an omnibus, which left them close to -their shabby home in the Euston Road. It was after five o'clock, and -Sibyl had to lie down for a couple of hours before acting. Jim -insisted that she should do so. He said that he would sooner part with -her when their mother was not present. She would be sure to make a -scene, and he detested scenes of every kind. -</P> - -<P> -In Sybil's own room they parted. There was jealousy in the lad's -heart, and a fierce murderous hatred of the stranger who, as it seemed -to him, had come between them. Yet, when her arms were flung round his -neck, and her fingers strayed through his hair, he softened and kissed -her with real affection. There were tears in his eyes as he went -downstairs. -</P> - -<P> -His mother was waiting for him below. She grumbled at his -unpunctuality, as he entered. He made no answer, but sat down to his -meagre meal. The flies buzzed round the table and crawled over the -stained cloth. Through the rumble of omnibuses, and the clatter of -street-cabs, he could hear the droning voice devouring each minute that -was left to him. -</P> - -<P> -After some time, he thrust away his plate and put his head in his -hands. He felt that he had a right to know. It should have been told -to him before, if it was as he suspected. Leaden with fear, his mother -watched him. Words dropped mechanically from her lips. A tattered -lace handkerchief twitched in her fingers. When the clock struck six, -he got up and went to the door. Then he turned back and looked at her. -Their eyes met. In hers he saw a wild appeal for mercy. It enraged -him. -</P> - -<P> -"Mother, I have something to ask you," he said. Her eyes wandered -vaguely about the room. She made no answer. "Tell me the truth. I -have a right to know. Were you married to my father?" -</P> - -<P> -She heaved a deep sigh. It was a sigh of relief. The terrible moment, -the moment that night and day, for weeks and months, she had dreaded, -had come at last, and yet she felt no terror. Indeed, in some measure -it was a disappointment to her. The vulgar directness of the question -called for a direct answer. The situation had not been gradually led -up to. It was crude. It reminded her of a bad rehearsal. -</P> - -<P> -"No," she answered, wondering at the harsh simplicity of life. -</P> - -<P> -"My father was a scoundrel then!" cried the lad, clenching his fists. -</P> - -<P> -She shook her head. "I knew he was not free. We loved each other very -much. If he had lived, he would have made provision for us. Don't -speak against him, my son. He was your father, and a gentleman. -Indeed, he was highly connected." -</P> - -<P> -An oath broke from his lips. "I don't care for myself," he exclaimed, -"but don't let Sibyl.... It is a gentleman, isn't it, who is in love -with her, or says he is? Highly connected, too, I suppose." -</P> - -<P> -For a moment a hideous sense of humiliation came over the woman. Her -head drooped. She wiped her eyes with shaking hands. "Sibyl has a -mother," she murmured; "I had none." -</P> - -<P> -The lad was touched. He went towards her, and stooping down, he kissed -her. "I am sorry if I have pained you by asking about my father," he -said, "but I could not help it. I must go now. Good-bye. Don't forget -that you will have only one child now to look after, and believe me -that if this man wrongs my sister, I will find out who he is, track him -down, and kill him like a dog. I swear it." -</P> - -<P> -The exaggerated folly of the threat, the passionate gesture that -accompanied it, the mad melodramatic words, made life seem more vivid -to her. She was familiar with the atmosphere. She breathed more -freely, and for the first time for many months she really admired her -son. She would have liked to have continued the scene on the same -emotional scale, but he cut her short. Trunks had to be carried down -and mufflers looked for. The lodging-house drudge bustled in and out. -There was the bargaining with the cabman. The moment was lost in -vulgar details. It was with a renewed feeling of disappointment that -she waved the tattered lace handkerchief from the window, as her son -drove away. She was conscious that a great opportunity had been -wasted. She consoled herself by telling Sibyl how desolate she felt -her life would be, now that she had only one child to look after. She -remembered the phrase. It had pleased her. Of the threat she said -nothing. It was vividly and dramatically expressed. She felt that -they would all laugh at it some day. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap06"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 6 -</H3> - -<P> -"I suppose you have heard the news, Basil?" said Lord Henry that -evening as Hallward was shown into a little private room at the Bristol -where dinner had been laid for three. -</P> - -<P> -"No, Harry," answered the artist, giving his hat and coat to the bowing -waiter. "What is it? Nothing about politics, I hope! They don't -interest me. There is hardly a single person in the House of Commons -worth painting, though many of them would be the better for a little -whitewashing." -</P> - -<P> -"Dorian Gray is engaged to be married," said Lord Henry, watching him -as he spoke. -</P> - -<P> -Hallward started and then frowned. "Dorian engaged to be married!" he -cried. "Impossible!" -</P> - -<P> -"It is perfectly true." -</P> - -<P> -"To whom?" -</P> - -<P> -"To some little actress or other." -</P> - -<P> -"I can't believe it. Dorian is far too sensible." -</P> - -<P> -"Dorian is far too wise not to do foolish things now and then, my dear -Basil." -</P> - -<P> -"Marriage is hardly a thing that one can do now and then, Harry." -</P> - -<P> -"Except in America," rejoined Lord Henry languidly. "But I didn't say -he was married. I said he was engaged to be married. There is a great -difference. I have a distinct remembrance of being married, but I have -no recollection at all of being engaged. I am inclined to think that I -never was engaged." -</P> - -<P> -"But think of Dorian's birth, and position, and wealth. It would be -absurd for him to marry so much beneath him." -</P> - -<P> -"If you want to make him marry this girl, tell him that, Basil. He is -sure to do it, then. Whenever a man does a thoroughly stupid thing, it -is always from the noblest motives." -</P> - -<P> -"I hope the girl is good, Harry. I don't want to see Dorian tied to -some vile creature, who might degrade his nature and ruin his -intellect." -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, she is better than good--she is beautiful," murmured Lord Henry, -sipping a glass of vermouth and orange-bitters. "Dorian says she is -beautiful, and he is not often wrong about things of that kind. Your -portrait of him has quickened his appreciation of the personal -appearance of other people. It has had that excellent effect, amongst -others. We are to see her to-night, if that boy doesn't forget his -appointment." -</P> - -<P> -"Are you serious?" -</P> - -<P> -"Quite serious, Basil. I should be miserable if I thought I should -ever be more serious than I am at the present moment." -</P> - -<P> -"But do you approve of it, Harry?" asked the painter, walking up and -down the room and biting his lip. "You can't approve of it, possibly. -It is some silly infatuation." -</P> - -<P> -"I never approve, or disapprove, of anything now. It is an absurd -attitude to take towards life. We are not sent into the world to air -our moral prejudices. I never take any notice of what common people -say, and I never interfere with what charming people do. If a -personality fascinates me, whatever mode of expression that personality -selects is absolutely delightful to me. Dorian Gray falls in love with -a beautiful girl who acts Juliet, and proposes to marry her. Why not? -If he wedded Messalina, he would be none the less interesting. You -know I am not a champion of marriage. The real drawback to marriage is -that it makes one unselfish. And unselfish people are colourless. -They lack individuality. Still, there are certain temperaments that -marriage makes more complex. They retain their egotism, and add to it -many other egos. They are forced to have more than one life. They -become more highly organized, and to be highly organized is, I should -fancy, the object of man's existence. Besides, every experience is of -value, and whatever one may say against marriage, it is certainly an -experience. I hope that Dorian Gray will make this girl his wife, -passionately adore her for six months, and then suddenly become -fascinated by some one else. He would be a wonderful study." -</P> - -<P> -"You don't mean a single word of all that, Harry; you know you don't. -If Dorian Gray's life were spoiled, no one would be sorrier than -yourself. You are much better than you pretend to be." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry laughed. "The reason we all like to think so well of others -is that we are all afraid for ourselves. The basis of optimism is -sheer terror. We think that we are generous because we credit our -neighbour with the possession of those virtues that are likely to be a -benefit to us. We praise the banker that we may overdraw our account, -and find good qualities in the highwayman in the hope that he may spare -our pockets. I mean everything that I have said. I have the greatest -contempt for optimism. As for a spoiled life, no life is spoiled but -one whose growth is arrested. If you want to mar a nature, you have -merely to reform it. As for marriage, of course that would be silly, -but there are other and more interesting bonds between men and women. -I will certainly encourage them. They have the charm of being -fashionable. But here is Dorian himself. He will tell you more than I -can." -</P> - -<P> -"My dear Harry, my dear Basil, you must both congratulate me!" said the -lad, throwing off his evening cape with its satin-lined wings and -shaking each of his friends by the hand in turn. "I have never been so -happy. Of course, it is sudden--all really delightful things are. And -yet it seems to me to be the one thing I have been looking for all my -life." He was flushed with excitement and pleasure, and looked -extraordinarily handsome. -</P> - -<P> -"I hope you will always be very happy, Dorian," said Hallward, "but I -don't quite forgive you for not having let me know of your engagement. -You let Harry know." -</P> - -<P> -"And I don't forgive you for being late for dinner," broke in Lord -Henry, putting his hand on the lad's shoulder and smiling as he spoke. -"Come, let us sit down and try what the new chef here is like, and then -you will tell us how it all came about." -</P> - -<P> -"There is really not much to tell," cried Dorian as they took their -seats at the small round table. "What happened was simply this. After -I left you yesterday evening, Harry, I dressed, had some dinner at that -little Italian restaurant in Rupert Street you introduced me to, and -went down at eight o'clock to the theatre. Sibyl was playing Rosalind. -Of course, the scenery was dreadful and the Orlando absurd. But Sibyl! -You should have seen her! When she came on in her boy's clothes, she -was perfectly wonderful. She wore a moss-coloured velvet jerkin with -cinnamon sleeves, slim, brown, cross-gartered hose, a dainty little -green cap with a hawk's feather caught in a jewel, and a hooded cloak -lined with dull red. She had never seemed to me more exquisite. She -had all the delicate grace of that Tanagra figurine that you have in -your studio, Basil. Her hair clustered round her face like dark leaves -round a pale rose. As for her acting--well, you shall see her -to-night. She is simply a born artist. I sat in the dingy box -absolutely enthralled. I forgot that I was in London and in the -nineteenth century. I was away with my love in a forest that no man -had ever seen. After the performance was over, I went behind and spoke -to her. As we were sitting together, suddenly there came into her eyes -a look that I had never seen there before. My lips moved towards hers. -We kissed each other. I can't describe to you what I felt at that -moment. It seemed to me that all my life had been narrowed to one -perfect point of rose-coloured joy. She trembled all over and shook -like a white narcissus. Then she flung herself on her knees and kissed -my hands. I feel that I should not tell you all this, but I can't help -it. Of course, our engagement is a dead secret. She has not even told -her own mother. I don't know what my guardians will say. Lord Radley -is sure to be furious. I don't care. I shall be of age in less than a -year, and then I can do what I like. I have been right, Basil, haven't -I, to take my love out of poetry and to find my wife in Shakespeare's -plays? Lips that Shakespeare taught to speak have whispered their -secret in my ear. I have had the arms of Rosalind around me, and -kissed Juliet on the mouth." -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, Dorian, I suppose you were right," said Hallward slowly. -</P> - -<P> -"Have you seen her to-day?" asked Lord Henry. -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray shook his head. "I left her in the forest of Arden; I -shall find her in an orchard in Verona." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry sipped his champagne in a meditative manner. "At what -particular point did you mention the word marriage, Dorian? And what -did she say in answer? Perhaps you forgot all about it." -</P> - -<P> -"My dear Harry, I did not treat it as a business transaction, and I did -not make any formal proposal. I told her that I loved her, and she -said she was not worthy to be my wife. Not worthy! Why, the whole -world is nothing to me compared with her." -</P> - -<P> -"Women are wonderfully practical," murmured Lord Henry, "much more -practical than we are. In situations of that kind we often forget to -say anything about marriage, and they always remind us." -</P> - -<P> -Hallward laid his hand upon his arm. "Don't, Harry. You have annoyed -Dorian. He is not like other men. He would never bring misery upon -any one. His nature is too fine for that." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry looked across the table. "Dorian is never annoyed with me," -he answered. "I asked the question for the best reason possible, for -the only reason, indeed, that excuses one for asking any -question--simple curiosity. I have a theory that it is always the -women who propose to us, and not we who propose to the women. Except, -of course, in middle-class life. But then the middle classes are not -modern." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray laughed, and tossed his head. "You are quite incorrigible, -Harry; but I don't mind. It is impossible to be angry with you. When -you see Sibyl Vane, you will feel that the man who could wrong her -would be a beast, a beast without a heart. I cannot understand how any -one can wish to shame the thing he loves. I love Sibyl Vane. I want -to place her on a pedestal of gold and to see the world worship the -woman who is mine. What is marriage? An irrevocable vow. You mock at -it for that. Ah! don't mock. It is an irrevocable vow that I want to -take. Her trust makes me faithful, her belief makes me good. When I -am with her, I regret all that you have taught me. I become different -from what you have known me to be. I am changed, and the mere touch of -Sibyl Vane's hand makes me forget you and all your wrong, fascinating, -poisonous, delightful theories." -</P> - -<P> -"And those are ...?" asked Lord Henry, helping himself to some salad. -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, your theories about life, your theories about love, your theories -about pleasure. All your theories, in fact, Harry." -</P> - -<P> -"Pleasure is the only thing worth having a theory about," he answered -in his slow melodious voice. "But I am afraid I cannot claim my theory -as my own. It belongs to Nature, not to me. Pleasure is Nature's -test, her sign of approval. When we are happy, we are always good, but -when we are good, we are not always happy." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! but what do you mean by good?" cried Basil Hallward. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes," echoed Dorian, leaning back in his chair and looking at Lord -Henry over the heavy clusters of purple-lipped irises that stood in the -centre of the table, "what do you mean by good, Harry?" -</P> - -<P> -"To be good is to be in harmony with one's self," he replied, touching -the thin stem of his glass with his pale, fine-pointed fingers. -"Discord is to be forced to be in harmony with others. One's own -life--that is the important thing. As for the lives of one's -neighbours, if one wishes to be a prig or a Puritan, one can flaunt -one's moral views about them, but they are not one's concern. Besides, -individualism has really the higher aim. Modern morality consists in -accepting the standard of one's age. I consider that for any man of -culture to accept the standard of his age is a form of the grossest -immorality." -</P> - -<P> -"But, surely, if one lives merely for one's self, Harry, one pays a -terrible price for doing so?" suggested the painter. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, we are overcharged for everything nowadays. I should fancy that -the real tragedy of the poor is that they can afford nothing but -self-denial. Beautiful sins, like beautiful things, are the privilege -of the rich." -</P> - -<P> -"One has to pay in other ways but money." -</P> - -<P> -"What sort of ways, Basil?" -</P> - -<P> -"Oh! I should fancy in remorse, in suffering, in ... well, in the -consciousness of degradation." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "My dear fellow, mediaeval art is -charming, but mediaeval emotions are out of date. One can use them in -fiction, of course. But then the only things that one can use in -fiction are the things that one has ceased to use in fact. Believe me, -no civilized man ever regrets a pleasure, and no uncivilized man ever -knows what a pleasure is." -</P> - -<P> -"I know what pleasure is," cried Dorian Gray. "It is to adore some -one." -</P> - -<P> -"That is certainly better than being adored," he answered, toying with -some fruits. "Being adored is a nuisance. Women treat us just as -humanity treats its gods. They worship us, and are always bothering us -to do something for them." -</P> - -<P> -"I should have said that whatever they ask for they had first given to -us," murmured the lad gravely. "They create love in our natures. They -have a right to demand it back." -</P> - -<P> -"That is quite true, Dorian," cried Hallward. -</P> - -<P> -"Nothing is ever quite true," said Lord Henry. -</P> - -<P> -"This is," interrupted Dorian. "You must admit, Harry, that women give -to men the very gold of their lives." -</P> - -<P> -"Possibly," he sighed, "but they invariably want it back in such very -small change. That is the worry. Women, as some witty Frenchman once -put it, inspire us with the desire to do masterpieces and always -prevent us from carrying them out." -</P> - -<P> -"Harry, you are dreadful! I don't know why I like you so much." -</P> - -<P> -"You will always like me, Dorian," he replied. "Will you have some -coffee, you fellows? Waiter, bring coffee, and fine-champagne, and -some cigarettes. No, don't mind the cigarettes--I have some. Basil, I -can't allow you to smoke cigars. You must have a cigarette. A -cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, -and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want? Yes, Dorian, -you will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you -have never had the courage to commit." -</P> - -<P> -"What nonsense you talk, Harry!" cried the lad, taking a light from a -fire-breathing silver dragon that the waiter had placed on the table. -"Let us go down to the theatre. When Sibyl comes on the stage you will -have a new ideal of life. She will represent something to you that you -have never known." -</P> - -<P> -"I have known everything," said Lord Henry, with a tired look in his -eyes, "but I am always ready for a new emotion. I am afraid, however, -that, for me at any rate, there is no such thing. Still, your -wonderful girl may thrill me. I love acting. It is so much more real -than life. Let us go. Dorian, you will come with me. I am so sorry, -Basil, but there is only room for two in the brougham. You must follow -us in a hansom." -</P> - -<P> -They got up and put on their coats, sipping their coffee standing. The -painter was silent and preoccupied. There was a gloom over him. He -could not bear this marriage, and yet it seemed to him to be better -than many other things that might have happened. After a few minutes, -they all passed downstairs. He drove off by himself, as had been -arranged, and watched the flashing lights of the little brougham in -front of him. A strange sense of loss came over him. He felt that -Dorian Gray would never again be to him all that he had been in the -past. Life had come between them.... His eyes darkened, and the -crowded flaring streets became blurred to his eyes. When the cab drew -up at the theatre, it seemed to him that he had grown years older. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap07"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 7 -</H3> - -<P> -For some reason or other, the house was crowded that night, and the fat -Jew manager who met them at the door was beaming from ear to ear with -an oily tremulous smile. He escorted them to their box with a sort of -pompous humility, waving his fat jewelled hands and talking at the top -of his voice. Dorian Gray loathed him more than ever. He felt as if -he had come to look for Miranda and had been met by Caliban. Lord -Henry, upon the other hand, rather liked him. At least he declared he -did, and insisted on shaking him by the hand and assuring him that he -was proud to meet a man who had discovered a real genius and gone -bankrupt over a poet. Hallward amused himself with watching the faces -in the pit. The heat was terribly oppressive, and the huge sunlight -flamed like a monstrous dahlia with petals of yellow fire. The youths -in the gallery had taken off their coats and waistcoats and hung them -over the side. They talked to each other across the theatre and shared -their oranges with the tawdry girls who sat beside them. Some women -were laughing in the pit. Their voices were horribly shrill and -discordant. The sound of the popping of corks came from the bar. -</P> - -<P> -"What a place to find one's divinity in!" said Lord Henry. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes!" answered Dorian Gray. "It was here I found her, and she is -divine beyond all living things. When she acts, you will forget -everything. These common rough people, with their coarse faces and -brutal gestures, become quite different when she is on the stage. They -sit silently and watch her. They weep and laugh as she wills them to -do. She makes them as responsive as a violin. She spiritualizes them, -and one feels that they are of the same flesh and blood as one's self." -</P> - -<P> -"The same flesh and blood as one's self! Oh, I hope not!" exclaimed -Lord Henry, who was scanning the occupants of the gallery through his -opera-glass. -</P> - -<P> -"Don't pay any attention to him, Dorian," said the painter. "I -understand what you mean, and I believe in this girl. Any one you love -must be marvellous, and any girl who has the effect you describe must -be fine and noble. To spiritualize one's age--that is something worth -doing. If this girl can give a soul to those who have lived without -one, if she can create the sense of beauty in people whose lives have -been sordid and ugly, if she can strip them of their selfishness and -lend them tears for sorrows that are not their own, she is worthy of -all your adoration, worthy of the adoration of the world. This -marriage is quite right. I did not think so at first, but I admit it -now. The gods made Sibyl Vane for you. Without her you would have -been incomplete." -</P> - -<P> -"Thanks, Basil," answered Dorian Gray, pressing his hand. "I knew that -you would understand me. Harry is so cynical, he terrifies me. But -here is the orchestra. It is quite dreadful, but it only lasts for -about five minutes. Then the curtain rises, and you will see the girl -to whom I am going to give all my life, to whom I have given everything -that is good in me." -</P> - -<P> -A quarter of an hour afterwards, amidst an extraordinary turmoil of -applause, Sibyl Vane stepped on to the stage. Yes, she was certainly -lovely to look at--one of the loveliest creatures, Lord Henry thought, -that he had ever seen. There was something of the fawn in her shy -grace and startled eyes. A faint blush, like the shadow of a rose in a -mirror of silver, came to her cheeks as she glanced at the crowded -enthusiastic house. She stepped back a few paces and her lips seemed -to tremble. Basil Hallward leaped to his feet and began to applaud. -Motionless, and as one in a dream, sat Dorian Gray, gazing at her. -Lord Henry peered through his glasses, murmuring, "Charming! charming!" -</P> - -<P> -The scene was the hall of Capulet's house, and Romeo in his pilgrim's -dress had entered with Mercutio and his other friends. The band, such -as it was, struck up a few bars of music, and the dance began. Through -the crowd of ungainly, shabbily dressed actors, Sibyl Vane moved like a -creature from a finer world. Her body swayed, while she danced, as a -plant sways in the water. The curves of her throat were the curves of -a white lily. Her hands seemed to be made of cool ivory. -</P> - -<P> -Yet she was curiously listless. She showed no sign of joy when her -eyes rested on Romeo. The few words she had to speak-- -</P> - -<P CLASS="poem"> -Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,<BR> - Which mannerly devotion shows in this;<BR> -For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch,<BR> - And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss--<BR> -</P> - -<P> -with the brief dialogue that follows, were spoken in a thoroughly -artificial manner. The voice was exquisite, but from the point of view -of tone it was absolutely false. It was wrong in colour. It took away -all the life from the verse. It made the passion unreal. -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray grew pale as he watched her. He was puzzled and anxious. -Neither of his friends dared to say anything to him. She seemed to -them to be absolutely incompetent. They were horribly disappointed. -</P> - -<P> -Yet they felt that the true test of any Juliet is the balcony scene of -the second act. They waited for that. If she failed there, there was -nothing in her. -</P> - -<P> -She looked charming as she came out in the moonlight. That could not -be denied. But the staginess of her acting was unbearable, and grew -worse as she went on. Her gestures became absurdly artificial. She -overemphasized everything that she had to say. The beautiful passage-- -</P> - -<P CLASS="poem"> -Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face,<BR> -Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek<BR> -For that which thou hast heard me speak to-night--<BR> -</P> - -<P> -was declaimed with the painful precision of a schoolgirl who has been -taught to recite by some second-rate professor of elocution. When she -leaned over the balcony and came to those wonderful lines-- -</P> - -<P CLASS="poem"> - Although I joy in thee,<BR> -I have no joy of this contract to-night:<BR> -It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden;<BR> -Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be<BR> -Ere one can say, "It lightens." Sweet, good-night!<BR> -This bud of love by summer's ripening breath<BR> -May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet--<BR> -</P> - -<P> -she spoke the words as though they conveyed no meaning to her. It was -not nervousness. Indeed, so far from being nervous, she was absolutely -self-contained. It was simply bad art. She was a complete failure. -</P> - -<P> -Even the common uneducated audience of the pit and gallery lost their -interest in the play. They got restless, and began to talk loudly and -to whistle. The Jew manager, who was standing at the back of the -dress-circle, stamped and swore with rage. The only person unmoved was -the girl herself. -</P> - -<P> -When the second act was over, there came a storm of hisses, and Lord -Henry got up from his chair and put on his coat. "She is quite -beautiful, Dorian," he said, "but she can't act. Let us go." -</P> - -<P> -"I am going to see the play through," answered the lad, in a hard -bitter voice. "I am awfully sorry that I have made you waste an -evening, Harry. I apologize to you both." -</P> - -<P> -"My dear Dorian, I should think Miss Vane was ill," interrupted -Hallward. "We will come some other night." -</P> - -<P> -"I wish she were ill," he rejoined. "But she seems to me to be simply -callous and cold. She has entirely altered. Last night she was a -great artist. This evening she is merely a commonplace mediocre -actress." -</P> - -<P> -"Don't talk like that about any one you love, Dorian. Love is a more -wonderful thing than art." -</P> - -<P> -"They are both simply forms of imitation," remarked Lord Henry. "But -do let us go. Dorian, you must not stay here any longer. It is not -good for one's morals to see bad acting. Besides, I don't suppose you -will want your wife to act, so what does it matter if she plays Juliet -like a wooden doll? She is very lovely, and if she knows as little -about life as she does about acting, she will be a delightful -experience. There are only two kinds of people who are really -fascinating--people who know absolutely everything, and people who know -absolutely nothing. Good heavens, my dear boy, don't look so tragic! -The secret of remaining young is never to have an emotion that is -unbecoming. Come to the club with Basil and myself. We will smoke -cigarettes and drink to the beauty of Sibyl Vane. She is beautiful. -What more can you want?" -</P> - -<P> -"Go away, Harry," cried the lad. "I want to be alone. Basil, you must -go. Ah! can't you see that my heart is breaking?" The hot tears came -to his eyes. His lips trembled, and rushing to the back of the box, he -leaned up against the wall, hiding his face in his hands. -</P> - -<P> -"Let us go, Basil," said Lord Henry with a strange tenderness in his -voice, and the two young men passed out together. -</P> - -<P> -A few moments afterwards the footlights flared up and the curtain rose -on the third act. Dorian Gray went back to his seat. He looked pale, -and proud, and indifferent. The play dragged on, and seemed -interminable. Half of the audience went out, tramping in heavy boots -and laughing. The whole thing was a fiasco. The last act was played -to almost empty benches. The curtain went down on a titter and some -groans. -</P> - -<P> -As soon as it was over, Dorian Gray rushed behind the scenes into the -greenroom. The girl was standing there alone, with a look of triumph -on her face. Her eyes were lit with an exquisite fire. There was a -radiance about her. Her parted lips were smiling over some secret of -their own. -</P> - -<P> -When he entered, she looked at him, and an expression of infinite joy -came over her. "How badly I acted to-night, Dorian!" she cried. -</P> - -<P> -"Horribly!" he answered, gazing at her in amazement. "Horribly! It -was dreadful. Are you ill? You have no idea what it was. You have no -idea what I suffered." -</P> - -<P> -The girl smiled. "Dorian," she answered, lingering over his name with -long-drawn music in her voice, as though it were sweeter than honey to -the red petals of her mouth. "Dorian, you should have understood. But -you understand now, don't you?" -</P> - -<P> -"Understand what?" he asked, angrily. -</P> - -<P> -"Why I was so bad to-night. Why I shall always be bad. Why I shall -never act well again." -</P> - -<P> -He shrugged his shoulders. "You are ill, I suppose. When you are ill -you shouldn't act. You make yourself ridiculous. My friends were -bored. I was bored." -</P> - -<P> -She seemed not to listen to him. She was transfigured with joy. An -ecstasy of happiness dominated her. -</P> - -<P> -"Dorian, Dorian," she cried, "before I knew you, acting was the one -reality of my life. It was only in the theatre that I lived. I -thought that it was all true. I was Rosalind one night and Portia the -other. The joy of Beatrice was my joy, and the sorrows of Cordelia -were mine also. I believed in everything. The common people who acted -with me seemed to me to be godlike. The painted scenes were my world. -I knew nothing but shadows, and I thought them real. You came--oh, my -beautiful love!--and you freed my soul from prison. You taught me what -reality really is. To-night, for the first time in my life, I saw -through the hollowness, the sham, the silliness of the empty pageant in -which I had always played. To-night, for the first time, I became -conscious that the Romeo was hideous, and old, and painted, that the -moonlight in the orchard was false, that the scenery was vulgar, and -that the words I had to speak were unreal, were not my words, were not -what I wanted to say. You had brought me something higher, something -of which all art is but a reflection. You had made me understand what -love really is. My love! My love! Prince Charming! Prince of life! -I have grown sick of shadows. You are more to me than all art can ever -be. What have I to do with the puppets of a play? When I came on -to-night, I could not understand how it was that everything had gone -from me. I thought that I was going to be wonderful. I found that I -could do nothing. Suddenly it dawned on my soul what it all meant. -The knowledge was exquisite to me. I heard them hissing, and I smiled. -What could they know of love such as ours? Take me away, Dorian--take -me away with you, where we can be quite alone. I hate the stage. I -might mimic a passion that I do not feel, but I cannot mimic one that -burns me like fire. Oh, Dorian, Dorian, you understand now what it -signifies? Even if I could do it, it would be profanation for me to -play at being in love. You have made me see that." -</P> - -<P> -He flung himself down on the sofa and turned away his face. "You have -killed my love," he muttered. -</P> - -<P> -She looked at him in wonder and laughed. He made no answer. She came -across to him, and with her little fingers stroked his hair. She knelt -down and pressed his hands to her lips. He drew them away, and a -shudder ran through him. -</P> - -<P> -Then he leaped up and went to the door. "Yes," he cried, "you have -killed my love. You used to stir my imagination. Now you don't even -stir my curiosity. You simply produce no effect. I loved you because -you were marvellous, because you had genius and intellect, because you -realized the dreams of great poets and gave shape and substance to the -shadows of art. You have thrown it all away. You are shallow and -stupid. My God! how mad I was to love you! What a fool I have been! -You are nothing to me now. I will never see you again. I will never -think of you. I will never mention your name. You don't know what you -were to me, once. Why, once ... Oh, I can't bear to think of it! I -wish I had never laid eyes upon you! You have spoiled the romance of -my life. How little you can know of love, if you say it mars your art! -Without your art, you are nothing. I would have made you famous, -splendid, magnificent. The world would have worshipped you, and you -would have borne my name. What are you now? A third-rate actress with -a pretty face." -</P> - -<P> -The girl grew white, and trembled. She clenched her hands together, -and her voice seemed to catch in her throat. "You are not serious, -Dorian?" she murmured. "You are acting." -</P> - -<P> -"Acting! I leave that to you. You do it so well," he answered -bitterly. -</P> - -<P> -She rose from her knees and, with a piteous expression of pain in her -face, came across the room to him. She put her hand upon his arm and -looked into his eyes. He thrust her back. "Don't touch me!" he cried. -</P> - -<P> -A low moan broke from her, and she flung herself at his feet and lay -there like a trampled flower. "Dorian, Dorian, don't leave me!" she -whispered. "I am so sorry I didn't act well. I was thinking of you -all the time. But I will try--indeed, I will try. It came so suddenly -across me, my love for you. I think I should never have known it if -you had not kissed me--if we had not kissed each other. Kiss me again, -my love. Don't go away from me. I couldn't bear it. Oh! don't go -away from me. My brother ... No; never mind. He didn't mean it. He -was in jest.... But you, oh! can't you forgive me for to-night? I will -work so hard and try to improve. Don't be cruel to me, because I love -you better than anything in the world. After all, it is only once that -I have not pleased you. But you are quite right, Dorian. I should -have shown myself more of an artist. It was foolish of me, and yet I -couldn't help it. Oh, don't leave me, don't leave me." A fit of -passionate sobbing choked her. She crouched on the floor like a -wounded thing, and Dorian Gray, with his beautiful eyes, looked down at -her, and his chiselled lips curled in exquisite disdain. There is -always something ridiculous about the emotions of people whom one has -ceased to love. Sibyl Vane seemed to him to be absurdly melodramatic. -Her tears and sobs annoyed him. -</P> - -<P> -"I am going," he said at last in his calm clear voice. "I don't wish -to be unkind, but I can't see you again. You have disappointed me." -</P> - -<P> -She wept silently, and made no answer, but crept nearer. Her little -hands stretched blindly out, and appeared to be seeking for him. He -turned on his heel and left the room. In a few moments he was out of -the theatre. -</P> - -<P> -Where he went to he hardly knew. He remembered wandering through dimly -lit streets, past gaunt, black-shadowed archways and evil-looking -houses. Women with hoarse voices and harsh laughter had called after -him. Drunkards had reeled by, cursing and chattering to themselves -like monstrous apes. He had seen grotesque children huddled upon -door-steps, and heard shrieks and oaths from gloomy courts. -</P> - -<P> -As the dawn was just breaking, he found himself close to Covent Garden. -The darkness lifted, and, flushed with faint fires, the sky hollowed -itself into a perfect pearl. Huge carts filled with nodding lilies -rumbled slowly down the polished empty street. The air was heavy with -the perfume of the flowers, and their beauty seemed to bring him an -anodyne for his pain. He followed into the market and watched the men -unloading their waggons. A white-smocked carter offered him some -cherries. He thanked him, wondered why he refused to accept any money -for them, and began to eat them listlessly. They had been plucked at -midnight, and the coldness of the moon had entered into them. A long -line of boys carrying crates of striped tulips, and of yellow and red -roses, defiled in front of him, threading their way through the huge, -jade-green piles of vegetables. Under the portico, with its grey, -sun-bleached pillars, loitered a troop of draggled bareheaded girls, -waiting for the auction to be over. Others crowded round the swinging -doors of the coffee-house in the piazza. The heavy cart-horses slipped -and stamped upon the rough stones, shaking their bells and trappings. -Some of the drivers were lying asleep on a pile of sacks. Iris-necked -and pink-footed, the pigeons ran about picking up seeds. -</P> - -<P> -After a little while, he hailed a hansom and drove home. For a few -moments he loitered upon the doorstep, looking round at the silent -square, with its blank, close-shuttered windows and its staring blinds. -The sky was pure opal now, and the roofs of the houses glistened like -silver against it. From some chimney opposite a thin wreath of smoke -was rising. It curled, a violet riband, through the nacre-coloured air. -</P> - -<P> -In the huge gilt Venetian lantern, spoil of some Doge's barge, that -hung from the ceiling of the great, oak-panelled hall of entrance, -lights were still burning from three flickering jets: thin blue petals -of flame they seemed, rimmed with white fire. He turned them out and, -having thrown his hat and cape on the table, passed through the library -towards the door of his bedroom, a large octagonal chamber on the -ground floor that, in his new-born feeling for luxury, he had just had -decorated for himself and hung with some curious Renaissance tapestries -that had been discovered stored in a disused attic at Selby Royal. As -he was turning the handle of the door, his eye fell upon the portrait -Basil Hallward had painted of him. He started back as if in surprise. -Then he went on into his own room, looking somewhat puzzled. After he -had taken the button-hole out of his coat, he seemed to hesitate. -Finally, he came back, went over to the picture, and examined it. In -the dim arrested light that struggled through the cream-coloured silk -blinds, the face appeared to him to be a little changed. The -expression looked different. One would have said that there was a -touch of cruelty in the mouth. It was certainly strange. -</P> - -<P> -He turned round and, walking to the window, drew up the blind. The -bright dawn flooded the room and swept the fantastic shadows into dusky -corners, where they lay shuddering. But the strange expression that he -had noticed in the face of the portrait seemed to linger there, to be -more intensified even. The quivering ardent sunlight showed him the -lines of cruelty round the mouth as clearly as if he had been looking -into a mirror after he had done some dreadful thing. -</P> - -<P> -He winced and, taking up from the table an oval glass framed in ivory -Cupids, one of Lord Henry's many presents to him, glanced hurriedly -into its polished depths. No line like that warped his red lips. What -did it mean? -</P> - -<P> -He rubbed his eyes, and came close to the picture, and examined it -again. There were no signs of any change when he looked into the -actual painting, and yet there was no doubt that the whole expression -had altered. It was not a mere fancy of his own. The thing was -horribly apparent. -</P> - -<P> -He threw himself into a chair and began to think. Suddenly there -flashed across his mind what he had said in Basil Hallward's studio the -day the picture had been finished. Yes, he remembered it perfectly. -He had uttered a mad wish that he himself might remain young, and the -portrait grow old; that his own beauty might be untarnished, and the -face on the canvas bear the burden of his passions and his sins; that -the painted image might be seared with the lines of suffering and -thought, and that he might keep all the delicate bloom and loveliness -of his then just conscious boyhood. Surely his wish had not been -fulfilled? Such things were impossible. It seemed monstrous even to -think of them. And, yet, there was the picture before him, with the -touch of cruelty in the mouth. -</P> - -<P> -Cruelty! Had he been cruel? It was the girl's fault, not his. He had -dreamed of her as a great artist, had given his love to her because he -had thought her great. Then she had disappointed him. She had been -shallow and unworthy. And, yet, a feeling of infinite regret came over -him, as he thought of her lying at his feet sobbing like a little -child. He remembered with what callousness he had watched her. Why -had he been made like that? Why had such a soul been given to him? -But he had suffered also. During the three terrible hours that the -play had lasted, he had lived centuries of pain, aeon upon aeon of -torture. His life was well worth hers. She had marred him for a -moment, if he had wounded her for an age. Besides, women were better -suited to bear sorrow than men. They lived on their emotions. They -only thought of their emotions. When they took lovers, it was merely -to have some one with whom they could have scenes. Lord Henry had told -him that, and Lord Henry knew what women were. Why should he trouble -about Sibyl Vane? She was nothing to him now. -</P> - -<P> -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? -</P> - -<P> -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. -</P> - -<P> -Yet it was watching him, with its beautiful marred face and its cruel -smile. Its bright hair gleamed in the early sunlight. Its blue eyes -met his own. A sense of infinite pity, not for himself, but for the -painted image of himself, came over him. It had altered already, and -would alter more. Its gold would wither into grey. Its red and white -roses would die. For every sin that he committed, a stain would fleck -and wreck its fairness. But he would not sin. The picture, changed or -unchanged, would be to him the visible emblem of conscience. He would -resist temptation. He would not see Lord Henry any more--would not, at -any rate, listen to those subtle poisonous theories that in Basil -Hallward's garden had first stirred within him the passion for -impossible things. He would go back to Sibyl Vane, make her amends, -marry her, try to love her again. Yes, it was his duty to do so. She -must have suffered more than he had. Poor child! He had been selfish -and cruel to her. The fascination that she had exercised over him -would return. They would be happy together. His life with her would -be beautiful and pure. -</P> - -<P> -He got up from his chair and drew a large screen right in front of the -portrait, shuddering as he glanced at it. "How horrible!" he murmured -to himself, and he walked across to the window and opened it. When he -stepped out on to the grass, he drew a deep breath. The fresh morning -air seemed to drive away all his sombre passions. He thought only of -Sibyl. A faint echo of his love came back to him. He repeated her -name over and over again. The birds that were singing in the -dew-drenched garden seemed to be telling the flowers about her. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap08"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 8 -</H3> - -<P> -It was long past noon when he awoke. His valet had crept several times -on tiptoe into the room to see if he was stirring, and had wondered -what made his young master sleep so late. Finally his bell sounded, -and Victor came in softly with a cup of tea, and a pile of letters, on -a small tray of old Sevres china, and drew back the olive-satin -curtains, with their shimmering blue lining, that hung in front of the -three tall windows. -</P> - -<P> -"Monsieur has well slept this morning," he said, smiling. -</P> - -<P> -"What o'clock is it, Victor?" asked Dorian Gray drowsily. -</P> - -<P> -"One hour and a quarter, Monsieur." -</P> - -<P> -How late it was! He sat up, and having sipped some tea, turned over -his letters. One of them was from Lord Henry, and had been brought by -hand that morning. He hesitated for a moment, and then put it aside. -The others he opened listlessly. They contained the usual collection -of cards, invitations to dinner, tickets for private views, programmes -of charity concerts, and the like that are showered on fashionable -young men every morning during the season. There was a rather heavy -bill for a chased silver Louis-Quinze toilet-set that he had not yet -had the courage to send on to his guardians, who were extremely -old-fashioned people and did not realize that we live in an age when -unnecessary things are our only necessities; and there were several -very courteously worded communications from Jermyn Street money-lenders -offering to advance any sum of money at a moment's notice and at the -most reasonable rates of interest. -</P> - -<P> -After about ten minutes he got up, and throwing on an elaborate -dressing-gown of silk-embroidered cashmere wool, passed into the -onyx-paved bathroom. The cool water refreshed him after his long -sleep. He seemed to have forgotten all that he had gone through. A -dim sense of having taken part in some strange tragedy came to him once -or twice, but there was the unreality of a dream about it. -</P> - -<P> -As soon as he was dressed, he went into the library and sat down to a -light French breakfast that had been laid out for him on a small round -table close to the open window. It was an exquisite day. The warm air -seemed laden with spices. A bee flew in and buzzed round the -blue-dragon bowl that, filled with sulphur-yellow roses, stood before -him. He felt perfectly happy. -</P> - -<P> -Suddenly his eye fell on the screen that he had placed in front of the -portrait, and he started. -</P> - -<P> -"Too cold for Monsieur?" asked his valet, putting an omelette on the -table. "I shut the window?" -</P> - -<P> -Dorian shook his head. "I am not cold," he murmured. -</P> - -<P> -Was it all true? Had the portrait really changed? Or had it been -simply his own imagination that had made him see a look of evil where -there had been a look of joy? Surely a painted canvas could not alter? -The thing was absurd. It would serve as a tale to tell Basil some day. -It would make him smile. -</P> - -<P> -And, yet, how vivid was his recollection of the whole thing! First in -the dim twilight, and then in the bright dawn, he had seen the touch of -cruelty round the warped lips. He almost dreaded his valet leaving the -room. He knew that when he was alone he would have to examine the -portrait. He was afraid of certainty. When the coffee and cigarettes -had been brought and the man turned to go, he felt a wild desire to -tell him to remain. As the door was closing behind him, he called him -back. The man stood waiting for his orders. Dorian looked at him for -a moment. "I am not at home to any one, Victor," he said with a sigh. -The man bowed and retired. -</P> - -<P> -Then he rose from the table, lit a cigarette, and flung himself down on -a luxuriously cushioned couch that stood facing the screen. The screen -was an old one, of gilt Spanish leather, stamped and wrought with a -rather florid Louis-Quatorze pattern. He scanned it curiously, -wondering if ever before it had concealed the secret of a man's life. -</P> - -<P> -Should he move it aside, after all? Why not let it stay there? What -was the use of knowing? If the thing was true, it was terrible. If it -was not true, why trouble about it? But what if, by some fate or -deadlier chance, eyes other than his spied behind and saw the horrible -change? What should he do if Basil Hallward came and asked to look at -his own picture? Basil would be sure to do that. No; the thing had to -be examined, and at once. Anything would be better than this dreadful -state of doubt. -</P> - -<P> -He got up and locked both doors. At least he would be alone when he -looked upon the mask of his shame. Then he drew the screen aside and -saw himself face to face. It was perfectly true. The portrait had -altered. -</P> - -<P> -As he often remembered afterwards, and always with no small wonder, he -found himself at first gazing at the portrait with a feeling of almost -scientific interest. That such a change should have taken place was -incredible to him. And yet it was a fact. Was there some subtle -affinity between the chemical atoms that shaped themselves into form -and colour on the canvas and the soul that was within him? Could it be -that what that soul thought, they realized?--that what it dreamed, they -made true? Or was there some other, more terrible reason? He -shuddered, and felt afraid, and, going back to the couch, lay there, -gazing at the picture in sickened horror. -</P> - -<P> -One thing, however, he felt that it had done for him. It had made him -conscious how unjust, how cruel, he had been to Sibyl Vane. It was not -too late to make reparation for that. She could still be his wife. -His unreal and selfish love would yield to some higher influence, would -be transformed into some nobler passion, and the portrait that Basil -Hallward had painted of him would be a guide to him through life, would -be to him what holiness is to some, and conscience to others, and the -fear of God to us all. There were opiates for remorse, drugs that -could lull the moral sense to sleep. But here was a visible symbol of -the degradation of sin. Here was an ever-present sign of the ruin men -brought upon their souls. -</P> - -<P> -Three o'clock struck, and four, and the half-hour rang its double -chime, but Dorian Gray did not stir. He was trying to gather up the -scarlet threads of life and to weave them into a pattern; to find his -way through the sanguine labyrinth of passion through which he was -wandering. He did not know what to do, or what to think. Finally, he -went over to the table and wrote a passionate letter to the girl he had -loved, imploring her forgiveness and accusing himself of madness. He -covered page after page with wild words of sorrow and wilder words of -pain. There is a luxury in self-reproach. When we blame ourselves, we -feel that no one else has a right to blame us. It is the confession, -not the priest, that gives us absolution. When Dorian had finished the -letter, he felt that he had been forgiven. -</P> - -<P> -Suddenly there came a knock to the door, and he heard Lord Henry's -voice outside. "My dear boy, I must see you. Let me in at once. I -can't bear your shutting yourself up like this." -</P> - -<P> -He made no answer at first, but remained quite still. The knocking -still continued and grew louder. Yes, it was better to let Lord Henry -in, and to explain to him the new life he was going to lead, to quarrel -with him if it became necessary to quarrel, to part if parting was -inevitable. He jumped up, drew the screen hastily across the picture, -and unlocked the door. -</P> - -<P> -"I am so sorry for it all, Dorian," said Lord Henry as he entered. -"But you must not think too much about it." -</P> - -<P> -"Do you mean about Sibyl Vane?" asked the lad. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, of course," answered Lord Henry, sinking into a chair and slowly -pulling off his yellow gloves. "It is dreadful, from one point of -view, but it was not your fault. Tell me, did you go behind and see -her, after the play was over?" -</P> - -<P> -"Yes." -</P> - -<P> -"I felt sure you had. Did you make a scene with her?" -</P> - -<P> -"I was brutal, Harry--perfectly brutal. But it is all right now. I am -not sorry for anything that has happened. It has taught me to know -myself better." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah, Dorian, I am so glad you take it in that way! I was afraid I -would find you plunged in remorse and tearing that nice curly hair of -yours." -</P> - -<P> -"I have got through all that," said Dorian, shaking his head and -smiling. "I am perfectly happy now. I know what conscience is, to -begin with. It is not what you told me it was. It is the divinest -thing in us. Don't sneer at it, Harry, any more--at least not before -me. I want to be good. I can't bear the idea of my soul being -hideous." -</P> - -<P> -"A very charming artistic basis for ethics, Dorian! I congratulate you -on it. But how are you going to begin?" -</P> - -<P> -"By marrying Sibyl Vane." -</P> - -<P> -"Marrying Sibyl Vane!" cried Lord Henry, standing up and looking at him -in perplexed amazement. "But, my dear Dorian--" -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, Harry, I know what you are going to say. Something dreadful -about marriage. Don't say it. Don't ever say things of that kind to -me again. Two days ago I asked Sibyl to marry me. I am not going to -break my word to her. She is to be my wife." -</P> - -<P> -"Your wife! Dorian! ... Didn't you get my letter? I wrote to you this -morning, and sent the note down by my own man." -</P> - -<P> -"Your letter? Oh, yes, I remember. I have not read it yet, Harry. I -was afraid there might be something in it that I wouldn't like. You -cut life to pieces with your epigrams." -</P> - -<P> -"You know nothing then?" -</P> - -<P> -"What do you mean?" -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry walked across the room, and sitting down by Dorian Gray, -took both his hands in his own and held them tightly. "Dorian," he -said, "my letter--don't be frightened--was to tell you that Sibyl Vane -is dead." -</P> - -<P> -A cry of pain broke from the lad's lips, and he leaped to his feet, -tearing his hands away from Lord Henry's grasp. "Dead! Sibyl dead! -It is not true! It is a horrible lie! How dare you say it?" -</P> - -<P> -"It is quite true, Dorian," said Lord Henry, gravely. "It is in all -the morning papers. I wrote down to you to ask you not to see any one -till I came. There will have to be an inquest, of course, and you must -not be mixed up in it. Things like that make a man fashionable in -Paris. But in London people are so prejudiced. Here, one should never -make one's debut with a scandal. One should reserve that to give an -interest to one's old age. I suppose they don't know your name at the -theatre? If they don't, it is all right. Did any one see you going -round to her room? That is an important point." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian did not answer for a few moments. He was dazed with horror. -Finally he stammered, in a stifled voice, "Harry, did you say an -inquest? What did you mean by that? Did Sibyl--? Oh, Harry, I can't -bear it! But be quick. Tell me everything at once." -</P> - -<P> -"I have no doubt it was not an accident, Dorian, though it must be put -in that way to the public. It seems that as she was leaving the -theatre with her mother, about half-past twelve or so, she said she had -forgotten something upstairs. They waited some time for her, but she -did not come down again. They ultimately found her lying dead on the -floor of her dressing-room. She had swallowed something by mistake, -some dreadful thing they use at theatres. I don't know what it was, -but it had either prussic acid or white lead in it. I should fancy it -was prussic acid, as she seems to have died instantaneously." -</P> - -<P> -"Harry, Harry, it is terrible!" cried the lad. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes; it is very tragic, of course, but you must not get yourself mixed -up in it. I see by The Standard that she was seventeen. I should have -thought she was almost younger than that. She looked such a child, and -seemed to know so little about acting. Dorian, you mustn't let this -thing get on your nerves. You must come and dine with me, and -afterwards we will look in at the opera. It is a Patti night, and -everybody will be there. You can come to my sister's box. She has got -some smart women with her." -</P> - -<P> -"So I have murdered Sibyl Vane," said Dorian Gray, half to himself, -"murdered her as surely as if I had cut her little throat with a knife. -Yet the roses are not less lovely for all that. The birds sing just as -happily in my garden. And to-night I am to dine with you, and then go -on to the opera, and sup somewhere, I suppose, afterwards. How -extraordinarily dramatic life is! If I had read all this in a book, -Harry, I think I would have wept over it. Somehow, now that it has -happened actually, and to me, it seems far too wonderful for tears. -Here is the first passionate love-letter I have ever written in my -life. Strange, that my first passionate love-letter should have been -addressed to a dead girl. Can they feel, I wonder, those white silent -people we call the dead? Sibyl! Can she feel, or know, or listen? -Oh, Harry, how I loved her once! It seems years ago to me now. She -was everything to me. Then came that dreadful night--was it really -only last night?--when she played so badly, and my heart almost broke. -She explained it all to me. It was terribly pathetic. But I was not -moved a bit. I thought her shallow. Suddenly something happened that -made me afraid. I can't tell you what it was, but it was terrible. I -said I would go back to her. I felt I had done wrong. And now she is -dead. My God! My God! Harry, what shall I do? You don't know the -danger I am in, and there is nothing to keep me straight. She would -have done that for me. She had no right to kill herself. It was -selfish of her." -</P> - -<P> -"My dear Dorian," answered Lord Henry, taking a cigarette from his case -and producing a gold-latten matchbox, "the only way a woman can ever -reform a man is by boring him so completely that he loses all possible -interest in life. If you had married this girl, you would have been -wretched. Of course, you would have treated her kindly. One can -always be kind to people about whom one cares nothing. But she would -have soon found out that you were absolutely indifferent to her. And -when a woman finds that out about her husband, she either becomes -dreadfully dowdy, or wears very smart bonnets that some other woman's -husband has to pay for. I say nothing about the social mistake, which -would have been abject--which, of course, I would not have allowed--but -I assure you that in any case the whole thing would have been an -absolute failure." -</P> - -<P> -"I suppose it would," muttered the lad, walking up and down the room -and looking horribly pale. "But I thought it was my duty. It is not -my fault that this terrible tragedy has prevented my doing what was -right. I remember your saying once that there is a fatality about good -resolutions--that they are always made too late. Mine certainly were." -</P> - -<P> -"Good resolutions are useless attempts to interfere with scientific -laws. Their origin is pure vanity. Their result is absolutely nil. -They give us, now and then, some of those luxurious sterile emotions -that have a certain charm for the weak. That is all that can be said -for them. They are simply cheques that men draw on a bank where they -have no account." -</P> - -<P> -"Harry," cried Dorian Gray, coming over and sitting down beside him, -"why is it that I cannot feel this tragedy as much as I want to? I -don't think I am heartless. Do you?" -</P> - -<P> -"You have done too many foolish things during the last fortnight to be -entitled to give yourself that name, Dorian," answered Lord Henry with -his sweet melancholy smile. -</P> - -<P> -The lad frowned. "I don't like that explanation, Harry," he rejoined, -"but I am glad you don't think I am heartless. I am nothing of the -kind. I know I am not. And yet I must admit that this thing that has -happened does not affect me as it should. It seems to me to be simply -like a wonderful ending to a wonderful play. It has all the terrible -beauty of a Greek tragedy, a tragedy in which I took a great part, but -by which I have not been wounded." -</P> - -<P> -"It is an interesting question," said Lord Henry, who found an -exquisite pleasure in playing on the lad's unconscious egotism, "an -extremely interesting question. I fancy that the true explanation is -this: It often happens that the real tragedies of life occur in such -an inartistic manner that they hurt us by their crude violence, their -absolute incoherence, their absurd want of meaning, their entire lack -of style. They affect us just as vulgarity affects us. They give us -an impression of sheer brute force, and we revolt against that. -Sometimes, however, a tragedy that possesses artistic elements of -beauty crosses our lives. If these elements of beauty are real, the -whole thing simply appeals to our sense of dramatic effect. Suddenly -we find that we are no longer the actors, but the spectators of the -play. Or rather we are both. We watch ourselves, and the mere wonder -of the spectacle enthralls us. In the present case, what is it that -has really happened? Some one has killed herself for love of you. I -wish that I had ever had such an experience. It would have made me in -love with love for the rest of my life. The people who have adored -me--there have not been very many, but there have been some--have -always insisted on living on, long after I had ceased to care for them, -or they to care for me. They have become stout and tedious, and when I -meet them, they go in at once for reminiscences. That awful memory of -woman! What a fearful thing it is! And what an utter intellectual -stagnation it reveals! One should absorb the colour of life, but one -should never remember its details. Details are always vulgar." -</P> - -<P> -"I must sow poppies in my garden," sighed Dorian. -</P> - -<P> -"There is no necessity," rejoined his companion. "Life has always -poppies in her hands. Of course, now and then things linger. I once -wore nothing but violets all through one season, as a form of artistic -mourning for a romance that would not die. Ultimately, however, it did -die. I forget what killed it. I think it was her proposing to -sacrifice the whole world for me. That is always a dreadful moment. -It fills one with the terror of eternity. Well--would you believe -it?--a week ago, at Lady Hampshire's, I found myself seated at dinner -next the lady in question, and she insisted on going over the whole -thing again, and digging up the past, and raking up the future. I had -buried my romance in a bed of asphodel. She dragged it out again and -assured me that I had spoiled her life. I am bound to state that she -ate an enormous dinner, so I did not feel any anxiety. But what a lack -of taste she showed! The one charm of the past is that it is the past. -But women never know when the curtain has fallen. They always want a -sixth act, and as soon as the interest of the play is entirely over, -they propose to continue it. If they were allowed their own way, every -comedy would have a tragic ending, and every tragedy would culminate in -a farce. They are charmingly artificial, but they have no sense of -art. You are more fortunate than I am. I assure you, Dorian, that not -one of the women I have known would have done for me what Sibyl Vane -did for you. Ordinary women always console themselves. Some of them -do it by going in for sentimental colours. Never trust a woman who -wears mauve, whatever her age may be, or a woman over thirty-five who -is fond of pink ribbons. It always means that they have a history. -Others find a great consolation in suddenly discovering the good -qualities of their husbands. They flaunt their conjugal felicity in -one's face, as if it were the most fascinating of sins. Religion -consoles some. Its mysteries have all the charm of a flirtation, a -woman once told me, and I can quite understand it. Besides, nothing -makes one so vain as being told that one is a sinner. Conscience makes -egotists of us all. Yes; there is really no end to the consolations -that women find in modern life. Indeed, I have not mentioned the most -important one." -</P> - -<P> -"What is that, Harry?" said the lad listlessly. -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, the obvious consolation. Taking some one else's admirer when one -loses one's own. In good society that always whitewashes a woman. But -really, Dorian, how different Sibyl Vane must have been from all the -women one meets! There is something to me quite beautiful about her -death. I am glad I am living in a century when such wonders happen. -They make one believe in the reality of the things we all play with, -such as romance, passion, and love." -</P> - -<P> -"I was terribly cruel to her. You forget that." -</P> - -<P> -"I am afraid that women appreciate cruelty, downright cruelty, more -than anything else. They have wonderfully primitive instincts. We -have emancipated them, but they remain slaves looking for their -masters, all the same. They love being dominated. I am sure you were -splendid. I have never seen you really and absolutely angry, but I can -fancy how delightful you looked. And, after all, you said something to -me the day before yesterday that seemed to me at the time to be merely -fanciful, but that I see now was absolutely true, and it holds the key -to everything." -</P> - -<P> -"What was that, Harry?" -</P> - -<P> -"You said to me that Sibyl Vane represented to you all the heroines of -romance--that she was Desdemona one night, and Ophelia the other; that -if she died as Juliet, she came to life as Imogen." -</P> - -<P> -"She will never come to life again now," muttered the lad, burying his -face in his hands. -</P> - -<P> -"No, she will never come to life. She has played her last part. But -you must think of that lonely death in the tawdry dressing-room simply -as a strange lurid fragment from some Jacobean tragedy, as a wonderful -scene from Webster, or Ford, or Cyril Tourneur. The girl never really -lived, and so she has never really died. To you at least she was -always a dream, a phantom that flitted through Shakespeare's plays and -left them lovelier for its presence, a reed through which Shakespeare's -music sounded richer and more full of joy. The moment she touched -actual life, she marred it, and it marred her, and so she passed away. -Mourn for Ophelia, if you like. Put ashes on your head because -Cordelia was strangled. Cry out against Heaven because the daughter of -Brabantio died. But don't waste your tears over Sibyl Vane. She was -less real than they are." -</P> - -<P> -There was a silence. The evening darkened in the room. Noiselessly, -and with silver feet, the shadows crept in from the garden. The -colours faded wearily out of things. -</P> - -<P> -After some time Dorian Gray looked up. "You have explained me to -myself, Harry," he murmured with something of a sigh of relief. "I -felt all that you have said, but somehow I was afraid of it, and I -could not express it to myself. How well you know me! But we will not -talk again of what has happened. It has been a marvellous experience. -That is all. I wonder if life has still in store for me anything as -marvellous." -</P> - -<P> -"Life has everything in store for you, Dorian. There is nothing that -you, with your extraordinary good looks, will not be able to do." -</P> - -<P> -"But suppose, Harry, I became haggard, and old, and wrinkled? What -then?" -</P> - -<P> -"Ah, then," said Lord Henry, rising to go, "then, my dear Dorian, you -would have to fight for your victories. As it is, they are brought to -you. No, you must keep your good looks. We live in an age that reads -too much to be wise, and that thinks too much to be beautiful. We -cannot spare you. And now you had better dress and drive down to the -club. We are rather late, as it is." -</P> - -<P> -"I think I shall join you at the opera, Harry. I feel too tired to eat -anything. What is the number of your sister's box?" -</P> - -<P> -"Twenty-seven, I believe. It is on the grand tier. You will see her -name on the door. But I am sorry you won't come and dine." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't feel up to it," said Dorian listlessly. "But I am awfully -obliged to you for all that you have said to me. You are certainly my -best friend. No one has ever understood me as you have." -</P> - -<P> -"We are only at the beginning of our friendship, Dorian," answered Lord -Henry, shaking him by the hand. "Good-bye. I shall see you before -nine-thirty, I hope. Remember, Patti is singing." -</P> - -<P> -As he closed the door behind him, Dorian Gray touched the bell, and in -a few minutes Victor appeared with the lamps and drew the blinds down. -He waited impatiently for him to go. The man seemed to take an -interminable time over everything. -</P> - -<P> -As soon as he had left, he rushed to the screen and drew it back. No; -there was no further change in the picture. It had received the news -of Sibyl Vane's death before he had known of it himself. It was -conscious of the events of life as they occurred. The vicious cruelty -that marred the fine lines of the mouth had, no doubt, appeared at the -very moment that the girl had drunk the poison, whatever it was. Or -was it indifferent to results? Did it merely take cognizance of what -passed within the soul? He wondered, and hoped that some day he would -see the change taking place before his very eyes, shuddering as he -hoped it. -</P> - -<P> -Poor Sibyl! What a romance it had all been! She had often mimicked -death on the stage. Then Death himself had touched her and taken her -with him. How had she played that dreadful last scene? Had she cursed -him, as she died? No; she had died for love of him, and love would -always be a sacrament to him now. She had atoned for everything by the -sacrifice she had made of her life. He would not think any more of -what she had made him go through, on that horrible night at the -theatre. When he thought of her, it would be as a wonderful tragic -figure sent on to the world's stage to show the supreme reality of -love. A wonderful tragic figure? Tears came to his eyes as he -remembered her childlike look, and winsome fanciful ways, and shy -tremulous grace. He brushed them away hastily and looked again at the -picture. -</P> - -<P> -He felt that the time had really come for making his choice. Or had -his choice already been made? Yes, life had decided that for -him--life, and his own infinite curiosity about life. Eternal youth, -infinite passion, pleasures subtle and secret, wild joys and wilder -sins--he was to have all these things. The portrait was to bear the -burden of his shame: that was all. -</P> - -<P> -A feeling of pain crept over him as he thought of the desecration that -was in store for the fair face on the canvas. Once, in boyish mockery -of Narcissus, he had kissed, or feigned to kiss, those painted lips -that now smiled so cruelly at him. Morning after morning he had sat -before the portrait wondering at its beauty, almost enamoured of it, as -it seemed to him at times. Was it to alter now with every mood to -which he yielded? Was it to become a monstrous and loathsome thing, to -be hidden away in a locked room, to be shut out from the sunlight that -had so often touched to brighter gold the waving wonder of its hair? -The pity of it! the pity of it! -</P> - -<P> -For a moment, he thought of praying that the horrible sympathy that -existed between him and the picture might cease. It had changed in -answer to a prayer; perhaps in answer to a prayer it might remain -unchanged. And yet, who, that knew anything about life, would -surrender the chance of remaining always young, however fantastic that -chance might be, or with what fateful consequences it might be fraught? -Besides, was it really under his control? Had it indeed been prayer -that had produced the substitution? Might there not be some curious -scientific reason for it all? If thought could exercise its influence -upon a living organism, might not thought exercise an influence upon -dead and inorganic things? Nay, without thought or conscious desire, -might not things external to ourselves vibrate in unison with our moods -and passions, atom calling to atom in secret love or strange affinity? -But the reason was of no importance. He would never again tempt by a -prayer any terrible power. If the picture was to alter, it was to -alter. That was all. Why inquire too closely into it? -</P> - -<P> -For there would be a real pleasure in watching it. He would be able to -follow his mind into its secret places. This portrait would be to him -the most magical of mirrors. As it had revealed to him his own body, -so it would reveal to him his own soul. And when winter came upon it, -he would still be standing where spring trembles on the verge of -summer. When the blood crept from its face, and left behind a pallid -mask of chalk with leaden eyes, he would keep the glamour of boyhood. -Not one blossom of his loveliness would ever fade. Not one pulse of -his life would ever weaken. Like the gods of the Greeks, he would be -strong, and fleet, and joyous. What did it matter what happened to the -coloured image on the canvas? He would be safe. That was everything. -</P> - -<P> -He drew the screen back into its former place in front of the picture, -smiling as he did so, and passed into his bedroom, where his valet was -already waiting for him. An hour later he was at the opera, and Lord -Henry was leaning over his chair. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap09"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 9 -</H3> - -<P> -As he was sitting at breakfast next morning, Basil Hallward was shown -into the room. -</P> - -<P> -"I am so glad I have found you, Dorian," he said gravely. "I called -last night, and they told me you were at the opera. Of course, I knew -that was impossible. But I wish you had left word where you had really -gone to. I passed a dreadful evening, half afraid that one tragedy -might be followed by another. I think you might have telegraphed for -me when you heard of it first. I read of it quite by chance in a late -edition of The Globe that I picked up at the club. I came here at once -and was miserable at not finding you. I can't tell you how -heart-broken I am about the whole thing. I know what you must suffer. -But where were you? Did you go down and see the girl's mother? For a -moment I thought of following you there. They gave the address in the -paper. Somewhere in the Euston Road, isn't it? But I was afraid of -intruding upon a sorrow that I could not lighten. Poor woman! What a -state she must be in! And her only child, too! What did she say about -it all?" -</P> - -<P> -"My dear Basil, how do I know?" murmured Dorian Gray, sipping some -pale-yellow wine from a delicate, gold-beaded bubble of Venetian glass -and looking dreadfully bored. "I was at the opera. You should have -come on there. I met Lady Gwendolen, Harry's sister, for the first -time. We were in her box. She is perfectly charming; and Patti sang -divinely. Don't talk about horrid subjects. If one doesn't talk about -a thing, it has never happened. It is simply expression, as Harry -says, that gives reality to things. I may mention that she was not the -woman's only child. There is a son, a charming fellow, I believe. But -he is not on the stage. He is a sailor, or something. And now, tell -me about yourself and what you are painting." -</P> - -<P> -"You went to the opera?" said Hallward, speaking very slowly and with a -strained touch of pain in his voice. "You went to the opera while -Sibyl Vane was lying dead in some sordid lodging? You can talk to me -of other women being charming, and of Patti singing divinely, before -the girl you loved has even the quiet of a grave to sleep in? Why, -man, there are horrors in store for that little white body of hers!" -</P> - -<P> -"Stop, Basil! I won't hear it!" cried Dorian, leaping to his feet. -"You must not tell me about things. What is done is done. What is -past is past." -</P> - -<P> -"You call yesterday the past?" -</P> - -<P> -"What has the actual lapse of time got to do with it? It is only -shallow people who require years to get rid of an emotion. A man who -is master of himself can end a sorrow as easily as he can invent a -pleasure. I don't want to be at the mercy of my emotions. I want to -use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them." -</P> - -<P> -"Dorian, this is horrible! Something has changed you completely. You -look exactly the same wonderful boy who, day after day, used to come -down to my studio to sit for his picture. But you were simple, -natural, and affectionate then. You were the most unspoiled creature -in the whole world. Now, I don't know what has come over you. You -talk as if you had no heart, no pity in you. It is all Harry's -influence. I see that." -</P> - -<P> -The lad flushed up and, going to the window, looked out for a few -moments on the green, flickering, sun-lashed garden. "I owe a great -deal to Harry, Basil," he said at last, "more than I owe to you. You -only taught me to be vain." -</P> - -<P> -"Well, I am punished for that, Dorian--or shall be some day." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't know what you mean, Basil," he exclaimed, turning round. "I -don't know what you want. What do you want?" -</P> - -<P> -"I want the Dorian Gray I used to paint," said the artist sadly. -</P> - -<P> -"Basil," said the lad, going over to him and putting his hand on his -shoulder, "you have come too late. Yesterday, when I heard that Sibyl -Vane had killed herself--" -</P> - -<P> -"Killed herself! Good heavens! is there no doubt about that?" cried -Hallward, looking up at him with an expression of horror. -</P> - -<P> -"My dear Basil! Surely you don't think it was a vulgar accident? Of -course she killed herself." -</P> - -<P> -The elder man buried his face in his hands. "How fearful," he -muttered, and a shudder ran through him. -</P> - -<P> -"No," said Dorian Gray, "there is nothing fearful about it. It is one -of the great romantic tragedies of the age. As a rule, people who act -lead the most commonplace lives. They are good husbands, or faithful -wives, or something tedious. You know what I mean--middle-class virtue -and all that kind of thing. How different Sibyl was! She lived her -finest tragedy. She was always a heroine. The last night she -played--the night you saw her--she acted badly because she had known -the reality of love. When she knew its unreality, she died, as Juliet -might have died. She passed again into the sphere of art. There is -something of the martyr about her. Her death has all the pathetic -uselessness of martyrdom, all its wasted beauty. But, as I was saying, -you must not think I have not suffered. If you had come in yesterday -at a particular moment--about half-past five, perhaps, or a quarter to -six--you would have found me in tears. Even Harry, who was here, who -brought me the news, in fact, had no idea what I was going through. I -suffered immensely. Then it passed away. I cannot repeat an emotion. -No one can, except sentimentalists. And you are awfully unjust, Basil. -You come down here to console me. That is charming of you. You find -me consoled, and you are furious. How like a sympathetic person! You -remind me of a story Harry told me about a certain philanthropist who -spent twenty years of his life in trying to get some grievance -redressed, or some unjust law altered--I forget exactly what it was. -Finally he succeeded, and nothing could exceed his disappointment. He -had absolutely nothing to do, almost died of ennui, and became a -confirmed misanthrope. And besides, my dear old Basil, if you really -want to console me, teach me rather to forget what has happened, or to -see it from a proper artistic point of view. Was it not Gautier who -used to write about la consolation des arts? I remember picking up a -little vellum-covered book in your studio one day and chancing on that -delightful phrase. Well, I am not like that young man you told me of -when we were down at Marlow together, the young man who used to say -that yellow satin could console one for all the miseries of life. I -love beautiful things that one can touch and handle. Old brocades, -green bronzes, lacquer-work, carved ivories, exquisite surroundings, -luxury, pomp--there is much to be got from all these. But the artistic -temperament that they create, or at any rate reveal, is still more to -me. To become the spectator of one's own life, as Harry says, is to -escape the suffering of life. I know you are surprised at my talking -to you like this. You have not realized how I have developed. I was a -schoolboy when you knew me. I am a man now. I have new passions, new -thoughts, new ideas. I am different, but you must not like me less. I -am changed, but you must always be my friend. Of course, I am very -fond of Harry. But I know that you are better than he is. You are not -stronger--you are too much afraid of life--but you are better. And how -happy we used to be together! Don't leave me, Basil, and don't quarrel -with me. I am what I am. There is nothing more to be said." -</P> - -<P> -The painter felt strangely moved. The lad was infinitely dear to him, -and his personality had been the great turning point in his art. He -could not bear the idea of reproaching him any more. After all, his -indifference was probably merely a mood that would pass away. There -was so much in him that was good, so much in him that was noble. -</P> - -<P> -"Well, Dorian," he said at length, with a sad smile, "I won't speak to -you again about this horrible thing, after to-day. I only trust your -name won't be mentioned in connection with it. The inquest is to take -place this afternoon. Have they summoned you?" -</P> - -<P> -Dorian shook his head, and a look of annoyance passed over his face at -the mention of the word "inquest." There was something so crude and -vulgar about everything of the kind. "They don't know my name," he -answered. -</P> - -<P> -"But surely she did?" -</P> - -<P> -"Only my Christian name, and that I am quite sure she never mentioned -to any one. She told me once that they were all rather curious to -learn who I was, and that she invariably told them my name was Prince -Charming. It was pretty of her. You must do me a drawing of Sibyl, -Basil. I should like to have something more of her than the memory of -a few kisses and some broken pathetic words." -</P> - -<P> -"I will try and do something, Dorian, if it would please you. But you -must come and sit to me yourself again. I can't get on without you." -</P> - -<P> -"I can never sit to you again, Basil. It is impossible!" he exclaimed, -starting back. -</P> - -<P> -The painter stared at him. "My dear boy, what nonsense!" he cried. -"Do you mean to say you don't like what I did of you? Where is it? -Why have you pulled the screen in front of it? Let me look at it. It -is the best thing I have ever done. Do take the screen away, Dorian. -It is simply disgraceful of your servant hiding my work like that. I -felt the room looked different as I came in." -</P> - -<P> -"My servant has nothing to do with it, Basil. You don't imagine I let -him arrange my room for me? He settles my flowers for me -sometimes--that is all. No; I did it myself. The light was too strong -on the portrait." -</P> - -<P> -"Too strong! Surely not, my dear fellow? It is an admirable place for -it. Let me see it." And Hallward walked towards the corner of the -room. -</P> - -<P> -A cry of terror broke from Dorian Gray's lips, and he rushed between -the painter and the screen. "Basil," he said, looking very pale, "you -must not look at it. I don't wish you to." -</P> - -<P> -"Not look at my own work! You are not serious. Why shouldn't I look -at it?" exclaimed Hallward, laughing. -</P> - -<P> -"If you try to look at it, Basil, on my word of honour I will never -speak to you again as long as I live. I am quite serious. I don't -offer any explanation, and you are not to ask for any. But, remember, -if you touch this screen, everything is over between us." -</P> - -<P> -Hallward was thunderstruck. He looked at Dorian Gray in absolute -amazement. He had never seen him like this before. The lad was -actually pallid with rage. His hands were clenched, and the pupils of -his eyes were like disks of blue fire. He was trembling all over. -</P> - -<P> -"Dorian!" -</P> - -<P> -"Don't speak!" -</P> - -<P> -"But what is the matter? Of course I won't look at it if you don't -want me to," he said, rather coldly, turning on his heel and going over -towards the window. "But, really, it seems rather absurd that I -shouldn't see my own work, especially as I am going to exhibit it in -Paris in the autumn. I shall probably have to give it another coat of -varnish before that, so I must see it some day, and why not to-day?" -</P> - -<P> -"To exhibit it! You want to exhibit it?" exclaimed Dorian Gray, a -strange sense of terror creeping over him. Was the world going to be -shown his secret? Were people to gape at the mystery of his life? -That was impossible. Something--he did not know what--had to be done -at once. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes; I don't suppose you will object to that. Georges Petit is going -to collect all my best pictures for a special exhibition in the Rue de -Seze, which will open the first week in October. The portrait will -only be away a month. I should think you could easily spare it for -that time. In fact, you are sure to be out of town. And if you keep -it always behind a screen, you can't care much about it." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray passed his hand over his forehead. There were beads of -perspiration there. He felt that he was on the brink of a horrible -danger. "You told me a month ago that you would never exhibit it," he -cried. "Why have you changed your mind? You people who go in for -being consistent have just as many moods as others have. The only -difference is that your moods are rather meaningless. You can't have -forgotten that you assured me most solemnly that nothing in the world -would induce you to send it to any exhibition. You told Harry exactly -the same thing." He stopped suddenly, and a gleam of light came into -his eyes. He remembered that Lord Henry had said to him once, half -seriously and half in jest, "If you want to have a strange quarter of -an hour, get Basil to tell you why he won't exhibit your picture. He -told me why he wouldn't, and it was a revelation to me." Yes, perhaps -Basil, too, had his secret. He would ask him and try. -</P> - -<P> -"Basil," he said, coming over quite close and looking him straight in -the face, "we have each of us a secret. Let me know yours, and I shall -tell you mine. What was your reason for refusing to exhibit my -picture?" -</P> - -<P> -The painter shuddered in spite of himself. "Dorian, if I told you, you -might like me less than you do, and you would certainly laugh at me. I -could not bear your doing either of those two things. If you wish me -never to look at your picture again, I am content. I have always you -to look at. If you wish the best work I have ever done to be hidden -from the world, I am satisfied. Your friendship is dearer to me than -any fame or reputation." -</P> - -<P> -"No, Basil, you must tell me," insisted Dorian Gray. "I think I have a -right to know." His feeling of terror had passed away, and curiosity -had taken its place. He was determined to find out Basil Hallward's -mystery. -</P> - -<P> -"Let us sit down, Dorian," said the painter, looking troubled. "Let us -sit down. And just answer me one question. Have you noticed in the -picture something curious?--something that probably at first did not -strike you, but that revealed itself to you suddenly?" -</P> - -<P> -"Basil!" cried the lad, clutching the arms of his chair with trembling -hands and gazing at him with wild startled eyes. -</P> - -<P> -"I see you did. Don't speak. Wait till you hear what I have to say. -Dorian, from the moment I met you, your personality had the most -extraordinary influence over me. I was dominated, soul, brain, and -power, by you. You became to me the visible incarnation of that unseen -ideal whose memory haunts us artists like an exquisite dream. I -worshipped you. I grew jealous of every one to whom you spoke. I -wanted to have you all to myself. I was only happy when I was with -you. When you were away from me, you were still present in my art.... -Of course, I never let you know anything about this. It would have -been impossible. You would not have understood it. I hardly -understood it myself. I only knew that I had seen perfection face to -face, and that the world had become wonderful to my eyes--too -wonderful, perhaps, for in such mad worships there is peril, the peril -of losing them, no less than the peril of keeping them.... Weeks and -weeks went on, and I grew more and more absorbed in you. Then came a -new development. I had drawn you as Paris in dainty armour, and as -Adonis with huntsman's cloak and polished boar-spear. Crowned with -heavy lotus-blossoms you had sat on the prow of Adrian's barge, gazing -across the green turbid Nile. You had leaned over the still pool of -some Greek woodland and seen in the water's silent silver the marvel of -your own face. And it had all been what art should be--unconscious, -ideal, and remote. One day, a fatal day I sometimes think, I -determined to paint a wonderful portrait of you as you actually are, -not in the costume of dead ages, but in your own dress and in your own -time. Whether it was the realism of the method, or the mere wonder of -your own personality, thus directly presented to me without mist or -veil, I cannot tell. But I know that as I worked at it, every flake -and film of colour seemed to me to reveal my secret. I grew afraid -that others would know of my idolatry. I felt, Dorian, that I had told -too much, that I had put too much of myself into it. Then it was that -I resolved never to allow the picture to be exhibited. You were a -little annoyed; but then you did not realize all that it meant to me. -Harry, to whom I talked about it, laughed at me. But I did not mind -that. When the picture was finished, and I sat alone with it, I felt -that I was right.... Well, after a few days the thing left my studio, -and as soon as I had got rid of the intolerable fascination of its -presence, it seemed to me that I had been foolish in imagining that I -had seen anything in it, more than that you were extremely good-looking -and that I could paint. Even now I cannot help feeling that it is a -mistake to think that the passion one feels in creation is ever really -shown in the work one creates. Art is always more abstract than we -fancy. Form and colour tell us of form and colour--that is all. It -often seems to me that art conceals the artist far more completely than -it ever reveals him. And so when I got this offer from Paris, I -determined to make your portrait the principal thing in my exhibition. -It never occurred to me that you would refuse. I see now that you were -right. The picture cannot be shown. You must not be angry with me, -Dorian, for what I have told you. As I said to Harry, once, you are -made to be worshipped." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray drew a long breath. The colour came back to his cheeks, -and a smile played about his lips. The peril was over. He was safe -for the time. Yet he could not help feeling infinite pity for the -painter who had just made this strange confession to him, and wondered -if he himself would ever be so dominated by the personality of a -friend. Lord Henry had the charm of being very dangerous. But that -was all. He was too clever and too cynical to be really fond of. -Would there ever be some one who would fill him with a strange -idolatry? Was that one of the things that life had in store? -</P> - -<P> -"It is extraordinary to me, Dorian," said Hallward, "that you should -have seen this in the portrait. Did you really see it?" -</P> - -<P> -"I saw something in it," he answered, "something that seemed to me very -curious." -</P> - -<P> -"Well, you don't mind my looking at the thing now?" -</P> - -<P> -Dorian shook his head. "You must not ask me that, Basil. I could not -possibly let you stand in front of that picture." -</P> - -<P> -"You will some day, surely?" -</P> - -<P> -"Never." -</P> - -<P> -"Well, perhaps you are right. And now good-bye, Dorian. You have been -the one person in my life who has really influenced my art. Whatever I -have done that is good, I owe to you. Ah! you don't know what it cost -me to tell you all that I have told you." -</P> - -<P> -"My dear Basil," said Dorian, "what have you told me? Simply that you -felt that you admired me too much. That is not even a compliment." -</P> - -<P> -"It was not intended as a compliment. It was a confession. Now that I -have made it, something seems to have gone out of me. Perhaps one -should never put one's worship into words." -</P> - -<P> -"It was a very disappointing confession." -</P> - -<P> -"Why, what did you expect, Dorian? You didn't see anything else in the -picture, did you? There was nothing else to see?" -</P> - -<P> -"No; there was nothing else to see. Why do you ask? But you mustn't -talk about worship. It is foolish. You and I are friends, Basil, and -we must always remain so." -</P> - -<P> -"You have got Harry," said the painter sadly. -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, Harry!" cried the lad, with a ripple of laughter. "Harry spends -his days in saying what is incredible and his evenings in doing what is -improbable. Just the sort of life I would like to lead. But still I -don't think I would go to Harry if I were in trouble. I would sooner -go to you, Basil." -</P> - -<P> -"You will sit to me again?" -</P> - -<P> -"Impossible!" -</P> - -<P> -"You spoil my life as an artist by refusing, Dorian. No man comes -across two ideal things. Few come across one." -</P> - -<P> -"I can't explain it to you, Basil, but I must never sit to you again. -There is something fatal about a portrait. It has a life of its own. -I will come and have tea with you. That will be just as pleasant." -</P> - -<P> -"Pleasanter for you, I am afraid," murmured Hallward regretfully. "And -now good-bye. I am sorry you won't let me look at the picture once -again. But that can't be helped. I quite understand what you feel -about it." -</P> - -<P> -As he left the room, Dorian Gray smiled to himself. Poor Basil! How -little he knew of the true reason! And how strange it was that, -instead of having been forced to reveal his own secret, he had -succeeded, almost by chance, in wresting a secret from his friend! How -much that strange confession explained to him! The painter's absurd -fits of jealousy, his wild devotion, his extravagant panegyrics, his -curious reticences--he understood them all now, and he felt sorry. -There seemed to him to be something tragic in a friendship so coloured -by romance. -</P> - -<P> -He sighed and touched the bell. The portrait must be hidden away at -all costs. He could not run such a risk of discovery again. It had -been mad of him to have allowed the thing to remain, even for an hour, -in a room to which any of his friends had access. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap10"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 10 -</H3> - -<P> -When his servant entered, he looked at him steadfastly and wondered if -he had thought of peering behind the screen. The man was quite -impassive and waited for his orders. Dorian lit a cigarette and walked -over to the glass and glanced into it. He could see the reflection of -Victor's face perfectly. It was like a placid mask of servility. -There was nothing to be afraid of, there. Yet he thought it best to be -on his guard. -</P> - -<P> -Speaking very slowly, he told him to tell the house-keeper that he -wanted to see her, and then to go to the frame-maker and ask him to -send two of his men round at once. It seemed to him that as the man -left the room his eyes wandered in the direction of the screen. Or was -that merely his own fancy? -</P> - -<P> -After a few moments, in her black silk dress, with old-fashioned thread -mittens on her wrinkled hands, Mrs. Leaf bustled into the library. He -asked her for the key of the schoolroom. -</P> - -<P> -"The old schoolroom, Mr. Dorian?" she exclaimed. "Why, it is full of -dust. I must get it arranged and put straight before you go into it. -It is not fit for you to see, sir. It is not, indeed." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't want it put straight, Leaf. I only want the key." -</P> - -<P> -"Well, sir, you'll be covered with cobwebs if you go into it. Why, it -hasn't been opened for nearly five years--not since his lordship died." -</P> - -<P> -He winced at the mention of his grandfather. He had hateful memories -of him. "That does not matter," he answered. "I simply want to see -the place--that is all. Give me the key." -</P> - -<P> -"And here is the key, sir," said the old lady, going over the contents -of her bunch with tremulously uncertain hands. "Here is the key. I'll -have it off the bunch in a moment. But you don't think of living up -there, sir, and you so comfortable here?" -</P> - -<P> -"No, no," he cried petulantly. "Thank you, Leaf. That will do." -</P> - -<P> -She lingered for a few moments, and was garrulous over some detail of -the household. He sighed and told her to manage things as she thought -best. She left the room, wreathed in smiles. -</P> - -<P> -As the door closed, Dorian put the key in his pocket and looked round -the room. His eye fell on a large, purple satin coverlet heavily -embroidered with gold, a splendid piece of late seventeenth-century -Venetian work that his grandfather had found in a convent near Bologna. -Yes, that would serve to wrap the dreadful thing in. It had perhaps -served often as a pall for the dead. Now it was to hide something that -had a corruption of its own, worse than the corruption of death -itself--something that would breed horrors and yet would never die. -What the worm was to the corpse, his sins would be to the painted image -on the canvas. They would mar its beauty and eat away its grace. They -would defile it and make it shameful. And yet the thing would still -live on. It would be always alive. -</P> - -<P> -He shuddered, and for a moment he regretted that he had not told Basil -the true reason why he had wished to hide the picture away. Basil -would have helped him to resist Lord Henry's influence, and the still -more poisonous influences that came from his own temperament. The love -that he bore him--for it was really love--had nothing in it that was -not noble and intellectual. It was not that mere physical admiration -of beauty that is born of the senses and that dies when the senses -tire. It was such love as Michelangelo had known, and Montaigne, and -Winckelmann, and Shakespeare himself. Yes, Basil could have saved him. -But it was too late now. The past could always be annihilated. -Regret, denial, or forgetfulness could do that. But the future was -inevitable. There were passions in him that would find their terrible -outlet, dreams that would make the shadow of their evil real. -</P> - -<P> -He took up from the couch the great purple-and-gold texture that -covered it, and, holding it in his hands, passed behind the screen. -Was the face on the canvas viler than before? It seemed to him that it -was unchanged, and yet his loathing of it was intensified. Gold hair, -blue eyes, and rose-red lips--they all were there. It was simply the -expression that had altered. That was horrible in its cruelty. -Compared to what he saw in it of censure or rebuke, how shallow Basil's -reproaches about Sibyl Vane had been!--how shallow, and of what little -account! His own soul was looking out at him from the canvas and -calling him to judgement. A look of pain came across him, and he flung -the rich pall over the picture. As he did so, a knock came to the -door. He passed out as his servant entered. -</P> - -<P> -"The persons are here, Monsieur." -</P> - -<P> -He felt that the man must be got rid of at once. He must not be -allowed to know where the picture was being taken to. There was -something sly about him, and he had thoughtful, treacherous eyes. -Sitting down at the writing-table he scribbled a note to Lord Henry, -asking him to send him round something to read and reminding him that -they were to meet at eight-fifteen that evening. -</P> - -<P> -"Wait for an answer," he said, handing it to him, "and show the men in -here." -</P> - -<P> -In two or three minutes there was another knock, and Mr. Hubbard -himself, the celebrated frame-maker of South Audley Street, came in -with a somewhat rough-looking young assistant. Mr. Hubbard was a -florid, red-whiskered little man, whose admiration for art was -considerably tempered by the inveterate impecuniosity of most of the -artists who dealt with him. As a rule, he never left his shop. He -waited for people to come to him. But he always made an exception in -favour of Dorian Gray. There was something about Dorian that charmed -everybody. It was a pleasure even to see him. -</P> - -<P> -"What can I do for you, Mr. Gray?" he said, rubbing his fat freckled -hands. "I thought I would do myself the honour of coming round in -person. I have just got a beauty of a frame, sir. Picked it up at a -sale. Old Florentine. Came from Fonthill, I believe. Admirably -suited for a religious subject, Mr. Gray." -</P> - -<P> -"I am so sorry you have given yourself the trouble of coming round, Mr. -Hubbard. I shall certainly drop in and look at the frame--though I -don't go in much at present for religious art--but to-day I only want a -picture carried to the top of the house for me. It is rather heavy, so -I thought I would ask you to lend me a couple of your men." -</P> - -<P> -"No trouble at all, Mr. Gray. I am delighted to be of any service to -you. Which is the work of art, sir?" -</P> - -<P> -"This," replied Dorian, moving the screen back. "Can you move it, -covering and all, just as it is? I don't want it to get scratched -going upstairs." -</P> - -<P> -"There will be no difficulty, sir," said the genial frame-maker, -beginning, with the aid of his assistant, to unhook the picture from -the long brass chains by which it was suspended. "And, now, where -shall we carry it to, Mr. Gray?" -</P> - -<P> -"I will show you the way, Mr. Hubbard, if you will kindly follow me. -Or perhaps you had better go in front. I am afraid it is right at the -top of the house. We will go up by the front staircase, as it is -wider." -</P> - -<P> -He held the door open for them, and they passed out into the hall and -began the ascent. The elaborate character of the frame had made the -picture extremely bulky, and now and then, in spite of the obsequious -protests of Mr. Hubbard, who had the true tradesman's spirited dislike -of seeing a gentleman doing anything useful, Dorian put his hand to it -so as to help them. -</P> - -<P> -"Something of a load to carry, sir," gasped the little man when they -reached the top landing. And he wiped his shiny forehead. -</P> - -<P> -"I am afraid it is rather heavy," murmured Dorian as he unlocked the -door that opened into the room that was to keep for him the curious -secret of his life and hide his soul from the eyes of men. -</P> - -<P> -He had not entered the place for more than four years--not, indeed, -since he had used it first as a play-room when he was a child, and then -as a study when he grew somewhat older. It was a large, -well-proportioned room, which had been specially built by the last Lord -Kelso for the use of the little grandson whom, for his strange likeness -to his mother, and also for other reasons, he had always hated and -desired to keep at a distance. It appeared to Dorian to have but -little changed. There was the huge Italian cassone, with its -fantastically painted panels and its tarnished gilt mouldings, in which -he had so often hidden himself as a boy. There the satinwood book-case -filled with his dog-eared schoolbooks. On the wall behind it was -hanging the same ragged Flemish tapestry where a faded king and queen -were playing chess in a garden, while a company of hawkers rode by, -carrying hooded birds on their gauntleted wrists. How well he -remembered it all! Every moment of his lonely childhood came back to -him as he looked round. He recalled the stainless purity of his boyish -life, and it seemed horrible to him that it was here the fatal portrait -was to be hidden away. How little he had thought, in those dead days, -of all that was in store for him! -</P> - -<P> -But there was no other place in the house so secure from prying eyes as -this. He had the key, and no one else could enter it. Beneath its -purple pall, the face painted on the canvas could grow bestial, sodden, -and unclean. What did it matter? No one could see it. He himself -would not see it. Why should he watch the hideous corruption of his -soul? He kept his youth--that was enough. And, besides, might not -his nature grow finer, after all? There was no reason that the future -should be so full of shame. Some love might come across his life, and -purify him, and shield him from those sins that seemed to be already -stirring in spirit and in flesh--those curious unpictured sins whose -very mystery lent them their subtlety and their charm. Perhaps, some -day, the cruel look would have passed away from the scarlet sensitive -mouth, and he might show to the world Basil Hallward's masterpiece. -</P> - -<P> -No; that was impossible. Hour by hour, and week by week, the thing -upon the canvas was growing old. It might escape the hideousness of -sin, but the hideousness of age was in store for it. The cheeks would -become hollow or flaccid. Yellow crow's feet would creep round the -fading eyes and make them horrible. The hair would lose its -brightness, the mouth would gape or droop, would be foolish or gross, -as the mouths of old men are. There would be the wrinkled throat, the -cold, blue-veined hands, the twisted body, that he remembered in the -grandfather who had been so stern to him in his boyhood. The picture -had to be concealed. There was no help for it. -</P> - -<P> -"Bring it in, Mr. Hubbard, please," he said, wearily, turning round. -"I am sorry I kept you so long. I was thinking of something else." -</P> - -<P> -"Always glad to have a rest, Mr. Gray," answered the frame-maker, who -was still gasping for breath. "Where shall we put it, sir?" -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, anywhere. Here: this will do. I don't want to have it hung up. -Just lean it against the wall. Thanks." -</P> - -<P> -"Might one look at the work of art, sir?" -</P> - -<P> -Dorian started. "It would not interest you, Mr. Hubbard," he said, -keeping his eye on the man. He felt ready to leap upon him and fling -him to the ground if he dared to lift the gorgeous hanging that -concealed the secret of his life. "I shan't trouble you any more now. -I am much obliged for your kindness in coming round." -</P> - -<P> -"Not at all, not at all, Mr. Gray. Ever ready to do anything for you, -sir." And Mr. Hubbard tramped downstairs, followed by the assistant, -who glanced back at Dorian with a look of shy wonder in his rough -uncomely face. He had never seen any one so marvellous. -</P> - -<P> -When the sound of their footsteps had died away, Dorian locked the door -and put the key in his pocket. He felt safe now. No one would ever -look upon the horrible thing. No eye but his would ever see his shame. -</P> - -<P> -On reaching the library, he found that it was just after five o'clock -and that the tea had been already brought up. On a little table of -dark perfumed wood thickly incrusted with nacre, a present from Lady -Radley, his guardian's wife, a pretty professional invalid who had -spent the preceding winter in Cairo, was lying a note from Lord Henry, -and beside it was a book bound in yellow paper, the cover slightly torn -and the edges soiled. A copy of the third edition of The St. James's -Gazette had been placed on the tea-tray. It was evident that Victor had -returned. He wondered if he had met the men in the hall as they were -leaving the house and had wormed out of them what they had been doing. -He would be sure to miss the picture--had no doubt missed it already, -while he had been laying the tea-things. The screen had not been set -back, and a blank space was visible on the wall. Perhaps some night he -might find him creeping upstairs and trying to force the door of the -room. It was a horrible thing to have a spy in one's house. He had -heard of rich men who had been blackmailed all their lives by some -servant who had read a letter, or overheard a conversation, or picked -up a card with an address, or found beneath a pillow a withered flower -or a shred of crumpled lace. -</P> - -<P> -He sighed, and having poured himself out some tea, opened Lord Henry's -note. It was simply to say that he sent him round the evening paper, -and a book that might interest him, and that he would be at the club at -eight-fifteen. He opened The St. James's languidly, and looked through -it. A red pencil-mark on the fifth page caught his eye. It drew -attention to the following paragraph: -</P> - -<BR> - -<P> -INQUEST ON AN ACTRESS.--An inquest was held this morning at the Bell -Tavern, Hoxton Road, by Mr. Danby, the District Coroner, on the body of -Sibyl Vane, a young actress recently engaged at the Royal Theatre, -Holborn. A verdict of death by misadventure was returned. -Considerable sympathy was expressed for the mother of the deceased, who -was greatly affected during the giving of her own evidence, and that of -Dr. Birrell, who had made the post-mortem examination of the deceased. -</P> - -<BR> - -<P> -He frowned, and tearing the paper in two, went across the room and -flung the pieces away. How ugly it all was! And how horribly real -ugliness made things! He felt a little annoyed with Lord Henry for -having sent him the report. And it was certainly stupid of him to have -marked it with red pencil. Victor might have read it. The man knew -more than enough English for that. -</P> - -<P> -Perhaps he had read it and had begun to suspect something. And, yet, -what did it matter? What had Dorian Gray to do with Sibyl Vane's -death? There was nothing to fear. Dorian Gray had not killed her. -</P> - -<P> -His eye fell on the yellow book that Lord Henry had sent him. What was -it, he wondered. He went towards the little, pearl-coloured octagonal -stand that had always looked to him like the work of some strange -Egyptian bees that wrought in silver, and taking up the volume, flung -himself into an arm-chair and began to turn over the leaves. After a -few minutes he became absorbed. It was the strangest book that he had -ever read. It seemed to him that in exquisite raiment, and to the -delicate sound of flutes, the sins of the world were passing in dumb -show before him. Things that he had dimly dreamed of were suddenly -made real to him. Things of which he had never dreamed were gradually -revealed. -</P> - -<P> -It was a novel without a plot and with only one character, being, -indeed, simply a psychological study of a certain young Parisian who -spent his life trying to realize in the nineteenth century all the -passions and modes of thought that belonged to every century except his -own, and to sum up, as it were, in himself the various moods through -which the world-spirit had ever passed, loving for their mere -artificiality those renunciations that men have unwisely called virtue, -as much as those natural rebellions that wise men still call sin. The -style in which it was written was that curious jewelled style, vivid -and obscure at once, full of argot and of archaisms, of technical -expressions and of elaborate paraphrases, that characterizes the work -of some of the finest artists of the French school of Symbolistes. -There were in it metaphors as monstrous as orchids and as subtle in -colour. The life of the senses was described in the terms of mystical -philosophy. One hardly knew at times whether one was reading the -spiritual ecstasies of some mediaeval saint or the morbid confessions -of a modern sinner. It was a poisonous book. The heavy odour of -incense seemed to cling about its pages and to trouble the brain. The -mere cadence of the sentences, the subtle monotony of their music, so -full as it was of complex refrains and movements elaborately repeated, -produced in the mind of the lad, as he passed from chapter to chapter, -a form of reverie, a malady of dreaming, that made him unconscious of -the falling day and creeping shadows. -</P> - -<P> -Cloudless, and pierced by one solitary star, a copper-green sky gleamed -through the windows. He read on by its wan light till he could read no -more. Then, after his valet had reminded him several times of the -lateness of the hour, he got up, and going into the next room, placed -the book on the little Florentine table that always stood at his -bedside and began to dress for dinner. -</P> - -<P> -It was almost nine o'clock before he reached the club, where he found -Lord Henry sitting alone, in the morning-room, looking very much bored. -</P> - -<P> -"I am so sorry, Harry," he cried, "but really it is entirely your -fault. That book you sent me so fascinated me that I forgot how the -time was going." -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, I thought you would like it," replied his host, rising from his -chair. -</P> - -<P> -"I didn't say I liked it, Harry. I said it fascinated me. There is a -great difference." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah, you have discovered that?" murmured Lord Henry. And they passed -into the dining-room. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap11"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 11 -</H3> - -<P> -For years, Dorian Gray could not free himself from the influence of -this book. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that he never -sought to free himself from it. He procured from Paris no less than -nine large-paper copies of the first edition, and had them bound in -different colours, so that they might suit his various moods and the -changing fancies of a nature over which he seemed, at times, to have -almost entirely lost control. The hero, the wonderful young Parisian -in whom the romantic and the scientific temperaments were so strangely -blended, became to him a kind of prefiguring type of himself. And, -indeed, the whole book seemed to him to contain the story of his own -life, written before he had lived it. -</P> - -<P> -In one point he was more fortunate than the novel's fantastic hero. He -never knew--never, indeed, had any cause to know--that somewhat -grotesque dread of mirrors, and polished metal surfaces, and still -water which came upon the young Parisian so early in his life, and was -occasioned by the sudden decay of a beau that had once, apparently, -been so remarkable. It was with an almost cruel joy--and perhaps in -nearly every joy, as certainly in every pleasure, cruelty has its -place--that he used to read the latter part of the book, with its -really tragic, if somewhat overemphasized, account of the sorrow and -despair of one who had himself lost what in others, and the world, he -had most dearly valued. -</P> - -<P> -For the wonderful beauty that had so fascinated Basil Hallward, and -many others besides him, seemed never to leave him. Even those who had -heard the most evil things against him--and from time to time strange -rumours about his mode of life crept through London and became the -chatter of the clubs--could not believe anything to his dishonour when -they saw him. He had always the look of one who had kept himself -unspotted from the world. Men who talked grossly became silent when -Dorian Gray entered the room. There was something in the purity of his -face that rebuked them. His mere presence seemed to recall to them the -memory of the innocence that they had tarnished. They wondered how one -so charming and graceful as he was could have escaped the stain of an -age that was at once sordid and sensual. -</P> - -<P> -Often, on returning home from one of those mysterious and prolonged -absences that gave rise to such strange conjecture among those who were -his friends, or thought that they were so, he himself would creep -upstairs to the locked room, open the door with the key that never left -him now, and stand, with a mirror, in front of the portrait that Basil -Hallward had painted of him, looking now at the evil and aging face on -the canvas, and now at the fair young face that laughed back at him -from the polished glass. The very sharpness of the contrast used to -quicken his sense of pleasure. He grew more and more enamoured of his -own beauty, more and more interested in the corruption of his own soul. -He would examine with minute care, and sometimes with a monstrous and -terrible delight, the hideous lines that seared the wrinkling forehead -or crawled around the heavy sensual mouth, wondering sometimes which -were the more horrible, the signs of sin or the signs of age. He would -place his white hands beside the coarse bloated hands of the picture, -and smile. He mocked the misshapen body and the failing limbs. -</P> - -<P> -There were moments, indeed, at night, when, lying sleepless in his own -delicately scented chamber, or in the sordid room of the little -ill-famed tavern near the docks which, under an assumed name and in -disguise, it was his habit to frequent, he would think of the ruin he -had brought upon his soul with a pity that was all the more poignant -because it was purely selfish. But moments such as these were rare. -That curiosity about life which Lord Henry had first stirred in him, as -they sat together in the garden of their friend, seemed to increase -with gratification. The more he knew, the more he desired to know. He -had mad hungers that grew more ravenous as he fed them. -</P> - -<P> -Yet he was not really reckless, at any rate in his relations to -society. Once or twice every month during the winter, and on each -Wednesday evening while the season lasted, he would throw open to the -world his beautiful house and have the most celebrated musicians of the -day to charm his guests with the wonders of their art. His little -dinners, in the settling of which Lord Henry always assisted him, were -noted as much for the careful selection and placing of those invited, -as for the exquisite taste shown in the decoration of the table, with -its subtle symphonic arrangements of exotic flowers, and embroidered -cloths, and antique plate of gold and silver. Indeed, there were many, -especially among the very young men, who saw, or fancied that they saw, -in Dorian Gray the true realization of a type of which they had often -dreamed in Eton or Oxford days, a type that was to combine something of -the real culture of the scholar with all the grace and distinction and -perfect manner of a citizen of the world. To them he seemed to be of -the company of those whom Dante describes as having sought to "make -themselves perfect by the worship of beauty." Like Gautier, he was one -for whom "the visible world existed." -</P> - -<P> -And, certainly, to him life itself was the first, the greatest, of the -arts, and for it all the other arts seemed to be but a preparation. -Fashion, by which what is really fantastic becomes for a moment -universal, and dandyism, which, in its own way, is an attempt to assert -the absolute modernity of beauty, had, of course, their fascination for -him. His mode of dressing, and the particular styles that from time to -time he affected, had their marked influence on the young exquisites of -the Mayfair balls and Pall Mall club windows, who copied him in -everything that he did, and tried to reproduce the accidental charm of -his graceful, though to him only half-serious, fopperies. -</P> - -<P> -For, while he was but too ready to accept the position that was almost -immediately offered to him on his coming of age, and found, indeed, a -subtle pleasure in the thought that he might really become to the -London of his own day what to imperial Neronian Rome the author of the -Satyricon once had been, yet in his inmost heart he desired to be -something more than a mere arbiter elegantiarum, to be consulted on the -wearing of a jewel, or the knotting of a necktie, or the conduct of a -cane. He sought to elaborate some new scheme of life that would have -its reasoned philosophy and its ordered principles, and find in the -spiritualizing of the senses its highest realization. -</P> - -<P> -The worship of the senses has often, and with much justice, been -decried, men feeling a natural instinct of terror about passions and -sensations that seem stronger than themselves, and that they are -conscious of sharing with the less highly organized forms of existence. -But it appeared to Dorian Gray that the true nature of the senses had -never been understood, and that they had remained savage and animal -merely because the world had sought to starve them into submission or -to kill them by pain, instead of aiming at making them elements of a -new spirituality, of which a fine instinct for beauty was to be the -dominant characteristic. As he looked back upon man moving through -history, he was haunted by a feeling of loss. So much had been -surrendered! and to such little purpose! There had been mad wilful -rejections, monstrous forms of self-torture and self-denial, whose -origin was fear and whose result was a degradation infinitely more -terrible than that fancied degradation from which, in their ignorance, -they had sought to escape; Nature, in her wonderful irony, driving out -the anchorite to feed with the wild animals of the desert and giving to -the hermit the beasts of the field as his companions. -</P> - -<P> -Yes: there was to be, as Lord Henry had prophesied, a new Hedonism -that was to recreate life and to save it from that harsh uncomely -puritanism that is having, in our own day, its curious revival. It was -to have its service of the intellect, certainly, yet it was never to -accept any theory or system that would involve the sacrifice of any -mode of passionate experience. Its aim, indeed, was to be experience -itself, and not the fruits of experience, sweet or bitter as they might -be. Of the asceticism that deadens the senses, as of the vulgar -profligacy that dulls them, it was to know nothing. But it was to -teach man to concentrate himself upon the moments of a life that is -itself but a moment. -</P> - -<P> -There are few of us who have not sometimes wakened before dawn, either -after one of those dreamless nights that make us almost enamoured of -death, or one of those nights of horror and misshapen joy, when through -the chambers of the brain sweep phantoms more terrible than reality -itself, and instinct with that vivid life that lurks in all grotesques, -and that lends to Gothic art its enduring vitality, this art being, one -might fancy, especially the art of those whose minds have been troubled -with the malady of reverie. Gradually white fingers creep through the -curtains, and they appear to tremble. In black fantastic shapes, dumb -shadows crawl into the corners of the room and crouch there. Outside, -there is the stirring of birds among the leaves, or the sound of men -going forth to their work, or the sigh and sob of the wind coming down -from the hills and wandering round the silent house, as though it -feared to wake the sleepers and yet must needs call forth sleep from -her purple cave. Veil after veil of thin dusky gauze is lifted, and by -degrees the forms and colours of things are restored to them, and we -watch the dawn remaking the world in its antique pattern. The wan -mirrors get back their mimic life. The flameless tapers stand where we -had left them, and beside them lies the half-cut book that we had been -studying, or the wired flower that we had worn at the ball, or the -letter that we had been afraid to read, or that we had read too often. -Nothing seems to us changed. Out of the unreal shadows of the night -comes back the real life that we had known. We have to resume it where -we had left off, and there steals over us a terrible sense of the -necessity for the continuance of energy in the same wearisome round of -stereotyped habits, or a wild longing, it may be, that our eyelids -might open some morning upon a world that had been refashioned anew in -the darkness for our pleasure, a world in which things would have fresh -shapes and colours, and be changed, or have other secrets, a world in -which the past would have little or no place, or survive, at any rate, -in no conscious form of obligation or regret, the remembrance even of -joy having its bitterness and the memories of pleasure their pain. -</P> - -<P> -It was the creation of such worlds as these that seemed to Dorian Gray -to be the true object, or amongst the true objects, of life; and in his -search for sensations that would be at once new and delightful, and -possess that element of strangeness that is so essential to romance, he -would often adopt certain modes of thought that he knew to be really -alien to his nature, abandon himself to their subtle influences, and -then, having, as it were, caught their colour and satisfied his -intellectual curiosity, leave them with that curious indifference that -is not incompatible with a real ardour of temperament, and that, -indeed, according to certain modern psychologists, is often a condition -of it. -</P> - -<P> -It was rumoured of him once that he was about to join the Roman -Catholic communion, and certainly the Roman ritual had always a great -attraction for him. The daily sacrifice, more awful really than all -the sacrifices of the antique world, stirred him as much by its superb -rejection of the evidence of the senses as by the primitive simplicity -of its elements and the eternal pathos of the human tragedy that it -sought to symbolize. He loved to kneel down on the cold marble -pavement and watch the priest, in his stiff flowered dalmatic, slowly -and with white hands moving aside the veil of the tabernacle, or -raising aloft the jewelled, lantern-shaped monstrance with that pallid -wafer that at times, one would fain think, is indeed the "panis -caelestis," the bread of angels, or, robed in the garments of the -Passion of Christ, breaking the Host into the chalice and smiting his -breast for his sins. The fuming censers that the grave boys, in their -lace and scarlet, tossed into the air like great gilt flowers had their -subtle fascination for him. As he passed out, he used to look with -wonder at the black confessionals and long to sit in the dim shadow of -one of them and listen to men and women whispering through the worn -grating the true story of their lives. -</P> - -<P> -But he never fell into the error of arresting his intellectual -development by any formal acceptance of creed or system, or of -mistaking, for a house in which to live, an inn that is but suitable -for the sojourn of a night, or for a few hours of a night in which -there are no stars and the moon is in travail. Mysticism, with its -marvellous power of making common things strange to us, and the subtle -antinomianism that always seems to accompany it, moved him for a -season; and for a season he inclined to the materialistic doctrines of -the Darwinismus movement in Germany, and found a curious pleasure in -tracing the thoughts and passions of men to some pearly cell in the -brain, or some white nerve in the body, delighting in the conception of -the absolute dependence of the spirit on certain physical conditions, -morbid or healthy, normal or diseased. Yet, as has been said of him -before, no theory of life seemed to him to be of any importance -compared with life itself. He felt keenly conscious of how barren all -intellectual speculation is when separated from action and experiment. -He knew that the senses, no less than the soul, have their spiritual -mysteries to reveal. -</P> - -<P> -And so he would now study perfumes and the secrets of their -manufacture, distilling heavily scented oils and burning odorous gums -from the East. He saw that there was no mood of the mind that had not -its counterpart in the sensuous life, and set himself to discover their -true relations, wondering what there was in frankincense that made one -mystical, and in ambergris that stirred one's passions, and in violets -that woke the memory of dead romances, and in musk that troubled the -brain, and in champak that stained the imagination; and seeking often -to elaborate a real psychology of perfumes, and to estimate the several -influences of sweet-smelling roots and scented, pollen-laden flowers; -of aromatic balms and of dark and fragrant woods; of spikenard, that -sickens; of hovenia, that makes men mad; and of aloes, that are said to -be able to expel melancholy from the soul. -</P> - -<P> -At another time he devoted himself entirely to music, and in a long -latticed room, with a vermilion-and-gold ceiling and walls of -olive-green lacquer, he used to give curious concerts in which mad -gipsies tore wild music from little zithers, or grave, yellow-shawled -Tunisians plucked at the strained strings of monstrous lutes, while -grinning Negroes beat monotonously upon copper drums and, crouching -upon scarlet mats, slim turbaned Indians blew through long pipes of -reed or brass and charmed--or feigned to charm--great hooded snakes and -horrible horned adders. The harsh intervals and shrill discords of -barbaric music stirred him at times when Schubert's grace, and Chopin's -beautiful sorrows, and the mighty harmonies of Beethoven himself, fell -unheeded on his ear. He collected together from all parts of the world -the strangest instruments that could be found, either in the tombs of -dead nations or among the few savage tribes that have survived contact -with Western civilizations, and loved to touch and try them. He had -the mysterious juruparis of the Rio Negro Indians, that women are not -allowed to look at and that even youths may not see till they have been -subjected to fasting and scourging, and the earthen jars of the -Peruvians that have the shrill cries of birds, and flutes of human -bones such as Alfonso de Ovalle heard in Chile, and the sonorous green -jaspers that are found near Cuzco and give forth a note of singular -sweetness. He had painted gourds filled with pebbles that rattled when -they were shaken; the long clarin of the Mexicans, into which the -performer does not blow, but through which he inhales the air; the -harsh ture of the Amazon tribes, that is sounded by the sentinels who -sit all day long in high trees, and can be heard, it is said, at a -distance of three leagues; the teponaztli, that has two vibrating -tongues of wood and is beaten with sticks that are smeared with an -elastic gum obtained from the milky juice of plants; the yotl-bells of -the Aztecs, that are hung in clusters like grapes; and a huge -cylindrical drum, covered with the skins of great serpents, like the -one that Bernal Diaz saw when he went with Cortes into the Mexican -temple, and of whose doleful sound he has left us so vivid a -description. The fantastic character of these instruments fascinated -him, and he felt a curious delight in the thought that art, like -Nature, has her monsters, things of bestial shape and with hideous -voices. Yet, after some time, he wearied of them, and would sit in his -box at the opera, either alone or with Lord Henry, listening in rapt -pleasure to "Tannhauser" and seeing in the prelude to that great work -of art a presentation of the tragedy of his own soul. -</P> - -<P> -On one occasion he took up the study of jewels, and appeared at a -costume ball as Anne de Joyeuse, Admiral of France, in a dress covered -with five hundred and sixty pearls. This taste enthralled him for -years, and, indeed, may be said never to have left him. He would often -spend a whole day settling and resettling in their cases the various -stones that he had collected, such as the olive-green chrysoberyl that -turns red by lamplight, the cymophane with its wirelike line of silver, -the pistachio-coloured peridot, rose-pink and wine-yellow topazes, -carbuncles of fiery scarlet with tremulous, four-rayed stars, flame-red -cinnamon-stones, orange and violet spinels, and amethysts with their -alternate layers of ruby and sapphire. He loved the red gold of the -sunstone, and the moonstone's pearly whiteness, and the broken rainbow -of the milky opal. He procured from Amsterdam three emeralds of -extraordinary size and richness of colour, and had a turquoise de la -vieille roche that was the envy of all the connoisseurs. -</P> - -<P> -He discovered wonderful stories, also, about jewels. In Alphonso's -Clericalis Disciplina a serpent was mentioned with eyes of real -jacinth, and in the romantic history of Alexander, the Conqueror of -Emathia was said to have found in the vale of Jordan snakes "with -collars of real emeralds growing on their backs." There was a gem in -the brain of the dragon, Philostratus told us, and "by the exhibition -of golden letters and a scarlet robe" the monster could be thrown into -a magical sleep and slain. According to the great alchemist, Pierre de -Boniface, the diamond rendered a man invisible, and the agate of India -made him eloquent. The cornelian appeased anger, and the hyacinth -provoked sleep, and the amethyst drove away the fumes of wine. The -garnet cast out demons, and the hydropicus deprived the moon of her -colour. The selenite waxed and waned with the moon, and the meloceus, -that discovers thieves, could be affected only by the blood of kids. -Leonardus Camillus had seen a white stone taken from the brain of a -newly killed toad, that was a certain antidote against poison. The -bezoar, that was found in the heart of the Arabian deer, was a charm -that could cure the plague. In the nests of Arabian birds was the -aspilates, that, according to Democritus, kept the wearer from any -danger by fire. -</P> - -<P> -The King of Ceilan rode through his city with a large ruby in his hand, -as the ceremony of his coronation. The gates of the palace of John the -Priest were "made of sardius, with the horn of the horned snake -inwrought, so that no man might bring poison within." Over the gable -were "two golden apples, in which were two carbuncles," so that the -gold might shine by day and the carbuncles by night. In Lodge's -strange romance 'A Margarite of America', it was stated that in the -chamber of the queen one could behold "all the chaste ladies of the -world, inchased out of silver, looking through fair mirrours of -chrysolites, carbuncles, sapphires, and greene emeraults." Marco Polo -had seen the inhabitants of Zipangu place rose-coloured pearls in the -mouths of the dead. A sea-monster had been enamoured of the pearl that -the diver brought to King Perozes, and had slain the thief, and mourned -for seven moons over its loss. When the Huns lured the king into the -great pit, he flung it away--Procopius tells the story--nor was it ever -found again, though the Emperor Anastasius offered five hundred-weight -of gold pieces for it. The King of Malabar had shown to a certain -Venetian a rosary of three hundred and four pearls, one for every god -that he worshipped. -</P> - -<P> -When the Duke de Valentinois, son of Alexander VI, visited Louis XII of -France, his horse was loaded with gold leaves, according to Brantome, -and his cap had double rows of rubies that threw out a great light. -Charles of England had ridden in stirrups hung with four hundred and -twenty-one diamonds. Richard II had a coat, valued at thirty thousand -marks, which was covered with balas rubies. Hall described Henry VIII, -on his way to the Tower previous to his coronation, as wearing "a -jacket of raised gold, the placard embroidered with diamonds and other -rich stones, and a great bauderike about his neck of large balasses." -The favourites of James I wore ear-rings of emeralds set in gold -filigrane. Edward II gave to Piers Gaveston a suit of red-gold armour -studded with jacinths, a collar of gold roses set with -turquoise-stones, and a skull-cap parseme with pearls. Henry II wore -jewelled gloves reaching to the elbow, and had a hawk-glove sewn with -twelve rubies and fifty-two great orients. The ducal hat of Charles -the Rash, the last Duke of Burgundy of his race, was hung with -pear-shaped pearls and studded with sapphires. -</P> - -<P> -How exquisite life had once been! How gorgeous in its pomp and -decoration! Even to read of the luxury of the dead was wonderful. -</P> - -<P> -Then he turned his attention to embroideries and to the tapestries that -performed the office of frescoes in the chill rooms of the northern -nations of Europe. As he investigated the subject--and he always had -an extraordinary faculty of becoming absolutely absorbed for the moment -in whatever he took up--he was almost saddened by the reflection of the -ruin that time brought on beautiful and wonderful things. He, at any -rate, had escaped that. Summer followed summer, and the yellow -jonquils bloomed and died many times, and nights of horror repeated the -story of their shame, but he was unchanged. No winter marred his face -or stained his flowerlike bloom. How different it was with material -things! Where had they passed to? Where was the great crocus-coloured -robe, on which the gods fought against the giants, that had been worked -by brown girls for the pleasure of Athena? Where the huge velarium -that Nero had stretched across the Colosseum at Rome, that Titan sail -of purple on which was represented the starry sky, and Apollo driving a -chariot drawn by white, gilt-reined steeds? He longed to see the -curious table-napkins wrought for the Priest of the Sun, on which were -displayed all the dainties and viands that could be wanted for a feast; -the mortuary cloth of King Chilperic, with its three hundred golden -bees; the fantastic robes that excited the indignation of the Bishop of -Pontus and were figured with "lions, panthers, bears, dogs, forests, -rocks, hunters--all, in fact, that a painter can copy from nature"; and -the coat that Charles of Orleans once wore, on the sleeves of which -were embroidered the verses of a song beginning "Madame, je suis tout -joyeux," the musical accompaniment of the words being wrought in gold -thread, and each note, of square shape in those days, formed with four -pearls. He read of the room that was prepared at the palace at Rheims -for the use of Queen Joan of Burgundy and was decorated with "thirteen -hundred and twenty-one parrots, made in broidery, and blazoned with the -king's arms, and five hundred and sixty-one butterflies, whose wings -were similarly ornamented with the arms of the queen, the whole worked -in gold." Catherine de Medicis had a mourning-bed made for her of -black velvet powdered with crescents and suns. Its curtains were of -damask, with leafy wreaths and garlands, figured upon a gold and silver -ground, and fringed along the edges with broideries of pearls, and it -stood in a room hung with rows of the queen's devices in cut black -velvet upon cloth of silver. Louis XIV had gold embroidered caryatides -fifteen feet high in his apartment. The state bed of Sobieski, King of -Poland, was made of Smyrna gold brocade embroidered in turquoises with -verses from the Koran. Its supports were of silver gilt, beautifully -chased, and profusely set with enamelled and jewelled medallions. It -had been taken from the Turkish camp before Vienna, and the standard of -Mohammed had stood beneath the tremulous gilt of its canopy. -</P> - -<P> -And so, for a whole year, he sought to accumulate the most exquisite -specimens that he could find of textile and embroidered work, getting -the dainty Delhi muslins, finely wrought with gold-thread palmates and -stitched over with iridescent beetles' wings; the Dacca gauzes, that -from their transparency are known in the East as "woven air," and -"running water," and "evening dew"; strange figured cloths from Java; -elaborate yellow Chinese hangings; books bound in tawny satins or fair -blue silks and wrought with fleurs-de-lis, birds and images; veils of -lacis worked in Hungary point; Sicilian brocades and stiff Spanish -velvets; Georgian work, with its gilt coins, and Japanese Foukousas, -with their green-toned golds and their marvellously plumaged birds. -</P> - -<P> -He had a special passion, also, for ecclesiastical vestments, as indeed -he had for everything connected with the service of the Church. In the -long cedar chests that lined the west gallery of his house, he had -stored away many rare and beautiful specimens of what is really the -raiment of the Bride of Christ, who must wear purple and jewels and -fine linen that she may hide the pallid macerated body that is worn by -the suffering that she seeks for and wounded by self-inflicted pain. -He possessed a gorgeous cope of crimson silk and gold-thread damask, -figured with a repeating pattern of golden pomegranates set in -six-petalled formal blossoms, beyond which on either side was the -pine-apple device wrought in seed-pearls. The orphreys were divided -into panels representing scenes from the life of the Virgin, and the -coronation of the Virgin was figured in coloured silks upon the hood. -This was Italian work of the fifteenth century. Another cope was of -green velvet, embroidered with heart-shaped groups of acanthus-leaves, -from which spread long-stemmed white blossoms, the details of which -were picked out with silver thread and coloured crystals. The morse -bore a seraph's head in gold-thread raised work. The orphreys were -woven in a diaper of red and gold silk, and were starred with -medallions of many saints and martyrs, among whom was St. Sebastian. -He had chasubles, also, of amber-coloured silk, and blue silk and gold -brocade, and yellow silk damask and cloth of gold, figured with -representations of the Passion and Crucifixion of Christ, and -embroidered with lions and peacocks and other emblems; dalmatics of -white satin and pink silk damask, decorated with tulips and dolphins -and fleurs-de-lis; altar frontals of crimson velvet and blue linen; and -many corporals, chalice-veils, and sudaria. In the mystic offices to -which such things were put, there was something that quickened his -imagination. -</P> - -<P> -For these treasures, and everything that he collected in his lovely -house, were to be to him means of forgetfulness, modes by which he -could escape, for a season, from the fear that seemed to him at times -to be almost too great to be borne. Upon the walls of the lonely -locked room where he had spent so much of his boyhood, he had hung with -his own hands the terrible portrait whose changing features showed him -the real degradation of his life, and in front of it had draped the -purple-and-gold pall as a curtain. For weeks he would not go there, -would forget the hideous painted thing, and get back his light heart, -his wonderful joyousness, his passionate absorption in mere existence. -Then, suddenly, some night he would creep out of the house, go down to -dreadful places near Blue Gate Fields, and stay there, day after day, -until he was driven away. On his return he would sit in front of the -picture, sometimes loathing it and himself, but filled, at other -times, with that pride of individualism that is half the -fascination of sin, and smiling with secret pleasure at the misshapen -shadow that had to bear the burden that should have been his own. -</P> - -<P> -After a few years he could not endure to be long out of England, and -gave up the villa that he had shared at Trouville with Lord Henry, as -well as the little white walled-in house at Algiers where they had more -than once spent the winter. He hated to be separated from the picture -that was such a part of his life, and was also afraid that during his -absence some one might gain access to the room, in spite of the -elaborate bars that he had caused to be placed upon the door. -</P> - -<P> -He was quite conscious that this would tell them nothing. It was true -that the portrait still preserved, under all the foulness and ugliness -of the face, its marked likeness to himself; but what could they learn -from that? He would laugh at any one who tried to taunt him. He had -not painted it. What was it to him how vile and full of shame it -looked? Even if he told them, would they believe it? -</P> - -<P> -Yet he was afraid. Sometimes when he was down at his great house in -Nottinghamshire, entertaining the fashionable young men of his own rank -who were his chief companions, and astounding the county by the wanton -luxury and gorgeous splendour of his mode of life, he would suddenly -leave his guests and rush back to town to see that the door had not -been tampered with and that the picture was still there. What if it -should be stolen? The mere thought made him cold with horror. Surely -the world would know his secret then. Perhaps the world already -suspected it. -</P> - -<P> -For, while he fascinated many, there were not a few who distrusted him. -He was very nearly blackballed at a West End club of which his birth -and social position fully entitled him to become a member, and it was -said that on one occasion, when he was brought by a friend into the -smoking-room of the Churchill, the Duke of Berwick and another -gentleman got up in a marked manner and went out. Curious stories -became current about him after he had passed his twenty-fifth year. It -was rumoured that he had been seen brawling with foreign sailors in a -low den in the distant parts of Whitechapel, and that he consorted with -thieves and coiners and knew the mysteries of their trade. His -extraordinary absences became notorious, and, when he used to reappear -again in society, men would whisper to each other in corners, or pass -him with a sneer, or look at him with cold searching eyes, as though -they were determined to discover his secret. -</P> - -<P> -Of such insolences and attempted slights he, of course, took no notice, -and in the opinion of most people his frank debonair manner, his -charming boyish smile, and the infinite grace of that wonderful youth -that seemed never to leave him, were in themselves a sufficient answer -to the calumnies, for so they termed them, that were circulated about -him. It was remarked, however, that some of those who had been most -intimate with him appeared, after a time, to shun him. Women who had -wildly adored him, and for his sake had braved all social censure and -set convention at defiance, were seen to grow pallid with shame or -horror if Dorian Gray entered the room. -</P> - -<P> -Yet these whispered scandals only increased in the eyes of many his -strange and dangerous charm. His great wealth was a certain element of -security. Society--civilized society, at least--is never very ready to -believe anything to the detriment of those who are both rich and -fascinating. It feels instinctively that manners are of more -importance than morals, and, in its opinion, the highest respectability -is of much less value than the possession of a good chef. And, after -all, it is a very poor consolation to be told that the man who has -given one a bad dinner, or poor wine, is irreproachable in his private -life. Even the cardinal virtues cannot atone for half-cold entrees, as -Lord Henry remarked once, in a discussion on the subject, and there is -possibly a good deal to be said for his view. For the canons of good -society are, or should be, the same as the canons of art. Form is -absolutely essential to it. It should have the dignity of a ceremony, -as well as its unreality, and should combine the insincere character of -a romantic play with the wit and beauty that make such plays delightful -to us. Is insincerity such a terrible thing? I think not. It is -merely a method by which we can multiply our personalities. -</P> - -<P> -Such, at any rate, was Dorian Gray's opinion. He used to wonder at the -shallow psychology of those who conceive the ego in man as a thing -simple, permanent, reliable, and of one essence. To him, man was a -being with myriad lives and myriad sensations, a complex multiform -creature that bore within itself strange legacies of thought and -passion, and whose very flesh was tainted with the monstrous maladies -of the dead. He loved to stroll through the gaunt cold picture-gallery -of his country house and look at the various portraits of those whose -blood flowed in his veins. Here was Philip Herbert, described by -Francis Osborne, in his Memoires on the Reigns of Queen Elizabeth and -King James, as one who was "caressed by the Court for his handsome -face, which kept him not long company." Was it young Herbert's life -that he sometimes led? Had some strange poisonous germ crept from body -to body till it had reached his own? Was it some dim sense of that -ruined grace that had made him so suddenly, and almost without cause, -give utterance, in Basil Hallward's studio, to the mad prayer that had -so changed his life? Here, in gold-embroidered red doublet, jewelled -surcoat, and gilt-edged ruff and wristbands, stood Sir Anthony Sherard, -with his silver-and-black armour piled at his feet. What had this -man's legacy been? Had the lover of Giovanna of Naples bequeathed him -some inheritance of sin and shame? Were his own actions merely the -dreams that the dead man had not dared to realize? Here, from the -fading canvas, smiled Lady Elizabeth Devereux, in her gauze hood, pearl -stomacher, and pink slashed sleeves. A flower was in her right hand, -and her left clasped an enamelled collar of white and damask roses. On -a table by her side lay a mandolin and an apple. There were large -green rosettes upon her little pointed shoes. He knew her life, and -the strange stories that were told about her lovers. Had he something -of her temperament in him? These oval, heavy-lidded eyes seemed to -look curiously at him. What of George Willoughby, with his powdered -hair and fantastic patches? How evil he looked! The face was -saturnine and swarthy, and the sensual lips seemed to be twisted with -disdain. Delicate lace ruffles fell over the lean yellow hands that -were so overladen with rings. He had been a macaroni of the eighteenth -century, and the friend, in his youth, of Lord Ferrars. What of the -second Lord Beckenham, the companion of the Prince Regent in his -wildest days, and one of the witnesses at the secret marriage with Mrs. -Fitzherbert? How proud and handsome he was, with his chestnut curls -and insolent pose! What passions had he bequeathed? The world had -looked upon him as infamous. He had led the orgies at Carlton House. -The star of the Garter glittered upon his breast. Beside him hung the -portrait of his wife, a pallid, thin-lipped woman in black. Her blood, -also, stirred within him. How curious it all seemed! And his mother -with her Lady Hamilton face and her moist, wine-dashed lips--he knew -what he had got from her. He had got from her his beauty, and his -passion for the beauty of others. She laughed at him in her loose -Bacchante dress. There were vine leaves in her hair. The purple -spilled from the cup she was holding. The carnations of the painting -had withered, but the eyes were still wonderful in their depth and -brilliancy of colour. They seemed to follow him wherever he went. -</P> - -<P> -Yet one had ancestors in literature as well as in one's own race, -nearer perhaps in type and temperament, many of them, and certainly -with an influence of which one was more absolutely conscious. There -were times when it appeared to Dorian Gray that the whole of history -was merely the record of his own life, not as he had lived it in act -and circumstance, but as his imagination had created it for him, as it -had been in his brain and in his passions. He felt that he had known -them all, those strange terrible figures that had passed across the -stage of the world and made sin so marvellous and evil so full of -subtlety. It seemed to him that in some mysterious way their lives had -been his own. -</P> - -<P> -The hero of the wonderful novel that had so influenced his life had -himself known this curious fancy. In the seventh chapter he tells how, -crowned with laurel, lest lightning might strike him, he had sat, as -Tiberius, in a garden at Capri, reading the shameful books of -Elephantis, while dwarfs and peacocks strutted round him and the -flute-player mocked the swinger of the censer; and, as Caligula, had -caroused with the green-shirted jockeys in their stables and supped in -an ivory manger with a jewel-frontleted horse; and, as Domitian, had -wandered through a corridor lined with marble mirrors, looking round -with haggard eyes for the reflection of the dagger that was to end his -days, and sick with that ennui, that terrible taedium vitae, that comes -on those to whom life denies nothing; and had peered through a clear -emerald at the red shambles of the circus and then, in a litter of -pearl and purple drawn by silver-shod mules, been carried through the -Street of Pomegranates to a House of Gold and heard men cry on Nero -Caesar as he passed by; and, as Elagabalus, had painted his face with -colours, and plied the distaff among the women, and brought the Moon -from Carthage and given her in mystic marriage to the Sun. -</P> - -<P> -Over and over again Dorian used to read this fantastic chapter, and the -two chapters immediately following, in which, as in some curious -tapestries or cunningly wrought enamels, were pictured the awful and -beautiful forms of those whom vice and blood and weariness had made -monstrous or mad: Filippo, Duke of Milan, who slew his wife and -painted her lips with a scarlet poison that her lover might suck death -from the dead thing he fondled; Pietro Barbi, the Venetian, known as -Paul the Second, who sought in his vanity to assume the title of -Formosus, and whose tiara, valued at two hundred thousand florins, was -bought at the price of a terrible sin; Gian Maria Visconti, who used -hounds to chase living men and whose murdered body was covered with -roses by a harlot who had loved him; the Borgia on his white horse, -with Fratricide riding beside him and his mantle stained with the blood -of Perotto; Pietro Riario, the young Cardinal Archbishop of Florence, -child and minion of Sixtus IV, whose beauty was equalled only by his -debauchery, and who received Leonora of Aragon in a pavilion of white -and crimson silk, filled with nymphs and centaurs, and gilded a boy -that he might serve at the feast as Ganymede or Hylas; Ezzelin, whose -melancholy could be cured only by the spectacle of death, and who had a -passion for red blood, as other men have for red wine--the son of the -Fiend, as was reported, and one who had cheated his father at dice when -gambling with him for his own soul; Giambattista Cibo, who in mockery -took the name of Innocent and into whose torpid veins the blood of -three lads was infused by a Jewish doctor; Sigismondo Malatesta, the -lover of Isotta and the lord of Rimini, whose effigy was burned at Rome -as the enemy of God and man, who strangled Polyssena with a napkin, and -gave poison to Ginevra d'Este in a cup of emerald, and in honour of a -shameful passion built a pagan church for Christian worship; Charles -VI, who had so wildly adored his brother's wife that a leper had warned -him of the insanity that was coming on him, and who, when his brain had -sickened and grown strange, could only be soothed by Saracen cards -painted with the images of love and death and madness; and, in his -trimmed jerkin and jewelled cap and acanthuslike curls, Grifonetto -Baglioni, who slew Astorre with his bride, and Simonetto with his page, -and whose comeliness was such that, as he lay dying in the yellow -piazza of Perugia, those who had hated him could not choose but weep, -and Atalanta, who had cursed him, blessed him. -</P> - -<P> -There was a horrible fascination in them all. He saw them at night, -and they troubled his imagination in the day. The Renaissance knew of -strange manners of poisoning--poisoning by a helmet and a lighted -torch, by an embroidered glove and a jewelled fan, by a gilded pomander -and by an amber chain. Dorian Gray had been poisoned by a book. There -were moments when he looked on evil simply as a mode through which he -could realize his conception of the beautiful. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap12"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 12 -</H3> - -<P> -It was on the ninth of November, the eve of his own thirty-eighth -birthday, as he often remembered afterwards. -</P> - -<P> -He was walking home about eleven o'clock from Lord Henry's, where he -had been dining, and was wrapped in heavy furs, as the night was cold -and foggy. At the corner of Grosvenor Square and South Audley Street, -a man passed him in the mist, walking very fast and with the collar of -his grey ulster turned up. He had a bag in his hand. Dorian -recognized him. It was Basil Hallward. A strange sense of fear, for -which he could not account, came over him. He made no sign of -recognition and went on quickly in the direction of his own house. -</P> - -<P> -But Hallward had seen him. Dorian heard him first stopping on the -pavement and then hurrying after him. In a few moments, his hand was -on his arm. -</P> - -<P> -"Dorian! What an extraordinary piece of luck! I have been waiting for -you in your library ever since nine o'clock. Finally I took pity on -your tired servant and told him to go to bed, as he let me out. I am -off to Paris by the midnight train, and I particularly wanted to see -you before I left. I thought it was you, or rather your fur coat, as -you passed me. But I wasn't quite sure. Didn't you recognize me?" -</P> - -<P> -"In this fog, my dear Basil? Why, I can't even recognize Grosvenor -Square. I believe my house is somewhere about here, but I don't feel -at all certain about it. I am sorry you are going away, as I have not -seen you for ages. But I suppose you will be back soon?" -</P> - -<P> -"No: I am going to be out of England for six months. I intend to take -a studio in Paris and shut myself up till I have finished a great -picture I have in my head. However, it wasn't about myself I wanted to -talk. Here we are at your door. Let me come in for a moment. I have -something to say to you." -</P> - -<P> -"I shall be charmed. But won't you miss your train?" said Dorian Gray -languidly as he passed up the steps and opened the door with his -latch-key. -</P> - -<P> -The lamplight struggled out through the fog, and Hallward looked at his -watch. "I have heaps of time," he answered. "The train doesn't go -till twelve-fifteen, and it is only just eleven. In fact, I was on my -way to the club to look for you, when I met you. You see, I shan't -have any delay about luggage, as I have sent on my heavy things. All I -have with me is in this bag, and I can easily get to Victoria in twenty -minutes." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian looked at him and smiled. "What a way for a fashionable painter -to travel! A Gladstone bag and an ulster! Come in, or the fog will -get into the house. And mind you don't talk about anything serious. -Nothing is serious nowadays. At least nothing should be." -</P> - -<P> -Hallward shook his head, as he entered, and followed Dorian into the -library. There was a bright wood fire blazing in the large open -hearth. The lamps were lit, and an open Dutch silver spirit-case -stood, with some siphons of soda-water and large cut-glass tumblers, on -a little marqueterie table. -</P> - -<P> -"You see your servant made me quite at home, Dorian. He gave me -everything I wanted, including your best gold-tipped cigarettes. He is -a most hospitable creature. I like him much better than the Frenchman -you used to have. What has become of the Frenchman, by the bye?" -</P> - -<P> -Dorian shrugged his shoulders. "I believe he married Lady Radley's -maid, and has established her in Paris as an English dressmaker. -Anglomania is very fashionable over there now, I hear. It seems silly -of the French, doesn't it? But--do you know?--he was not at all a bad -servant. I never liked him, but I had nothing to complain about. One -often imagines things that are quite absurd. He was really very -devoted to me and seemed quite sorry when he went away. Have another -brandy-and-soda? Or would you like hock-and-seltzer? I always take -hock-and-seltzer myself. There is sure to be some in the next room." -</P> - -<P> -"Thanks, I won't have anything more," said the painter, taking his cap -and coat off and throwing them on the bag that he had placed in the -corner. "And now, my dear fellow, I want to speak to you seriously. -Don't frown like that. You make it so much more difficult for me." -</P> - -<P> -"What is it all about?" cried Dorian in his petulant way, flinging -himself down on the sofa. "I hope it is not about myself. I am tired -of myself to-night. I should like to be somebody else." -</P> - -<P> -"It is about yourself," answered Hallward in his grave deep voice, "and -I must say it to you. I shall only keep you half an hour." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian sighed and lit a cigarette. "Half an hour!" he murmured. -</P> - -<P> -"It is not much to ask of you, Dorian, and it is entirely for your own -sake that I am speaking. I think it right that you should know that -the most dreadful things are being said against you in London." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't wish to know anything about them. I love scandals about other -people, but scandals about myself don't interest me. They have not got -the charm of novelty." -</P> - -<P> -"They must interest you, Dorian. Every gentleman is interested in his -good name. You don't want people to talk of you as something vile and -degraded. Of course, you have your position, and your wealth, and all -that kind of thing. But position and wealth are not everything. Mind -you, I don't believe these rumours at all. At least, I can't believe -them when I see you. Sin is a thing that writes itself across a man's -face. It cannot be concealed. People talk sometimes of secret vices. -There are no such things. If a wretched man has a vice, it shows -itself in the lines of his mouth, the droop of his eyelids, the -moulding of his hands even. Somebody--I won't mention his name, but -you know him--came to me last year to have his portrait done. I had -never seen him before, and had never heard anything about him at the -time, though I have heard a good deal since. He offered an extravagant -price. I refused him. There was something in the shape of his fingers -that I hated. I know now that I was quite right in what I fancied -about him. His life is dreadful. But you, Dorian, with your pure, -bright, innocent face, and your marvellous untroubled youth--I can't -believe anything against you. And yet I see you very seldom, and you -never come down to the studio now, and when I am away from you, and I -hear all these hideous things that people are whispering about you, I -don't know what to say. Why is it, Dorian, that a man like the Duke of -Berwick leaves the room of a club when you enter it? Why is it that so -many gentlemen in London will neither go to your house or invite you to -theirs? You used to be a friend of Lord Staveley. I met him at dinner -last week. Your name happened to come up in conversation, in -connection with the miniatures you have lent to the exhibition at the -Dudley. Staveley curled his lip and said that you might have the most -artistic tastes, but that you were a man whom no pure-minded girl -should be allowed to know, and whom no chaste woman should sit in the -same room with. I reminded him that I was a friend of yours, and asked -him what he meant. He told me. He told me right out before everybody. -It was horrible! Why is your friendship so fatal to young men? There -was that wretched boy in the Guards who committed suicide. You were -his great friend. There was Sir Henry Ashton, who had to leave England -with a tarnished name. You and he were inseparable. What about Adrian -Singleton and his dreadful end? What about Lord Kent's only son and -his career? I met his father yesterday in St. James's Street. He -seemed broken with shame and sorrow. What about the young Duke of -Perth? What sort of life has he got now? What gentleman would -associate with him?" -</P> - -<P> -"Stop, Basil. You are talking about things of which you know nothing," -said Dorian Gray, biting his lip, and with a note of infinite contempt -in his voice. "You ask me why Berwick leaves a room when I enter it. -It is because I know everything about his life, not because he knows -anything about mine. With such blood as he has in his veins, how could -his record be clean? You ask me about Henry Ashton and young Perth. -Did I teach the one his vices, and the other his debauchery? If Kent's -silly son takes his wife from the streets, what is that to me? If -Adrian Singleton writes his friend's name across a bill, am I his -keeper? I know how people chatter in England. The middle classes air -their moral prejudices over their gross dinner-tables, and whisper -about what they call the profligacies of their betters in order to try -and pretend that they are in smart society and on intimate terms with -the people they slander. In this country, it is enough for a man to -have distinction and brains for every common tongue to wag against him. -And what sort of lives do these people, who pose as being moral, lead -themselves? My dear fellow, you forget that we are in the native land -of the hypocrite." -</P> - -<P> -"Dorian," cried Hallward, "that is not the question. England is bad -enough I know, and English society is all wrong. That is the reason -why I want you to be fine. You have not been fine. One has a right to -judge of a man by the effect he has over his friends. Yours seem to -lose all sense of honour, of goodness, of purity. You have filled them -with a madness for pleasure. They have gone down into the depths. You -led them there. Yes: you led them there, and yet you can smile, as -you are smiling now. And there is worse behind. I know you and Harry -are inseparable. Surely for that reason, if for none other, you should -not have made his sister's name a by-word." -</P> - -<P> -"Take care, Basil. You go too far." -</P> - -<P> -"I must speak, and you must listen. You shall listen. When you met -Lady Gwendolen, not a breath of scandal had ever touched her. Is there -a single decent woman in London now who would drive with her in the -park? Why, even her children are not allowed to live with her. Then -there are other stories--stories that you have been seen creeping at -dawn out of dreadful houses and slinking in disguise into the foulest -dens in London. Are they true? Can they be true? When I first heard -them, I laughed. I hear them now, and they make me shudder. What -about your country-house and the life that is led there? Dorian, you -don't know what is said about you. I won't tell you that I don't want -to preach to you. I remember Harry saying once that every man who -turned himself into an amateur curate for the moment always began by -saying that, and then proceeded to break his word. I do want to preach -to you. I want you to lead such a life as will make the world respect -you. I want you to have a clean name and a fair record. I want you to -get rid of the dreadful people you associate with. Don't shrug your -shoulders like that. Don't be so indifferent. You have a wonderful -influence. Let it be for good, not for evil. They say that you -corrupt every one with whom you become intimate, and that it is quite -sufficient for you to enter a house for shame of some kind to follow -after. I don't know whether it is so or not. How should I know? But -it is said of you. I am told things that it seems impossible to doubt. -Lord Gloucester was one of my greatest friends at Oxford. He showed me -a letter that his wife had written to him when she was dying alone in -her villa at Mentone. Your name was implicated in the most terrible -confession I ever read. I told him that it was absurd--that I knew you -thoroughly and that you were incapable of anything of the kind. Know -you? I wonder do I know you? Before I could answer that, I should -have to see your soul." -</P> - -<P> -"To see my soul!" muttered Dorian Gray, starting up from the sofa and -turning almost white from fear. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes," answered Hallward gravely, and with deep-toned sorrow in his -voice, "to see your soul. But only God can do that." -</P> - -<P> -A bitter laugh of mockery broke from the lips of the younger man. "You -shall see it yourself, to-night!" he cried, seizing a lamp from the -table. "Come: it is your own handiwork. Why shouldn't you look at -it? You can tell the world all about it afterwards, if you choose. -Nobody would believe you. If they did believe you, they would like me -all the better for it. I know the age better than you do, though you -will prate about it so tediously. Come, I tell you. You have -chattered enough about corruption. Now you shall look on it face to -face." -</P> - -<P> -There was the madness of pride in every word he uttered. He stamped -his foot upon the ground in his boyish insolent manner. He felt a -terrible joy at the thought that some one else was to share his secret, -and that the man who had painted the portrait that was the origin of -all his shame was to be burdened for the rest of his life with the -hideous memory of what he had done. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes," he continued, coming closer to him and looking steadfastly into -his stern eyes, "I shall show you my soul. You shall see the thing -that you fancy only God can see." -</P> - -<P> -Hallward started back. "This is blasphemy, Dorian!" he cried. "You -must not say things like that. They are horrible, and they don't mean -anything." -</P> - -<P> -"You think so?" He laughed again. -</P> - -<P> -"I know so. As for what I said to you to-night, I said it for your -good. You know I have been always a stanch friend to you." -</P> - -<P> -"Don't touch me. Finish what you have to say." -</P> - -<P> -A twisted flash of pain shot across the painter's face. He paused for -a moment, and a wild feeling of pity came over him. After all, what -right had he to pry into the life of Dorian Gray? If he had done a -tithe of what was rumoured about him, how much he must have suffered! -Then he straightened himself up, and walked over to the fire-place, and -stood there, looking at the burning logs with their frostlike ashes and -their throbbing cores of flame. -</P> - -<P> -"I am waiting, Basil," said the young man in a hard clear voice. -</P> - -<P> -He turned round. "What I have to say is this," he cried. "You must -give me some answer to these horrible charges that are made against -you. If you tell me that they are absolutely untrue from beginning to -end, I shall believe you. Deny them, Dorian, deny them! Can't you see -what I am going through? My God! don't tell me that you are bad, and -corrupt, and shameful." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray smiled. There was a curl of contempt in his lips. "Come -upstairs, Basil," he said quietly. "I keep a diary of my life from day -to day, and it never leaves the room in which it is written. I shall -show it to you if you come with me." -</P> - -<P> -"I shall come with you, Dorian, if you wish it. I see I have missed my -train. That makes no matter. I can go to-morrow. But don't ask me to -read anything to-night. All I want is a plain answer to my question." -</P> - -<P> -"That shall be given to you upstairs. I could not give it here. You -will not have to read long." -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap13"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 13 -</H3> - -<P> -He passed out of the room and began the ascent, Basil Hallward -following close behind. They walked softly, as men do instinctively at -night. The lamp cast fantastic shadows on the wall and staircase. A -rising wind made some of the windows rattle. -</P> - -<P> -When they reached the top landing, Dorian set the lamp down on the -floor, and taking out the key, turned it in the lock. "You insist on -knowing, Basil?" he asked in a low voice. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes." -</P> - -<P> -"I am delighted," he answered, smiling. Then he added, somewhat -harshly, "You are the one man in the world who is entitled to know -everything about me. You have had more to do with my life than you -think"; and, taking up the lamp, he opened the door and went in. A -cold current of air passed them, and the light shot up for a moment in -a flame of murky orange. He shuddered. "Shut the door behind you," he -whispered, as he placed the lamp on the table. -</P> - -<P> -Hallward glanced round him with a puzzled expression. The room looked -as if it had not been lived in for years. A faded Flemish tapestry, a -curtained picture, an old Italian cassone, and an almost empty -book-case--that was all that it seemed to contain, besides a chair and -a table. As Dorian Gray was lighting a half-burned candle that was -standing on the mantelshelf, he saw that the whole place was covered -with dust and that the carpet was in holes. A mouse ran scuffling -behind the wainscoting. There was a damp odour of mildew. -</P> - -<P> -"So you think that it is only God who sees the soul, Basil? Draw that -curtain back, and you will see mine." -</P> - -<P> -The voice that spoke was cold and cruel. "You are mad, Dorian, or -playing a part," muttered Hallward, frowning. -</P> - -<P> -"You won't? Then I must do it myself," said the young man, and he tore -the curtain from its rod and flung it on the ground. -</P> - -<P> -An exclamation of horror broke from the painter's lips as he saw in the -dim light the hideous face on the canvas grinning at him. There was -something in its expression that filled him with disgust and loathing. -Good heavens! it was Dorian Gray's own face that he was looking at! -The horror, whatever it was, had not yet entirely spoiled that -marvellous beauty. There was still some gold in the thinning hair and -some scarlet on the sensual mouth. The sodden eyes had kept something -of the loveliness of their blue, the noble curves had not yet -completely passed away from chiselled nostrils and from plastic throat. -Yes, it was Dorian himself. But who had done it? He seemed to -recognize his own brushwork, and the frame was his own design. The -idea was monstrous, yet he felt afraid. He seized the lighted candle, -and held it to the picture. In the left-hand corner was his own name, -traced in long letters of bright vermilion. -</P> - -<P> -It was some foul parody, some infamous ignoble satire. He had never -done that. Still, it was his own picture. He knew it, and he felt as -if his blood had changed in a moment from fire to sluggish ice. His -own picture! What did it mean? Why had it altered? He turned and -looked at Dorian Gray with the eyes of a sick man. His mouth twitched, -and his parched tongue seemed unable to articulate. He passed his hand -across his forehead. It was dank with clammy sweat. -</P> - -<P> -The young man was leaning against the mantelshelf, watching him with -that strange expression that one sees on the faces of those who are -absorbed in a play when some great artist is acting. There was neither -real sorrow in it nor real joy. There was simply the passion of the -spectator, with perhaps a flicker of triumph in his eyes. He had taken -the flower out of his coat, and was smelling it, or pretending to do so. -</P> - -<P> -"What does this mean?" cried Hallward, at last. His own voice sounded -shrill and curious in his ears. -</P> - -<P> -"Years ago, when I was a boy," said Dorian Gray, crushing the flower in -his hand, "you met me, flattered me, and taught me to be vain of my -good looks. One day you introduced me to a friend of yours, who -explained to me the wonder of youth, and you finished a portrait of me -that revealed to me the wonder of beauty. In a mad moment that, even -now, I don't know whether I regret or not, I made a wish, perhaps you -would call it a prayer...." -</P> - -<P> -"I remember it! Oh, how well I remember it! No! the thing is -impossible. The room is damp. Mildew has got into the canvas. The -paints I used had some wretched mineral poison in them. I tell you the -thing is impossible." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah, what is impossible?" murmured the young man, going over to the -window and leaning his forehead against the cold, mist-stained glass. -</P> - -<P> -"You told me you had destroyed it." -</P> - -<P> -"I was wrong. It has destroyed me." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't believe it is my picture." -</P> - -<P> -"Can't you see your ideal in it?" said Dorian bitterly. -</P> - -<P> -"My ideal, as you call it..." -</P> - -<P> -"As you called it." -</P> - -<P> -"There was nothing evil in it, nothing shameful. You were to me such -an ideal as I shall never meet again. This is the face of a satyr." -</P> - -<P> -"It is the face of my soul." -</P> - -<P> -"Christ! what a thing I must have worshipped! It has the eyes of a -devil." -</P> - -<P> -"Each of us has heaven and hell in him, Basil," cried Dorian with a -wild gesture of despair. -</P> - -<P> -Hallward turned again to the portrait and gazed at it. "My God! If it -is true," he exclaimed, "and this is what you have done with your life, -why, you must be worse even than those who talk against you fancy you -to be!" He held the light up again to the canvas and examined it. The -surface seemed to be quite undisturbed and as he had left it. It was -from within, apparently, that the foulness and horror had come. -Through some strange quickening of inner life the leprosies of sin were -slowly eating the thing away. The rotting of a corpse in a watery -grave was not so fearful. -</P> - -<P> -His hand shook, and the candle fell from its socket on the floor and -lay there sputtering. He placed his foot on it and put it out. Then -he flung himself into the rickety chair that was standing by the table -and buried his face in his hands. -</P> - -<P> -"Good God, Dorian, what a lesson! What an awful lesson!" There was no -answer, but he could hear the young man sobbing at the window. "Pray, -Dorian, pray," he murmured. "What is it that one was taught to say in -one's boyhood? 'Lead us not into temptation. Forgive us our sins. -Wash away our iniquities.' Let us say that together. The prayer of -your pride has been answered. The prayer of your repentance will be -answered also. I worshipped you too much. I am punished for it. You -worshipped yourself too much. We are both punished." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray turned slowly around and looked at him with tear-dimmed -eyes. "It is too late, Basil," he faltered. -</P> - -<P> -"It is never too late, Dorian. Let us kneel down and try if we cannot -remember a prayer. Isn't there a verse somewhere, 'Though your sins be -as scarlet, yet I will make them as white as snow'?" -</P> - -<P> -"Those words mean nothing to me now." -</P> - -<P> -"Hush! Don't say that. You have done enough evil in your life. My -God! Don't you see that accursed thing leering at us?" -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray glanced at the picture, and suddenly an uncontrollable -feeling of hatred for Basil Hallward came over him, as though it had -been suggested to him by the image on the canvas, whispered into his -ear by those grinning lips. The mad passions of a hunted animal -stirred within him, and he loathed the man who was seated at the table, -more than in his whole life he had ever loathed anything. He glanced -wildly around. Something glimmered on the top of the painted chest -that faced him. His eye fell on it. He knew what it was. It was a -knife that he had brought up, some days before, to cut a piece of cord, -and had forgotten to take away with him. He moved slowly towards it, -passing Hallward as he did so. As soon as he got behind him, he seized -it and turned round. Hallward stirred in his chair as if he was going -to rise. He rushed at him and dug the knife into the great vein that -is behind the ear, crushing the man's head down on the table and -stabbing again and again. -</P> - -<P> -There was a stifled groan and the horrible sound of some one choking -with blood. Three times the outstretched arms shot up convulsively, -waving grotesque, stiff-fingered hands in the air. He stabbed him -twice more, but the man did not move. Something began to trickle on -the floor. He waited for a moment, still pressing the head down. Then -he threw the knife on the table, and listened. -</P> - -<P> -He could hear nothing, but the drip, drip on the threadbare carpet. He -opened the door and went out on the landing. The house was absolutely -quiet. No one was about. For a few seconds he stood bending over the -balustrade and peering down into the black seething well of darkness. -Then he took out the key and returned to the room, locking himself in -as he did so. -</P> - -<P> -The thing was still seated in the chair, straining over the table with -bowed head, and humped back, and long fantastic arms. Had it not been -for the red jagged tear in the neck and the clotted black pool that was -slowly widening on the table, one would have said that the man was -simply asleep. -</P> - -<P> -How quickly it had all been done! He felt strangely calm, and walking -over to the window, opened it and stepped out on the balcony. The wind -had blown the fog away, and the sky was like a monstrous peacock's -tail, starred with myriads of golden eyes. He looked down and saw the -policeman going his rounds and flashing the long beam of his lantern on -the doors of the silent houses. The crimson spot of a prowling hansom -gleamed at the corner and then vanished. A woman in a fluttering shawl -was creeping slowly by the railings, staggering as she went. Now and -then she stopped and peered back. Once, she began to sing in a hoarse -voice. The policeman strolled over and said something to her. She -stumbled away, laughing. A bitter blast swept across the square. The -gas-lamps flickered and became blue, and the leafless trees shook their -black iron branches to and fro. He shivered and went back, closing the -window behind him. -</P> - -<P> -Having reached the door, he turned the key and opened it. He did not -even glance at the murdered man. He felt that the secret of the whole -thing was not to realize the situation. The friend who had painted the -fatal portrait to which all his misery had been due had gone out of his -life. That was enough. -</P> - -<P> -Then he remembered the lamp. It was a rather curious one of Moorish -workmanship, made of dull silver inlaid with arabesques of burnished -steel, and studded with coarse turquoises. Perhaps it might be missed -by his servant, and questions would be asked. He hesitated for a -moment, then he turned back and took it from the table. He could not -help seeing the dead thing. How still it was! How horribly white the -long hands looked! It was like a dreadful wax image. -</P> - -<P> -Having locked the door behind him, he crept quietly downstairs. The -woodwork creaked and seemed to cry out as if in pain. He stopped -several times and waited. No: everything was still. It was merely -the sound of his own footsteps. -</P> - -<P> -When he reached the library, he saw the bag and coat in the corner. -They must be hidden away somewhere. He unlocked a secret press that -was in the wainscoting, a press in which he kept his own curious -disguises, and put them into it. He could easily burn them afterwards. -Then he pulled out his watch. It was twenty minutes to two. -</P> - -<P> -He sat down and began to think. Every year--every month, almost--men -were strangled in England for what he had done. There had been a -madness of murder in the air. Some red star had come too close to the -earth.... And yet, what evidence was there against him? Basil Hallward -had left the house at eleven. No one had seen him come in again. Most -of the servants were at Selby Royal. His valet had gone to bed.... -Paris! Yes. It was to Paris that Basil had gone, and by the midnight -train, as he had intended. With his curious reserved habits, it would -be months before any suspicions would be roused. Months! Everything -could be destroyed long before then. -</P> - -<P> -A sudden thought struck him. He put on his fur coat and hat and went -out into the hall. There he paused, hearing the slow heavy tread of -the policeman on the pavement outside and seeing the flash of the -bull's-eye reflected in the window. He waited and held his breath. -</P> - -<P> -After a few moments he drew back the latch and slipped out, shutting -the door very gently behind him. Then he began ringing the bell. In -about five minutes his valet appeared, half-dressed and looking very -drowsy. -</P> - -<P> -"I am sorry to have had to wake you up, Francis," he said, stepping in; -"but I had forgotten my latch-key. What time is it?" -</P> - -<P> -"Ten minutes past two, sir," answered the man, looking at the clock and -blinking. -</P> - -<P> -"Ten minutes past two? How horribly late! You must wake me at nine -to-morrow. I have some work to do." -</P> - -<P> -"All right, sir." -</P> - -<P> -"Did any one call this evening?" -</P> - -<P> -"Mr. Hallward, sir. He stayed here till eleven, and then he went away -to catch his train." -</P> - -<P> -"Oh! I am sorry I didn't see him. Did he leave any message?" -</P> - -<P> -"No, sir, except that he would write to you from Paris, if he did not -find you at the club." -</P> - -<P> -"That will do, Francis. Don't forget to call me at nine to-morrow." -</P> - -<P> -"No, sir." -</P> - -<P> -The man shambled down the passage in his slippers. -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray threw his hat and coat upon the table and passed into the -library. For a quarter of an hour he walked up and down the room, -biting his lip and thinking. Then he took down the Blue Book from one -of the shelves and began to turn over the leaves. "Alan Campbell, 152, -Hertford Street, Mayfair." Yes; that was the man he wanted. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap14"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 14 -</H3> - -<P> -At nine o'clock the next morning his servant came in with a cup of -chocolate on a tray and opened the shutters. Dorian was sleeping quite -peacefully, lying on his right side, with one hand underneath his -cheek. He looked like a boy who had been tired out with play, or study. -</P> - -<P> -The man had to touch him twice on the shoulder before he woke, and as -he opened his eyes a faint smile passed across his lips, as though he -had been lost in some delightful dream. Yet he had not dreamed at all. -His night had been untroubled by any images of pleasure or of pain. -But youth smiles without any reason. It is one of its chiefest charms. -</P> - -<P> -He turned round, and leaning upon his elbow, began to sip his -chocolate. The mellow November sun came streaming into the room. The -sky was bright, and there was a genial warmth in the air. It was -almost like a morning in May. -</P> - -<P> -Gradually the events of the preceding night crept with silent, -blood-stained feet into his brain and reconstructed themselves there -with terrible distinctness. He winced at the memory of all that he had -suffered, and for a moment the same curious feeling of loathing for -Basil Hallward that had made him kill him as he sat in the chair came -back to him, and he grew cold with passion. The dead man was still -sitting there, too, and in the sunlight now. How horrible that was! -Such hideous things were for the darkness, not for the day. -</P> - -<P> -He felt that if he brooded on what he had gone through he would sicken -or grow mad. There were sins whose fascination was more in the memory -than in the doing of them, strange triumphs that gratified the pride -more than the passions, and gave to the intellect a quickened sense of -joy, greater than any joy they brought, or could ever bring, to the -senses. But this was not one of them. It was a thing to be driven out -of the mind, to be drugged with poppies, to be strangled lest it might -strangle one itself. -</P> - -<P> -When the half-hour struck, he passed his hand across his forehead, and -then got up hastily and dressed himself with even more than his usual -care, giving a good deal of attention to the choice of his necktie and -scarf-pin and changing his rings more than once. He spent a long time -also over breakfast, tasting the various dishes, talking to his valet -about some new liveries that he was thinking of getting made for the -servants at Selby, and going through his correspondence. At some of -the letters, he smiled. Three of them bored him. One he read several -times over and then tore up with a slight look of annoyance in his -face. "That awful thing, a woman's memory!" as Lord Henry had once -said. -</P> - -<P> -After he had drunk his cup of black coffee, he wiped his lips slowly -with a napkin, motioned to his servant to wait, and going over to the -table, sat down and wrote two letters. One he put in his pocket, the -other he handed to the valet. -</P> - -<P> -"Take this round to 152, Hertford Street, Francis, and if Mr. Campbell -is out of town, get his address." -</P> - -<P> -As soon as he was alone, he lit a cigarette and began sketching upon a -piece of paper, drawing first flowers and bits of architecture, and -then human faces. Suddenly he remarked that every face that he drew -seemed to have a fantastic likeness to Basil Hallward. He frowned, and -getting up, went over to the book-case and took out a volume at hazard. -He was determined that he would not think about what had happened until -it became absolutely necessary that he should do so. -</P> - -<P> -When he had stretched himself on the sofa, he looked at the title-page -of the book. It was Gautier's Emaux et Camees, Charpentier's -Japanese-paper edition, with the Jacquemart etching. The binding was -of citron-green leather, with a design of gilt trellis-work and dotted -pomegranates. It had been given to him by Adrian Singleton. As he -turned over the pages, his eye fell on the poem about the hand of -Lacenaire, the cold yellow hand "du supplice encore mal lavee," with -its downy red hairs and its "doigts de faune." He glanced at his own -white taper fingers, shuddering slightly in spite of himself, and -passed on, till he came to those lovely stanzas upon Venice: -</P> - -<P CLASS="poem"> -Sur une gamme chromatique,<BR> - Le sein de peries ruisselant,<BR> -La Venus de l'Adriatique<BR> - Sort de l'eau son corps rose et blanc.<BR> -</P> - -<P CLASS="poem"> -Les domes, sur l'azur des ondes<BR> - Suivant la phrase au pur contour,<BR> -S'enflent comme des gorges rondes<BR> - Que souleve un soupir d'amour.<BR> -</P> - -<P CLASS="poem"> -L'esquif aborde et me depose,<BR> - Jetant son amarre au pilier,<BR> -Devant une facade rose,<BR> - Sur le marbre d'un escalier.<BR> -</P> - -<BR> - -<P> -How exquisite they were! As one read them, one seemed to be floating -down the green water-ways of the pink and pearl city, seated in a black -gondola with silver prow and trailing curtains. The mere lines looked -to him like those straight lines of turquoise-blue that follow one as -one pushes out to the Lido. The sudden flashes of colour reminded him -of the gleam of the opal-and-iris-throated birds that flutter round the -tall honeycombed Campanile, or stalk, with such stately grace, through -the dim, dust-stained arcades. Leaning back with half-closed eyes, he -kept saying over and over to himself: -</P> - -<P CLASS="poem"> -"Devant une facade rose,<BR> - Sur le marbre d'un escalier."<BR> -</P> - -<P> -The whole of Venice was in those two lines. He remembered the autumn -that he had passed there, and a wonderful love that had stirred him to -mad delightful follies. There was romance in every place. But Venice, -like Oxford, had kept the background for romance, and, to the true -romantic, background was everything, or almost everything. Basil had -been with him part of the time, and had gone wild over Tintoret. Poor -Basil! What a horrible way for a man to die! -</P> - -<P> -He sighed, and took up the volume again, and tried to forget. He read -of the swallows that fly in and out of the little cafe at Smyrna where -the Hadjis sit counting their amber beads and the turbaned merchants -smoke their long tasselled pipes and talk gravely to each other; he -read of the Obelisk in the Place de la Concorde that weeps tears of -granite in its lonely sunless exile and longs to be back by the hot, -lotus-covered Nile, where there are Sphinxes, and rose-red ibises, and -white vultures with gilded claws, and crocodiles with small beryl eyes -that crawl over the green steaming mud; he began to brood over those -verses which, drawing music from kiss-stained marble, tell of that -curious statue that Gautier compares to a contralto voice, the "monstre -charmant" that couches in the porphyry-room of the Louvre. But after a -time the book fell from his hand. He grew nervous, and a horrible fit -of terror came over him. What if Alan Campbell should be out of -England? Days would elapse before he could come back. Perhaps he -might refuse to come. What could he do then? Every moment was of -vital importance. -</P> - -<P> -They had been great friends once, five years before--almost -inseparable, indeed. Then the intimacy had come suddenly to an end. -When they met in society now, it was only Dorian Gray who smiled: Alan -Campbell never did. -</P> - -<P> -He was an extremely clever young man, though he had no real -appreciation of the visible arts, and whatever little sense of the -beauty of poetry he possessed he had gained entirely from Dorian. His -dominant intellectual passion was for science. At Cambridge he had -spent a great deal of his time working in the laboratory, and had taken -a good class in the Natural Science Tripos of his year. Indeed, he was -still devoted to the study of chemistry, and had a laboratory of his -own in which he used to shut himself up all day long, greatly to the -annoyance of his mother, who had set her heart on his standing for -Parliament and had a vague idea that a chemist was a person who made up -prescriptions. He was an excellent musician, however, as well, and -played both the violin and the piano better than most amateurs. In -fact, it was music that had first brought him and Dorian Gray -together--music and that indefinable attraction that Dorian seemed to -be able to exercise whenever he wished--and, indeed, exercised often -without being conscious of it. They had met at Lady Berkshire's the -night that Rubinstein played there, and after that used to be always -seen together at the opera and wherever good music was going on. For -eighteen months their intimacy lasted. Campbell was always either at -Selby Royal or in Grosvenor Square. To him, as to many others, Dorian -Gray was the type of everything that is wonderful and fascinating in -life. Whether or not a quarrel had taken place between them no one -ever knew. But suddenly people remarked that they scarcely spoke when -they met and that Campbell seemed always to go away early from any -party at which Dorian Gray was present. He had changed, too--was -strangely melancholy at times, appeared almost to dislike hearing -music, and would never himself play, giving as his excuse, when he was -called upon, that he was so absorbed in science that he had no time -left in which to practise. And this was certainly true. Every day he -seemed to become more interested in biology, and his name appeared once -or twice in some of the scientific reviews in connection with certain -curious experiments. -</P> - -<P> -This was the man Dorian Gray was waiting for. Every second he kept -glancing at the clock. As the minutes went by he became horribly -agitated. At last he got up and began to pace up and down the room, -looking like a beautiful caged thing. He took long stealthy strides. -His hands were curiously cold. -</P> - -<P> -The suspense became unbearable. Time seemed to him to be crawling with -feet of lead, while he by monstrous winds was being swept towards the -jagged edge of some black cleft of precipice. He knew what was waiting -for him there; saw it, indeed, and, shuddering, crushed with dank hands -his burning lids as though he would have robbed the very brain of sight -and driven the eyeballs back into their cave. It was useless. The -brain had its own food on which it battened, and the imagination, made -grotesque by terror, twisted and distorted as a living thing by pain, -danced like some foul puppet on a stand and grinned through moving -masks. Then, suddenly, time stopped for him. Yes: that blind, -slow-breathing thing crawled no more, and horrible thoughts, time being -dead, raced nimbly on in front, and dragged a hideous future from its -grave, and showed it to him. He stared at it. Its very horror made -him stone. -</P> - -<P> -At last the door opened and his servant entered. He turned glazed eyes -upon him. -</P> - -<P> -"Mr. Campbell, sir," said the man. -</P> - -<P> -A sigh of relief broke from his parched lips, and the colour came back -to his cheeks. -</P> - -<P> -"Ask him to come in at once, Francis." He felt that he was himself -again. His mood of cowardice had passed away. -</P> - -<P> -The man bowed and retired. In a few moments, Alan Campbell walked in, -looking very stern and rather pale, his pallor being intensified by his -coal-black hair and dark eyebrows. -</P> - -<P> -"Alan! This is kind of you. I thank you for coming." -</P> - -<P> -"I had intended never to enter your house again, Gray. But you said it -was a matter of life and death." His voice was hard and cold. He -spoke with slow deliberation. There was a look of contempt in the -steady searching gaze that he turned on Dorian. He kept his hands in -the pockets of his Astrakhan coat, and seemed not to have noticed the -gesture with which he had been greeted. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes: it is a matter of life and death, Alan, and to more than one -person. Sit down." -</P> - -<P> -Campbell took a chair by the table, and Dorian sat opposite to him. -The two men's eyes met. In Dorian's there was infinite pity. He knew -that what he was going to do was dreadful. -</P> - -<P> -After a strained moment of silence, he leaned across and said, very -quietly, but watching the effect of each word upon the face of him he -had sent for, "Alan, in a locked room at the top of this house, a room -to which nobody but myself has access, a dead man is seated at a table. -He has been dead ten hours now. Don't stir, and don't look at me like -that. Who the man is, why he died, how he died, are matters that do -not concern you. What you have to do is this--" -</P> - -<P> -"Stop, Gray. I don't want to know anything further. Whether what you -have told me is true or not true doesn't concern me. I entirely -decline to be mixed up in your life. Keep your horrible secrets to -yourself. They don't interest me any more." -</P> - -<P> -"Alan, they will have to interest you. This one will have to interest -you. I am awfully sorry for you, Alan. But I can't help myself. You -are the one man who is able to save me. I am forced to bring you into -the matter. I have no option. Alan, you are scientific. You know -about chemistry and things of that kind. You have made experiments. -What you have got to do is to destroy the thing that is upstairs--to -destroy it so that not a vestige of it will be left. Nobody saw this -person come into the house. Indeed, at the present moment he is -supposed to be in Paris. He will not be missed for months. When he is -missed, there must be no trace of him found here. You, Alan, you must -change him, and everything that belongs to him, into a handful of ashes -that I may scatter in the air." -</P> - -<P> -"You are mad, Dorian." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! I was waiting for you to call me Dorian." -</P> - -<P> -"You are mad, I tell you--mad to imagine that I would raise a finger to -help you, mad to make this monstrous confession. I will have nothing -to do with this matter, whatever it is. Do you think I am going to -peril my reputation for you? What is it to me what devil's work you -are up to?" -</P> - -<P> -"It was suicide, Alan." -</P> - -<P> -"I am glad of that. But who drove him to it? You, I should fancy." -</P> - -<P> -"Do you still refuse to do this for me?" -</P> - -<P> -"Of course I refuse. I will have absolutely nothing to do with it. I -don't care what shame comes on you. You deserve it all. I should not -be sorry to see you disgraced, publicly disgraced. How dare you ask -me, of all men in the world, to mix myself up in this horror? I should -have thought you knew more about people's characters. Your friend Lord -Henry Wotton can't have taught you much about psychology, whatever else -he has taught you. Nothing will induce me to stir a step to help you. -You have come to the wrong man. Go to some of your friends. Don't -come to me." -</P> - -<P> -"Alan, it was murder. I killed him. You don't know what he had made -me suffer. Whatever my life is, he had more to do with the making or -the marring of it than poor Harry has had. He may not have intended -it, the result was the same." -</P> - -<P> -"Murder! Good God, Dorian, is that what you have come to? I shall not -inform upon you. It is not my business. Besides, without my stirring -in the matter, you are certain to be arrested. Nobody ever commits a -crime without doing something stupid. But I will have nothing to do -with it." -</P> - -<P> -"You must have something to do with it. Wait, wait a moment; listen to -me. Only listen, Alan. All I ask of you is to perform a certain -scientific experiment. You go to hospitals and dead-houses, and the -horrors that you do there don't affect you. If in some hideous -dissecting-room or fetid laboratory you found this man lying on a -leaden table with red gutters scooped out in it for the blood to flow -through, you would simply look upon him as an admirable subject. You -would not turn a hair. You would not believe that you were doing -anything wrong. On the contrary, you would probably feel that you were -benefiting the human race, or increasing the sum of knowledge in the -world, or gratifying intellectual curiosity, or something of that kind. -What I want you to do is merely what you have often done before. -Indeed, to destroy a body must be far less horrible than what you are -accustomed to work at. And, remember, it is the only piece of evidence -against me. If it is discovered, I am lost; and it is sure to be -discovered unless you help me." -</P> - -<P> -"I have no desire to help you. You forget that. I am simply -indifferent to the whole thing. It has nothing to do with me." -</P> - -<P> -"Alan, I entreat you. Think of the position I am in. Just before you -came I almost fainted with terror. You may know terror yourself some -day. No! don't think of that. Look at the matter purely from the -scientific point of view. You don't inquire where the dead things on -which you experiment come from. Don't inquire now. I have told you -too much as it is. But I beg of you to do this. We were friends once, -Alan." -</P> - -<P> -"Don't speak about those days, Dorian--they are dead." -</P> - -<P> -"The dead linger sometimes. The man upstairs will not go away. He is -sitting at the table with bowed head and outstretched arms. Alan! -Alan! If you don't come to my assistance, I am ruined. Why, they will -hang me, Alan! Don't you understand? They will hang me for what I -have done." -</P> - -<P> -"There is no good in prolonging this scene. I absolutely refuse to do -anything in the matter. It is insane of you to ask me." -</P> - -<P> -"You refuse?" -</P> - -<P> -"Yes." -</P> - -<P> -"I entreat you, Alan." -</P> - -<P> -"It is useless." -</P> - -<P> -The same look of pity came into Dorian Gray's eyes. Then he stretched -out his hand, took a piece of paper, and wrote something on it. He -read it over twice, folded it carefully, and pushed it across the -table. Having done this, he got up and went over to the window. -</P> - -<P> -Campbell looked at him in surprise, and then took up the paper, and -opened it. As he read it, his face became ghastly pale and he fell -back in his chair. A horrible sense of sickness came over him. He -felt as if his heart was beating itself to death in some empty hollow. -</P> - -<P> -After two or three minutes of terrible silence, Dorian turned round and -came and stood behind him, putting his hand upon his shoulder. -</P> - -<P> -"I am so sorry for you, Alan," he murmured, "but you leave me no -alternative. I have a letter written already. Here it is. You see -the address. If you don't help me, I must send it. If you don't help -me, I will send it. You know what the result will be. But you are -going to help me. It is impossible for you to refuse now. I tried to -spare you. You will do me the justice to admit that. You were stern, -harsh, offensive. You treated me as no man has ever dared to treat -me--no living man, at any rate. I bore it all. Now it is for me to -dictate terms." -</P> - -<P> -Campbell buried his face in his hands, and a shudder passed through him. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, it is my turn to dictate terms, Alan. You know what they are. -The thing is quite simple. Come, don't work yourself into this fever. -The thing has to be done. Face it, and do it." -</P> - -<P> -A groan broke from Campbell's lips and he shivered all over. The -ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece seemed to him to be dividing -time into separate atoms of agony, each of which was too terrible to be -borne. He felt as if an iron ring was being slowly tightened round his -forehead, as if the disgrace with which he was threatened had already -come upon him. The hand upon his shoulder weighed like a hand of lead. -It was intolerable. It seemed to crush him. -</P> - -<P> -"Come, Alan, you must decide at once." -</P> - -<P> -"I cannot do it," he said, mechanically, as though words could alter -things. -</P> - -<P> -"You must. You have no choice. Don't delay." -</P> - -<P> -He hesitated a moment. "Is there a fire in the room upstairs?" -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, there is a gas-fire with asbestos." -</P> - -<P> -"I shall have to go home and get some things from the laboratory." -</P> - -<P> -"No, Alan, you must not leave the house. Write out on a sheet of -notepaper what you want and my servant will take a cab and bring the -things back to you." -</P> - -<P> -Campbell scrawled a few lines, blotted them, and addressed an envelope -to his assistant. Dorian took the note up and read it carefully. Then -he rang the bell and gave it to his valet, with orders to return as -soon as possible and to bring the things with him. -</P> - -<P> -As the hall door shut, Campbell started nervously, and having got up -from the chair, went over to the chimney-piece. He was shivering with a -kind of ague. For nearly twenty minutes, neither of the men spoke. A -fly buzzed noisily about the room, and the ticking of the clock was -like the beat of a hammer. -</P> - -<P> -As the chime struck one, Campbell turned round, and looking at Dorian -Gray, saw that his eyes were filled with tears. There was something in -the purity and refinement of that sad face that seemed to enrage him. -"You are infamous, absolutely infamous!" he muttered. -</P> - -<P> -"Hush, Alan. You have saved my life," said Dorian. -</P> - -<P> -"Your life? Good heavens! what a life that is! You have gone from -corruption to corruption, and now you have culminated in crime. In -doing what I am going to do--what you force me to do--it is not of your -life that I am thinking." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah, Alan," murmured Dorian with a sigh, "I wish you had a thousandth -part of the pity for me that I have for you." He turned away as he -spoke and stood looking out at the garden. Campbell made no answer. -</P> - -<P> -After about ten minutes a knock came to the door, and the servant -entered, carrying a large mahogany chest of chemicals, with a long coil -of steel and platinum wire and two rather curiously shaped iron clamps. -</P> - -<P> -"Shall I leave the things here, sir?" he asked Campbell. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes," said Dorian. "And I am afraid, Francis, that I have another -errand for you. What is the name of the man at Richmond who supplies -Selby with orchids?" -</P> - -<P> -"Harden, sir." -</P> - -<P> -"Yes--Harden. You must go down to Richmond at once, see Harden -personally, and tell him to send twice as many orchids as I ordered, -and to have as few white ones as possible. In fact, I don't want any -white ones. It is a lovely day, Francis, and Richmond is a very pretty -place--otherwise I wouldn't bother you about it." -</P> - -<P> -"No trouble, sir. At what time shall I be back?" -</P> - -<P> -Dorian looked at Campbell. "How long will your experiment take, Alan?" -he said in a calm indifferent voice. The presence of a third person in -the room seemed to give him extraordinary courage. -</P> - -<P> -Campbell frowned and bit his lip. "It will take about five hours," he -answered. -</P> - -<P> -"It will be time enough, then, if you are back at half-past seven, -Francis. Or stay: just leave my things out for dressing. You can -have the evening to yourself. I am not dining at home, so I shall not -want you." -</P> - -<P> -"Thank you, sir," said the man, leaving the room. -</P> - -<P> -"Now, Alan, there is not a moment to be lost. How heavy this chest is! -I'll take it for you. You bring the other things." He spoke rapidly -and in an authoritative manner. Campbell felt dominated by him. They -left the room together. -</P> - -<P> -When they reached the top landing, Dorian took out the key and turned -it in the lock. Then he stopped, and a troubled look came into his -eyes. He shuddered. "I don't think I can go in, Alan," he murmured. -</P> - -<P> -"It is nothing to me. I don't require you," said Campbell coldly. -</P> - -<P> -Dorian half opened the door. As he did so, he saw the face of his -portrait leering in the sunlight. On the floor in front of it the torn -curtain was lying. He remembered that the night before he had -forgotten, for the first time in his life, to hide the fatal canvas, -and was about to rush forward, when he drew back with a shudder. -</P> - -<P> -What was that loathsome red dew that gleamed, wet and glistening, on -one of the hands, as though the canvas had sweated blood? How horrible -it was!--more horrible, it seemed to him for the moment, than the -silent thing that he knew was stretched across the table, the thing -whose grotesque misshapen shadow on the spotted carpet showed him that -it had not stirred, but was still there, as he had left it. -</P> - -<P> -He heaved a deep breath, opened the door a little wider, and with -half-closed eyes and averted head, walked quickly in, determined that -he would not look even once upon the dead man. Then, stooping down and -taking up the gold-and-purple hanging, he flung it right over the -picture. -</P> - -<P> -There he stopped, feeling afraid to turn round, and his eyes fixed -themselves on the intricacies of the pattern before him. He heard -Campbell bringing in the heavy chest, and the irons, and the other -things that he had required for his dreadful work. He began to wonder -if he and Basil Hallward had ever met, and, if so, what they had -thought of each other. -</P> - -<P> -"Leave me now," said a stern voice behind him. -</P> - -<P> -He turned and hurried out, just conscious that the dead man had been -thrust back into the chair and that Campbell was gazing into a -glistening yellow face. As he was going downstairs, he heard the key -being turned in the lock. -</P> - -<P> -It was long after seven when Campbell came back into the library. He -was pale, but absolutely calm. "I have done what you asked me to do," -he muttered "And now, good-bye. Let us never see each other again." -</P> - -<P> -"You have saved me from ruin, Alan. I cannot forget that," said Dorian -simply. -</P> - -<P> -As soon as Campbell had left, he went upstairs. There was a horrible -smell of nitric acid in the room. But the thing that had been sitting -at the table was gone. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap15"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 15 -</H3> - -<P> -That evening, at eight-thirty, exquisitely dressed and wearing a large -button-hole of Parma violets, Dorian Gray was ushered into Lady -Narborough's drawing-room by bowing servants. His forehead was -throbbing with maddened nerves, and he felt wildly excited, but his -manner as he bent over his hostess's hand was as easy and graceful as -ever. Perhaps one never seems so much at one's ease as when one has to -play a part. Certainly no one looking at Dorian Gray that night could -have believed that he had passed through a tragedy as horrible as any -tragedy of our age. Those finely shaped fingers could never have -clutched a knife for sin, nor those smiling lips have cried out on God -and goodness. He himself could not help wondering at the calm of his -demeanour, and for a moment felt keenly the terrible pleasure of a -double life. -</P> - -<P> -It was a small party, got up rather in a hurry by Lady Narborough, who -was a very clever woman with what Lord Henry used to describe as the -remains of really remarkable ugliness. She had proved an excellent -wife to one of our most tedious ambassadors, and having buried her -husband properly in a marble mausoleum, which she had herself designed, -and married off her daughters to some rich, rather elderly men, she -devoted herself now to the pleasures of French fiction, French cookery, -and French esprit when she could get it. -</P> - -<P> -Dorian was one of her especial favourites, and she always told him that -she was extremely glad she had not met him in early life. "I know, my -dear, I should have fallen madly in love with you," she used to say, -"and thrown my bonnet right over the mills for your sake. It is most -fortunate that you were not thought of at the time. As it was, our -bonnets were so unbecoming, and the mills were so occupied in trying to -raise the wind, that I never had even a flirtation with anybody. -However, that was all Narborough's fault. He was dreadfully -short-sighted, and there is no pleasure in taking in a husband who -never sees anything." -</P> - -<P> -Her guests this evening were rather tedious. The fact was, as she -explained to Dorian, behind a very shabby fan, one of her married -daughters had come up quite suddenly to stay with her, and, to make -matters worse, had actually brought her husband with her. "I think it -is most unkind of her, my dear," she whispered. "Of course I go and -stay with them every summer after I come from Homburg, but then an old -woman like me must have fresh air sometimes, and besides, I really wake -them up. You don't know what an existence they lead down there. It is -pure unadulterated country life. They get up early, because they have -so much to do, and go to bed early, because they have so little to -think about. There has not been a scandal in the neighbourhood since -the time of Queen Elizabeth, and consequently they all fall asleep -after dinner. You shan't sit next either of them. You shall sit by me -and amuse me." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian murmured a graceful compliment and looked round the room. Yes: -it was certainly a tedious party. Two of the people he had never seen -before, and the others consisted of Ernest Harrowden, one of those -middle-aged mediocrities so common in London clubs who have no enemies, -but are thoroughly disliked by their friends; Lady Ruxton, an -overdressed woman of forty-seven, with a hooked nose, who was always -trying to get herself compromised, but was so peculiarly plain that to -her great disappointment no one would ever believe anything against -her; Mrs. Erlynne, a pushing nobody, with a delightful lisp and -Venetian-red hair; Lady Alice Chapman, his hostess's daughter, a dowdy -dull girl, with one of those characteristic British faces that, once -seen, are never remembered; and her husband, a red-cheeked, -white-whiskered creature who, like so many of his class, was under the -impression that inordinate joviality can atone for an entire lack of -ideas. -</P> - -<P> -He was rather sorry he had come, till Lady Narborough, looking at the -great ormolu gilt clock that sprawled in gaudy curves on the -mauve-draped mantelshelf, exclaimed: "How horrid of Henry Wotton to be -so late! I sent round to him this morning on chance and he promised -faithfully not to disappoint me." -</P> - -<P> -It was some consolation that Harry was to be there, and when the door -opened and he heard his slow musical voice lending charm to some -insincere apology, he ceased to feel bored. -</P> - -<P> -But at dinner he could not eat anything. Plate after plate went away -untasted. Lady Narborough kept scolding him for what she called "an -insult to poor Adolphe, who invented the menu specially for you," and -now and then Lord Henry looked across at him, wondering at his silence -and abstracted manner. From time to time the butler filled his glass -with champagne. He drank eagerly, and his thirst seemed to increase. -</P> - -<P> -"Dorian," said Lord Henry at last, as the chaud-froid was being handed -round, "what is the matter with you to-night? You are quite out of -sorts." -</P> - -<P> -"I believe he is in love," cried Lady Narborough, "and that he is -afraid to tell me for fear I should be jealous. He is quite right. I -certainly should." -</P> - -<P> -"Dear Lady Narborough," murmured Dorian, smiling, "I have not been in -love for a whole week--not, in fact, since Madame de Ferrol left town." -</P> - -<P> -"How you men can fall in love with that woman!" exclaimed the old lady. -"I really cannot understand it." -</P> - -<P> -"It is simply because she remembers you when you were a little girl, -Lady Narborough," said Lord Henry. "She is the one link between us and -your short frocks." -</P> - -<P> -"She does not remember my short frocks at all, Lord Henry. But I -remember her very well at Vienna thirty years ago, and how decolletee -she was then." -</P> - -<P> -"She is still decolletee," he answered, taking an olive in his long -fingers; "and when she is in a very smart gown she looks like an -edition de luxe of a bad French novel. She is really wonderful, and -full of surprises. Her capacity for family affection is extraordinary. -When her third husband died, her hair turned quite gold from grief." -</P> - -<P> -"How can you, Harry!" cried Dorian. -</P> - -<P> -"It is a most romantic explanation," laughed the hostess. "But her -third husband, Lord Henry! You don't mean to say Ferrol is the fourth?" -</P> - -<P> -"Certainly, Lady Narborough." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't believe a word of it." -</P> - -<P> -"Well, ask Mr. Gray. He is one of her most intimate friends." -</P> - -<P> -"Is it true, Mr. Gray?" -</P> - -<P> -"She assures me so, Lady Narborough," said Dorian. "I asked her -whether, like Marguerite de Navarre, she had their hearts embalmed and -hung at her girdle. She told me she didn't, because none of them had -had any hearts at all." -</P> - -<P> -"Four husbands! Upon my word that is trop de zele." -</P> - -<P> -"Trop d'audace, I tell her," said Dorian. -</P> - -<P> -"Oh! she is audacious enough for anything, my dear. And what is Ferrol -like? I don't know him." -</P> - -<P> -"The husbands of very beautiful women belong to the criminal classes," -said Lord Henry, sipping his wine. -</P> - -<P> -Lady Narborough hit him with her fan. "Lord Henry, I am not at all -surprised that the world says that you are extremely wicked." -</P> - -<P> -"But what world says that?" asked Lord Henry, elevating his eyebrows. -"It can only be the next world. This world and I are on excellent -terms." -</P> - -<P> -"Everybody I know says you are very wicked," cried the old lady, -shaking her head. -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry looked serious for some moments. "It is perfectly -monstrous," he said, at last, "the way people go about nowadays saying -things against one behind one's back that are absolutely and entirely -true." -</P> - -<P> -"Isn't he incorrigible?" cried Dorian, leaning forward in his chair. -</P> - -<P> -"I hope so," said his hostess, laughing. "But really, if you all -worship Madame de Ferrol in this ridiculous way, I shall have to marry -again so as to be in the fashion." -</P> - -<P> -"You will never marry again, Lady Narborough," broke in Lord Henry. -"You were far too happy. When a woman marries again, it is because she -detested her first husband. When a man marries again, it is because he -adored his first wife. Women try their luck; men risk theirs." -</P> - -<P> -"Narborough wasn't perfect," cried the old lady. -</P> - -<P> -"If he had been, you would not have loved him, my dear lady," was the -rejoinder. "Women love us for our defects. If we have enough of them, -they will forgive us everything, even our intellects. You will never -ask me to dinner again after saying this, I am afraid, Lady Narborough, -but it is quite true." -</P> - -<P> -"Of course it is true, Lord Henry. If we women did not love you for -your defects, where would you all be? Not one of you would ever be -married. You would be a set of unfortunate bachelors. Not, however, -that that would alter you much. Nowadays all the married men live like -bachelors, and all the bachelors like married men." -</P> - -<P> -"Fin de siecle," murmured Lord Henry. -</P> - -<P> -"Fin du globe," answered his hostess. -</P> - -<P> -"I wish it were fin du globe," said Dorian with a sigh. "Life is a -great disappointment." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah, my dear," cried Lady Narborough, putting on her gloves, "don't -tell me that you have exhausted life. When a man says that one knows -that life has exhausted him. Lord Henry is very wicked, and I -sometimes wish that I had been; but you are made to be good--you look -so good. I must find you a nice wife. Lord Henry, don't you think -that Mr. Gray should get married?" -</P> - -<P> -"I am always telling him so, Lady Narborough," said Lord Henry with a -bow. -</P> - -<P> -"Well, we must look out for a suitable match for him. I shall go -through Debrett carefully to-night and draw out a list of all the -eligible young ladies." -</P> - -<P> -"With their ages, Lady Narborough?" asked Dorian. -</P> - -<P> -"Of course, with their ages, slightly edited. But nothing must be done -in a hurry. I want it to be what The Morning Post calls a suitable -alliance, and I want you both to be happy." -</P> - -<P> -"What nonsense people talk about happy marriages!" exclaimed Lord -Henry. "A man can be happy with any woman, as long as he does not love -her." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! what a cynic you are!" cried the old lady, pushing back her chair -and nodding to Lady Ruxton. "You must come and dine with me soon -again. You are really an admirable tonic, much better than what Sir -Andrew prescribes for me. You must tell me what people you would like -to meet, though. I want it to be a delightful gathering." -</P> - -<P> -"I like men who have a future and women who have a past," he answered. -"Or do you think that would make it a petticoat party?" -</P> - -<P> -"I fear so," she said, laughing, as she stood up. "A thousand pardons, -my dear Lady Ruxton," she added, "I didn't see you hadn't finished your -cigarette." -</P> - -<P> -"Never mind, Lady Narborough. I smoke a great deal too much. I am -going to limit myself, for the future." -</P> - -<P> -"Pray don't, Lady Ruxton," said Lord Henry. "Moderation is a fatal -thing. Enough is as bad as a meal. More than enough is as good as a -feast." -</P> - -<P> -Lady Ruxton glanced at him curiously. "You must come and explain that -to me some afternoon, Lord Henry. It sounds a fascinating theory," she -murmured, as she swept out of the room. -</P> - -<P> -"Now, mind you don't stay too long over your politics and scandal," -cried Lady Narborough from the door. "If you do, we are sure to -squabble upstairs." -</P> - -<P> -The men laughed, and Mr. Chapman got up solemnly from the foot of the -table and came up to the top. Dorian Gray changed his seat and went -and sat by Lord Henry. Mr. Chapman began to talk in a loud voice about -the situation in the House of Commons. He guffawed at his adversaries. -The word doctrinaire--word full of terror to the British -mind--reappeared from time to time between his explosions. An -alliterative prefix served as an ornament of oratory. He hoisted the -Union Jack on the pinnacles of thought. The inherited stupidity of the -race--sound English common sense he jovially termed it--was shown to be -the proper bulwark for society. -</P> - -<P> -A smile curved Lord Henry's lips, and he turned round and looked at -Dorian. -</P> - -<P> -"Are you better, my dear fellow?" he asked. "You seemed rather out of -sorts at dinner." -</P> - -<P> -"I am quite well, Harry. I am tired. That is all." -</P> - -<P> -"You were charming last night. The little duchess is quite devoted to -you. She tells me she is going down to Selby." -</P> - -<P> -"She has promised to come on the twentieth." -</P> - -<P> -"Is Monmouth to be there, too?" -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, yes, Harry." -</P> - -<P> -"He bores me dreadfully, almost as much as he bores her. She is very -clever, too clever for a woman. She lacks the indefinable charm of -weakness. It is the feet of clay that make the gold of the image -precious. Her feet are very pretty, but they are not feet of clay. -White porcelain feet, if you like. They have been through the fire, -and what fire does not destroy, it hardens. She has had experiences." -</P> - -<P> -"How long has she been married?" asked Dorian. -</P> - -<P> -"An eternity, she tells me. I believe, according to the peerage, it is -ten years, but ten years with Monmouth must have been like eternity, -with time thrown in. Who else is coming?" -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, the Willoughbys, Lord Rugby and his wife, our hostess, Geoffrey -Clouston, the usual set. I have asked Lord Grotrian." -</P> - -<P> -"I like him," said Lord Henry. "A great many people don't, but I find -him charming. He atones for being occasionally somewhat overdressed by -being always absolutely over-educated. He is a very modern type." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't know if he will be able to come, Harry. He may have to go to -Monte Carlo with his father." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! what a nuisance people's people are! Try and make him come. By -the way, Dorian, you ran off very early last night. You left before -eleven. What did you do afterwards? Did you go straight home?" -</P> - -<P> -Dorian glanced at him hurriedly and frowned. -</P> - -<P> -"No, Harry," he said at last, "I did not get home till nearly three." -</P> - -<P> -"Did you go to the club?" -</P> - -<P> -"Yes," he answered. Then he bit his lip. "No, I don't mean that. I -didn't go to the club. I walked about. I forget what I did.... How -inquisitive you are, Harry! You always want to know what one has been -doing. I always want to forget what I have been doing. I came in at -half-past two, if you wish to know the exact time. I had left my -latch-key at home, and my servant had to let me in. If you want any -corroborative evidence on the subject, you can ask him." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "My dear fellow, as if I cared! -Let us go up to the drawing-room. No sherry, thank you, Mr. Chapman. -Something has happened to you, Dorian. Tell me what it is. You are -not yourself to-night." -</P> - -<P> -"Don't mind me, Harry. I am irritable, and out of temper. I shall -come round and see you to-morrow, or next day. Make my excuses to Lady -Narborough. I shan't go upstairs. I shall go home. I must go home." -</P> - -<P> -"All right, Dorian. I dare say I shall see you to-morrow at tea-time. -The duchess is coming." -</P> - -<P> -"I will try to be there, Harry," he said, leaving the room. As he -drove back to his own house, he was conscious that the sense of terror -he thought he had strangled had come back to him. Lord Henry's casual -questioning had made him lose his nerve for the moment, and he wanted -his nerve still. Things that were dangerous had to be destroyed. He -winced. He hated the idea of even touching them. -</P> - -<P> -Yet it had to be done. He realized that, and when he had locked the -door of his library, he opened the secret press into which he had -thrust Basil Hallward's coat and bag. A huge fire was blazing. He -piled another log on it. The smell of the singeing clothes and burning -leather was horrible. It took him three-quarters of an hour to consume -everything. At the end he felt faint and sick, and having lit some -Algerian pastilles in a pierced copper brazier, he bathed his hands and -forehead with a cool musk-scented vinegar. -</P> - -<P> -Suddenly he started. His eyes grew strangely bright, and he gnawed -nervously at his underlip. Between two of the windows stood a large -Florentine cabinet, made out of ebony and inlaid with ivory and blue -lapis. He watched it as though it were a thing that could fascinate -and make afraid, as though it held something that he longed for and yet -almost loathed. His breath quickened. A mad craving came over him. -He lit a cigarette and then threw it away. His eyelids drooped till -the long fringed lashes almost touched his cheek. But he still watched -the cabinet. At last he got up from the sofa on which he had been -lying, went over to it, and having unlocked it, touched some hidden -spring. A triangular drawer passed slowly out. His fingers moved -instinctively towards it, dipped in, and closed on something. It was a -small Chinese box of black and gold-dust lacquer, elaborately wrought, -the sides patterned with curved waves, and the silken cords hung with -round crystals and tasselled in plaited metal threads. He opened it. -Inside was a green paste, waxy in lustre, the odour curiously heavy and -persistent. -</P> - -<P> -He hesitated for some moments, with a strangely immobile smile upon his -face. Then shivering, though the atmosphere of the room was terribly -hot, he drew himself up and glanced at the clock. It was twenty -minutes to twelve. He put the box back, shutting the cabinet doors as -he did so, and went into his bedroom. -</P> - -<P> -As midnight was striking bronze blows upon the dusky air, Dorian Gray, -dressed commonly, and with a muffler wrapped round his throat, crept -quietly out of his house. In Bond Street he found a hansom with a good -horse. He hailed it and in a low voice gave the driver an address. -</P> - -<P> -The man shook his head. "It is too far for me," he muttered. -</P> - -<P> -"Here is a sovereign for you," said Dorian. "You shall have another if -you drive fast." -</P> - -<P> -"All right, sir," answered the man, "you will be there in an hour," and -after his fare had got in he turned his horse round and drove rapidly -towards the river. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap16"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 16 -</H3> - -<P> -A cold rain began to fall, and the blurred street-lamps looked ghastly -in the dripping mist. The public-houses were just closing, and dim men -and women were clustering in broken groups round their doors. From -some of the bars came the sound of horrible laughter. In others, -drunkards brawled and screamed. -</P> - -<P> -Lying back in the hansom, with his hat pulled over his forehead, Dorian -Gray watched with listless eyes the sordid shame of the great city, and -now and then he repeated to himself the words that Lord Henry had said -to him on the first day they had met, "To cure the soul by means of the -senses, and the senses by means of the soul." Yes, that was the -secret. He had often tried it, and would try it again now. There were -opium dens where one could buy oblivion, dens of horror where the -memory of old sins could be destroyed by the madness of sins that were -new. -</P> - -<P> -The moon hung low in the sky like a yellow skull. From time to time a -huge misshapen cloud stretched a long arm across and hid it. The -gas-lamps grew fewer, and the streets more narrow and gloomy. Once the -man lost his way and had to drive back half a mile. A steam rose from -the horse as it splashed up the puddles. The sidewindows of the hansom -were clogged with a grey-flannel mist. -</P> - -<P> -"To cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses by means of -the soul!" How the words rang in his ears! His soul, certainly, was -sick to death. Was it true that the senses could cure it? Innocent -blood had been spilled. What could atone for that? Ah! for that there -was no atonement; but though forgiveness was impossible, forgetfulness -was possible still, and he was determined to forget, to stamp the thing -out, to crush it as one would crush the adder that had stung one. -Indeed, what right had Basil to have spoken to him as he had done? Who -had made him a judge over others? He had said things that were -dreadful, horrible, not to be endured. -</P> - -<P> -On and on plodded the hansom, going slower, it seemed to him, at each -step. He thrust up the trap and called to the man to drive faster. -The hideous hunger for opium began to gnaw at him. His throat burned -and his delicate hands twitched nervously together. He struck at the -horse madly with his stick. The driver laughed and whipped up. He -laughed in answer, and the man was silent. -</P> - -<P> -The way seemed interminable, and the streets like the black web of some -sprawling spider. The monotony became unbearable, and as the mist -thickened, he felt afraid. -</P> - -<P> -Then they passed by lonely brickfields. The fog was lighter here, and -he could see the strange, bottle-shaped kilns with their orange, -fanlike tongues of fire. A dog barked as they went by, and far away in -the darkness some wandering sea-gull screamed. The horse stumbled in a -rut, then swerved aside and broke into a gallop. -</P> - -<P> -After some time they left the clay road and rattled again over -rough-paven streets. Most of the windows were dark, but now and then -fantastic shadows were silhouetted against some lamplit blind. He -watched them curiously. They moved like monstrous marionettes and made -gestures like live things. He hated them. A dull rage was in his -heart. As they turned a corner, a woman yelled something at them from -an open door, and two men ran after the hansom for about a hundred -yards. The driver beat at them with his whip. -</P> - -<P> -It is said that passion makes one think in a circle. Certainly with -hideous iteration the bitten lips of Dorian Gray shaped and reshaped -those subtle words that dealt with soul and sense, till he had found in -them the full expression, as it were, of his mood, and justified, by -intellectual approval, passions that without such justification would -still have dominated his temper. From cell to cell of his brain crept -the one thought; and the wild desire to live, most terrible of all -man's appetites, quickened into force each trembling nerve and fibre. -Ugliness that had once been hateful to him because it made things real, -became dear to him now for that very reason. Ugliness was the one -reality. The coarse brawl, the loathsome den, the crude violence of -disordered life, the very vileness of thief and outcast, were more -vivid, in their intense actuality of impression, than all the gracious -shapes of art, the dreamy shadows of song. They were what he needed -for forgetfulness. In three days he would be free. -</P> - -<P> -Suddenly the man drew up with a jerk at the top of a dark lane. Over -the low roofs and jagged chimney-stacks of the houses rose the black -masts of ships. Wreaths of white mist clung like ghostly sails to the -yards. -</P> - -<P> -"Somewhere about here, sir, ain't it?" he asked huskily through the -trap. -</P> - -<P> -Dorian started and peered round. "This will do," he answered, and -having got out hastily and given the driver the extra fare he had -promised him, he walked quickly in the direction of the quay. Here and -there a lantern gleamed at the stern of some huge merchantman. The -light shook and splintered in the puddles. A red glare came from an -outward-bound steamer that was coaling. The slimy pavement looked like -a wet mackintosh. -</P> - -<P> -He hurried on towards the left, glancing back now and then to see if he -was being followed. In about seven or eight minutes he reached a small -shabby house that was wedged in between two gaunt factories. In one of -the top-windows stood a lamp. He stopped and gave a peculiar knock. -</P> - -<P> -After a little time he heard steps in the passage and the chain being -unhooked. The door opened quietly, and he went in without saying a -word to the squat misshapen figure that flattened itself into the -shadow as he passed. At the end of the hall hung a tattered green -curtain that swayed and shook in the gusty wind which had followed him -in from the street. He dragged it aside and entered a long low room -which looked as if it had once been a third-rate dancing-saloon. Shrill -flaring gas-jets, dulled and distorted in the fly-blown mirrors that -faced them, were ranged round the walls. Greasy reflectors of ribbed -tin backed them, making quivering disks of light. The floor was -covered with ochre-coloured sawdust, trampled here and there into mud, -and stained with dark rings of spilled liquor. Some Malays were -crouching by a little charcoal stove, playing with bone counters and -showing their white teeth as they chattered. In one corner, with his -head buried in his arms, a sailor sprawled over a table, and by the -tawdrily painted bar that ran across one complete side stood two -haggard women, mocking an old man who was brushing the sleeves of his -coat with an expression of disgust. "He thinks he's got red ants on -him," laughed one of them, as Dorian passed by. The man looked at her -in terror and began to whimper. -</P> - -<P> -At the end of the room there was a little staircase, leading to a -darkened chamber. As Dorian hurried up its three rickety steps, the -heavy odour of opium met him. He heaved a deep breath, and his -nostrils quivered with pleasure. When he entered, a young man with -smooth yellow hair, who was bending over a lamp lighting a long thin -pipe, looked up at him and nodded in a hesitating manner. -</P> - -<P> -"You here, Adrian?" muttered Dorian. -</P> - -<P> -"Where else should I be?" he answered, listlessly. "None of the chaps -will speak to me now." -</P> - -<P> -"I thought you had left England." -</P> - -<P> -"Darlington is not going to do anything. My brother paid the bill at -last. George doesn't speak to me either.... I don't care," he added -with a sigh. "As long as one has this stuff, one doesn't want friends. -I think I have had too many friends." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian winced and looked round at the grotesque things that lay in such -fantastic postures on the ragged mattresses. The twisted limbs, the -gaping mouths, the staring lustreless eyes, fascinated him. He knew in -what strange heavens they were suffering, and what dull hells were -teaching them the secret of some new joy. They were better off than he -was. He was prisoned in thought. Memory, like a horrible malady, was -eating his soul away. From time to time he seemed to see the eyes of -Basil Hallward looking at him. Yet he felt he could not stay. The -presence of Adrian Singleton troubled him. He wanted to be where no -one would know who he was. He wanted to escape from himself. -</P> - -<P> -"I am going on to the other place," he said after a pause. -</P> - -<P> -"On the wharf?" -</P> - -<P> -"Yes." -</P> - -<P> -"That mad-cat is sure to be there. They won't have her in this place -now." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian shrugged his shoulders. "I am sick of women who love one. -Women who hate one are much more interesting. Besides, the stuff is -better." -</P> - -<P> -"Much the same." -</P> - -<P> -"I like it better. Come and have something to drink. I must have -something." -</P> - -<P> -"I don't want anything," murmured the young man. -</P> - -<P> -"Never mind." -</P> - -<P> -Adrian Singleton rose up wearily and followed Dorian to the bar. A -half-caste, in a ragged turban and a shabby ulster, grinned a hideous -greeting as he thrust a bottle of brandy and two tumblers in front of -them. The women sidled up and began to chatter. Dorian turned his -back on them and said something in a low voice to Adrian Singleton. -</P> - -<P> -A crooked smile, like a Malay crease, writhed across the face of one of -the women. "We are very proud to-night," she sneered. -</P> - -<P> -"For God's sake don't talk to me," cried Dorian, stamping his foot on -the ground. "What do you want? Money? Here it is. Don't ever talk -to me again." -</P> - -<P> -Two red sparks flashed for a moment in the woman's sodden eyes, then -flickered out and left them dull and glazed. She tossed her head and -raked the coins off the counter with greedy fingers. Her companion -watched her enviously. -</P> - -<P> -"It's no use," sighed Adrian Singleton. "I don't care to go back. -What does it matter? I am quite happy here." -</P> - -<P> -"You will write to me if you want anything, won't you?" said Dorian, -after a pause. -</P> - -<P> -"Perhaps." -</P> - -<P> -"Good night, then." -</P> - -<P> -"Good night," answered the young man, passing up the steps and wiping -his parched mouth with a handkerchief. -</P> - -<P> -Dorian walked to the door with a look of pain in his face. As he drew -the curtain aside, a hideous laugh broke from the painted lips of the -woman who had taken his money. "There goes the devil's bargain!" she -hiccoughed, in a hoarse voice. -</P> - -<P> -"Curse you!" he answered, "don't call me that." -</P> - -<P> -She snapped her fingers. "Prince Charming is what you like to be -called, ain't it?" she yelled after him. -</P> - -<P> -The drowsy sailor leaped to his feet as she spoke, and looked wildly -round. The sound of the shutting of the hall door fell on his ear. He -rushed out as if in pursuit. -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray hurried along the quay through the drizzling rain. His -meeting with Adrian Singleton had strangely moved him, and he wondered -if the ruin of that young life was really to be laid at his door, as -Basil Hallward had said to him with such infamy of insult. He bit his -lip, and for a few seconds his eyes grew sad. Yet, after all, what did -it matter to him? One's days were too brief to take the burden of -another's errors on one's shoulders. Each man lived his own life and -paid his own price for living it. The only pity was one had to pay so -often for a single fault. One had to pay over and over again, indeed. -In her dealings with man, destiny never closed her accounts. -</P> - -<P> -There are moments, psychologists tell us, when the passion for sin, or -for what the world calls sin, so dominates a nature that every fibre of -the body, as every cell of the brain, seems to be instinct with fearful -impulses. Men and women at such moments lose the freedom of their -will. They move to their terrible end as automatons move. Choice is -taken from them, and conscience is either killed, or, if it lives at -all, lives but to give rebellion its fascination and disobedience its -charm. For all sins, as theologians weary not of reminding us, are -sins of disobedience. When that high spirit, that morning star of -evil, fell from heaven, it was as a rebel that he fell. -</P> - -<P> -Callous, concentrated on evil, with stained mind, and soul hungry for -rebellion, Dorian Gray hastened on, quickening his step as he went, but -as he darted aside into a dim archway, that had served him often as a -short cut to the ill-famed place where he was going, he felt himself -suddenly seized from behind, and before he had time to defend himself, -he was thrust back against the wall, with a brutal hand round his -throat. -</P> - -<P> -He struggled madly for life, and by a terrible effort wrenched the -tightening fingers away. In a second he heard the click of a revolver, -and saw the gleam of a polished barrel, pointing straight at his head, -and the dusky form of a short, thick-set man facing him. -</P> - -<P> -"What do you want?" he gasped. -</P> - -<P> -"Keep quiet," said the man. "If you stir, I shoot you." -</P> - -<P> -"You are mad. What have I done to you?" -</P> - -<P> -"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." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray grew sick with fear. "I never knew her," he stammered. "I -never heard of her. You are mad." -</P> - -<P> -"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 to-night for -India, and I must do my job first. One minute. That's all." -</P> - -<P> -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!" -</P> - -<P> -"Eighteen years," said the man. "Why do you ask me? What do years -matter?" -</P> - -<P> -"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!" -</P> - -<P> -James Vane hesitated for a moment, not understanding what was meant. -Then he seized Dorian Gray and dragged him from the archway. -</P> - -<P> -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. -</P> - -<P> -He loosened his hold and reeled back. "My God! my God!" he cried, "and -I would have murdered you!" -</P> - -<P> -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." -</P> - -<P> -"Forgive me, sir," muttered James Vane. "I was deceived. A chance -word I heard in that damned den set me on the wrong track." -</P> - -<P> -"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. -</P> - -<P> -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. -</P> - -<P> -"Why didn't you kill him?" she hissed out, putting 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." -</P> - -<P> -"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." -</P> - -<P> -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." -</P> - -<P> -"You lie!" cried James Vane. -</P> - -<P> -She raised her hand up to heaven. "Before God I am telling the truth," -she cried. -</P> - -<P> -"Before God?" -</P> - -<P> -"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. -</P> - -<P> -"You swear this?" -</P> - -<P> -"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." -</P> - -<P> -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. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap17"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 17 -</H3> - -<P> -A week later Dorian Gray was sitting in the conservatory at Selby -Royal, talking to the pretty Duchess of Monmouth, who with her husband, -a jaded-looking man of sixty, was amongst his guests. It was tea-time, -and the mellow light of the huge, lace-covered lamp that stood on the -table lit up the delicate china and hammered silver of the service at -which the duchess was presiding. Her white hands were moving daintily -among the cups, and her full red lips were smiling at something that -Dorian had whispered to her. Lord Henry was lying back in a -silk-draped wicker chair, looking at them. On a peach-coloured divan -sat Lady Narborough, pretending to listen to the duke's description of -the last Brazilian beetle that he had added to his collection. Three -young men in elaborate smoking-suits were handing tea-cakes to some of -the women. The house-party consisted of twelve people, and there were -more expected to arrive on the next day. -</P> - -<P> -"What are you two talking about?" said Lord Henry, strolling over to -the table and putting his cup down. "I hope Dorian has told you about -my plan for rechristening everything, Gladys. It is a delightful idea." -</P> - -<P> -"But I don't want to be rechristened, Harry," rejoined the duchess, -looking up at him with her wonderful eyes. "I am quite satisfied with -my own name, and I am sure Mr. Gray should be satisfied with his." -</P> - -<P> -"My dear Gladys, I would not alter either name for the world. They are -both perfect. I was thinking chiefly of flowers. Yesterday I cut an -orchid, for my button-hole. It was a marvellous spotted thing, as -effective as the seven deadly sins. In a thoughtless moment I asked -one of the gardeners what it was called. He told me it was a fine -specimen of Robinsoniana, or something dreadful of that kind. It is a -sad truth, but we have lost the faculty of giving lovely names to -things. Names are everything. I never quarrel with actions. My one -quarrel is with words. That is the reason I hate vulgar realism in -literature. The man who could call a spade a spade should be compelled -to use one. It is the only thing he is fit for." -</P> - -<P> -"Then what should we call you, Harry?" she asked. -</P> - -<P> -"His name is Prince Paradox," said Dorian. -</P> - -<P> -"I recognize him in a flash," exclaimed the duchess. -</P> - -<P> -"I won't hear of it," laughed Lord Henry, sinking into a chair. "From -a label there is no escape! I refuse the title." -</P> - -<P> -"Royalties may not abdicate," fell as a warning from pretty lips. -</P> - -<P> -"You wish me to defend my throne, then?" -</P> - -<P> -"Yes." -</P> - -<P> -"I give the truths of to-morrow." -</P> - -<P> -"I prefer the mistakes of to-day," she answered. -</P> - -<P> -"You disarm me, Gladys," he cried, catching the wilfulness of her mood. -</P> - -<P> -"Of your shield, Harry, not of your spear." -</P> - -<P> -"I never tilt against beauty," he said, with a wave of his hand. -</P> - -<P> -"That is your error, Harry, believe me. You value beauty far too much." -</P> - -<P> -"How can you say that? I admit that I think that it is better to be -beautiful than to be good. But on the other hand, no one is more ready -than I am to acknowledge that it is better to be good than to be ugly." -</P> - -<P> -"Ugliness is one of the seven deadly sins, then?" cried the duchess. -"What becomes of your simile about the orchid?" -</P> - -<P> -"Ugliness is one of the seven deadly virtues, Gladys. You, as a good -Tory, must not underrate them. Beer, the Bible, and the seven deadly -virtues have made our England what she is." -</P> - -<P> -"You don't like your country, then?" she asked. -</P> - -<P> -"I live in it." -</P> - -<P> -"That you may censure it the better." -</P> - -<P> -"Would you have me take the verdict of Europe on it?" he inquired. -</P> - -<P> -"What do they say of us?" -</P> - -<P> -"That Tartuffe has emigrated to England and opened a shop." -</P> - -<P> -"Is that yours, Harry?" -</P> - -<P> -"I give it to you." -</P> - -<P> -"I could not use it. It is too true." -</P> - -<P> -"You need not be afraid. Our countrymen never recognize a description." -</P> - -<P> -"They are practical." -</P> - -<P> -"They are more cunning than practical. When they make up their ledger, -they balance stupidity by wealth, and vice by hypocrisy." -</P> - -<P> -"Still, we have done great things." -</P> - -<P> -"Great things have been thrust on us, Gladys." -</P> - -<P> -"We have carried their burden." -</P> - -<P> -"Only as far as the Stock Exchange." -</P> - -<P> -She shook her head. "I believe in the race," she cried. -</P> - -<P> -"It represents the survival of the pushing." -</P> - -<P> -"It has development." -</P> - -<P> -"Decay fascinates me more." -</P> - -<P> -"What of art?" she asked. -</P> - -<P> -"It is a malady." -</P> - -<P> -"Love?" -</P> - -<P> -"An illusion." -</P> - -<P> -"Religion?" -</P> - -<P> -"The fashionable substitute for belief." -</P> - -<P> -"You are a sceptic." -</P> - -<P> -"Never! Scepticism is the beginning of faith." -</P> - -<P> -"What are you?" -</P> - -<P> -"To define is to limit." -</P> - -<P> -"Give me a clue." -</P> - -<P> -"Threads snap. You would lose your way in the labyrinth." -</P> - -<P> -"You bewilder me. Let us talk of some one else." -</P> - -<P> -"Our host is a delightful topic. Years ago he was christened Prince -Charming." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! don't remind me of that," cried Dorian Gray. -</P> - -<P> -"Our host is rather horrid this evening," answered the duchess, -colouring. "I believe he thinks that Monmouth married me on purely -scientific principles as the best specimen he could find of a modern -butterfly." -</P> - -<P> -"Well, I hope he won't stick pins into you, Duchess," laughed Dorian. -</P> - -<P> -"Oh! my maid does that already, Mr. Gray, when she is annoyed with me." -</P> - -<P> -"And what does she get annoyed with you about, Duchess?" -</P> - -<P> -"For the most trivial things, Mr. Gray, I assure you. Usually because -I come in at ten minutes to nine and tell her that I must be dressed by -half-past eight." -</P> - -<P> -"How unreasonable of her! You should give her warning." -</P> - -<P> -"I daren't, Mr. Gray. Why, she invents hats for me. You remember the -one I wore at Lady Hilstone's garden-party? You don't, but it is nice -of you to pretend that you do. Well, she made it out of nothing. All -good hats are made out of nothing." -</P> - -<P> -"Like all good reputations, Gladys," interrupted Lord Henry. "Every -effect that one produces gives one an enemy. To be popular one must be -a mediocrity." -</P> - -<P> -"Not with women," said the duchess, shaking her head; "and women rule -the world. I assure you we can't bear mediocrities. We women, as some -one says, love with our ears, just as you men love with your eyes, if -you ever love at all." -</P> - -<P> -"It seems to me that we never do anything else," murmured Dorian. -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! then, you never really love, Mr. Gray," answered the duchess with -mock sadness. -</P> - -<P> -"My dear Gladys!" cried Lord Henry. "How can you say that? Romance -lives by repetition, and repetition converts an appetite into an art. -Besides, each time that one loves is the only time one has ever loved. -Difference of object does not alter singleness of passion. It merely -intensifies it. We can have in life but one great experience at best, -and the secret of life is to reproduce that experience as often as -possible." -</P> - -<P> -"Even when one has been wounded by it, Harry?" asked the duchess after -a pause. -</P> - -<P> -"Especially when one has been wounded by it," answered Lord Henry. -</P> - -<P> -The duchess turned and looked at Dorian Gray with a curious expression -in her eyes. "What do you say to that, Mr. Gray?" she inquired. -</P> - -<P> -Dorian hesitated for a moment. Then he threw his head back and -laughed. "I always agree with Harry, Duchess." -</P> - -<P> -"Even when he is wrong?" -</P> - -<P> -"Harry is never wrong, Duchess." -</P> - -<P> -"And does his philosophy make you happy?" -</P> - -<P> -"I have never searched for happiness. Who wants happiness? I have -searched for pleasure." -</P> - -<P> -"And found it, Mr. Gray?" -</P> - -<P> -"Often. Too often." -</P> - -<P> -The duchess sighed. "I am searching for peace," she said, "and if I -don't go and dress, I shall have none this evening." -</P> - -<P> -"Let me get you some orchids, Duchess," cried Dorian, starting to his -feet and walking down the conservatory. -</P> - -<P> -"You are flirting disgracefully with him," said Lord Henry to his -cousin. "You had better take care. He is very fascinating." -</P> - -<P> -"If he were not, there would be no battle." -</P> - -<P> -"Greek meets Greek, then?" -</P> - -<P> -"I am on the side of the Trojans. They fought for a woman." -</P> - -<P> -"They were defeated." -</P> - -<P> -"There are worse things than capture," she answered. -</P> - -<P> -"You gallop with a loose rein." -</P> - -<P> -"Pace gives life," was the riposte. -</P> - -<P> -"I shall write it in my diary to-night." -</P> - -<P> -"What?" -</P> - -<P> -"That a burnt child loves the fire." -</P> - -<P> -"I am not even singed. My wings are untouched." -</P> - -<P> -"You use them for everything, except flight." -</P> - -<P> -"Courage has passed from men to women. It is a new experience for us." -</P> - -<P> -"You have a rival." -</P> - -<P> -"Who?" -</P> - -<P> -He laughed. "Lady Narborough," he whispered. "She perfectly adores -him." -</P> - -<P> -"You fill me with apprehension. The appeal to antiquity is fatal to us -who are romanticists." -</P> - -<P> -"Romanticists! You have all the methods of science." -</P> - -<P> -"Men have educated us." -</P> - -<P> -"But not explained you." -</P> - -<P> -"Describe us as a sex," was her challenge. -</P> - -<P> -"Sphinxes without secrets." -</P> - -<P> -She looked at him, smiling. "How long Mr. Gray is!" she said. "Let us -go and help him. I have not yet told him the colour of my frock." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! you must suit your frock to his flowers, Gladys." -</P> - -<P> -"That would be a premature surrender." -</P> - -<P> -"Romantic art begins with its climax." -</P> - -<P> -"I must keep an opportunity for retreat." -</P> - -<P> -"In the Parthian manner?" -</P> - -<P> -"They found safety in the desert. I could not do that." -</P> - -<P> -"Women are not always allowed a choice," he answered, but hardly had he -finished the sentence before from the far end of the conservatory came -a stifled groan, followed by the dull sound of a heavy fall. Everybody -started up. The duchess stood motionless in horror. And with fear in -his eyes, Lord Henry rushed through the flapping palms to find Dorian -Gray lying face downwards on the tiled floor in a deathlike swoon. -</P> - -<P> -He was carried at once into the blue drawing-room and laid upon one of -the sofas. After a short time, he came to himself and looked round -with a dazed expression. -</P> - -<P> -"What has happened?" he asked. "Oh! I remember. Am I safe here, -Harry?" He began to tremble. -</P> - -<P> -"My dear Dorian," answered Lord Henry, "you merely fainted. That was -all. You must have overtired yourself. You had better not come down -to dinner. I will take your place." -</P> - -<P> -"No, I will come down," he said, struggling to his feet. "I would -rather come down. I must not be alone." -</P> - -<P> -He went to his room and dressed. There was a wild recklessness of -gaiety in his manner as he sat at table, but now and then a thrill of -terror ran through him when he remembered that, pressed against the -window of the conservatory, like a white handkerchief, he had seen the -face of James Vane watching him. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap18"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 18 -</H3> - -<P> -The next day he did not leave the house, and, indeed, spent most of the -time in his own room, sick with a wild terror of dying, and yet -indifferent to life itself. The consciousness of being hunted, snared, -tracked down, had begun to dominate him. If the tapestry did but -tremble in the wind, he shook. The dead leaves that were blown against -the leaded panes seemed to him like his own wasted resolutions and wild -regrets. When he closed his eyes, he saw again the sailor's face -peering through the mist-stained glass, and horror seemed once more to -lay its hand upon his heart. -</P> - -<P> -But perhaps it had been only his fancy that had called vengeance out of -the night and set the hideous shapes of punishment before him. Actual -life was chaos, but there was something terribly logical in the -imagination. It was the imagination that set remorse to dog the feet -of sin. It was the imagination that made each crime bear its misshapen -brood. In the common world of fact the wicked were not punished, nor -the good rewarded. Success was given to the strong, failure thrust -upon the weak. That was all. Besides, had any stranger been prowling -round the house, he would have been seen by the servants or the -keepers. Had any foot-marks been found on the flower-beds, the -gardeners would have reported it. Yes, it had been merely fancy. -Sibyl Vane's brother had not come back to kill him. He had sailed away -in his ship to founder in some winter sea. From him, at any rate, he -was safe. Why, the man did not know who he was, could not know who he -was. The mask of youth had saved him. -</P> - -<P> -And yet if it had been merely an illusion, how terrible it was to think -that conscience could raise such fearful phantoms, and give them -visible form, and make them move before one! What sort of life would -his be if, day and night, shadows of his crime were to peer at him from -silent corners, to mock him from secret places, to whisper in his ear -as he sat at the feast, to wake him with icy fingers as he lay asleep! -As the thought crept through his brain, he grew pale with terror, and -the air seemed to him to have become suddenly colder. Oh! in what a -wild hour of madness he had killed his friend! How ghastly the mere -memory of the scene! He saw it all again. Each hideous detail came -back to him with added horror. Out of the black cave of time, terrible -and swathed in scarlet, rose the image of his sin. When Lord Henry -came in at six o'clock, he found him crying as one whose heart will -break. -</P> - -<P> -It was not till the third day that he ventured to go out. There was -something in the clear, pine-scented air of that winter morning that -seemed to bring him back his joyousness and his ardour for life. But -it was not merely the physical conditions of environment that had -caused the change. His own nature had revolted against the excess of -anguish that had sought to maim and mar the perfection of its calm. -With subtle and finely wrought temperaments it is always so. Their -strong passions must either bruise or bend. They either slay the man, -or themselves die. Shallow sorrows and shallow loves live on. The -loves and sorrows that are great are destroyed by their own plenitude. -Besides, he had convinced himself that he had been the victim of a -terror-stricken imagination, and looked back now on his fears with -something of pity and not a little of contempt. -</P> - -<P> -After breakfast, he walked with the duchess for an hour in the garden -and then drove across the park to join the shooting-party. The crisp -frost lay like salt upon the grass. The sky was an inverted cup of -blue metal. A thin film of ice bordered the flat, reed-grown lake. -</P> - -<P> -At the corner of the pine-wood he caught sight of Sir Geoffrey -Clouston, the duchess's brother, jerking two spent cartridges out of -his gun. He jumped from the cart, and having told the groom to take -the mare home, made his way towards his guest through the withered -bracken and rough undergrowth. -</P> - -<P> -"Have you had good sport, Geoffrey?" he asked. -</P> - -<P> -"Not very good, Dorian. I think most of the birds have gone to the -open. I dare say it will be better after lunch, when we get to new -ground." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian strolled along by his side. The keen aromatic air, the brown -and red lights that glimmered in the wood, the hoarse cries of the -beaters ringing out from time to time, and the sharp snaps of the guns -that followed, fascinated him and filled him with a sense of delightful -freedom. He was dominated by the carelessness of happiness, by the -high indifference of joy. -</P> - -<P> -Suddenly from a lumpy tussock of old grass some twenty yards in front -of them, with black-tipped ears erect and long hinder limbs throwing it -forward, started a hare. It bolted for a thicket of alders. Sir -Geoffrey put his gun to his shoulder, but there was something in the -animal's grace of movement that strangely charmed Dorian Gray, and he -cried out at once, "Don't shoot it, Geoffrey. Let it live." -</P> - -<P> -"What nonsense, Dorian!" laughed his companion, and as the hare bounded -into the thicket, he fired. There were two cries heard, the cry of a -hare in pain, which is dreadful, the cry of a man in agony, which is -worse. -</P> - -<P> -"Good heavens! I have hit a beater!" exclaimed Sir Geoffrey. "What an -ass the man was to get in front of the guns! Stop shooting there!" he -called out at the top of his voice. "A man is hurt." -</P> - -<P> -The head-keeper came running up with a stick in his hand. -</P> - -<P> -"Where, sir? Where is he?" he shouted. At the same time, the firing -ceased along the line. -</P> - -<P> -"Here," answered Sir Geoffrey angrily, hurrying towards the thicket. -"Why on earth don't you keep your men back? Spoiled my shooting for -the day." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian watched them as they plunged into the alder-clump, brushing the -lithe swinging branches aside. In a few moments they emerged, dragging -a body after them into the sunlight. He turned away in horror. It -seemed to him that misfortune followed wherever he went. He heard Sir -Geoffrey ask if the man was really dead, and the affirmative answer of -the keeper. The wood seemed to him to have become suddenly alive with -faces. There was the trampling of myriad feet and the low buzz of -voices. A great copper-breasted pheasant came beating through the -boughs overhead. -</P> - -<P> -After a few moments--that were to him, in his perturbed state, like -endless hours of pain--he felt a hand laid on his shoulder. He started -and looked round. -</P> - -<P> -"Dorian," said Lord Henry, "I had better tell them that the shooting is -stopped for to-day. It would not look well to go on." -</P> - -<P> -"I wish it were stopped for ever, Harry," he answered bitterly. "The -whole thing is hideous and cruel. Is the man ...?" -</P> - -<P> -He could not finish the sentence. -</P> - -<P> -"I am afraid so," rejoined Lord Henry. "He got the whole charge of -shot in his chest. He must have died almost instantaneously. Come; -let us go home." -</P> - -<P> -They walked side by side in the direction of the avenue for nearly -fifty yards without speaking. Then Dorian looked at Lord Henry and -said, with a heavy sigh, "It is a bad omen, Harry, a very bad omen." -</P> - -<P> -"What is?" asked Lord Henry. "Oh! this accident, I suppose. My dear -fellow, it can't be helped. It was the man's own fault. Why did he -get in front of the guns? Besides, it is nothing to us. It is rather -awkward for Geoffrey, of course. It does not do to pepper beaters. It -makes people think that one is a wild shot. And Geoffrey is not; he -shoots very straight. But there is no use talking about the matter." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian shook his head. "It is a bad omen, Harry. I feel as if -something horrible were going to happen to some of us. To myself, -perhaps," he added, passing his hand over his eyes, with a gesture of -pain. -</P> - -<P> -The elder man laughed. "The only horrible thing in the world is ennui, -Dorian. That is the one sin for which there is no forgiveness. But we -are not likely to suffer from it unless these fellows keep chattering -about this thing at dinner. I must tell them that the subject is to be -tabooed. As for omens, there is no such thing as an omen. Destiny -does not send us heralds. She is too wise or too cruel for that. -Besides, what on earth could happen to you, Dorian? You have -everything in the world that a man can want. There is no one who would -not be delighted to change places with you." -</P> - -<P> -"There is no one with whom I would not change places, Harry. Don't -laugh like that. I am telling you the truth. The wretched peasant who -has just died is better off than I am. I have no terror of death. It -is the coming of death that terrifies me. Its monstrous wings seem to -wheel in the leaden air around me. Good heavens! don't you see a man -moving behind the trees there, watching me, waiting for me?" -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry looked in the direction in which the trembling gloved hand -was pointing. "Yes," he said, smiling, "I see the gardener waiting for -you. I suppose he wants to ask you what flowers you wish to have on -the table to-night. How absurdly nervous you are, my dear fellow! You -must come and see my doctor, when we get back to town." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian heaved a sigh of relief as he saw the gardener approaching. The -man touched his hat, glanced for a moment at Lord Henry in a hesitating -manner, and then produced a letter, which he handed to his master. -"Her Grace told me to wait for an answer," he murmured. -</P> - -<P> -Dorian put the letter into his pocket. "Tell her Grace that I am -coming in," he said, coldly. The man turned round and went rapidly in -the direction of the house. -</P> - -<P> -"How fond women are of doing dangerous things!" laughed Lord Henry. -"It is one of the qualities in them that I admire most. A woman will -flirt with anybody in the world as long as other people are looking on." -</P> - -<P> -"How fond you are of saying dangerous things, Harry! In the present -instance, you are quite astray. I like the duchess very much, but I -don't love her." -</P> - -<P> -"And the duchess loves you very much, but she likes you less, so you -are excellently matched." -</P> - -<P> -"You are talking scandal, Harry, and there is never any basis for -scandal." -</P> - -<P> -"The basis of every scandal is an immoral certainty," said Lord Henry, -lighting a cigarette. -</P> - -<P> -"You would sacrifice anybody, Harry, for the sake of an epigram." -</P> - -<P> -"The world goes to the altar of its own accord," was the answer. -</P> - -<P> -"I wish I could love," cried Dorian Gray with a deep note of pathos in -his voice. "But I seem to have lost the passion and forgotten the -desire. I am too much concentrated on myself. My own personality has -become a burden to me. I want to escape, to go away, to forget. It -was silly of me to come down here at all. I think I shall send a wire -to Harvey to have the yacht got ready. On a yacht one is safe." -</P> - -<P> -"Safe from what, Dorian? You are in some trouble. Why not tell me -what it is? You know I would help you." -</P> - -<P> -"I can't tell you, Harry," he answered sadly. "And I dare say it is -only a fancy of mine. This unfortunate accident has upset me. I have -a horrible presentiment that something of the kind may happen to me." -</P> - -<P> -"What nonsense!" -</P> - -<P> -"I hope it is, but I can't help feeling it. Ah! here is the duchess, -looking like Artemis in a tailor-made gown. You see we have come back, -Duchess." -</P> - -<P> -"I have heard all about it, Mr. Gray," she answered. "Poor Geoffrey is -terribly upset. And it seems that you asked him not to shoot the hare. -How curious!" -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, it was very curious. I don't know what made me say it. Some -whim, I suppose. It looked the loveliest of little live things. But I -am sorry they told you about the man. It is a hideous subject." -</P> - -<P> -"It is an annoying subject," broke in Lord Henry. "It has no -psychological value at all. Now if Geoffrey had done the thing on -purpose, how interesting he would be! I should like to know some one -who had committed a real murder." -</P> - -<P> -"How horrid of you, Harry!" cried the duchess. "Isn't it, Mr. Gray? -Harry, Mr. Gray is ill again. He is going to faint." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian drew himself up with an effort and smiled. "It is nothing, -Duchess," he murmured; "my nerves are dreadfully out of order. That is -all. I am afraid I walked too far this morning. I didn't hear what -Harry said. Was it very bad? You must tell me some other time. I -think I must go and lie down. You will excuse me, won't you?" -</P> - -<P> -They had reached the great flight of steps that led from the -conservatory on to the terrace. As the glass door closed behind -Dorian, Lord Henry turned and looked at the duchess with his slumberous -eyes. "Are you very much in love with him?" he asked. -</P> - -<P> -She did not answer for some time, but stood gazing at the landscape. -"I wish I knew," she said at last. -</P> - -<P> -He shook his head. "Knowledge would be fatal. It is the uncertainty -that charms one. A mist makes things wonderful." -</P> - -<P> -"One may lose one's way." -</P> - -<P> -"All ways end at the same point, my dear Gladys." -</P> - -<P> -"What is that?" -</P> - -<P> -"Disillusion." -</P> - -<P> -"It was my debut in life," she sighed. -</P> - -<P> -"It came to you crowned." -</P> - -<P> -"I am tired of strawberry leaves." -</P> - -<P> -"They become you." -</P> - -<P> -"Only in public." -</P> - -<P> -"You would miss them," said Lord Henry. -</P> - -<P> -"I will not part with a petal." -</P> - -<P> -"Monmouth has ears." -</P> - -<P> -"Old age is dull of hearing." -</P> - -<P> -"Has he never been jealous?" -</P> - -<P> -"I wish he had been." -</P> - -<P> -He glanced about as if in search of something. "What are you looking -for?" she inquired. -</P> - -<P> -"The button from your foil," he answered. "You have dropped it." -</P> - -<P> -She laughed. "I have still the mask." -</P> - -<P> -"It makes your eyes lovelier," was his reply. -</P> - -<P> -She laughed again. Her teeth showed like white seeds in a scarlet -fruit. -</P> - -<P> -Upstairs, in his own room, Dorian Gray was lying on a sofa, with terror -in every tingling fibre of his body. Life had suddenly become too -hideous a burden for him to bear. The dreadful death of the unlucky -beater, shot in the thicket like a wild animal, had seemed to him to -pre-figure death for himself also. He had nearly swooned at what Lord -Henry had said in a chance mood of cynical jesting. -</P> - -<P> -At five o'clock he rang his bell for his servant and gave him orders to -pack his things for the night-express to town, and to have the brougham -at the door by eight-thirty. He was determined not to sleep another -night at Selby Royal. It was an ill-omened place. Death walked there -in the sunlight. The grass of the forest had been spotted with blood. -</P> - -<P> -Then he wrote a note to Lord Henry, telling him that he was going up to -town to consult his doctor and asking him to entertain his guests in -his absence. As he was putting it into the envelope, a knock came to -the door, and his valet informed him that the head-keeper wished to see -him. He frowned and bit his lip. "Send him in," he muttered, after -some moments' hesitation. -</P> - -<P> -As soon as the man entered, Dorian pulled his chequebook out of a -drawer and spread it out before him. -</P> - -<P> -"I suppose you have come about the unfortunate accident of this -morning, Thornton?" he said, taking up a pen. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, sir," answered the gamekeeper. -</P> - -<P> -"Was the poor fellow married? Had he any people dependent on him?" -asked Dorian, looking bored. "If so, I should not like them to be left -in want, and will send them any sum of money you may think necessary." -</P> - -<P> -"We don't know who he is, sir. That is what I took the liberty of -coming to you about." -</P> - -<P> -"Don't know who he is?" said Dorian, listlessly. "What do you mean? -Wasn't he one of your men?" -</P> - -<P> -"No, sir. Never saw him before. Seems like a sailor, sir." -</P> - -<P> -The pen dropped from Dorian Gray's hand, and he felt as if his heart -had suddenly stopped beating. "A sailor?" he cried out. "Did you say -a sailor?" -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, sir. He looks as if he had been a sort of sailor; tattooed on -both arms, and that kind of thing." -</P> - -<P> -"Was there anything found on him?" said Dorian, leaning forward and -looking at the man with startled eyes. "Anything that would tell his -name?" -</P> - -<P> -"Some money, sir--not much, and a six-shooter. There was no name of any -kind. A decent-looking man, sir, but rough-like. A sort of sailor we -think." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian started to his feet. A terrible hope fluttered past him. He -clutched at it madly. "Where is the body?" he exclaimed. "Quick! I -must see it at once." -</P> - -<P> -"It is in an empty stable in the Home Farm, sir. The folk don't like -to have that sort of thing in their houses. They say a corpse brings -bad luck." -</P> - -<P> -"The Home Farm! Go there at once and meet me. Tell one of the grooms -to bring my horse round. No. Never mind. I'll go to the stables -myself. It will save time." -</P> - -<P> -In less than a quarter of an hour, Dorian Gray was galloping down the -long avenue as hard as he could go. The trees seemed to sweep past him -in spectral procession, and wild shadows to fling themselves across his -path. Once the mare swerved at a white gate-post and nearly threw him. -He lashed her across the neck with his crop. She cleft the dusky air -like an arrow. The stones flew from her hoofs. -</P> - -<P> -At last he reached the Home Farm. Two men were loitering in the yard. -He leaped from the saddle and threw the reins to one of them. In the -farthest stable a light was glimmering. Something seemed to tell him -that the body was there, and he hurried to the door and put his hand -upon the latch. -</P> - -<P> -There he paused for a moment, feeling that he was on the brink of a -discovery that would either make or mar his life. Then he thrust the -door open and entered. -</P> - -<P> -On a heap of sacking in the far corner was lying the dead body of a man -dressed in a coarse shirt and a pair of blue trousers. A spotted -handkerchief had been placed over the face. A coarse candle, stuck in -a bottle, sputtered beside it. -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray shuddered. He felt that his could not be the hand to take -the handkerchief away, and called out to one of the farm-servants to -come to him. -</P> - -<P> -"Take that thing off the face. I wish to see it," he said, clutching -at the door-post for support. -</P> - -<P> -When the farm-servant had done so, he stepped forward. A cry of joy -broke from his lips. The man who had been shot in the thicket was -James Vane. -</P> - -<P> -He stood there for some minutes looking at the dead body. As he rode -home, his eyes were full of tears, for he knew he was safe. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap19"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 19 -</H3> - -<P> -"There is no use your telling me that you are going to be good," cried -Lord Henry, dipping his white fingers into a red copper bowl filled -with rose-water. "You are quite perfect. Pray, don't change." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray shook his head. "No, Harry, I have done too many dreadful -things in my life. I am not going to do any more. I began my good -actions yesterday." -</P> - -<P> -"Where were you yesterday?" -</P> - -<P> -"In the country, Harry. I was staying at a little inn by myself." -</P> - -<P> -"My dear boy," said Lord Henry, smiling, "anybody can be good in the -country. There are no temptations there. That is the reason why -people who live out of town are so absolutely uncivilized. -Civilization is not by any means an easy thing to attain to. There are -only two ways by which man can reach it. One is by being cultured, the -other by being corrupt. Country people have no opportunity of being -either, so they stagnate." -</P> - -<P> -"Culture and corruption," echoed Dorian. "I have known something of -both. It seems terrible to me now that they should ever be found -together. For I have a new ideal, Harry. I am going to alter. I -think I have altered." -</P> - -<P> -"You have not yet told me what your good action was. Or did you say -you had done more than one?" asked his companion as he spilled into his -plate a little crimson pyramid of seeded strawberries and, through a -perforated, shell-shaped spoon, snowed white sugar upon them. -</P> - -<P> -"I can tell you, Harry. It is not a story I could tell to any one -else. I spared somebody. It sounds vain, but you understand what I -mean. She was quite beautiful and wonderfully like Sibyl Vane. I -think it was that which first attracted me to her. You remember Sibyl, -don't you? How long ago that seems! Well, Hetty was not one of our -own class, of course. She was simply a girl in a village. But I -really loved her. I am quite sure that I loved her. All during this -wonderful May that we have been having, I used to run down and see her -two or three times a week. Yesterday she met me in a little orchard. -The apple-blossoms kept tumbling down on her hair, and she was -laughing. We were to have gone away together this morning at dawn. -Suddenly I determined to leave her as flowerlike as I had found her." -</P> - -<P> -"I should think the novelty of the emotion must have given you a thrill -of real pleasure, Dorian," interrupted Lord Henry. "But I can finish -your idyll for you. You gave her good advice and broke her heart. -That was the beginning of your reformation." -</P> - -<P> -"Harry, you are horrible! You mustn't say these dreadful things. -Hetty's heart is not broken. Of course, she cried and all that. But -there is no disgrace upon her. She can live, like Perdita, in her -garden of mint and marigold." -</P> - -<P> -"And weep over a faithless Florizel," said Lord Henry, laughing, as he -leaned back in his chair. "My dear Dorian, you have the most curiously -boyish moods. Do you think this girl will ever be really content now -with any one of her own rank? I suppose she will be married some day -to a rough carter or a grinning ploughman. Well, the fact of having -met you, and loved you, will teach her to despise her husband, and she -will be wretched. From a moral point of view, I cannot say that I -think much of your great renunciation. Even as a beginning, it is -poor. Besides, how do you know that Hetty isn't floating at the -present moment in some starlit mill-pond, with lovely water-lilies -round her, like Ophelia?" -</P> - -<P> -"I can't bear this, Harry! You mock at everything, and then suggest -the most serious tragedies. I am sorry I told you now. I don't care -what you say to me. I know I was right in acting as I did. Poor -Hetty! As I rode past the farm this morning, I saw her white face at -the window, like a spray of jasmine. Don't let us talk about it any -more, and don't try to persuade me that the first good action I have -done for years, the first little bit of self-sacrifice I have ever -known, is really a sort of sin. I want to be better. I am going to be -better. Tell me something about yourself. What is going on in town? -I have not been to the club for days." -</P> - -<P> -"The people are still discussing poor Basil's disappearance." -</P> - -<P> -"I should have thought they had got tired of that by this time," said -Dorian, pouring himself out some wine and frowning slightly. -</P> - -<P> -"My dear boy, they have only been talking about it for six weeks, and -the British public are really not equal to the mental strain of having -more than one topic every three months. They have been very fortunate -lately, however. They have had my own divorce-case and Alan Campbell's -suicide. Now they have got the mysterious disappearance of an artist. -Scotland Yard still insists that the man in the grey ulster who left -for Paris by the midnight train on the ninth of November was poor -Basil, and the French police declare that Basil never arrived in Paris -at all. I suppose in about a fortnight we shall be told that he has -been seen in San Francisco. It is an odd thing, but every one who -disappears is said to be seen at San Francisco. It must be a -delightful city, and possess all the attractions of the next world." -</P> - -<P> -"What do you think has happened to Basil?" asked Dorian, holding up his -Burgundy against the light and wondering how it was that he could -discuss the matter so calmly. -</P> - -<P> -"I have not the slightest idea. If Basil chooses to hide himself, it -is no business of mine. If he is dead, I don't want to think about -him. Death is the only thing that ever terrifies me. I hate it." -</P> - -<P> -"Why?" said the younger man wearily. -</P> - -<P> -"Because," said Lord Henry, passing beneath his nostrils the gilt -trellis of an open vinaigrette box, "one can survive everything -nowadays except that. Death and vulgarity are the only two facts in -the nineteenth century that one cannot explain away. Let us have our -coffee in the music-room, Dorian. You must play Chopin to me. The man -with whom my wife ran away played Chopin exquisitely. Poor Victoria! -I was very fond of her. The house is rather lonely without her. Of -course, married life is merely a habit, a bad habit. But then one -regrets the loss even of one's worst habits. Perhaps one regrets them -the most. They are such an essential part of one's personality." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian said nothing, but rose from the table, and passing into the next -room, sat down to the piano and let his fingers stray across the white -and black ivory of the keys. After the coffee had been brought in, he -stopped, and looking over at Lord Henry, said, "Harry, did it ever -occur to you that Basil was murdered?" -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry yawned. "Basil was very popular, and always wore a -Waterbury watch. Why should he have been murdered? He was not clever -enough to have enemies. Of course, he had a wonderful genius for -painting. But a man can paint like Velasquez and yet be as dull as -possible. Basil was really rather dull. He only interested me once, -and that was when he told me, years ago, that he had a wild adoration -for you and that you were the dominant motive of his art." -</P> - -<P> -"I was very fond of Basil," said Dorian with a note of sadness in his -voice. "But don't people say that he was murdered?" -</P> - -<P> -"Oh, some of the papers do. It does not seem to me to be at all -probable. I know there are dreadful places in Paris, but Basil was not -the sort of man to have gone to them. He had no curiosity. It was his -chief defect." -</P> - -<P> -"What would you say, Harry, if I told you that I had murdered Basil?" -said the younger man. He watched him intently after he had spoken. -</P> - -<P> -"I would say, my dear fellow, that you were posing for a character that -doesn't suit you. All crime is vulgar, just as all vulgarity is crime. -It is not in you, Dorian, to commit a murder. I am sorry if I hurt -your vanity by saying so, but I assure you it is true. Crime belongs -exclusively to the lower orders. I don't blame them in the smallest -degree. I should fancy that crime was to them what art is to us, -simply a method of procuring extraordinary sensations." -</P> - -<P> -"A method of procuring sensations? Do you think, then, that a man who -has once committed a murder could possibly do the same crime again? -Don't tell me that." -</P> - -<P> -"Oh! anything becomes a pleasure if one does it too often," cried Lord -Henry, laughing. "That is one of the most important secrets of life. -I should fancy, however, that murder is always a mistake. One should -never do anything that one cannot talk about after dinner. But let us -pass from poor Basil. I wish I could believe that he had come to such -a really romantic end as you suggest, but I can't. I dare say he fell -into the Seine off an omnibus and that the conductor hushed up the -scandal. Yes: I should fancy that was his end. I see him lying now -on his back under those dull-green waters, with the heavy barges -floating over him and long weeds catching in his hair. Do you know, I -don't think he would have done much more good work. During the last -ten years his painting had gone off very much." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian heaved a sigh, and Lord Henry strolled across the room and began -to stroke the head of a curious Java parrot, a large, grey-plumaged -bird with pink crest and tail, that was balancing itself upon a bamboo -perch. As his pointed fingers touched it, it dropped the white scurf -of crinkled lids over black, glasslike eyes and began to sway backwards -and forwards. -</P> - -<P> -"Yes," he continued, turning round and taking his handkerchief out of -his pocket; "his painting had quite gone off. It seemed to me to have -lost something. It had lost an ideal. When you and he ceased to be -great friends, he ceased to be a great artist. What was it separated -you? I suppose he bored you. If so, he never forgave you. It's a -habit bores have. By the way, what has become of that wonderful -portrait he did of you? I don't think I have ever seen it since he -finished it. Oh! I remember your telling me years ago that you had -sent it down to Selby, and that it had got mislaid or stolen on the -way. You never got it back? What a pity! it was really a -masterpiece. I remember I wanted to buy it. I wish I had now. It -belonged to Basil's best period. Since then, his work was that curious -mixture of bad painting and good intentions that always entitles a man -to be called a representative British artist. Did you advertise for -it? You should." -</P> - -<P> -"I forget," said Dorian. "I suppose I did. But I never really liked -it. I am sorry I sat for it. The memory of the thing is hateful to -me. Why do you talk of it? It used to remind me of those curious -lines in some play--Hamlet, I think--how do they run?-- -</P> - -<P CLASS="poem"> -"Like the painting of a sorrow,<BR> -A face without a heart."<BR> -</P> - -<P> -Yes: that is what it was like." -</P> - -<P> -Lord Henry laughed. "If a man treats life artistically, his brain is -his heart," he answered, sinking into an arm-chair. -</P> - -<P> -Dorian Gray shook his head and struck some soft chords on the piano. -"'Like the painting of a sorrow,'" he repeated, "'a face without a -heart.'" -</P> - -<P> -The elder man lay back and looked at him with half-closed eyes. "By -the way, Dorian," he said after a pause, "'what does it profit a man if -he gain the whole world and lose--how does the quotation run?--his own -soul'?" -</P> - -<P> -The music jarred, and Dorian Gray started and stared at his friend. -"Why do you ask me that, Harry?" -</P> - -<P> -"My dear fellow," said Lord Henry, elevating his eyebrows in surprise, -"I asked you because I thought you might be able to give me an answer. -That is all. I was going through the park last Sunday, and close by -the Marble Arch there stood a little crowd of shabby-looking people -listening to some vulgar street-preacher. As I passed by, I heard the -man yelling out that question to his audience. It struck me as being -rather dramatic. London is very rich in curious effects of that kind. -A wet Sunday, an uncouth Christian in a mackintosh, a ring of sickly -white faces under a broken roof of dripping umbrellas, and a wonderful -phrase flung into the air by shrill hysterical lips--it was really very -good in its way, quite a suggestion. I thought of telling the prophet -that art had a soul, but that man had not. I am afraid, however, he -would not have understood me." -</P> - -<P> -"Don't, Harry. The soul is a terrible reality. It can be bought, and -sold, and bartered away. It can be poisoned, or made perfect. There -is a soul in each one of us. I know it." -</P> - -<P> -"Do you feel quite sure of that, Dorian?" -</P> - -<P> -"Quite sure." -</P> - -<P> -"Ah! then it must be an illusion. The things one feels absolutely -certain about are never true. That is the fatality of faith, and the -lesson of romance. How grave you are! Don't be so serious. What have -you or I to do with the superstitions of our age? No: we have given -up our belief in the soul. Play me something. Play me a nocturne, -Dorian, and, as you play, tell me, in a low voice, how you have kept -your youth. You must have some secret. I am only ten years older than -you are, and I am wrinkled, and worn, and yellow. You are really -wonderful, Dorian. You have never looked more charming than you do -to-night. You remind me of the day I saw you first. You were rather -cheeky, very shy, and absolutely extraordinary. You have changed, of -course, but not in appearance. I wish you would tell me your secret. -To get back my youth I would do anything in the world, except take -exercise, get up early, or be respectable. Youth! There is nothing -like it. It's absurd to talk of the ignorance of youth. The only -people to whose opinions I listen now with any respect are people much -younger than myself. They seem in front of me. Life has revealed to -them her latest wonder. As for the aged, I always contradict the aged. -I do it on principle. If you ask them their opinion on something that -happened yesterday, they solemnly give you the opinions current in -1820, when people wore high stocks, believed in everything, and knew -absolutely nothing. How lovely that thing you are playing is! I -wonder, did Chopin write it at Majorca, with the sea weeping round the -villa and the salt spray dashing against the panes? It is marvellously -romantic. What a blessing it is that there is one art left to us that -is not imitative! Don't stop. I want music to-night. It seems to me -that you are the young Apollo and that I am Marsyas listening to you. -I have sorrows, Dorian, of my own, that even you know nothing of. The -tragedy of old age is not that one is old, but that one is young. I am -amazed sometimes at my own sincerity. Ah, Dorian, how happy you are! -What an exquisite life you have had! You have drunk deeply of -everything. You have crushed the grapes against your palate. Nothing -has been hidden from you. And it has all been to you no more than the -sound of music. It has not marred you. You are still the same." -</P> - -<P> -"I am not the same, Harry." -</P> - -<P> -"Yes, you are the same. I wonder what the rest of your life will be. -Don't spoil it by renunciations. At present you are a perfect type. -Don't make yourself incomplete. You are quite flawless now. You need -not shake your head: you know you are. Besides, Dorian, don't deceive -yourself. Life is not governed by will or intention. Life is a -question of nerves, and fibres, and slowly built-up cells in which -thought hides itself and passion has its dreams. You may fancy -yourself safe and think yourself strong. But a chance tone of colour -in a room or a morning sky, a particular perfume that you had once -loved and that brings subtle memories with it, a line from a forgotten -poem that you had come across again, a cadence from a piece of music -that you had ceased to play--I tell you, Dorian, that it is on things -like these that our lives depend. Browning writes about that -somewhere; but our own senses will imagine them for us. There are -moments when the odour of lilas blanc passes suddenly across me, and I -have to live the strangest month of my life over again. I wish I could -change places with you, Dorian. The world has cried out against us -both, but it has always worshipped you. It always will worship you. -You are the type of what the age is searching for, and what it is -afraid it has found. I am so glad that you have never done anything, -never carved a statue, or painted a picture, or produced anything -outside of yourself! Life has been your art. You have set yourself to -music. Your days are your sonnets." -</P> - -<P> -Dorian rose up from the piano and passed his hand through his hair. -"Yes, life has been exquisite," he murmured, "but I am not going to -have the same life, Harry. And you must not say these extravagant -things to me. You don't know everything about me. I think that if you -did, even you would turn from me. You laugh. Don't laugh." -</P> - -<P> -"Why have you stopped playing, Dorian? Go back and give me the -nocturne over again. Look at that great, honey-coloured moon that -hangs in the dusky air. She is waiting for you to charm her, and if -you play she will come closer to the earth. You won't? Let us go to -the club, then. It has been a charming evening, and we must end it -charmingly. There is some one at White's who wants immensely to know -you--young Lord Poole, Bournemouth's eldest son. He has already copied -your neckties, and has begged me to introduce him to you. He is quite -delightful and rather reminds me of you." -</P> - -<P> -"I hope not," said Dorian with a sad look in his eyes. "But I am tired -to-night, Harry. I shan't go to the club. It is nearly eleven, and I -want to go to bed early." -</P> - -<P> -"Do stay. You have never played so well as to-night. There was -something in your touch that was wonderful. It had more expression -than I had ever heard from it before." -</P> - -<P> -"It is because I am going to be good," he answered, smiling. "I am a -little changed already." -</P> - -<P> -"You cannot change to me, Dorian," said Lord Henry. "You and I will -always be friends." -</P> - -<P> -"Yet you poisoned me with a book once. I should not forgive that. -Harry, promise me that you will never lend that book to any one. It -does harm." -</P> - -<P> -"My dear boy, you are really beginning to moralize. You will soon be -going about like the converted, and the revivalist, warning people -against all the sins of which you have grown tired. You are much too -delightful to do that. Besides, it is no use. You and I are what we -are, and will be what we will be. As for being poisoned by a book, -there is no such thing as that. Art has no influence upon action. It -annihilates the desire to act. It is superbly sterile. The books that -the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame. -That is all. But we won't discuss literature. Come round to-morrow. I -am going to ride at eleven. We might go together, and I will take you -to lunch afterwards with Lady Branksome. She is a charming woman, and -wants to consult you about some tapestries she is thinking of buying. -Mind you come. Or shall we lunch with our little duchess? She says -she never sees you now. Perhaps you are tired of Gladys? I thought -you would be. Her clever tongue gets on one's nerves. Well, in any -case, be here at eleven." -</P> - -<P> -"Must I really come, Harry?" -</P> - -<P> -"Certainly. The park is quite lovely now. I don't think there have -been such lilacs since the year I met you." -</P> - -<P> -"Very well. I shall be here at eleven," said Dorian. "Good night, -Harry." As he reached the door, he hesitated for a moment, as if he -had something more to say. Then he sighed and went out. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR> - -<A NAME="chap20"></A> -<H3 ALIGN="center"> -CHAPTER 20 -</H3> - -<P> -It was a lovely night, so warm that he threw his coat over his arm and -did not even put his silk scarf round his throat. As he strolled home, -smoking his cigarette, two young men in evening dress passed him. He -heard one of them whisper to the other, "That is Dorian Gray." He -remembered how pleased he used to be when he was pointed out, or stared -at, or talked about. He was tired of hearing his own name now. Half -the charm of the little village where he had been so often lately was -that no one knew who he was. He had often told the girl whom he had -lured to love him that he was poor, and she had believed him. He had -told her once that he was wicked, and she had laughed at him and -answered that wicked people were always very old and very ugly. What a -laugh she had!--just like a thrush singing. And how pretty she had -been in her cotton dresses and her large hats! She knew nothing, but -she had everything that he had lost. -</P> - -<P> -When he reached home, he found his servant waiting up for him. He sent -him to bed, and threw himself down on the sofa in the library, and -began to think over some of the things that Lord Henry had said to him. -</P> - -<P> -Was it really true that one could never change? He felt a wild longing -for the unstained purity of his boyhood--his rose-white boyhood, as -Lord Henry had once called it. He knew that he had tarnished himself, -filled his mind with corruption and given horror to his fancy; that he -had been an evil influence to others, and had experienced a terrible -joy in being so; and that of the lives that had crossed his own, it had -been the fairest and the most full of promise that he had brought to -shame. But was it all irretrievable? Was there no hope for him? -</P> - -<P> -Ah! in what a monstrous moment of pride and passion he had prayed that -the portrait should bear the burden of his days, and he keep the -unsullied splendour of eternal youth! All his failure had been due to -that. Better for him that each sin of his life had brought its sure -swift penalty along with it. There was purification in punishment. -Not "Forgive us our sins" but "Smite us for our iniquities" should be -the prayer of man to a most just God. -</P> - -<P> -The curiously carved mirror that Lord Henry had given to him, so many -years ago now, was standing on the table, and the white-limbed Cupids -laughed round it as of old. He took it up, as he had done on that -night of horror when he had first noted the change in the fatal -picture, and with wild, tear-dimmed eyes looked into its polished -shield. Once, some one who had terribly loved him had written to him a -mad letter, ending with these idolatrous words: "The world is changed -because you are made of ivory and gold. The curves of your lips -rewrite history." The phrases came back to his memory, and he repeated -them over and over to himself. Then he loathed his own beauty, and -flinging the mirror on the floor, crushed it into silver splinters -beneath his heel. It was his beauty that had ruined him, his beauty -and the youth that he had prayed for. But for those two things, his -life might have been free from stain. His beauty had been to him but a -mask, his youth but a mockery. What was youth at best? A green, an -unripe time, a time of shallow moods, and sickly thoughts. Why had he -worn its livery? Youth had spoiled him. -</P> - -<P> -It was better not to think of the past. Nothing could alter that. It -was of himself, and of his own future, that he had to think. James -Vane was hidden in a nameless grave in Selby churchyard. Alan Campbell -had shot himself one night in his laboratory, but had not revealed the -secret that he had been forced to know. The excitement, such as it -was, over Basil Hallward's disappearance would soon pass away. It was -already waning. He was perfectly safe there. Nor, indeed, was it the -death of Basil Hallward that weighed most upon his mind. It was the -living death of his own soul that troubled him. Basil had painted the -portrait that had marred his life. He could not forgive him that. It -was the portrait that had done everything. Basil had said things to -him that were unbearable, and that he had yet borne with patience. The -murder had been simply the madness of a moment. As for Alan Campbell, -his suicide had been his own act. He had chosen to do it. It was -nothing to him. -</P> - -<P> -A new life! That was what he wanted. That was what he was waiting -for. Surely he had begun it already. He had spared one innocent -thing, at any rate. He would never again tempt innocence. He would be -good. -</P> - -<P> -As he thought of Hetty Merton, he began to wonder if the portrait in -the locked room had changed. Surely it was not still so horrible as it -had been? Perhaps if his life became pure, he would be able to expel -every sign of evil passion from the face. Perhaps the signs of evil -had already gone away. He would go and look. -</P> - -<P> -He took the lamp from the table and crept upstairs. As he unbarred the -door, a smile of joy flitted across his strangely young-looking face -and lingered for a moment about his lips. Yes, he would be good, and -the hideous thing that he had hidden away would no longer be a terror -to him. He felt as if the load had been lifted from him already. -</P> - -<P> -He went in quietly, locking the door behind him, as was his custom, and -dragged the purple hanging from the portrait. A cry of pain and -indignation broke from him. He could see no change, save that in the -eyes there was a look of cunning and in the mouth the curved wrinkle of -the hypocrite. The thing was still loathsome--more loathsome, if -possible, than before--and the scarlet dew that spotted the hand seemed -brighter, and more like blood newly spilled. Then he trembled. Had it -been merely vanity that had made him do his one good deed? Or the -desire for a new sensation, as Lord Henry had hinted, with his mocking -laugh? Or that passion to act a part that sometimes makes us do things -finer than we are ourselves? Or, perhaps, all these? And why was the -red stain larger than it had been? It seemed to have crept like a -horrible disease over the wrinkled fingers. There was blood on the -painted feet, as though the thing had dripped--blood even on the hand -that had not held the knife. Confess? Did it mean that he was to -confess? To give himself up and be put to death? He laughed. He felt -that the idea was monstrous. Besides, even if he did confess, who -would believe him? There was no trace of the murdered man anywhere. -Everything belonging to him had been destroyed. He himself had burned -what had been below-stairs. The world would simply say that he was mad. -They would shut him up if he persisted in his story.... Yet it was -his duty to confess, to suffer public shame, and to make public -atonement. There was a God who called upon men to tell their sins to -earth as well as to heaven. Nothing that he could do would cleanse him -till he had told his own sin. His sin? He shrugged his shoulders. -The death of Basil Hallward seemed very little to him. He was thinking -of Hetty Merton. For it was an unjust mirror, this mirror of his soul -that he was looking at. Vanity? Curiosity? Hypocrisy? Had there -been nothing more in his renunciation than that? There had been -something more. At least he thought so. But who could tell? ... No. -There had been nothing more. Through vanity he had spared her. In -hypocrisy he had worn the mask of goodness. For curiosity's sake he -had tried the denial of self. He recognized that now. -</P> - -<P> -But this murder--was it to dog him all his life? Was he always to be -burdened by his past? Was he really to confess? Never. There was -only one bit of evidence left against him. The picture itself--that -was evidence. He would destroy it. Why had he kept it so long? Once -it had given him pleasure to watch it changing and growing old. Of -late he had felt no such pleasure. It had kept him awake at night. -When he had been away, he had been filled with terror lest other eyes -should look upon it. It had brought melancholy across his passions. -Its mere memory had marred many moments of joy. It had been like -conscience to him. Yes, it had been conscience. He would destroy it. -</P> - -<P> -He looked round and saw the knife that had stabbed Basil Hallward. He -had cleaned it many times, till there was no stain left upon it. It -was bright, and glistened. As it had killed the painter, so it would -kill the painter's work, and all that that meant. It would kill the -past, and when that was dead, he would be free. It would kill this -monstrous soul-life, and without its hideous warnings, he would be at -peace. He seized the thing, and stabbed the picture with it. -</P> - -<P> -There was a cry heard, and a crash. The cry was so horrible in its -agony that the frightened servants woke and crept out of their rooms. -Two gentlemen, who were passing in the square below, stopped and looked -up at the great house. They walked on till they met a policeman and -brought him back. The man rang the bell several times, but there was -no answer. Except for a light in one of the top windows, the house was -all dark. After a time, he went away and stood in an adjoining portico -and watched. -</P> - -<P> -"Whose house is that, Constable?" asked the elder of the two gentlemen. -</P> - -<P> -"Mr. Dorian Gray's, sir," answered the policeman. -</P> - -<P> -They looked at each other, as they walked away, and sneered. One of -them was Sir Henry Ashton's uncle. -</P> - -<P> -Inside, in the servants' part of the house, the half-clad domestics -were talking in low whispers to each other. Old Mrs. Leaf was crying -and wringing her hands. Francis was as pale as death. -</P> - -<P> -After about a quarter of an hour, he got the coachman and one of the -footmen and crept upstairs. They knocked, but there was no reply. -They called out. Everything was still. Finally, after vainly trying -to force the door, they got on the roof and dropped down on to the -balcony. The windows yielded easily--their bolts were old. -</P> - -<P> -When they entered, they found hanging upon the wall a splendid portrait -of their master as they had last seen him, in all the wonder of his -exquisite youth and beauty. Lying on the floor was a dead man, in -evening dress, with a knife in his heart. He was withered, wrinkled, -and loathsome of visage. It was not till they had examined the rings -that they recognized who it was. -</P> - -<BR><BR><BR><BR> - - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY *** - -***** This file should be named 174-h.htm or 174-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/1/7/174/ - -Produced by Judith Boss. HTML version by Al Haines. - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Thus, we do not necessarily -keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. - - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: - - http://www.gutenberg.net - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - - -</pre> - -</BODY> - -</HTML> - - diff --git a/old/20080609-174.txt b/old/20080609-174.txt deleted file mode 100644 index edce595..0000000 --- a/old/20080609-174.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,8904 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with -almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net - - -Title: The Picture of Dorian Gray - -Author: Oscar Wilde - -Release Date: June 9, 2008 [EBook #174] -[This file last updated on July 2, 2011] - - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ASCII - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY *** - - - - -Produced by Judith Boss. HTML version by Al Haines. - - - - - - - - - - -The Picture of Dorian Gray - -by - -Oscar Wilde - - - - -THE PREFACE - -The artist is the creator of beautiful things. To reveal art and -conceal the artist is art's aim. The critic is he who can translate -into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful -things. - -The highest as the lowest form of criticism is a mode of autobiography. -Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without -being charming. This is a fault. - -Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the -cultivated. For these there is hope. They are the elect to whom -beautiful things mean only beauty. - -There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well -written, or badly written. That is all. - -The nineteenth century dislike of realism is the rage of Caliban seeing -his own face in a glass. - -The nineteenth century dislike of romanticism is the rage of Caliban -not seeing his own face in a glass. The moral life of man forms part -of the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality of art consists -in the perfect use of an imperfect medium. No artist desires to prove -anything. Even things that are true can be proved. No artist has -ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in an artist is an -unpardonable mannerism of style. No artist is ever morbid. The artist -can express everything. Thought and language are to the artist -instruments of an art. Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for -an art. From the point of view of form, the type of all the arts is -the art of the musician. From the point of view of feeling, the -actor's craft is the type. All art is at once surface and symbol. -Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. Those who read -the symbol do so at their peril. It is the spectator, and not life, -that art really mirrors. Diversity of opinion about a work of art -shows that the work is new, complex, and vital. When critics disagree, -the artist is in accord with himself. We can forgive a man for making -a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for -making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely. - - All art is quite useless. - - OSCAR WILDE - - - - -CHAPTER 1 - -The studio was filled with the rich odour of roses, and when the light -summer wind stirred amidst the trees of the garden, there came through -the open door the heavy scent of the lilac, or the more delicate -perfume of the pink-flowering thorn. - -From the corner of the divan of Persian saddle-bags on which he was -lying, smoking, as was his custom, innumerable cigarettes, Lord Henry -Wotton could just catch the gleam of the honey-sweet and honey-coloured -blossoms of a laburnum, whose tremulous branches seemed hardly able to -bear the burden of a beauty so flamelike as theirs; and now and then -the fantastic shadows of birds in flight flitted across the long -tussore-silk curtains that were stretched in front of the huge window, -producing a kind of momentary Japanese effect, and making him think of -those pallid, jade-faced painters of Tokyo who, through the medium of -an art that is necessarily immobile, seek to convey the sense of -swiftness and motion. The sullen murmur of the bees shouldering their -way through the long unmown grass, or circling with monotonous -insistence round the dusty gilt horns of the straggling woodbine, -seemed to make the stillness more oppressive. The dim roar of London -was like the bourdon note of a distant organ. - -In the centre of the room, clamped to an upright easel, stood the -full-length portrait of a young man of extraordinary personal beauty, -and in front of it, some little distance away, was sitting the artist -himself, Basil Hallward, whose sudden disappearance some years ago -caused, at the time, such public excitement and gave rise to so many -strange conjectures. - -As the painter looked at the gracious and comely form he had so -skilfully mirrored in his art, a smile of pleasure passed across his -face, and seemed about to linger there. But he suddenly started up, -and closing his eyes, placed his fingers upon the lids, as though he -sought to imprison within his brain some curious dream from which he -feared he might awake. - -"It is your best work, Basil, the best thing you have ever done," said -Lord Henry languidly. "You must certainly send it next year to the -Grosvenor. The Academy is too large and too vulgar. Whenever I have -gone there, there have been either so many people that I have not been -able to see the pictures, which was dreadful, or so many pictures that -I have not been able to see the people, which was worse. The Grosvenor -is really the only place." - -"I don't think I shall send it anywhere," he answered, tossing his head -back in that odd way that used to make his friends laugh at him at -Oxford. "No, I won't send it anywhere." - -Lord Henry elevated his eyebrows and looked at him in amazement through -the thin blue wreaths of smoke that curled up in such fanciful whorls -from his heavy, opium-tainted cigarette. "Not send it anywhere? My -dear fellow, why? Have you any reason? What odd chaps you painters -are! You do anything in the world to gain a reputation. As soon as -you have one, you seem to want to throw it away. It is silly of you, -for there is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, -and that is not being talked about. A portrait like this would set you -far above all the young men in England, and make the old men quite -jealous, if old men are ever capable of any emotion." - -"I know you will laugh at me," he replied, "but I really can't exhibit -it. I have put too much of myself into it." - -Lord Henry stretched himself out on the divan and laughed. - -"Yes, I knew you would; but it is quite true, all the same." - -"Too much of yourself in it! Upon my word, Basil, I didn't know you -were so vain; and I really can't see any resemblance between you, with -your rugged strong face and your coal-black hair, and this young -Adonis, who looks as if he was made out of ivory and rose-leaves. Why, -my dear Basil, he is a Narcissus, and you--well, of course you have an -intellectual expression and all that. But beauty, real beauty, ends -where an intellectual expression begins. Intellect is in itself a mode -of exaggeration, and destroys the harmony of any face. The moment one -sits down to think, one becomes all nose, or all forehead, or something -horrid. Look at the successful men in any of the learned professions. -How perfectly hideous they are! Except, of course, in the Church. But -then in the Church they don't think. A bishop keeps on saying at the -age of eighty what he was told to say when he was a boy of eighteen, -and as a natural consequence he always looks absolutely delightful. -Your mysterious young friend, whose name you have never told me, but -whose picture really fascinates me, never thinks. I feel quite sure of -that. He is some brainless beautiful creature who should be always -here in winter when we have no flowers to look at, and always here in -summer when we want something to chill our intelligence. Don't flatter -yourself, Basil: you are not in the least like him." - -"You don't understand me, Harry," answered the artist. "Of course I am -not like him. I know that perfectly well. Indeed, I should be sorry -to look like him. You shrug your shoulders? I am telling you the -truth. There is a fatality about all physical and intellectual -distinction, the sort of fatality that seems to dog through history the -faltering steps of kings. It is better not to be different from one's -fellows. The ugly and the stupid have the best of it in this world. -They can sit at their ease and gape at the play. If they know nothing -of victory, they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat. They -live as we all should live--undisturbed, indifferent, and without -disquiet. They neither bring ruin upon others, nor ever receive it -from alien hands. Your rank and wealth, Harry; my brains, such as they -are--my art, whatever it may be worth; Dorian Gray's good looks--we -shall all suffer for what the gods have given us, suffer terribly." - -"Dorian Gray? Is that his name?" asked Lord Henry, walking across the -studio towards Basil Hallward. - -"Yes, that is his name. I didn't intend to tell it to you." - -"But why not?" - -"Oh, I can't explain. When I like people immensely, I never tell their -names to any one. It is like surrendering a part of them. I have -grown to love secrecy. It seems to be the one thing that can make -modern life mysterious or marvellous to us. The commonest thing is -delightful if one only hides it. When I leave town now I never tell my -people where I am going. If I did, I would lose all my pleasure. It -is a silly habit, I dare say, but somehow it seems to bring a great -deal of romance into one's life. I suppose you think me awfully -foolish about it?" - -"Not at all," answered Lord Henry, "not at all, my dear Basil. You -seem to forget that I am married, and the one charm of marriage is that -it makes a life of deception absolutely necessary for both parties. I -never know where my wife is, and my wife never knows what I am doing. -When we meet--we do meet occasionally, when we dine out together, or go -down to the Duke's--we tell each other the most absurd stories with the -most serious faces. My wife is very good at it--much better, in fact, -than I am. She never gets confused over her dates, and I always do. -But when she does find me out, she makes no row at all. I sometimes -wish she would; but she merely laughs at me." - -"I hate the way you talk about your married life, Harry," said Basil -Hallward, strolling towards the door that led into the garden. "I -believe that you are really a very good husband, but that you are -thoroughly ashamed of your own virtues. You are an extraordinary -fellow. You never say a moral thing, and you never do a wrong thing. -Your cynicism is simply a pose." - -"Being natural is simply a pose, and the most irritating pose I know," -cried Lord Henry, laughing; and the two young men went out into the -garden together and ensconced themselves on a long bamboo seat that -stood in the shade of a tall laurel bush. The sunlight slipped over -the polished leaves. In the grass, white daisies were tremulous. - -After a pause, Lord Henry pulled out his watch. "I am afraid I must be -going, Basil," he murmured, "and before I go, I insist on your -answering a question I put to you some time ago." - -"What is that?" said the painter, keeping his eyes fixed on the ground. - -"You know quite well." - -"I do not, Harry." - -"Well, I will tell you what it is. I want you to explain to me why you -won't exhibit Dorian Gray's picture. I want the real reason." - -"I told you the real reason." - -"No, you did not. You said it was because there was too much of -yourself in it. Now, that is childish." - -"Harry," said Basil Hallward, looking him straight in the face, "every -portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not -of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. It is -not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on -the coloured canvas, reveals himself. The reason I will not exhibit -this picture is that I am afraid that I have shown in it the secret of -my own soul." - -Lord Henry laughed. "And what is that?" he asked. - -"I will tell you," said Hallward; but an expression of perplexity came -over his face. - -"I am all expectation, Basil," continued his companion, glancing at him. - -"Oh, there is really very little to tell, Harry," answered the painter; -"and I am afraid you will hardly understand it. Perhaps you will -hardly believe it." - -Lord Henry smiled, and leaning down, plucked a pink-petalled daisy from -the grass and examined it. "I am quite sure I shall understand it," he -replied, gazing intently at the little golden, white-feathered disk, -"and as for believing things, I can believe anything, provided that it -is quite incredible." - -The wind shook some blossoms from the trees, and the heavy -lilac-blooms, with their clustering stars, moved to and fro in the -languid air. A grasshopper began to chirrup by the wall, and like a -blue thread a long thin dragon-fly floated past on its brown gauze -wings. Lord Henry felt as if he could hear Basil Hallward's heart -beating, and wondered what was coming. - -"The story is simply this," said the painter after some time. "Two -months ago I went to a crush at Lady Brandon's. You know we poor -artists have to show ourselves in society from time to time, just to -remind the public that we are not savages. With an evening coat and a -white tie, as you told me once, anybody, even a stock-broker, can gain -a reputation for being civilized. Well, after I had been in the room -about ten minutes, talking to huge overdressed dowagers and tedious -academicians, I suddenly became conscious that some one was looking at -me. I turned half-way round and saw Dorian Gray for the first time. -When our eyes met, I felt that I was growing pale. A curious sensation -of terror came over me. I knew that I had come face to face with some -one whose mere personality was so fascinating that, if I allowed it to -do so, it would absorb my whole nature, my whole soul, my very art -itself. I did not want any external influence in my life. You know -yourself, Harry, how independent I am by nature. I have always been my -own master; had at least always been so, till I met Dorian Gray. -Then--but I don't know how to explain it to you. Something seemed to -tell me that I was on the verge of a terrible crisis in my life. I had -a strange feeling that fate had in store for me exquisite joys and -exquisite sorrows. I grew afraid and turned to quit the room. It was -not conscience that made me do so: it was a sort of cowardice. I take -no credit to myself for trying to escape." - -"Conscience and cowardice are really the same things, Basil. -Conscience is the trade-name of the firm. That is all." - -"I don't believe that, Harry, and I don't believe you do either. -However, whatever was my motive--and it may have been pride, for I used -to be very proud--I certainly struggled to the door. There, of course, -I stumbled against Lady Brandon. 'You are not going to run away so -soon, Mr. Hallward?' she screamed out. You know her curiously shrill -voice?" - -"Yes; she is a peacock in everything but beauty," said Lord Henry, -pulling the daisy to bits with his long nervous fingers. - -"I could not get rid of her. She brought me up to royalties, and -people with stars and garters, and elderly ladies with gigantic tiaras -and parrot noses. She spoke of me as her dearest friend. I had only -met her once before, but she took it into her head to lionize me. I -believe some picture of mine had made a great success at the time, at -least had been chattered about in the penny newspapers, which is the -nineteenth-century standard of immortality. Suddenly I found myself -face to face with the young man whose personality had so strangely -stirred me. We were quite close, almost touching. Our eyes met again. -It was reckless of me, but I asked Lady Brandon to introduce me to him. -Perhaps it was not so reckless, after all. It was simply inevitable. -We would have spoken to each other without any introduction. I am sure -of that. Dorian told me so afterwards. He, too, felt that we were -destined to know each other." - -"And how did Lady Brandon describe this wonderful young man?" asked his -companion. "I know she goes in for giving a rapid precis of all her -guests. I remember her bringing me up to a truculent and red-faced old -gentleman covered all over with orders and ribbons, and hissing into my -ear, in a tragic whisper which must have been perfectly audible to -everybody in the room, the most astounding details. I simply fled. I -like to find out people for myself. But Lady Brandon treats her guests -exactly as an auctioneer treats his goods. She either explains them -entirely away, or tells one everything about them except what one wants -to know." - -"Poor Lady Brandon! You are hard on her, Harry!" said Hallward -listlessly. - -"My dear fellow, she tried to found a salon, and only succeeded in -opening a restaurant. How could I admire her? But tell me, what did -she say about Mr. Dorian Gray?" - -"Oh, something like, 'Charming boy--poor dear mother and I absolutely -inseparable. Quite forget what he does--afraid he--doesn't do -anything--oh, yes, plays the piano--or is it the violin, dear Mr. -Gray?' Neither of us could help laughing, and we became friends at -once." - -"Laughter is not at all a bad beginning for a friendship, and it is far -the best ending for one," said the young lord, plucking another daisy. - -Hallward shook his head. "You don't understand what friendship is, -Harry," he murmured--"or what enmity is, for that matter. You like -every one; that is to say, you are indifferent to every one." - -"How horribly unjust of you!" cried Lord Henry, tilting his hat back -and looking up at the little clouds that, like ravelled skeins of -glossy white silk, were drifting across the hollowed turquoise of the -summer sky. "Yes; horribly unjust of you. I make a great difference -between people. I choose my friends for their good looks, my -acquaintances for their good characters, and my enemies for their good -intellects. A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies. -I have not got one who is a fool. They are all men of some -intellectual power, and consequently they all appreciate me. Is that -very vain of me? I think it is rather vain." - -"I should think it was, Harry. But according to your category I must -be merely an acquaintance." - -"My dear old Basil, you are much more than an acquaintance." - -"And much less than a friend. A sort of brother, I suppose?" - -"Oh, brothers! I don't care for brothers. My elder brother won't die, -and my younger brothers seem never to do anything else." - -"Harry!" exclaimed Hallward, frowning. - -"My dear fellow, I am not quite serious. But I can't help detesting my -relations. I suppose it comes from the fact that none of us can stand -other people having the same faults as ourselves. I quite sympathize -with the rage of the English democracy against what they call the vices -of the upper orders. The masses feel that drunkenness, stupidity, and -immorality should be their own special property, and that if any one of -us makes an ass of himself, he is poaching on their preserves. When -poor Southwark got into the divorce court, their indignation was quite -magnificent. And yet I don't suppose that ten per cent of the -proletariat live correctly." - -"I don't agree with a single word that you have said, and, what is -more, Harry, I feel sure you don't either." - -Lord Henry stroked his pointed brown beard and tapped the toe of his -patent-leather boot with a tasselled ebony cane. "How English you are -Basil! That is the second time you have made that observation. If one -puts forward an idea to a true Englishman--always a rash thing to -do--he never dreams of considering whether the idea is right or wrong. -The only thing he considers of any importance is whether one believes -it oneself. Now, the value of an idea has nothing whatsoever to do -with the sincerity of the man who expresses it. Indeed, the -probabilities are that the more insincere the man is, the more purely -intellectual will the idea be, as in that case it will not be coloured -by either his wants, his desires, or his prejudices. However, I don't -propose to discuss politics, sociology, or metaphysics with you. I -like persons better than principles, and I like persons with no -principles better than anything else in the world. Tell me more about -Mr. Dorian Gray. How often do you see him?" - -"Every day. I couldn't be happy if I didn't see him every day. He is -absolutely necessary to me." - -"How extraordinary! I thought you would never care for anything but -your art." - -"He is all my art to me now," said the painter gravely. "I sometimes -think, Harry, that there are only two eras of any importance in the -world's history. The first is the appearance of a new medium for art, -and the second is the appearance of a new personality for art also. -What the invention of oil-painting was to the Venetians, the face of -Antinous was to late Greek sculpture, and the face of Dorian Gray will -some day be to me. It is not merely that I paint from him, draw from -him, sketch from him. Of course, I have done all that. But he is much -more to me than a model or a sitter. I won't tell you that I am -dissatisfied with what I have done of him, or that his beauty is such -that art cannot express it. There is nothing that art cannot express, -and I know that the work I have done, since I met Dorian Gray, is good -work, is the best work of my life. But in some curious way--I wonder -will you understand me?--his personality has suggested to me an -entirely new manner in art, an entirely new mode of style. I see -things differently, I think of them differently. I can now recreate -life in a way that was hidden from me before. 'A dream of form in days -of thought'--who is it who says that? I forget; but it is what Dorian -Gray has been to me. The merely visible presence of this lad--for he -seems to me little more than a lad, though he is really over -twenty--his merely visible presence--ah! I wonder can you realize all -that that means? Unconsciously he defines for me the lines of a fresh -school, a school that is to have in it all the passion of the romantic -spirit, all the perfection of the spirit that is Greek. The harmony of -soul and body--how much that is! We in our madness have separated the -two, and have invented a realism that is vulgar, an ideality that is -void. Harry! if you only knew what Dorian Gray is to me! You remember -that landscape of mine, for which Agnew offered me such a huge price -but which I would not part with? It is one of the best things I have -ever done. And why is it so? Because, while I was painting it, Dorian -Gray sat beside me. Some subtle influence passed from him to me, and -for the first time in my life I saw in the plain woodland the wonder I -had always looked for and always missed." - -"Basil, this is extraordinary! I must see Dorian Gray." - -Hallward got up from the seat and walked up and down the garden. After -some time he came back. "Harry," he said, "Dorian Gray is to me simply -a motive in art. You might see nothing in him. I see everything in -him. He is never more present in my work than when no image of him is -there. He is a suggestion, as I have said, of a new manner. I find -him in the curves of certain lines, in the loveliness and subtleties of -certain colours. That is all." - -"Then why won't you exhibit his portrait?" asked Lord Henry. - -"Because, without intending it, I have put into it some expression of -all this curious artistic idolatry, of which, of course, I have never -cared to speak to him. He knows nothing about it. He shall never know -anything about it. But the world might guess it, and I will not bare -my soul to their shallow prying eyes. My heart shall never be put -under their microscope. There is too much of myself in the thing, -Harry--too much of myself!" - -"Poets are not so scrupulous as you are. They know how useful passion -is for publication. Nowadays a broken heart will run to many editions." - -"I hate them for it," cried Hallward. "An artist should create -beautiful things, but should put nothing of his own life into them. We -live in an age when men treat art as if it were meant to be a form of -autobiography. We have lost the abstract sense of beauty. Some day I -will show the world what it is; and for that reason the world shall -never see my portrait of Dorian Gray." - -"I think you are wrong, Basil, but I won't argue with you. It is only -the intellectually lost who ever argue. Tell me, is Dorian Gray very -fond of you?" - -The painter considered for a few moments. "He likes me," he answered -after a pause; "I know he likes me. Of course I flatter him -dreadfully. I find a strange pleasure in saying things to him that I -know I shall be sorry for having said. As a rule, he is charming to -me, and we sit in the studio and talk of a thousand things. Now and -then, however, he is horribly thoughtless, and seems to take a real -delight in giving me pain. Then I feel, Harry, that I have given away -my whole soul to some one who treats it as if it were a flower to put -in his coat, a bit of decoration to charm his vanity, an ornament for a -summer's day." - -"Days in summer, Basil, are apt to linger," murmured Lord Henry. -"Perhaps you will tire sooner than he will. It is a sad thing to think -of, but there is no doubt that genius lasts longer than beauty. That -accounts for the fact that we all take such pains to over-educate -ourselves. In the wild struggle for existence, we want to have -something that endures, and so we fill our minds with rubbish and -facts, in the silly hope of keeping our place. The thoroughly -well-informed man--that is the modern ideal. And the mind of the -thoroughly well-informed man is a dreadful thing. It is like a -bric-a-brac shop, all monsters and dust, with everything priced above -its proper value. I think you will tire first, all the same. Some day -you will look at your friend, and he will seem to you to be a little -out of drawing, or you won't like his tone of colour, or something. -You will bitterly reproach him in your own heart, and seriously think -that he has behaved very badly to you. The next time he calls, you -will be perfectly cold and indifferent. It will be a great pity, for -it will alter you. What you have told me is quite a romance, a romance -of art one might call it, and the worst of having a romance of any kind -is that it leaves one so unromantic." - -"Harry, don't talk like that. As long as I live, the personality of -Dorian Gray will dominate me. You can't feel what I feel. You change -too often." - -"Ah, my dear Basil, that is exactly why I can feel it. Those who are -faithful know only the trivial side of love: it is the faithless who -know love's tragedies." And Lord Henry struck a light on a dainty -silver case and began to smoke a cigarette with a self-conscious and -satisfied air, as if he had summed up the world in a phrase. There was -a rustle of chirruping sparrows in the green lacquer leaves of the ivy, -and the blue cloud-shadows chased themselves across the grass like -swallows. How pleasant it was in the garden! And how delightful other -people's emotions were!--much more delightful than their ideas, it -seemed to him. One's own soul, and the passions of one's -friends--those were the fascinating things in life. He pictured to -himself with silent amusement the tedious luncheon that he had missed -by staying so long with Basil Hallward. Had he gone to his aunt's, he -would have been sure to have met Lord Goodbody there, and the whole -conversation would have been about the feeding of the poor and the -necessity for model lodging-houses. Each class would have preached the -importance of those virtues, for whose exercise there was no necessity -in their own lives. The rich would have spoken on the value of thrift, -and the idle grown eloquent over the dignity of labour. It was -charming to have escaped all that! As he thought of his aunt, an idea -seemed to strike him. He turned to Hallward and said, "My dear fellow, -I have just remembered." - -"Remembered what, Harry?" - -"Where I heard the name of Dorian Gray." - -"Where was it?" asked Hallward, with a slight frown. - -"Don't look so angry, Basil. It was at my aunt, Lady Agatha's. She -told me she had discovered a wonderful young man who was going to help -her in the East End, and that his name was Dorian Gray. I am bound to -state that she never told me he was good-looking. Women have no -appreciation of good looks; at least, good women have not. She said -that he was very earnest and had a beautiful nature. I at once -pictured to myself a creature with spectacles and lank hair, horribly -freckled, and tramping about on huge feet. I wish I had known it was -your friend." - -"I am very glad you didn't, Harry." - -"Why?" - -"I don't want you to meet him." - -"You don't want me to meet him?" - -"No." - -"Mr. Dorian Gray is in the studio, sir," said the butler, coming into -the garden. - -"You must introduce me now," cried Lord Henry, laughing. - -The painter turned to his servant, who stood blinking in the sunlight. -"Ask Mr. Gray to wait, Parker: I shall be in in a few moments." The -man bowed and went up the walk. - -Then he looked at Lord Henry. "Dorian Gray is my dearest friend," he -said. "He has a simple and a beautiful nature. Your aunt was quite -right in what she said of him. Don't spoil him. Don't try to -influence him. Your influence would be bad. The world is wide, and -has many marvellous people in it. Don't take away from me the one -person who gives to my art whatever charm it possesses: my life as an -artist depends on him. Mind, Harry, I trust you." He spoke very -slowly, and the words seemed wrung out of him almost against his will. - -"What nonsense you talk!" said Lord Henry, smiling, and taking Hallward -by the arm, he almost led him into the house. - - - -CHAPTER 2 - -As they entered they saw Dorian Gray. He was seated at the piano, with -his back to them, turning over the pages of a volume of Schumann's -"Forest Scenes." "You must lend me these, Basil," he cried. "I want -to learn them. They are perfectly charming." - -"That entirely depends on how you sit to-day, Dorian." - -"Oh, I am tired of sitting, and I don't want a life-sized portrait of -myself," answered the lad, swinging round on the music-stool in a -wilful, petulant manner. When he caught sight of Lord Henry, a faint -blush coloured his cheeks for a moment, and he started up. "I beg your -pardon, Basil, but I didn't know you had any one with you." - -"This is Lord Henry Wotton, Dorian, an old Oxford friend of mine. I -have just been telling him what a capital sitter you were, and now you -have spoiled everything." - -"You have not spoiled my pleasure in meeting you, Mr. Gray," said Lord -Henry, stepping forward and extending his hand. "My aunt has often -spoken to me about you. You are one of her favourites, and, I am -afraid, one of her victims also." - -"I am in Lady Agatha's black books at present," answered Dorian with a -funny look of penitence. "I promised to go to a club in Whitechapel -with her last Tuesday, and I really forgot all about it. We were to -have played a duet together--three duets, I believe. I don't know what -she will say to me. I am far too frightened to call." - -"Oh, I will make your peace with my aunt. She is quite devoted to you. -And I don't think it really matters about your not being there. The -audience probably thought it was a duet. When Aunt Agatha sits down to -the piano, she makes quite enough noise for two people." - -"That is very horrid to her, and not very nice to me," answered Dorian, -laughing. - -Lord Henry looked at him. Yes, he was certainly wonderfully handsome, -with his finely curved scarlet lips, his frank blue eyes, his crisp -gold hair. There was something in his face that made one trust him at -once. All the candour of youth was there, as well as all youth's -passionate purity. One felt that he had kept himself unspotted from -the world. No wonder Basil Hallward worshipped him. - -"You are too charming to go in for philanthropy, Mr. Gray--far too -charming." And Lord Henry flung himself down on the divan and opened -his cigarette-case. - -The painter had been busy mixing his colours and getting his brushes -ready. He was looking worried, and when he heard Lord Henry's last -remark, he glanced at him, hesitated for a moment, and then said, -"Harry, I want to finish this picture to-day. Would you think it -awfully rude of me if I asked you to go away?" - -Lord Henry smiled and looked at Dorian Gray. "Am I to go, Mr. Gray?" -he asked. - -"Oh, please don't, Lord Henry. I see that Basil is in one of his sulky -moods, and I can't bear him when he sulks. Besides, I want you to tell -me why I should not go in for philanthropy." - -"I don't know that I shall tell you that, Mr. Gray. It is so tedious a -subject that one would have to talk seriously about it. But I -certainly shall not run away, now that you have asked me to stop. You -don't really mind, Basil, do you? You have often told me that you -liked your sitters to have some one to chat to." - -Hallward bit his lip. "If Dorian wishes it, of course you must stay. -Dorian's whims are laws to everybody, except himself." - -Lord Henry took up his hat and gloves. "You are very pressing, Basil, -but I am afraid I must go. I have promised to meet a man at the -Orleans. Good-bye, Mr. Gray. Come and see me some afternoon in Curzon -Street. I am nearly always at home at five o'clock. Write to me when -you are coming. I should be sorry to miss you." - -"Basil," cried Dorian Gray, "if Lord Henry Wotton goes, I shall go, -too. You never open your lips while you are painting, and it is -horribly dull standing on a platform and trying to look pleasant. Ask -him to stay. I insist upon it." - -"Stay, Harry, to oblige Dorian, and to oblige me," said Hallward, -gazing intently at his picture. "It is quite true, I never talk when I -am working, and never listen either, and it must be dreadfully tedious -for my unfortunate sitters. I beg you to stay." - -"But what about my man at the Orleans?" - -The painter laughed. "I don't think there will be any difficulty about -that. Sit down again, Harry. And now, Dorian, get up on the platform, -and don't move about too much, or pay any attention to what Lord Henry -says. He has a very bad influence over all his friends, with the -single exception of myself." - -Dorian Gray stepped up on the dais with the air of a young Greek -martyr, and made a little moue of discontent to Lord Henry, to whom he -had rather taken a fancy. He was so unlike Basil. They made a -delightful contrast. And he had such a beautiful voice. After a few -moments he said to him, "Have you really a very bad influence, Lord -Henry? As bad as Basil says?" - -"There is no such thing as a good influence, Mr. Gray. All influence -is immoral--immoral from the scientific point of view." - -"Why?" - -"Because to influence a person is to give him one's own soul. He does -not think his natural thoughts, or burn with his natural passions. His -virtues are not real to him. His sins, if there are such things as -sins, are borrowed. He becomes an echo of some one else's music, an -actor of a part that has not been written for him. The aim of life is -self-development. To realize one's nature perfectly--that is what each -of us is here for. People are afraid of themselves, nowadays. They -have forgotten the highest of all duties, the duty that one owes to -one's self. Of course, they are charitable. They feed the hungry and -clothe the beggar. But their own souls starve, and are naked. Courage -has gone out of our race. Perhaps we never really had it. The terror -of society, which is the basis of morals, the terror of God, which is -the secret of religion--these are the two things that govern us. And -yet--" - -"Just turn your head a little more to the right, Dorian, like a good -boy," said the painter, deep in his work and conscious only that a look -had come into the lad's face that he had never seen there before. - -"And yet," continued Lord Henry, in his low, musical voice, and with -that graceful wave of the hand that was always so characteristic of -him, and that he had even in his Eton days, "I believe that if one man -were to live out his life fully and completely, were to give form to -every feeling, expression to every thought, reality to every dream--I -believe that the world would gain such a fresh impulse of joy that we -would forget all the maladies of mediaevalism, and return to the -Hellenic ideal--to something finer, richer than the Hellenic ideal, it -may be. But the bravest man amongst us is afraid of himself. The -mutilation of the savage has its tragic survival in the self-denial -that mars our lives. We are punished for our refusals. Every impulse -that we strive to strangle broods in the mind and poisons us. The body -sins once, and has done with its sin, for action is a mode of -purification. Nothing remains then but the recollection of a pleasure, -or the luxury of a regret. The only way to get rid of a temptation is -to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for -the things it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its -monstrous laws have made monstrous and unlawful. It has been said that -the great events of the world take place in the brain. It is in the -brain, and the brain only, that the great sins of the world take place -also. You, Mr. Gray, you yourself, with your rose-red youth and your -rose-white boyhood, you have had passions that have made you afraid, -thoughts that have filled you with terror, day-dreams and sleeping -dreams whose mere memory might stain your cheek with shame--" - -"Stop!" faltered Dorian Gray, "stop! you bewilder me. I don't know -what to say. There is some answer to you, but I cannot find it. Don't -speak. Let me think. Or, rather, let me try not to think." - -For nearly ten minutes he stood there, motionless, with parted lips and -eyes strangely bright. He was dimly conscious that entirely fresh -influences were at work within him. Yet they seemed to him to have -come really from himself. The few words that Basil's friend had said -to him--words spoken by chance, no doubt, and with wilful paradox in -them--had touched some secret chord that had never been touched before, -but that he felt was now vibrating and throbbing to curious pulses. - -Music had stirred him like that. Music had troubled him many times. -But music was not articulate. It was not a new world, but rather -another chaos, that it created in us. Words! Mere words! How -terrible they were! How clear, and vivid, and cruel! One could not -escape from them. And yet what a subtle magic there was in them! They -seemed to be able to give a plastic form to formless things, and to -have a music of their own as sweet as that of viol or of lute. Mere -words! Was there anything so real as words? - -Yes; there had been things in his boyhood that he had not understood. -He understood them now. Life suddenly became fiery-coloured to him. -It seemed to him that he had been walking in fire. Why had he not -known it? - -With his subtle smile, Lord Henry watched him. He knew the precise -psychological moment when to say nothing. He felt intensely -interested. He was amazed at the sudden impression that his words had -produced, and, remembering a book that he had read when he was sixteen, -a book which had revealed to him much that he had not known before, he -wondered whether Dorian Gray was passing through a similar experience. -He had merely shot an arrow into the air. Had it hit the mark? How -fascinating the lad was! - -Hallward painted away with that marvellous bold touch of his, that had -the true refinement and perfect delicacy that in art, at any rate comes -only from strength. He was unconscious of the silence. - -"Basil, I am tired of standing," cried Dorian Gray suddenly. "I must -go out and sit in the garden. The air is stifling here." - -"My dear fellow, I am so sorry. When I am painting, I can't think of -anything else. But you never sat better. You were perfectly still. -And I have caught the effect I wanted--the half-parted lips and the -bright look in the eyes. I don't know what Harry has been saying to -you, but he has certainly made you have the most wonderful expression. -I suppose he has been paying you compliments. You mustn't believe a -word that he says." - -"He has certainly not been paying me compliments. Perhaps that is the -reason that I don't believe anything he has told me." - -"You know you believe it all," said Lord Henry, looking at him with his -dreamy languorous eyes. "I will go out to the garden with you. It is -horribly hot in the studio. Basil, let us have something iced to -drink, something with strawberries in it." - -"Certainly, Harry. Just touch the bell, and when Parker comes I will -tell him what you want. I have got to work up this background, so I -will join you later on. Don't keep Dorian too long. I have never been -in better form for painting than I am to-day. This is going to be my -masterpiece. It is my masterpiece as it stands." - -Lord Henry went out to the garden and found Dorian Gray burying his -face in the great cool lilac-blossoms, feverishly drinking in their -perfume as if it had been wine. He came close to him and put his hand -upon his shoulder. "You are quite right to do that," he murmured. -"Nothing can cure the soul but the senses, just as nothing can cure the -senses but the soul." - -The lad started and drew back. He was bareheaded, and the leaves had -tossed his rebellious curls and tangled all their gilded threads. -There was a look of fear in his eyes, such as people have when they are -suddenly awakened. His finely chiselled nostrils quivered, and some -hidden nerve shook the scarlet of his lips and left them trembling. - -"Yes," continued Lord Henry, "that is one of the great secrets of -life--to cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses by means -of the soul. You are a wonderful creation. You know more than you -think you know, just as you know less than you want to know." - -Dorian Gray frowned and turned his head away. He could not help liking -the tall, graceful young man who was standing by him. His romantic, -olive-coloured face and worn expression interested him. There was -something in his low languid voice that was absolutely fascinating. -His cool, white, flowerlike hands, even, had a curious charm. They -moved, as he spoke, like music, and seemed to have a language of their -own. But he felt afraid of him, and ashamed of being afraid. Why had -it been left for a stranger to reveal him to himself? He had known -Basil Hallward for months, but the friendship between them had never -altered him. Suddenly there had come some one across his life who -seemed to have disclosed to him life's mystery. And, yet, what was -there to be afraid of? He was not a schoolboy or a girl. It was -absurd to be frightened. - -"Let us go and sit in the shade," said Lord Henry. "Parker has brought -out the drinks, and if you stay any longer in this glare, you will be -quite spoiled, and Basil will never paint you again. You really must -not allow yourself to become sunburnt. It would be unbecoming." - -"What can it matter?" cried Dorian Gray, laughing, as he sat down on -the seat at the end of the garden. - -"It should matter everything to you, Mr. Gray." - -"Why?" - -"Because you have the most marvellous youth, and youth is the one thing -worth having." - -"I don't feel that, Lord Henry." - -"No, you don't feel it now. Some day, when you are old and wrinkled -and ugly, when thought has seared your forehead with its lines, and -passion branded your lips with its hideous fires, you will feel it, you -will feel it terribly. Now, wherever you go, you charm the world. -Will it always be so? ... You have a wonderfully beautiful face, Mr. -Gray. Don't frown. You have. And beauty is a form of genius--is -higher, indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. It is of the -great facts of the world, like sunlight, or spring-time, or the -reflection in dark waters of that silver shell we call the moon. It -cannot be questioned. It has its divine right of sovereignty. It -makes princes of those who have it. You smile? Ah! when you have lost -it you won't smile.... People say sometimes that beauty is only -superficial. That may be so, but at least it is not so superficial as -thought is. To me, beauty is the wonder of wonders. It is only -shallow people who do not judge by appearances. The true mystery of -the world is the visible, not the invisible.... Yes, Mr. Gray, the -gods have been good to you. But what the gods give they quickly take -away. You have only a few years in which to live really, perfectly, -and fully. When your youth goes, your beauty will go with it, and then -you will suddenly discover that there are no triumphs left for you, or -have to content yourself with those mean triumphs that the memory of -your past will make more bitter than defeats. Every month as it wanes -brings you nearer to something dreadful. Time is jealous of you, and -wars against your lilies and your roses. You will become sallow, and -hollow-cheeked, and dull-eyed. You will suffer horribly.... Ah! -realize your youth while you have it. Don't squander the gold of your -days, listening to the tedious, trying to improve the hopeless failure, -or giving away your life to the ignorant, the common, and the vulgar. -These are the sickly aims, the false ideals, of our age. Live! Live -the wonderful life that is in you! Let nothing be lost upon you. Be -always searching for new sensations. Be afraid of nothing.... A new -Hedonism--that is what our century wants. You might be its visible -symbol. With your personality there is nothing you could not do. The -world belongs to you for a season.... The moment I met you I saw that -you were quite unconscious of what you really are, of what you really -might be. There was so much in you that charmed me that I felt I must -tell you something about yourself. I thought how tragic it would be if -you were wasted. For there is such a little time that your youth will -last--such a little time. The common hill-flowers wither, but they -blossom again. The laburnum will be as yellow next June as it is now. -In a month there will be purple stars on the clematis, and year after -year the green night of its leaves will hold its purple stars. But we -never get back our youth. The pulse of joy that beats in us at twenty -becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail, our senses rot. We degenerate into -hideous puppets, haunted by the memory of the passions of which we were -too much afraid, and the exquisite temptations that we had not the -courage to yield to. Youth! Youth! There is absolutely nothing in -the world but youth!" - -Dorian Gray listened, open-eyed and wondering. The spray of lilac fell -from his hand upon the gravel. A furry bee came and buzzed round it -for a moment. Then it began to scramble all over the oval stellated -globe of the tiny blossoms. He watched it with that strange interest -in trivial things that we try to develop when things of high import -make us afraid, or when we are stirred by some new emotion for which we -cannot find expression, or when some thought that terrifies us lays -sudden siege to the brain and calls on us to yield. After a time the -bee flew away. He saw it creeping into the stained trumpet of a Tyrian -convolvulus. The flower seemed to quiver, and then swayed gently to -and fro. - -Suddenly the painter appeared at the door of the studio and made -staccato signs for them to come in. They turned to each other and -smiled. - -"I am waiting," he cried. "Do come in. The light is quite perfect, -and you can bring your drinks." - -They rose up and sauntered down the walk together. Two green-and-white -butterflies fluttered past them, and in the pear-tree at the corner of -the garden a thrush began to sing. - -"You are glad you have met me, Mr. Gray," said Lord Henry, looking at -him. - -"Yes, I am glad now. I wonder shall I always be glad?" - -"Always! That is a dreadful word. It makes me shudder when I hear it. -Women are so fond of using it. They spoil every romance by trying to -make it last for ever. It is a meaningless word, too. The only -difference between a caprice and a lifelong passion is that the caprice -lasts a little longer." - -As they entered the studio, Dorian Gray put his hand upon Lord Henry's -arm. "In that case, let our friendship be a caprice," he murmured, -flushing at his own boldness, then stepped up on the platform and -resumed his pose. - -Lord Henry flung himself into a large wicker arm-chair and watched him. -The sweep and dash of the brush on the canvas made the only sound that -broke the stillness, except when, now and then, Hallward stepped back -to look at his work from a distance. In the slanting beams that -streamed through the open doorway the dust danced and was golden. The -heavy scent of the roses seemed to brood over everything. - -After about a quarter of an hour Hallward stopped painting, looked for -a long time at Dorian Gray, and then for a long time at the picture, -biting the end of one of his huge brushes and frowning. "It is quite -finished," he cried at last, and stooping down he wrote his name in -long vermilion letters on the left-hand corner of the canvas. - -Lord Henry came over and examined the picture. It was certainly a -wonderful work of art, and a wonderful likeness as well. - -"My dear fellow, I congratulate you most warmly," he said. "It is the -finest portrait of modern times. Mr. Gray, come over and look at -yourself." - -The lad started, as if awakened from some dream. - -"Is it really finished?" he murmured, stepping down from the platform. - -"Quite finished," said the painter. "And you have sat splendidly -to-day. I am awfully obliged to you." - -"That is entirely due to me," broke in Lord Henry. "Isn't it, Mr. -Gray?" - -Dorian made no answer, but passed listlessly in front of his picture -and turned towards it. When he saw it he drew back, and his cheeks -flushed for a moment with pleasure. A look of joy came into his eyes, -as if he had recognized himself for the first time. He stood there -motionless and in wonder, dimly conscious that Hallward was speaking to -him, but not catching the meaning of his words. The sense of his own -beauty came on him like a revelation. He had never felt it before. -Basil Hallward's compliments had seemed to him to be merely the -charming exaggeration of friendship. He had listened to them, laughed -at them, forgotten them. They had not influenced his nature. Then had -come Lord Henry Wotton with his strange panegyric on youth, his -terrible warning of its brevity. That had stirred him at the time, and -now, as he stood gazing at the shadow of his own loveliness, the full -reality of the description flashed across him. Yes, there would be a -day when his face would be wrinkled and wizen, his eyes dim and -colourless, the grace of his figure broken and deformed. The scarlet -would pass away from his lips and the gold steal from his hair. The -life that was to make his soul would mar his body. He would become -dreadful, hideous, and uncouth. - -As he thought of it, a sharp pang of pain struck through him like a -knife and made each delicate fibre of his nature quiver. His eyes -deepened into amethyst, and across them came a mist of tears. He felt -as if a hand of ice had been laid upon his heart. - -"Don't you like it?" cried Hallward at last, stung a little by the -lad's silence, not understanding what it meant. - -"Of course he likes it," said Lord Henry. "Who wouldn't like it? It -is one of the greatest things in modern art. I will give you anything -you like to ask for it. I must have it." - -"It is not my property, Harry." - -"Whose property is it?" - -"Dorian's, of course," answered the painter. - -"He is a very lucky fellow." - -"How sad it is!" murmured Dorian Gray with his eyes still fixed upon -his own portrait. "How sad it is! I shall grow old, and horrible, and -dreadful. But this picture will remain always young. It will never be -older than this particular day of June.... If it were only the other -way! If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was -to grow old! For that--for that--I would give everything! Yes, there -is nothing in the whole world I would not give! I would give my soul -for that!" - -"You would hardly care for such an arrangement, Basil," cried Lord -Henry, laughing. "It would be rather hard lines on your work." - -"I should object very strongly, Harry," said Hallward. - -Dorian Gray turned and looked at him. "I believe you would, Basil. -You like your art better than your friends. I am no more to you than a -green bronze figure. Hardly as much, I dare say." - -The painter stared in amazement. It was so unlike Dorian to speak like -that. What had happened? He seemed quite angry. His face was flushed -and his cheeks burning. - -"Yes," he continued, "I am less to you than your ivory Hermes or your -silver Faun. You will like them always. How long will you like me? -Till I have my first wrinkle, I suppose. I know, now, that when one -loses one's good looks, whatever they may be, one loses everything. -Your picture has taught me that. Lord Henry Wotton is perfectly right. -Youth is the only thing worth having. When I find that I am growing -old, I shall kill myself." - -Hallward turned pale and caught his hand. "Dorian! Dorian!" he cried, -"don't talk like that. I have never had such a friend as you, and I -shall never have such another. You are not jealous of material things, -are you?--you who are finer than any of them!" - -"I am jealous of everything whose beauty does not die. I am jealous of -the portrait you have painted of me. Why should it keep what I must -lose? Every moment that passes takes something from me and gives -something to it. Oh, if it were only the other way! If the picture -could change, and I could be always what I am now! Why did you paint -it? It will mock me some day--mock me horribly!" The hot tears welled -into his eyes; he tore his hand away and, flinging himself on the -divan, he buried his face in the cushions, as though he was praying. - -"This is your doing, Harry," said the painter bitterly. - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "It is the real Dorian Gray--that -is all." - -"It is not." - -"If it is not, what have I to do with it?" - -"You should have gone away when I asked you," he muttered. - -"I stayed when you asked me," was Lord Henry's answer. - -"Harry, I can't quarrel with my two best friends at once, but between -you both you have made me hate the finest piece of work I have ever -done, and I will destroy it. What is it but canvas and colour? I will -not let it come across our three lives and mar them." - -Dorian Gray lifted his golden head from the pillow, and with pallid -face and tear-stained eyes, looked at him as he walked over to the deal -painting-table that was set beneath the high curtained window. What -was he doing there? His fingers were straying about among the litter -of tin tubes and dry brushes, seeking for something. Yes, it was for -the long palette-knife, with its thin blade of lithe steel. He had -found it at last. He was going to rip up the canvas. - -With a stifled sob the lad leaped from the couch, and, rushing over to -Hallward, tore the knife out of his hand, and flung it to the end of -the studio. "Don't, Basil, don't!" he cried. "It would be murder!" - -"I am glad you appreciate my work at last, Dorian," said the painter -coldly when he had recovered from his surprise. "I never thought you -would." - -"Appreciate it? I am in love with it, Basil. It is part of myself. I -feel that." - -"Well, as soon as you are dry, you shall be varnished, and framed, and -sent home. Then you can do what you like with yourself." And he walked -across the room and rang the bell for tea. "You will have tea, of -course, Dorian? And so will you, Harry? Or do you object to such -simple pleasures?" - -"I adore simple pleasures," said Lord Henry. "They are the last refuge -of the complex. But I don't like scenes, except on the stage. What -absurd fellows you are, both of you! I wonder who it was defined man -as a rational animal. It was the most premature definition ever given. -Man is many things, but he is not rational. I am glad he is not, after -all--though I wish you chaps would not squabble over the picture. You -had much better let me have it, Basil. This silly boy doesn't really -want it, and I really do." - -"If you let any one have it but me, Basil, I shall never forgive you!" -cried Dorian Gray; "and I don't allow people to call me a silly boy." - -"You know the picture is yours, Dorian. I gave it to you before it -existed." - -"And you know you have been a little silly, Mr. Gray, and that you -don't really object to being reminded that you are extremely young." - -"I should have objected very strongly this morning, Lord Henry." - -"Ah! this morning! You have lived since then." - -There came a knock at the door, and the butler entered with a laden -tea-tray and set it down upon a small Japanese table. There was a -rattle of cups and saucers and the hissing of a fluted Georgian urn. -Two globe-shaped china dishes were brought in by a page. Dorian Gray -went over and poured out the tea. The two men sauntered languidly to -the table and examined what was under the covers. - -"Let us go to the theatre to-night," said Lord Henry. "There is sure -to be something on, somewhere. I have promised to dine at White's, but -it is only with an old friend, so I can send him a wire to say that I -am ill, or that I am prevented from coming in consequence of a -subsequent engagement. I think that would be a rather nice excuse: it -would have all the surprise of candour." - -"It is such a bore putting on one's dress-clothes," muttered Hallward. -"And, when one has them on, they are so horrid." - -"Yes," answered Lord Henry dreamily, "the costume of the nineteenth -century is detestable. It is so sombre, so depressing. Sin is the -only real colour-element left in modern life." - -"You really must not say things like that before Dorian, Harry." - -"Before which Dorian? The one who is pouring out tea for us, or the -one in the picture?" - -"Before either." - -"I should like to come to the theatre with you, Lord Henry," said the -lad. - -"Then you shall come; and you will come, too, Basil, won't you?" - -"I can't, really. I would sooner not. I have a lot of work to do." - -"Well, then, you and I will go alone, Mr. Gray." - -"I should like that awfully." - -The painter bit his lip and walked over, cup in hand, to the picture. -"I shall stay with the real Dorian," he said, sadly. - -"Is it the real Dorian?" cried the original of the portrait, strolling -across to him. "Am I really like that?" - -"Yes; you are just like that." - -"How wonderful, Basil!" - -"At least you are like it in appearance. But it will never alter," -sighed Hallward. "That is something." - -"What a fuss people make about fidelity!" exclaimed Lord Henry. "Why, -even in love it is purely a question for physiology. It has nothing to -do with our own will. Young men want to be faithful, and are not; old -men want to be faithless, and cannot: that is all one can say." - -"Don't go to the theatre to-night, Dorian," said Hallward. "Stop and -dine with me." - -"I can't, Basil." - -"Why?" - -"Because I have promised Lord Henry Wotton to go with him." - -"He won't like you the better for keeping your promises. He always -breaks his own. I beg you not to go." - -Dorian Gray laughed and shook his head. - -"I entreat you." - -The lad hesitated, and looked over at Lord Henry, who was watching them -from the tea-table with an amused smile. - -"I must go, Basil," he answered. - -"Very well," said Hallward, and he went over and laid down his cup on -the tray. "It is rather late, and, as you have to dress, you had -better lose no time. Good-bye, Harry. Good-bye, Dorian. Come and see -me soon. Come to-morrow." - -"Certainly." - -"You won't forget?" - -"No, of course not," cried Dorian. - -"And ... Harry!" - -"Yes, Basil?" - -"Remember what I asked you, when we were in the garden this morning." - -"I have forgotten it." - -"I trust you." - -"I wish I could trust myself," said Lord Henry, laughing. "Come, Mr. -Gray, my hansom is outside, and I can drop you at your own place. -Good-bye, Basil. It has been a most interesting afternoon." - -As the door closed behind them, the painter flung himself down on a -sofa, and a look of pain came into his face. - - - -CHAPTER 3 - -At half-past twelve next day Lord Henry Wotton strolled from Curzon -Street over to the Albany to call on his uncle, Lord Fermor, a genial -if somewhat rough-mannered old bachelor, whom the outside world called -selfish because it derived no particular benefit from him, but who was -considered generous by Society as he fed the people who amused him. -His father had been our ambassador at Madrid when Isabella was young -and Prim unthought of, but had retired from the diplomatic service in a -capricious moment of annoyance on not being offered the Embassy at -Paris, a post to which he considered that he was fully entitled by -reason of his birth, his indolence, the good English of his dispatches, -and his inordinate passion for pleasure. The son, who had been his -father's secretary, had resigned along with his chief, somewhat -foolishly as was thought at the time, and on succeeding some months -later to the title, had set himself to the serious study of the great -aristocratic art of doing absolutely nothing. He had two large town -houses, but preferred to live in chambers as it was less trouble, and -took most of his meals at his club. He paid some attention to the -management of his collieries in the Midland counties, excusing himself -for this taint of industry on the ground that the one advantage of -having coal was that it enabled a gentleman to afford the decency of -burning wood on his own hearth. In politics he was a Tory, except when -the Tories were in office, during which period he roundly abused them -for being a pack of Radicals. He was a hero to his valet, who bullied -him, and a terror to most of his relations, whom he bullied in turn. -Only England could have produced him, and he always said that the -country was going to the dogs. His principles were out of date, but -there was a good deal to be said for his prejudices. - -When Lord Henry entered the room, he found his uncle sitting in a rough -shooting-coat, smoking a cheroot and grumbling over The Times. "Well, -Harry," said the old gentleman, "what brings you out so early? I -thought you dandies never got up till two, and were not visible till -five." - -"Pure family affection, I assure you, Uncle George. I want to get -something out of you." - -"Money, I suppose," said Lord Fermor, making a wry face. "Well, sit -down and tell me all about it. Young people, nowadays, imagine that -money is everything." - -"Yes," murmured Lord Henry, settling his button-hole in his coat; "and -when they grow older they know it. But I don't want money. It is only -people who pay their bills who want that, Uncle George, and I never pay -mine. Credit is the capital of a younger son, and one lives charmingly -upon it. Besides, I always deal with Dartmoor's tradesmen, and -consequently they never bother me. What I want is information: not -useful information, of course; useless information." - -"Well, I can tell you anything that is in an English Blue Book, Harry, -although those fellows nowadays write a lot of nonsense. When I was in -the Diplomatic, things were much better. But I hear they let them in -now by examination. What can you expect? Examinations, sir, are pure -humbug from beginning to end. If a man is a gentleman, he knows quite -enough, and if he is not a gentleman, whatever he knows is bad for him." - -"Mr. Dorian Gray does not belong to Blue Books, Uncle George," said -Lord Henry languidly. - -"Mr. Dorian Gray? Who is he?" asked Lord Fermor, knitting his bushy -white eyebrows. - -"That is what I have come to learn, Uncle George. Or rather, I know -who he is. He is the last Lord Kelso's grandson. His mother was a -Devereux, Lady Margaret Devereux. I want you to tell me about his -mother. What was she like? Whom did she marry? You have known nearly -everybody in your time, so you might have known her. I am very much -interested in Mr. Gray at present. I have only just met him." - -"Kelso's grandson!" echoed the old gentleman. "Kelso's grandson! ... -Of course.... I knew his mother intimately. I believe I was at her -christening. She was an extraordinarily beautiful girl, Margaret -Devereux, and made all the men frantic by running away with a penniless -young fellow--a mere nobody, sir, a subaltern in a foot regiment, or -something of that kind. Certainly. I remember the whole thing as if -it happened yesterday. The poor chap was killed in a duel at Spa a few -months after the marriage. There was an ugly story about it. They -said Kelso got some rascally adventurer, some Belgian brute, to insult -his son-in-law in public--paid him, sir, to do it, paid him--and that -the fellow spitted his man as if he had been a pigeon. The thing was -hushed up, but, egad, Kelso ate his chop alone at the club for some -time afterwards. He brought his daughter back with him, I was told, -and she never spoke to him again. Oh, yes; it was a bad business. The -girl died, too, died within a year. So she left a son, did she? I had -forgotten that. What sort of boy is he? If he is like his mother, he -must be a good-looking chap." - -"He is very good-looking," assented Lord Henry. - -"I hope he will fall into proper hands," continued the old man. "He -should have a pot of money waiting for him if Kelso did the right thing -by him. His mother had money, too. All the Selby property came to -her, through her grandfather. Her grandfather hated Kelso, thought him -a mean dog. He was, too. Came to Madrid once when I was there. Egad, -I was ashamed of him. The Queen used to ask me about the English noble -who was always quarrelling with the cabmen about their fares. They -made quite a story of it. I didn't dare show my face at Court for a -month. I hope he treated his grandson better than he did the jarvies." - -"I don't know," answered Lord Henry. "I fancy that the boy will be -well off. He is not of age yet. He has Selby, I know. He told me so. -And ... his mother was very beautiful?" - -"Margaret Devereux was one of the loveliest creatures I ever saw, -Harry. What on earth induced her to behave as she did, I never could -understand. She could have married anybody she chose. Carlington was -mad after her. She was romantic, though. All the women of that family -were. The men were a poor lot, but, egad! the women were wonderful. -Carlington went on his knees to her. Told me so himself. She laughed -at him, and there wasn't a girl in London at the time who wasn't after -him. And by the way, Harry, talking about silly marriages, what is -this humbug your father tells me about Dartmoor wanting to marry an -American? Ain't English girls good enough for him?" - -"It is rather fashionable to marry Americans just now, Uncle George." - -"I'll back English women against the world, Harry," said Lord Fermor, -striking the table with his fist. - -"The betting is on the Americans." - -"They don't last, I am told," muttered his uncle. - -"A long engagement exhausts them, but they are capital at a -steeplechase. They take things flying. I don't think Dartmoor has a -chance." - -"Who are her people?" grumbled the old gentleman. "Has she got any?" - -Lord Henry shook his head. "American girls are as clever at concealing -their parents, as English women are at concealing their past," he said, -rising to go. - -"They are pork-packers, I suppose?" - -"I hope so, Uncle George, for Dartmoor's sake. I am told that -pork-packing is the most lucrative profession in America, after -politics." - -"Is she pretty?" - -"She behaves as if she was beautiful. Most American women do. It is -the secret of their charm." - -"Why can't these American women stay in their own country? They are -always telling us that it is the paradise for women." - -"It is. That is the reason why, like Eve, they are so excessively -anxious to get out of it," said Lord Henry. "Good-bye, Uncle George. -I shall be late for lunch, if I stop any longer. Thanks for giving me -the information I wanted. I always like to know everything about my -new friends, and nothing about my old ones." - -"Where are you lunching, Harry?" - -"At Aunt Agatha's. I have asked myself and Mr. Gray. He is her latest -protege." - -"Humph! tell your Aunt Agatha, Harry, not to bother me any more with -her charity appeals. I am sick of them. Why, the good woman thinks -that I have nothing to do but to write cheques for her silly fads." - -"All right, Uncle George, I'll tell her, but it won't have any effect. -Philanthropic people lose all sense of humanity. It is their -distinguishing characteristic." - -The old gentleman growled approvingly and rang the bell for his -servant. Lord Henry passed up the low arcade into Burlington Street -and turned his steps in the direction of Berkeley Square. - -So that was the story of Dorian Gray's parentage. Crudely as it had -been told to him, it had yet stirred him by its suggestion of a -strange, almost modern romance. A beautiful woman risking everything -for a mad passion. A few wild weeks of happiness cut short by a -hideous, treacherous crime. Months of voiceless agony, and then a -child born in pain. The mother snatched away by death, the boy left to -solitude and the tyranny of an old and loveless man. Yes; it was an -interesting background. It posed the lad, made him more perfect, as it -were. Behind every exquisite thing that existed, there was something -tragic. Worlds had to be in travail, that the meanest flower might -blow.... And how charming he had been at dinner the night before, as -with startled eyes and lips parted in frightened pleasure he had sat -opposite to him at the club, the red candleshades staining to a richer -rose the wakening wonder of his face. Talking to him was like playing -upon an exquisite violin. He answered to every touch and thrill of the -bow.... There was something terribly enthralling in the exercise of -influence. No other activity was like it. To project one's soul into -some gracious form, and let it tarry there for a moment; to hear one's -own intellectual views echoed back to one with all the added music of -passion and youth; to convey one's temperament into another as though -it were a subtle fluid or a strange perfume: there was a real joy in -that--perhaps the most satisfying joy left to us in an age so limited -and vulgar as our own, an age grossly carnal in its pleasures, and -grossly common in its aims.... He was a marvellous type, too, this lad, -whom by so curious a chance he had met in Basil's studio, or could be -fashioned into a marvellous type, at any rate. Grace was his, and the -white purity of boyhood, and beauty such as old Greek marbles kept for -us. There was nothing that one could not do with him. He could be -made a Titan or a toy. What a pity it was that such beauty was -destined to fade! ... And Basil? From a psychological point of view, -how interesting he was! The new manner in art, the fresh mode of -looking at life, suggested so strangely by the merely visible presence -of one who was unconscious of it all; the silent spirit that dwelt in -dim woodland, and walked unseen in open field, suddenly showing -herself, Dryadlike and not afraid, because in his soul who sought for -her there had been wakened that wonderful vision to which alone are -wonderful things revealed; the mere shapes and patterns of things -becoming, as it were, refined, and gaining a kind of symbolical value, -as though they were themselves patterns of some other and more perfect -form whose shadow they made real: how strange it all was! He -remembered something like it in history. Was it not Plato, that artist -in thought, who had first analyzed it? Was it not Buonarotti who had -carved it in the coloured marbles of a sonnet-sequence? But in our own -century it was strange.... Yes; he would try to be to Dorian Gray -what, without knowing it, the lad was to the painter who had fashioned -the wonderful portrait. He would seek to dominate him--had already, -indeed, half done so. He would make that wonderful spirit his own. -There was something fascinating in this son of love and death. - -Suddenly he stopped and glanced up at the houses. He found that he had -passed his aunt's some distance, and, smiling to himself, turned back. -When he entered the somewhat sombre hall, the butler told him that they -had gone in to lunch. He gave one of the footmen his hat and stick and -passed into the dining-room. - -"Late as usual, Harry," cried his aunt, shaking her head at him. - -He invented a facile excuse, and having taken the vacant seat next to -her, looked round to see who was there. Dorian bowed to him shyly from -the end of the table, a flush of pleasure stealing into his cheek. -Opposite was the Duchess of Harley, a lady of admirable good-nature and -good temper, much liked by every one who knew her, and of those ample -architectural proportions that in women who are not duchesses are -described by contemporary historians as stoutness. Next to her sat, on -her right, Sir Thomas Burdon, a Radical member of Parliament, who -followed his leader in public life and in private life followed the -best cooks, dining with the Tories and thinking with the Liberals, in -accordance with a wise and well-known rule. The post on her left was -occupied by Mr. Erskine of Treadley, an old gentleman of considerable -charm and culture, who had fallen, however, into bad habits of silence, -having, as he explained once to Lady Agatha, said everything that he -had to say before he was thirty. His own neighbour was Mrs. Vandeleur, -one of his aunt's oldest friends, a perfect saint amongst women, but so -dreadfully dowdy that she reminded one of a badly bound hymn-book. -Fortunately for him she had on the other side Lord Faudel, a most -intelligent middle-aged mediocrity, as bald as a ministerial statement -in the House of Commons, with whom she was conversing in that intensely -earnest manner which is the one unpardonable error, as he remarked once -himself, that all really good people fall into, and from which none of -them ever quite escape. - -"We are talking about poor Dartmoor, Lord Henry," cried the duchess, -nodding pleasantly to him across the table. "Do you think he will -really marry this fascinating young person?" - -"I believe she has made up her mind to propose to him, Duchess." - -"How dreadful!" exclaimed Lady Agatha. "Really, some one should -interfere." - -"I am told, on excellent authority, that her father keeps an American -dry-goods store," said Sir Thomas Burdon, looking supercilious. - -"My uncle has already suggested pork-packing, Sir Thomas." - -"Dry-goods! What are American dry-goods?" asked the duchess, raising -her large hands in wonder and accentuating the verb. - -"American novels," answered Lord Henry, helping himself to some quail. - -The duchess looked puzzled. - -"Don't mind him, my dear," whispered Lady Agatha. "He never means -anything that he says." - -"When America was discovered," said the Radical member--and he began to -give some wearisome facts. Like all people who try to exhaust a -subject, he exhausted his listeners. The duchess sighed and exercised -her privilege of interruption. "I wish to goodness it never had been -discovered at all!" she exclaimed. "Really, our girls have no chance -nowadays. It is most unfair." - -"Perhaps, after all, America never has been discovered," said Mr. -Erskine; "I myself would say that it had merely been detected." - -"Oh! but I have seen specimens of the inhabitants," answered the -duchess vaguely. "I must confess that most of them are extremely -pretty. And they dress well, too. They get all their dresses in -Paris. I wish I could afford to do the same." - -"They say that when good Americans die they go to Paris," chuckled Sir -Thomas, who had a large wardrobe of Humour's cast-off clothes. - -"Really! And where do bad Americans go to when they die?" inquired the -duchess. - -"They go to America," murmured Lord Henry. - -Sir Thomas frowned. "I am afraid that your nephew is prejudiced -against that great country," he said to Lady Agatha. "I have travelled -all over it in cars provided by the directors, who, in such matters, -are extremely civil. I assure you that it is an education to visit it." - -"But must we really see Chicago in order to be educated?" asked Mr. -Erskine plaintively. "I don't feel up to the journey." - -Sir Thomas waved his hand. "Mr. Erskine of Treadley has the world on -his shelves. We practical men like to see things, not to read about -them. The Americans are an extremely interesting people. They are -absolutely reasonable. I think that is their distinguishing -characteristic. Yes, Mr. Erskine, an absolutely reasonable people. I -assure you there is no nonsense about the Americans." - -"How dreadful!" cried Lord Henry. "I can stand brute force, but brute -reason is quite unbearable. There is something unfair about its use. -It is hitting below the intellect." - -"I do not understand you," said Sir Thomas, growing rather red. - -"I do, Lord Henry," murmured Mr. Erskine, with a smile. - -"Paradoxes are all very well in their way...." rejoined the baronet. - -"Was that a paradox?" asked Mr. Erskine. "I did not think so. Perhaps -it was. Well, the way of paradoxes is the way of truth. To test -reality we must see it on the tight rope. When the verities become -acrobats, we can judge them." - -"Dear me!" said Lady Agatha, "how you men argue! I am sure I never can -make out what you are talking about. Oh! Harry, I am quite vexed with -you. Why do you try to persuade our nice Mr. Dorian Gray to give up -the East End? I assure you he would be quite invaluable. They would -love his playing." - -"I want him to play to me," cried Lord Henry, smiling, and he looked -down the table and caught a bright answering glance. - -"But they are so unhappy in Whitechapel," continued Lady Agatha. - -"I can sympathize with everything except suffering," said Lord Henry, -shrugging his shoulders. "I cannot sympathize with that. It is too -ugly, too horrible, too distressing. There is something terribly -morbid in the modern sympathy with pain. One should sympathize with -the colour, the beauty, the joy of life. The less said about life's -sores, the better." - -"Still, the East End is a very important problem," remarked Sir Thomas -with a grave shake of the head. - -"Quite so," answered the young lord. "It is the problem of slavery, -and we try to solve it by amusing the slaves." - -The politician looked at him keenly. "What change do you propose, -then?" he asked. - -Lord Henry laughed. "I don't desire to change anything in England -except the weather," he answered. "I am quite content with philosophic -contemplation. But, as the nineteenth century has gone bankrupt -through an over-expenditure of sympathy, I would suggest that we should -appeal to science to put us straight. The advantage of the emotions is -that they lead us astray, and the advantage of science is that it is -not emotional." - -"But we have such grave responsibilities," ventured Mrs. Vandeleur -timidly. - -"Terribly grave," echoed Lady Agatha. - -Lord Henry looked over at Mr. Erskine. "Humanity takes itself too -seriously. It is the world's original sin. If the caveman had known -how to laugh, history would have been different." - -"You are really very comforting," warbled the duchess. "I have always -felt rather guilty when I came to see your dear aunt, for I take no -interest at all in the East End. For the future I shall be able to -look her in the face without a blush." - -"A blush is very becoming, Duchess," remarked Lord Henry. - -"Only when one is young," she answered. "When an old woman like myself -blushes, it is a very bad sign. Ah! Lord Henry, I wish you would tell -me how to become young again." - -He thought for a moment. "Can you remember any great error that you -committed in your early days, Duchess?" he asked, looking at her across -the table. - -"A great many, I fear," she cried. - -"Then commit them over again," he said gravely. "To get back one's -youth, one has merely to repeat one's follies." - -"A delightful theory!" she exclaimed. "I must put it into practice." - -"A dangerous theory!" came from Sir Thomas's tight lips. Lady Agatha -shook her head, but could not help being amused. Mr. Erskine listened. - -"Yes," he continued, "that is one of the great secrets of life. -Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and -discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are -one's mistakes." - -A laugh ran round the table. - -He played with the idea and grew wilful; tossed it into the air and -transformed it; let it escape and recaptured it; made it iridescent -with fancy and winged it with paradox. The praise of folly, as he went -on, soared into a philosophy, and philosophy herself became young, and -catching the mad music of pleasure, wearing, one might fancy, her -wine-stained robe and wreath of ivy, danced like a Bacchante over the -hills of life, and mocked the slow Silenus for being sober. Facts fled -before her like frightened forest things. Her white feet trod the huge -press at which wise Omar sits, till the seething grape-juice rose round -her bare limbs in waves of purple bubbles, or crawled in red foam over -the vat's black, dripping, sloping sides. It was an extraordinary -improvisation. He felt that the eyes of Dorian Gray were fixed on him, -and the consciousness that amongst his audience there was one whose -temperament he wished to fascinate seemed to give his wit keenness and -to lend colour to his imagination. He was brilliant, fantastic, -irresponsible. He charmed his listeners out of themselves, and they -followed his pipe, laughing. Dorian Gray never took his gaze off him, -but sat like one under a spell, smiles chasing each other over his lips -and wonder growing grave in his darkening eyes. - -At last, liveried in the costume of the age, reality entered the room -in the shape of a servant to tell the duchess that her carriage was -waiting. She wrung her hands in mock despair. "How annoying!" she -cried. "I must go. I have to call for my husband at the club, to take -him to some absurd meeting at Willis's Rooms, where he is going to be -in the chair. If I am late he is sure to be furious, and I couldn't -have a scene in this bonnet. It is far too fragile. A harsh word -would ruin it. No, I must go, dear Agatha. Good-bye, Lord Henry, you -are quite delightful and dreadfully demoralizing. I am sure I don't -know what to say about your views. You must come and dine with us some -night. Tuesday? Are you disengaged Tuesday?" - -"For you I would throw over anybody, Duchess," said Lord Henry with a -bow. - -"Ah! that is very nice, and very wrong of you," she cried; "so mind you -come"; and she swept out of the room, followed by Lady Agatha and the -other ladies. - -When Lord Henry had sat down again, Mr. Erskine moved round, and taking -a chair close to him, placed his hand upon his arm. - -"You talk books away," he said; "why don't you write one?" - -"I am too fond of reading books to care to write them, Mr. Erskine. I -should like to write a novel certainly, a novel that would be as lovely -as a Persian carpet and as unreal. But there is no literary public in -England for anything except newspapers, primers, and encyclopaedias. -Of all people in the world the English have the least sense of the -beauty of literature." - -"I fear you are right," answered Mr. Erskine. "I myself used to have -literary ambitions, but I gave them up long ago. And now, my dear -young friend, if you will allow me to call you so, may I ask if you -really meant all that you said to us at lunch?" - -"I quite forget what I said," smiled Lord Henry. "Was it all very bad?" - -"Very bad indeed. In fact I consider you extremely dangerous, and if -anything happens to our good duchess, we shall all look on you as being -primarily responsible. But I should like to talk to you about life. -The generation into which I was born was tedious. Some day, when you -are tired of London, come down to Treadley and expound to me your -philosophy of pleasure over some admirable Burgundy I am fortunate -enough to possess." - -"I shall be charmed. A visit to Treadley would be a great privilege. -It has a perfect host, and a perfect library." - -"You will complete it," answered the old gentleman with a courteous -bow. "And now I must bid good-bye to your excellent aunt. I am due at -the Athenaeum. It is the hour when we sleep there." - -"All of you, Mr. Erskine?" - -"Forty of us, in forty arm-chairs. We are practising for an English -Academy of Letters." - -Lord Henry laughed and rose. "I am going to the park," he cried. - -As he was passing out of the door, Dorian Gray touched him on the arm. -"Let me come with you," he murmured. - -"But I thought you had promised Basil Hallward to go and see him," -answered Lord Henry. - -"I would sooner come with you; yes, I feel I must come with you. Do -let me. And you will promise to talk to me all the time? No one talks -so wonderfully as you do." - -"Ah! I have talked quite enough for to-day," said Lord Henry, smiling. -"All I want now is to look at life. You may come and look at it with -me, if you care to." - - - -CHAPTER 4 - -One afternoon, a month later, Dorian Gray was reclining in a luxurious -arm-chair, in the little library of Lord Henry's house in Mayfair. It -was, in its way, a very charming room, with its high panelled -wainscoting of olive-stained oak, its cream-coloured frieze and ceiling -of raised plasterwork, and its brickdust felt carpet strewn with silk, -long-fringed Persian rugs. On a tiny satinwood table stood a statuette -by Clodion, and beside it lay a copy of Les Cent Nouvelles, bound for -Margaret of Valois by Clovis Eve and powdered with the gilt daisies -that Queen had selected for her device. Some large blue china jars and -parrot-tulips were ranged on the mantelshelf, and through the small -leaded panes of the window streamed the apricot-coloured light of a -summer day in London. - -Lord Henry had not yet come in. He was always late on principle, his -principle being that punctuality is the thief of time. So the lad was -looking rather sulky, as with listless fingers he turned over the pages -of an elaborately illustrated edition of Manon Lescaut that he had -found in one of the book-cases. The formal monotonous ticking of the -Louis Quatorze clock annoyed him. Once or twice he thought of going -away. - -At last he heard a step outside, and the door opened. "How late you -are, Harry!" he murmured. - -"I am afraid it is not Harry, Mr. Gray," answered a shrill voice. - -He glanced quickly round and rose to his feet. "I beg your pardon. I -thought--" - -"You thought it was my husband. It is only his wife. You must let me -introduce myself. I know you quite well by your photographs. I think -my husband has got seventeen of them." - -"Not seventeen, Lady Henry?" - -"Well, eighteen, then. And I saw you with him the other night at the -opera." She laughed nervously as she spoke, and watched him with her -vague forget-me-not eyes. She was a curious woman, whose dresses -always looked as if they had been designed in a rage and put on in a -tempest. She was usually in love with somebody, and, as her passion -was never returned, she had kept all her illusions. She tried to look -picturesque, but only succeeded in being untidy. Her name was -Victoria, and she had a perfect mania for going to church. - -"That was at Lohengrin, Lady Henry, I think?" - -"Yes; it was at dear Lohengrin. I like Wagner's music better than -anybody's. It is so loud that one can talk the whole time without other -people hearing what one says. That is a great advantage, don't you -think so, Mr. Gray?" - -The same nervous staccato laugh broke from her thin lips, and her -fingers began to play with a long tortoise-shell paper-knife. - -Dorian smiled and shook his head: "I am afraid I don't think so, Lady -Henry. I never talk during music--at least, during good music. If one -hears bad music, it is one's duty to drown it in conversation." - -"Ah! that is one of Harry's views, isn't it, Mr. Gray? I always hear -Harry's views from his friends. It is the only way I get to know of -them. But you must not think I don't like good music. I adore it, but -I am afraid of it. It makes me too romantic. I have simply worshipped -pianists--two at a time, sometimes, Harry tells me. I don't know what -it is about them. Perhaps it is that they are foreigners. They all -are, ain't they? Even those that are born in England become foreigners -after a time, don't they? It is so clever of them, and such a -compliment to art. Makes it quite cosmopolitan, doesn't it? You have -never been to any of my parties, have you, Mr. Gray? You must come. I -can't afford orchids, but I spare no expense in foreigners. They make -one's rooms look so picturesque. But here is Harry! Harry, I came in -to look for you, to ask you something--I forget what it was--and I -found Mr. Gray here. We have had such a pleasant chat about music. We -have quite the same ideas. No; I think our ideas are quite different. -But he has been most pleasant. I am so glad I've seen him." - -"I am charmed, my love, quite charmed," said Lord Henry, elevating his -dark, crescent-shaped eyebrows and looking at them both with an amused -smile. "So sorry I am late, Dorian. I went to look after a piece of -old brocade in Wardour Street and had to bargain for hours for it. -Nowadays people know the price of everything and the value of nothing." - -"I am afraid I must be going," exclaimed Lady Henry, breaking an -awkward silence with her silly sudden laugh. "I have promised to drive -with the duchess. Good-bye, Mr. Gray. Good-bye, Harry. You are -dining out, I suppose? So am I. Perhaps I shall see you at Lady -Thornbury's." - -"I dare say, my dear," said Lord Henry, shutting the door behind her -as, looking like a bird of paradise that had been out all night in the -rain, she flitted out of the room, leaving a faint odour of -frangipanni. Then he lit a cigarette and flung himself down on the -sofa. - -"Never marry a woman with straw-coloured hair, Dorian," he said after a -few puffs. - -"Why, Harry?" - -"Because they are so sentimental." - -"But I like sentimental people." - -"Never marry at all, Dorian. Men marry because they are tired; women, -because they are curious: both are disappointed." - -"I don't think I am likely to marry, Harry. I am too much in love. -That is one of your aphorisms. I am putting it into practice, as I do -everything that you say." - -"Who are you in love with?" asked Lord Henry after a pause. - -"With an actress," said Dorian Gray, blushing. - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "That is a rather commonplace -debut." - -"You would not say so if you saw her, Harry." - -"Who is she?" - -"Her name is Sibyl Vane." - -"Never heard of her." - -"No one has. People will some day, however. She is a genius." - -"My dear boy, no woman is a genius. Women are a decorative sex. They -never have anything to say, but they say it charmingly. Women -represent the triumph of matter over mind, just as men represent the -triumph of mind over morals." - -"Harry, how can you?" - -"My dear Dorian, it is quite true. I am analysing women at present, so -I ought to know. The subject is not so abstruse as I thought it was. -I find that, ultimately, there are only two kinds of women, the plain -and the coloured. The plain women are very useful. If you want to -gain a reputation for respectability, you have merely to take them down -to supper. The other women are very charming. They commit one -mistake, however. They paint in order to try and look young. Our -grandmothers painted in order to try and talk brilliantly. Rouge and -esprit used to go together. That is all over now. As long as a woman -can look ten years younger than her own daughter, she is perfectly -satisfied. As for conversation, there are only five women in London -worth talking to, and two of these can't be admitted into decent -society. However, tell me about your genius. How long have you known -her?" - -"Ah! Harry, your views terrify me." - -"Never mind that. How long have you known her?" - -"About three weeks." - -"And where did you come across her?" - -"I will tell you, Harry, but you mustn't be unsympathetic about it. -After all, it never would have happened if I had not met you. You -filled me with a wild desire to know everything about life. For days -after I met you, something seemed to throb in my veins. As I lounged -in the park, or strolled down Piccadilly, I used to look at every one -who passed me and wonder, with a mad curiosity, what sort of lives they -led. Some of them fascinated me. Others filled me with terror. There -was an exquisite poison in the air. I had a passion for sensations.... -Well, one evening about seven o'clock, I determined to go out in search -of some adventure. I felt that this grey monstrous London of ours, -with its myriads of people, its sordid sinners, and its splendid sins, -as you once phrased it, must have something in store for me. I fancied -a thousand things. The mere danger gave me a sense of delight. I -remembered what you had said to me on that wonderful evening when we -first dined together, about the search for beauty being the real secret -of life. I don't know what I expected, but I went out and wandered -eastward, soon losing my way in a labyrinth of grimy streets and black -grassless squares. About half-past eight I passed by an absurd little -theatre, with great flaring gas-jets and gaudy play-bills. A hideous -Jew, in the most amazing waistcoat I ever beheld in my life, was -standing at the entrance, smoking a vile cigar. He had greasy -ringlets, and an enormous diamond blazed in the centre of a soiled -shirt. 'Have a box, my Lord?' he said, when he saw me, and he took off -his hat with an air of gorgeous servility. There was something about -him, Harry, that amused me. He was such a monster. You will laugh at -me, I know, but I really went in and paid a whole guinea for the -stage-box. To the present day I can't make out why I did so; and yet if -I hadn't--my dear Harry, if I hadn't--I should have missed the greatest -romance of my life. I see you are laughing. It is horrid of you!" - -"I am not laughing, Dorian; at least I am not laughing at you. But you -should not say the greatest romance of your life. You should say the -first romance of your life. You will always be loved, and you will -always be in love with love. A grande passion is the privilege of -people who have nothing to do. That is the one use of the idle classes -of a country. Don't be afraid. There are exquisite things in store -for you. This is merely the beginning." - -"Do you think my nature so shallow?" cried Dorian Gray angrily. - -"No; I think your nature so deep." - -"How do you mean?" - -"My dear boy, the people who love only once in their lives are really -the shallow people. What they call their loyalty, and their fidelity, -I call either the lethargy of custom or their lack of imagination. -Faithfulness is to the emotional life what consistency is to the life -of the intellect--simply a confession of failure. Faithfulness! I -must analyse it some day. The passion for property is in it. There -are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that -others might pick them up. But I don't want to interrupt you. Go on -with your story." - -"Well, I found myself seated in a horrid little private box, with a -vulgar drop-scene staring me in the face. I looked out from behind the -curtain and surveyed the house. It was a tawdry affair, all Cupids and -cornucopias, like a third-rate wedding-cake. The gallery and pit were -fairly full, but the two rows of dingy stalls were quite empty, and -there was hardly a person in what I suppose they called the -dress-circle. Women went about with oranges and ginger-beer, and there -was a terrible consumption of nuts going on." - -"It must have been just like the palmy days of the British drama." - -"Just like, I should fancy, and very depressing. I began to wonder -what on earth I should do when I caught sight of the play-bill. What -do you think the play was, Harry?" - -"I should think 'The Idiot Boy', or 'Dumb but Innocent'. Our fathers -used to like that sort of piece, I believe. The longer I live, Dorian, -the more keenly I feel that whatever was good enough for our fathers is -not good enough for us. In art, as in politics, les grandperes ont -toujours tort." - -"This play was good enough for us, Harry. It was Romeo and Juliet. I -must admit that I was rather annoyed at the idea of seeing Shakespeare -done in such a wretched hole of a place. Still, I felt interested, in -a sort of way. At any rate, I determined to wait for the first act. -There was a dreadful orchestra, presided over by a young Hebrew who sat -at a cracked piano, that nearly drove me away, but at last the -drop-scene was drawn up and the play began. Romeo was a stout elderly -gentleman, with corked eyebrows, a husky tragedy voice, and a figure -like a beer-barrel. Mercutio was almost as bad. He was played by the -low-comedian, who had introduced gags of his own and was on most -friendly terms with the pit. They were both as grotesque as the -scenery, and that looked as if it had come out of a country-booth. But -Juliet! Harry, imagine a girl, hardly seventeen years of age, with a -little, flowerlike face, a small Greek head with plaited coils of -dark-brown hair, eyes that were violet wells of passion, lips that were -like the petals of a rose. She was the loveliest thing I had ever seen -in my life. You said to me once that pathos left you unmoved, but that -beauty, mere beauty, could fill your eyes with tears. I tell you, -Harry, I could hardly see this girl for the mist of tears that came -across me. And her voice--I never heard such a voice. It was very low -at first, with deep mellow notes that seemed to fall singly upon one's -ear. Then it became a little louder, and sounded like a flute or a -distant hautboy. In the garden-scene it had all the tremulous ecstasy -that one hears just before dawn when nightingales are singing. There -were moments, later on, when it had the wild passion of violins. You -know how a voice can stir one. Your voice and the voice of Sibyl Vane -are two things that I shall never forget. When I close my eyes, I hear -them, and each of them says something different. I don't know which to -follow. Why should I not love her? Harry, I do love her. She is -everything to me in life. Night after night I go to see her play. One -evening she is Rosalind, and the next evening she is Imogen. I have -seen her die in the gloom of an Italian tomb, sucking the poison from -her lover's lips. I have watched her wandering through the forest of -Arden, disguised as a pretty boy in hose and doublet and dainty cap. -She has been mad, and has come into the presence of a guilty king, and -given him rue to wear and bitter herbs to taste of. She has been -innocent, and the black hands of jealousy have crushed her reedlike -throat. I have seen her in every age and in every costume. Ordinary -women never appeal to one's imagination. They are limited to their -century. No glamour ever transfigures them. One knows their minds as -easily as one knows their bonnets. One can always find them. There is -no mystery in any of them. They ride in the park in the morning and -chatter at tea-parties in the afternoon. They have their stereotyped -smile and their fashionable manner. They are quite obvious. But an -actress! How different an actress is! Harry! why didn't you tell me -that the only thing worth loving is an actress?" - -"Because I have loved so many of them, Dorian." - -"Oh, yes, horrid people with dyed hair and painted faces." - -"Don't run down dyed hair and painted faces. There is an extraordinary -charm in them, sometimes," said Lord Henry. - -"I wish now I had not told you about Sibyl Vane." - -"You could not have helped telling me, Dorian. All through your life -you will tell me everything you do." - -"Yes, Harry, I believe that is true. I cannot help telling you things. -You have a curious influence over me. If I ever did a crime, I would -come and confess it to you. You would understand me." - -"People like you--the wilful sunbeams of life--don't commit crimes, -Dorian. But I am much obliged for the compliment, all the same. And -now tell me--reach me the matches, like a good boy--thanks--what are -your actual relations with Sibyl Vane?" - -Dorian Gray leaped to his feet, with flushed cheeks and burning eyes. -"Harry! Sibyl Vane is sacred!" - -"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," laughed Dorian. -"By this time, however, the lights were being put out in the theatre, -and I had to go. He wanted me to try some cigars that he strongly -recommended. I declined. The next night, of course, I arrived at the -place again. When he saw me, he made me a low bow and assured me that -I was a munificent patron of art. He was a most offensive brute, -though he had an extraordinary passion for Shakespeare. He told me -once, with an air of pride, that his five bankruptcies were entirely -due to 'The Bard,' as he insisted on calling him. He seemed to think -it a distinction." - -"It was a distinction, my dear Dorian--a great distinction. Most -people become bankrupt through having invested too heavily in the prose -of life. To have ruined one's self over poetry is an honour. But when -did you first speak to Miss Sibyl Vane?" - -"The third night. She had been playing Rosalind. I could not help -going round. I had thrown her some flowers, and she had looked at -me--at least I fancied that she had. The old Jew was persistent. He -seemed determined to take me behind, so I consented. It was curious my -not wanting to know her, wasn't it?" - -"No; I don't think so." - -"My dear Harry, why?" - -"I will tell you some other time. Now I want to know about the girl." - -"Sibyl? Oh, she was so shy and so gentle. There is something of a -child about her. Her eyes opened wide in exquisite wonder when I told -her what I thought of her performance, and she seemed quite unconscious -of her power. I think we were both rather nervous. The old Jew stood -grinning at the doorway of the dusty greenroom, making elaborate -speeches about us both, while we stood looking at each other like -children. He would insist on calling me 'My Lord,' so I had to assure -Sibyl that I was not anything of the kind. She said quite simply to -me, 'You look more like a prince. I must call you Prince Charming.'" - -"Upon my word, Dorian, Miss Sibyl knows how to pay compliments." - -"You don't understand her, Harry. She regarded me merely as a person -in a play. She knows nothing of life. She lives with her mother, a -faded tired woman who played Lady Capulet in a sort of magenta -dressing-wrapper on the first night, and looks as if she had seen -better days." - -"I know that look. It depresses me," murmured Lord Henry, examining -his rings. - -"The Jew wanted to tell me her history, but I said it did not interest -me." - -"You were quite right. There is always something infinitely mean about -other people's tragedies." - -"Sibyl is the only thing I care about. What is it to me where she came -from? From her little head to her little feet, she is absolutely and -entirely divine. Every night of my life I go to see her act, and every -night she is more marvellous." - -"That is the reason, I suppose, that you never dine with me now. I -thought you must have some curious romance on hand. You have; but it -is not quite what I expected." - -"My dear Harry, we either lunch or sup together every day, and I have -been to the opera with you several times," said Dorian, opening his -blue eyes in wonder. - -"You always come dreadfully late." - -"Well, I can't help going to see Sibyl play," he cried, "even if it is -only for a single act. I get hungry for her presence; and when I think -of the wonderful soul that is hidden away in that little ivory body, I -am filled with awe." - -"You can dine with me to-night, Dorian, can't you?" - -He shook his head. "To-night she is Imogen," he answered, "and -to-morrow night she will be Juliet." - -"When is she Sibyl Vane?" - -"Never." - -"I congratulate you." - -"How horrid you are! She is all the great heroines of the world in -one. She is more than an individual. You laugh, but I tell you she -has genius. I love her, and I must make her love me. You, who know -all the secrets of life, tell me how to charm Sibyl Vane to love me! I -want to make Romeo jealous. I want the dead lovers of the world to -hear our laughter and grow sad. I want a breath of our passion to stir -their dust into consciousness, to wake their ashes into pain. My God, -Harry, how I worship her!" He was walking up and down the room as he -spoke. Hectic spots of red burned on his cheeks. He was terribly -excited. - -Lord Henry watched him with a subtle sense of pleasure. How different -he was now from the shy frightened boy he had met in Basil Hallward's -studio! His nature had developed like a flower, had borne blossoms of -scarlet flame. Out of its secret hiding-place had crept his soul, and -desire had come to meet it on the way. - -"And what do you propose to do?" said Lord Henry at last. - -"I want you and Basil to come with me some night and see her act. I -have not the slightest fear of the result. You are certain to -acknowledge her genius. Then we must get her out of the Jew's hands. -She is bound to him for three years--at least for two years and eight -months--from the present time. I shall have to pay him something, of -course. When all that is settled, I shall take a West End theatre and -bring her out properly. She will make the world as mad as she has made -me." - -"That would be impossible, my dear boy." - -"Yes, she will. She has not merely art, consummate art-instinct, in -her, but she has personality also; and you have often told me that it -is personalities, not principles, that move the age." - -"Well, what night shall we go?" - -"Let me see. To-day is Tuesday. Let us fix to-morrow. She plays -Juliet to-morrow." - -"All right. The Bristol at eight o'clock; and I will get Basil." - -"Not eight, Harry, please. Half-past six. We must be there before the -curtain rises. You must see her in the first act, where she meets -Romeo." - -"Half-past six! What an hour! It will be like having a meat-tea, or -reading an English novel. It must be seven. No gentleman dines before -seven. Shall you see Basil between this and then? Or shall I write to -him?" - -"Dear Basil! I have not laid eyes on him for a week. It is rather -horrid of me, as he has sent me my portrait in the most wonderful -frame, specially designed by himself, and, though I am a little jealous -of the picture for being a whole month younger than I am, I must admit -that I delight in it. Perhaps you had better write to him. I don't -want to see him alone. He says things that annoy me. He gives me good -advice." - -Lord Henry smiled. "People are very fond of giving away what they need -most themselves. It is what I call the depth of generosity." - -"Oh, Basil is the best of fellows, but he seems to me to be just a bit -of a Philistine. Since I have known you, Harry, I have discovered -that." - -"Basil, my dear boy, puts everything that is charming in him into his -work. The consequence is that he has nothing left for life but his -prejudices, his principles, and his common sense. The only artists I -have ever known who are personally delightful are bad artists. Good -artists exist simply in what they make, and consequently are perfectly -uninteresting in what they are. A great poet, a really great poet, is -the most unpoetical of all creatures. But inferior poets are -absolutely fascinating. The worse their rhymes are, the more -picturesque they look. The mere fact of having published a book of -second-rate sonnets makes a man quite irresistible. He lives the -poetry that he cannot write. The others write the poetry that they -dare not realize." - -"I wonder is that really so, Harry?" said Dorian Gray, putting some -perfume on his handkerchief out of a large, gold-topped bottle that -stood on the table. "It must be, if you say it. And now I am off. -Imogen is waiting for me. Don't forget about to-morrow. Good-bye." - -As he left the room, Lord Henry's heavy eyelids drooped, and he began -to think. Certainly few people had ever interested him so much as -Dorian Gray, and yet the lad's mad adoration of some one else caused -him not the slightest pang of annoyance or jealousy. He was pleased by -it. It made him a more interesting study. He had been always -enthralled by the methods of natural science, but the ordinary -subject-matter of that science had seemed to him trivial and of no -import. And so he had begun by vivisecting himself, as he had ended by -vivisecting others. Human life--that appeared to him the one thing -worth investigating. Compared to it there was nothing else of any -value. It was true that as one watched life in its curious crucible of -pain and pleasure, one could not wear over one's face a mask of glass, -nor keep the sulphurous fumes from troubling the brain and making the -imagination turbid with monstrous fancies and misshapen dreams. There -were poisons so subtle that to know their properties one had to sicken -of them. There were maladies so strange that one had to pass through -them if one sought to understand their nature. And, yet, what a great -reward one received! How wonderful the whole world became to one! To -note the curious hard logic of passion, and the emotional coloured life -of the intellect--to observe where they met, and where they separated, -at what point they were in unison, and at what point they were at -discord--there was a delight in that! What matter what the cost was? -One could never pay too high a price for any sensation. - -He was conscious--and the thought brought a gleam of pleasure into his -brown agate eyes--that it was through certain words of his, musical -words said with musical utterance, that Dorian Gray's soul had turned -to this white girl and bowed in worship before her. To a large extent -the lad was his own creation. He had made him premature. That was -something. Ordinary people waited till life disclosed to them its -secrets, but to the few, to the elect, the mysteries of life were -revealed before the veil was drawn away. Sometimes this was the effect -of art, and chiefly of the art of literature, which dealt immediately -with the passions and the intellect. But now and then a complex -personality took the place and assumed the office of art, was indeed, -in its way, a real work of art, life having its elaborate masterpieces, -just as poetry has, or sculpture, or painting. - -Yes, the lad was premature. He was gathering his harvest while it was -yet spring. The pulse and passion of youth were in him, but he was -becoming self-conscious. It was delightful to watch him. With his -beautiful face, and his beautiful soul, he was a thing to wonder at. -It was no matter how it all ended, or was destined to end. He was like -one of those gracious figures in a pageant or a play, whose joys seem -to be remote from one, but whose sorrows stir one's sense of beauty, -and whose wounds are like red roses. - -Soul and body, body and soul--how mysterious they were! There was -animalism in the soul, and the body had its moments of spirituality. -The senses could refine, and the intellect could degrade. Who could -say where the fleshly impulse ceased, or the psychical impulse began? -How shallow were the arbitrary definitions of ordinary psychologists! -And yet how difficult to decide between the claims of the various -schools! Was the soul a shadow seated in the house of sin? Or was the -body really in the soul, as Giordano Bruno thought? The separation of -spirit from matter was a mystery, and the union of spirit with matter -was a mystery also. - -He began to wonder whether we could ever make psychology so absolute a -science that each little spring of life would be revealed to us. As it -was, we always misunderstood ourselves and rarely understood others. -Experience was of no ethical value. It was merely the name men gave to -their mistakes. Moralists had, as a rule, regarded it as a mode of -warning, had claimed for it a certain ethical efficacy in the formation -of character, had praised it as something that taught us what to follow -and showed us what to avoid. But there was no motive power in -experience. It was as little of an active cause as conscience itself. -All that it really demonstrated was that our future would be the same -as our past, and that the sin we had done once, and with loathing, we -would do many times, and with joy. - -It was clear to him that the experimental method was the only method by -which one could arrive at any scientific analysis of the passions; and -certainly Dorian Gray was a subject made to his hand, and seemed to -promise rich and fruitful results. His sudden mad love for Sibyl Vane -was a psychological phenomenon of no small interest. There was no -doubt that curiosity had much to do with it, curiosity and the desire -for new experiences, yet it was not a simple, but rather a very complex -passion. What there was in it of the purely sensuous instinct of -boyhood had been transformed by the workings of the imagination, -changed into something that seemed to the lad himself to be remote from -sense, and was for that very reason all the more dangerous. It was the -passions about whose origin we deceived ourselves that tyrannized most -strongly over us. Our weakest motives were those of whose nature we -were conscious. It often happened that when we thought we were -experimenting on others we were really experimenting on ourselves. - -While Lord Henry sat dreaming on these things, a knock came to the -door, and his valet entered and reminded him it was time to dress for -dinner. He got up and looked out into the street. The sunset had -smitten into scarlet gold the upper windows of the houses opposite. -The panes glowed like plates of heated metal. The sky above was like a -faded rose. He thought of his friend's young fiery-coloured life and -wondered how it was all going to end. - -When he arrived home, about half-past twelve o'clock, he saw a telegram -lying on the hall table. He opened it and found it was from Dorian -Gray. It was to tell him that he was engaged to be married to Sibyl -Vane. - - - -CHAPTER 5 - -"Mother, Mother, I am so happy!" whispered the girl, burying her face -in the lap of the faded, tired-looking woman who, with back turned to -the shrill intrusive light, was sitting in the one arm-chair that their -dingy sitting-room contained. "I am so happy!" she repeated, "and you -must be happy, too!" - -Mrs. Vane winced and put her thin, bismuth-whitened hands on her -daughter's head. "Happy!" she echoed, "I am only happy, Sibyl, when I -see you act. You must not think of anything but your acting. Mr. -Isaacs has been very good to us, and we owe him money." - -The girl looked up and pouted. "Money, Mother?" she cried, "what does -money matter? Love is more than money." - -"Mr. Isaacs has advanced us fifty pounds to pay off our debts and to -get a proper outfit for James. You must not forget that, Sibyl. Fifty -pounds is a very large sum. Mr. Isaacs has been most considerate." - -"He is not a gentleman, Mother, and I hate the way he talks to me," -said the girl, rising to her feet and going over to the window. - -"I don't know how we could manage without him," answered the elder -woman querulously. - -Sibyl Vane tossed her head and laughed. "We don't want him any more, -Mother. Prince Charming rules life for us now." Then she paused. A -rose shook in her blood and shadowed her cheeks. Quick breath parted -the petals of her lips. They trembled. Some southern wind of passion -swept over her and stirred the dainty folds of her dress. "I love -him," she said simply. - -"Foolish child! foolish child!" was the parrot-phrase flung in answer. -The waving of crooked, false-jewelled fingers gave grotesqueness to the -words. - -The girl laughed again. The joy of a caged bird was in her voice. Her -eyes caught the melody and echoed it in radiance, then closed for a -moment, as though to hide their secret. When they opened, the mist of -a dream had passed across them. - -Thin-lipped wisdom spoke at her from the worn chair, hinted at -prudence, quoted from that book of cowardice whose author apes the name -of common sense. She did not listen. She was free in her prison of -passion. Her prince, Prince Charming, was with her. She had called on -memory to remake him. She had sent her soul to search for him, and it -had brought him back. His kiss burned again upon her mouth. Her -eyelids were warm with his breath. - -Then wisdom altered its method and spoke of espial and discovery. This -young man might be rich. If so, marriage should be thought of. -Against the shell of her ear broke the waves of worldly cunning. The -arrows of craft shot by her. She saw the thin lips moving, and smiled. - -Suddenly she felt the need to speak. The wordy silence troubled her. -"Mother, Mother," she cried, "why does he love me so much? I know why -I love him. I love him because he is like what love himself should be. -But what does he see in me? I am not worthy of him. And yet--why, I -cannot tell--though I feel so much beneath him, I don't feel humble. I -feel proud, terribly proud. Mother, did you love my father as I love -Prince Charming?" - -The elder woman grew pale beneath the coarse powder that daubed her -cheeks, and her dry lips twitched with a spasm of pain. Sybil rushed -to her, flung her arms round her neck, and kissed her. "Forgive me, -Mother. I know it pains you to talk about our father. But it only -pains you because you loved him so much. Don't look so sad. I am as -happy to-day as you were twenty years ago. Ah! let me be happy for -ever!" - -"My child, you are far too young to think of falling in love. Besides, -what do you know of this young man? You don't even know his name. The -whole thing is most inconvenient, and really, when James is going away -to Australia, and I have so much to think of, I must say that you -should have shown more consideration. However, as I said before, if he -is rich ..." - -"Ah! Mother, Mother, let me be happy!" - -Mrs. Vane glanced at her, and with one of those false theatrical -gestures that so often become a mode of second nature to a -stage-player, clasped her in her arms. At this moment, the door opened -and a young lad with rough brown hair came into the room. He was -thick-set of figure, and his hands and feet were large and somewhat -clumsy in movement. He was not so finely bred as his sister. One -would hardly have guessed the close relationship that existed between -them. Mrs. Vane fixed her eyes on him and intensified her smile. She -mentally elevated her son to the dignity of an audience. She felt sure -that the tableau was interesting. - -"You might keep some of your kisses for me, Sibyl, I think," said the -lad with a good-natured grumble. - -"Ah! but you don't like being kissed, Jim," she cried. "You are a -dreadful old bear." And she ran across the room and hugged him. - -James Vane looked into his sister's face with tenderness. "I want you -to come out with me for a walk, Sibyl. I don't suppose I shall ever -see this horrid London again. I am sure I don't want to." - -"My son, don't say such dreadful things," murmured Mrs. Vane, taking up -a tawdry theatrical dress, with a sigh, and beginning to patch it. She -felt a little disappointed that he had not joined the group. It would -have increased the theatrical picturesqueness of the situation. - -"Why not, Mother? I mean it." - -"You pain me, my son. I trust you will return from Australia in a -position of affluence. I believe there is no society of any kind in -the Colonies--nothing that I would call society--so when you have made -your fortune, you must come back and assert yourself in London." - -"Society!" muttered the lad. "I don't want to know anything about -that. I should like to make some money to take you and Sibyl off the -stage. I hate it." - -"Oh, Jim!" said Sibyl, laughing, "how unkind of you! But are you -really going for a walk with me? That will be nice! I was afraid you -were going to say good-bye to some of your friends--to Tom Hardy, who -gave you that hideous pipe, or Ned Langton, who makes fun of you for -smoking it. It is very sweet of you to let me have your last -afternoon. Where shall we go? Let us go to the park." - -"I am too shabby," he answered, frowning. "Only swell people go to the -park." - -"Nonsense, Jim," she whispered, stroking the sleeve of his coat. - -He hesitated for a moment. "Very well," he said at last, "but don't be -too long dressing." She danced out of the door. One could hear her -singing as she ran upstairs. Her little feet pattered overhead. - -He walked up and down the room two or three times. Then he turned to -the still figure in the chair. "Mother, are my things ready?" he asked. - -"Quite ready, James," she answered, keeping her eyes on her work. For -some months past she had felt ill at ease when she was alone with this -rough stern son of hers. Her shallow secret nature was troubled when -their eyes met. She used to wonder if he suspected anything. The -silence, for he made no other observation, became intolerable to her. -She began to complain. Women defend themselves by attacking, just as -they attack by sudden and strange surrenders. "I hope you will be -contented, James, with your sea-faring life," she said. "You must -remember that it is your own choice. You might have entered a -solicitor's office. Solicitors are a very respectable class, and in -the country often dine with the best families." - -"I hate offices, and I hate clerks," he replied. "But you are quite -right. I have chosen my own life. All I say is, watch over Sibyl. -Don't let her come to any harm. Mother, you must watch over her." - -"James, you really talk very strangely. Of course I watch over Sibyl." - -"I hear a gentleman comes every night to the theatre and goes behind to -talk to her. Is that right? What about that?" - -"You are speaking about things you don't understand, James. In the -profession we are accustomed to receive a great deal of most gratifying -attention. I myself used to receive many bouquets at one time. That -was when acting was really understood. As for Sibyl, I do not know at -present whether her attachment is serious or not. But there is no -doubt that the young man in question is a perfect gentleman. He is -always most polite to me. Besides, he has the appearance of being -rich, and the flowers he sends are lovely." - -"You don't know his name, though," said the lad harshly. - -"No," answered his mother with a placid expression in her face. "He -has not yet revealed his real name. I think it is quite romantic of -him. He is probably a member of the aristocracy." - -James Vane bit his lip. "Watch over Sibyl, Mother," he cried, "watch -over her." - -"My son, you distress me very much. Sibyl is always under my special -care. Of course, if this gentleman is wealthy, there is no reason why -she should not contract an alliance with him. I trust he is one of the -aristocracy. He has all the appearance of it, I must say. It might be -a most brilliant marriage for Sibyl. They would make a charming -couple. His good looks are really quite remarkable; everybody notices -them." - -The lad muttered something to himself and drummed on the window-pane -with his coarse fingers. He had just turned round to say something -when the door opened and Sibyl ran in. - -"How serious you both are!" she cried. "What is the matter?" - -"Nothing," he answered. "I suppose one must be serious sometimes. -Good-bye, Mother; I will have my dinner at five o'clock. Everything is -packed, except my shirts, so you need not trouble." - -"Good-bye, my son," she answered with a bow of strained stateliness. - -She was extremely annoyed at the tone he had adopted with her, and -there was something in his look that had made her feel afraid. - -"Kiss me, Mother," said the girl. Her flowerlike lips touched the -withered cheek and warmed its frost. - -"My child! my child!" cried Mrs. Vane, looking up to the ceiling in -search of an imaginary gallery. - -"Come, Sibyl," said her brother impatiently. He hated his mother's -affectations. - -They went out into the flickering, wind-blown sunlight and strolled -down the dreary Euston Road. The passersby glanced in wonder at the -sullen heavy youth who, in coarse, ill-fitting clothes, was in the -company of such a graceful, refined-looking girl. He was like a common -gardener walking with a rose. - -Jim frowned from time to time when he caught the inquisitive glance of -some stranger. He had that dislike of being stared at, which comes on -geniuses late in life and never leaves the commonplace. Sibyl, -however, was quite unconscious of the effect she was producing. Her -love was trembling in laughter on her lips. She was thinking of Prince -Charming, and, that she might think of him all the more, she did not -talk of him, but prattled on about the ship in which Jim was going to -sail, about the gold he was certain to find, about the wonderful -heiress whose life he was to save from the wicked, red-shirted -bushrangers. For he was not to remain a sailor, or a supercargo, or -whatever he was going to be. Oh, no! A sailor's existence was -dreadful. Fancy being cooped up in a horrid ship, with the hoarse, -hump-backed waves trying to get in, and a black wind blowing the masts -down and tearing the sails into long screaming ribands! He was to -leave the vessel at Melbourne, bid a polite good-bye to the captain, -and go off at once to the gold-fields. Before a week was over he was to -come across a large nugget of pure gold, the largest nugget that had -ever been discovered, and bring it down to the coast in a waggon -guarded by six mounted policemen. The bushrangers were to attack them -three times, and be defeated with immense slaughter. Or, no. He was -not to go to the gold-fields at all. They were horrid places, where -men got intoxicated, and shot each other in bar-rooms, and used bad -language. He was to be a nice sheep-farmer, and one evening, as he was -riding home, he was to see the beautiful heiress being carried off by a -robber on a black horse, and give chase, and rescue her. Of course, -she would fall in love with him, and he with her, and they would get -married, and come home, and live in an immense house in London. Yes, -there were delightful things in store for him. But he must be very -good, and not lose his temper, or spend his money foolishly. She was -only a year older than he was, but she knew so much more of life. He -must be sure, also, to write to her by every mail, and to say his -prayers each night before he went to sleep. God was very good, and -would watch over him. She would pray for him, too, and in a few years -he would come back quite rich and happy. - -The lad listened sulkily to her and made no answer. He was heart-sick -at leaving home. - -Yet it was not this alone that made him gloomy and morose. -Inexperienced though he was, he had still a strong sense of the danger -of Sibyl's position. This young dandy who was making love to her could -mean her no good. He was a gentleman, and he hated him for that, hated -him through some curious race-instinct for which he could not account, -and which for that reason was all the more dominant within him. He was -conscious also of the shallowness and vanity of his mother's nature, -and in that saw infinite peril for Sibyl and Sibyl's happiness. -Children begin by loving their parents; as they grow older they judge -them; sometimes they forgive them. - -His mother! He had something on his mind to ask of her, something that -he had brooded on for many months of silence. A chance phrase that he -had heard at the theatre, a whispered sneer that had reached his ears -one night as he waited at the stage-door, had set loose a train of -horrible thoughts. He remembered it as if it had been the lash of a -hunting-crop across his face. His brows knit together into a wedge-like -furrow, and with a twitch of pain he bit his underlip. - -"You are not listening to a word I am saying, Jim," cried Sibyl, "and I -am making the most delightful plans for your future. Do say something." - -"What do you want me to say?" - -"Oh! that you will be a good boy and not forget us," she answered, -smiling at him. - -He shrugged his shoulders. "You are more likely to forget me than I am -to forget you, Sibyl." - -She flushed. "What do you mean, Jim?" she asked. - -"You have a new friend, I hear. Who is he? Why have you not told me -about him? He means you no good." - -"Stop, Jim!" she exclaimed. "You must not say anything against him. I -love him." - -"Why, you don't even know his name," answered the lad. "Who is he? I -have a right to know." - -"He is called Prince Charming. Don't you like the name. Oh! you silly -boy! you should never forget it. If you only saw him, you would think -him the most wonderful person in the world. Some day you will meet -him--when you come back from Australia. You will like him so much. -Everybody likes him, and I ... love him. I wish you could come to the -theatre to-night. He is going to be there, and I am to play Juliet. -Oh! how I shall play it! Fancy, Jim, to be in love and play Juliet! -To have him sitting there! To play for his delight! I am afraid I may -frighten the company, frighten or enthrall them. To be in love is to -surpass one's self. Poor dreadful Mr. Isaacs will be shouting 'genius' -to his loafers at the bar. He has preached me as a dogma; to-night he -will announce me as a revelation. I feel it. And it is all his, his -only, Prince Charming, my wonderful lover, my god of graces. But I am -poor beside him. Poor? What does that matter? When poverty creeps in -at the door, love flies in through the window. Our proverbs want -rewriting. They were made in winter, and it is summer now; spring-time -for me, I think, a very dance of blossoms in blue skies." - -"He is a gentleman," said the lad sullenly. - -"A prince!" she cried musically. "What more do you want?" - -"He wants to enslave you." - -"I shudder at the thought of being free." - -"I want you to beware of him." - -"To see him is to worship him; to know him is to trust him." - -"Sibyl, you are mad about him." - -She laughed and took his arm. "You dear old Jim, you talk as if you -were a hundred. Some day you will be in love yourself. Then you will -know what it is. Don't look so sulky. Surely you should be glad to -think that, though you are going away, you leave me happier than I have -ever been before. Life has been hard for us both, terribly hard and -difficult. But it will be different now. You are going to a new -world, and I have found one. Here are two chairs; let us sit down and -see the smart people go by." - -They took their seats amidst a crowd of watchers. The tulip-beds -across the road flamed like throbbing rings of fire. A white -dust--tremulous cloud of orris-root it seemed--hung in the panting air. -The brightly coloured parasols danced and dipped like monstrous -butterflies. - -She made her brother talk of himself, his hopes, his prospects. He -spoke slowly and with effort. They passed words to each other as -players at a game pass counters. Sibyl felt oppressed. She could not -communicate her joy. A faint smile curving that sullen mouth was all -the echo she could win. After some time she became silent. Suddenly -she caught a glimpse of golden hair and laughing lips, and in an open -carriage with two ladies Dorian Gray drove past. - -She started to her feet. "There he is!" she cried. - -"Who?" said Jim Vane. - -"Prince Charming," she answered, looking after the victoria. - -He jumped up and seized her roughly by the arm. "Show him to me. -Which is he? Point him out. I must see him!" he exclaimed; but at -that moment the Duke of Berwick's four-in-hand came between, and when -it had left the space clear, the carriage had swept out of the park. - -"He is gone," murmured Sibyl sadly. "I wish you had seen him." - -"I wish I had, for as sure as there is a God in heaven, if he ever does -you any wrong, I shall kill him." - -She looked at him in horror. He repeated his words. They cut the air -like a dagger. The people round began to gape. A lady standing close -to her tittered. - -"Come away, Jim; come away," she whispered. He followed her doggedly -as she passed through the crowd. He felt glad at what he had said. - -When they reached the Achilles Statue, she turned round. There was -pity in her eyes that became laughter on her lips. She shook her head -at him. "You are foolish, Jim, utterly foolish; a bad-tempered boy, -that is all. How can you say such horrible things? You don't know -what you are talking about. You are simply jealous and unkind. Ah! I -wish you would fall in love. Love makes people good, and what you said -was wicked." - -"I am sixteen," he answered, "and I know what I am about. Mother is no -help to you. She doesn't understand how to look after you. I wish now -that I was not going to Australia at all. I have a great mind to chuck -the whole thing up. I would, if my articles hadn't been signed." - -"Oh, don't be so serious, Jim. You are like one of the heroes of those -silly melodramas Mother used to be so fond of acting in. I am not -going to quarrel with you. I have seen him, and oh! to see him is -perfect happiness. We won't quarrel. I know you would never harm any -one I love, would you?" - -"Not as long as you love him, I suppose," was the sullen answer. - -"I shall love him for ever!" she cried. - -"And he?" - -"For ever, too!" - -"He had better." - -She shrank from him. Then she laughed and put her hand on his arm. He -was merely a boy. - -At the Marble Arch they hailed an omnibus, which left them close to -their shabby home in the Euston Road. It was after five o'clock, and -Sibyl had to lie down for a couple of hours before acting. Jim -insisted that she should do so. He said that he would sooner part with -her when their mother was not present. She would be sure to make a -scene, and he detested scenes of every kind. - -In Sybil's own room they parted. There was jealousy in the lad's -heart, and a fierce murderous hatred of the stranger who, as it seemed -to him, had come between them. Yet, when her arms were flung round his -neck, and her fingers strayed through his hair, he softened and kissed -her with real affection. There were tears in his eyes as he went -downstairs. - -His mother was waiting for him below. She grumbled at his -unpunctuality, as he entered. He made no answer, but sat down to his -meagre meal. The flies buzzed round the table and crawled over the -stained cloth. Through the rumble of omnibuses, and the clatter of -street-cabs, he could hear the droning voice devouring each minute that -was left to him. - -After some time, he thrust away his plate and put his head in his -hands. He felt that he had a right to know. It should have been told -to him before, if it was as he suspected. Leaden with fear, his mother -watched him. Words dropped mechanically from her lips. A tattered -lace handkerchief twitched in her fingers. When the clock struck six, -he got up and went to the door. Then he turned back and looked at her. -Their eyes met. In hers he saw a wild appeal for mercy. It enraged -him. - -"Mother, I have something to ask you," he said. Her eyes wandered -vaguely about the room. She made no answer. "Tell me the truth. I -have a right to know. Were you married to my father?" - -She heaved a deep sigh. It was a sigh of relief. The terrible moment, -the moment that night and day, for weeks and months, she had dreaded, -had come at last, and yet she felt no terror. Indeed, in some measure -it was a disappointment to her. The vulgar directness of the question -called for a direct answer. The situation had not been gradually led -up to. It was crude. It reminded her of a bad rehearsal. - -"No," she answered, wondering at the harsh simplicity of life. - -"My father was a scoundrel then!" cried the lad, clenching his fists. - -She shook her head. "I knew he was not free. We loved each other very -much. If he had lived, he would have made provision for us. Don't -speak against him, my son. He was your father, and a gentleman. -Indeed, he was highly connected." - -An oath broke from his lips. "I don't care for myself," he exclaimed, -"but don't let Sibyl.... It is a gentleman, isn't it, who is in love -with her, or says he is? Highly connected, too, I suppose." - -For a moment a hideous sense of humiliation came over the woman. Her -head drooped. She wiped her eyes with shaking hands. "Sibyl has a -mother," she murmured; "I had none." - -The lad was touched. He went towards her, and stooping down, he kissed -her. "I am sorry if I have pained you by asking about my father," he -said, "but I could not help it. I must go now. Good-bye. Don't forget -that you will have only one child now to look after, and believe me -that if this man wrongs my sister, I will find out who he is, track him -down, and kill him like a dog. I swear it." - -The exaggerated folly of the threat, the passionate gesture that -accompanied it, the mad melodramatic words, made life seem more vivid -to her. She was familiar with the atmosphere. She breathed more -freely, and for the first time for many months she really admired her -son. She would have liked to have continued the scene on the same -emotional scale, but he cut her short. Trunks had to be carried down -and mufflers looked for. The lodging-house drudge bustled in and out. -There was the bargaining with the cabman. The moment was lost in -vulgar details. It was with a renewed feeling of disappointment that -she waved the tattered lace handkerchief from the window, as her son -drove away. She was conscious that a great opportunity had been -wasted. She consoled herself by telling Sibyl how desolate she felt -her life would be, now that she had only one child to look after. She -remembered the phrase. It had pleased her. Of the threat she said -nothing. It was vividly and dramatically expressed. She felt that -they would all laugh at it some day. - - - -CHAPTER 6 - -"I suppose you have heard the news, Basil?" said Lord Henry that -evening as Hallward was shown into a little private room at the Bristol -where dinner had been laid for three. - -"No, Harry," answered the artist, giving his hat and coat to the bowing -waiter. "What is it? Nothing about politics, I hope! They don't -interest me. There is hardly a single person in the House of Commons -worth painting, though many of them would be the better for a little -whitewashing." - -"Dorian Gray is engaged to be married," said Lord Henry, watching him -as he spoke. - -Hallward started and then frowned. "Dorian engaged to be married!" he -cried. "Impossible!" - -"It is perfectly true." - -"To whom?" - -"To some little actress or other." - -"I can't believe it. Dorian is far too sensible." - -"Dorian is far too wise not to do foolish things now and then, my dear -Basil." - -"Marriage is hardly a thing that one can do now and then, Harry." - -"Except in America," rejoined Lord Henry languidly. "But I didn't say -he was married. I said he was engaged to be married. There is a great -difference. I have a distinct remembrance of being married, but I have -no recollection at all of being engaged. I am inclined to think that I -never was engaged." - -"But think of Dorian's birth, and position, and wealth. It would be -absurd for him to marry so much beneath him." - -"If you want to make him marry this girl, tell him that, Basil. He is -sure to do it, then. Whenever a man does a thoroughly stupid thing, it -is always from the noblest motives." - -"I hope the girl is good, Harry. I don't want to see Dorian tied to -some vile creature, who might degrade his nature and ruin his -intellect." - -"Oh, she is better than good--she is beautiful," murmured Lord Henry, -sipping a glass of vermouth and orange-bitters. "Dorian says she is -beautiful, and he is not often wrong about things of that kind. Your -portrait of him has quickened his appreciation of the personal -appearance of other people. It has had that excellent effect, amongst -others. We are to see her to-night, if that boy doesn't forget his -appointment." - -"Are you serious?" - -"Quite serious, Basil. I should be miserable if I thought I should -ever be more serious than I am at the present moment." - -"But do you approve of it, Harry?" asked the painter, walking up and -down the room and biting his lip. "You can't approve of it, possibly. -It is some silly infatuation." - -"I never approve, or disapprove, of anything now. It is an absurd -attitude to take towards life. We are not sent into the world to air -our moral prejudices. I never take any notice of what common people -say, and I never interfere with what charming people do. If a -personality fascinates me, whatever mode of expression that personality -selects is absolutely delightful to me. Dorian Gray falls in love with -a beautiful girl who acts Juliet, and proposes to marry her. Why not? -If he wedded Messalina, he would be none the less interesting. You -know I am not a champion of marriage. The real drawback to marriage is -that it makes one unselfish. And unselfish people are colourless. -They lack individuality. Still, there are certain temperaments that -marriage makes more complex. They retain their egotism, and add to it -many other egos. They are forced to have more than one life. They -become more highly organized, and to be highly organized is, I should -fancy, the object of man's existence. Besides, every experience is of -value, and whatever one may say against marriage, it is certainly an -experience. I hope that Dorian Gray will make this girl his wife, -passionately adore her for six months, and then suddenly become -fascinated by some one else. He would be a wonderful study." - -"You don't mean a single word of all that, Harry; you know you don't. -If Dorian Gray's life were spoiled, no one would be sorrier than -yourself. You are much better than you pretend to be." - -Lord Henry laughed. "The reason we all like to think so well of others -is that we are all afraid for ourselves. The basis of optimism is -sheer terror. We think that we are generous because we credit our -neighbour with the possession of those virtues that are likely to be a -benefit to us. We praise the banker that we may overdraw our account, -and find good qualities in the highwayman in the hope that he may spare -our pockets. I mean everything that I have said. I have the greatest -contempt for optimism. As for a spoiled life, no life is spoiled but -one whose growth is arrested. If you want to mar a nature, you have -merely to reform it. As for marriage, of course that would be silly, -but there are other and more interesting bonds between men and women. -I will certainly encourage them. They have the charm of being -fashionable. But here is Dorian himself. He will tell you more than I -can." - -"My dear Harry, my dear Basil, you must both congratulate me!" said the -lad, throwing off his evening cape with its satin-lined wings and -shaking each of his friends by the hand in turn. "I have never been so -happy. Of course, it is sudden--all really delightful things are. And -yet it seems to me to be the one thing I have been looking for all my -life." He was flushed with excitement and pleasure, and looked -extraordinarily handsome. - -"I hope you will always be very happy, Dorian," said Hallward, "but I -don't quite forgive you for not having let me know of your engagement. -You let Harry know." - -"And I don't forgive you for being late for dinner," broke in Lord -Henry, putting his hand on the lad's shoulder and smiling as he spoke. -"Come, let us sit down and try what the new chef here is like, and then -you will tell us how it all came about." - -"There is really not much to tell," cried Dorian as they took their -seats at the small round table. "What happened was simply this. After -I left you yesterday evening, Harry, I dressed, had some dinner at that -little Italian restaurant in Rupert Street you introduced me to, and -went down at eight o'clock to the theatre. Sibyl was playing Rosalind. -Of course, the scenery was dreadful and the Orlando absurd. But Sibyl! -You should have seen her! When she came on in her boy's clothes, she -was perfectly wonderful. She wore a moss-coloured velvet jerkin with -cinnamon sleeves, slim, brown, cross-gartered hose, a dainty little -green cap with a hawk's feather caught in a jewel, and a hooded cloak -lined with dull red. She had never seemed to me more exquisite. She -had all the delicate grace of that Tanagra figurine that you have in -your studio, Basil. Her hair clustered round her face like dark leaves -round a pale rose. As for her acting--well, you shall see her -to-night. She is simply a born artist. I sat in the dingy box -absolutely enthralled. I forgot that I was in London and in the -nineteenth century. I was away with my love in a forest that no man -had ever seen. After the performance was over, I went behind and spoke -to her. As we were sitting together, suddenly there came into her eyes -a look that I had never seen there before. My lips moved towards hers. -We kissed each other. I can't describe to you what I felt at that -moment. It seemed to me that all my life had been narrowed to one -perfect point of rose-coloured joy. She trembled all over and shook -like a white narcissus. Then she flung herself on her knees and kissed -my hands. I feel that I should not tell you all this, but I can't help -it. Of course, our engagement is a dead secret. She has not even told -her own mother. I don't know what my guardians will say. Lord Radley -is sure to be furious. I don't care. I shall be of age in less than a -year, and then I can do what I like. I have been right, Basil, haven't -I, to take my love out of poetry and to find my wife in Shakespeare's -plays? Lips that Shakespeare taught to speak have whispered their -secret in my ear. I have had the arms of Rosalind around me, and -kissed Juliet on the mouth." - -"Yes, Dorian, I suppose you were right," said Hallward slowly. - -"Have you seen her to-day?" asked Lord Henry. - -Dorian Gray shook his head. "I left her in the forest of Arden; I -shall find her in an orchard in Verona." - -Lord Henry sipped his champagne in a meditative manner. "At what -particular point did you mention the word marriage, Dorian? And what -did she say in answer? Perhaps you forgot all about it." - -"My dear Harry, I did not treat it as a business transaction, and I did -not make any formal proposal. I told her that I loved her, and she -said she was not worthy to be my wife. Not worthy! Why, the whole -world is nothing to me compared with her." - -"Women are wonderfully practical," murmured Lord Henry, "much more -practical than we are. In situations of that kind we often forget to -say anything about marriage, and they always remind us." - -Hallward laid his hand upon his arm. "Don't, Harry. You have annoyed -Dorian. He is not like other men. He would never bring misery upon -any one. His nature is too fine for that." - -Lord Henry looked across the table. "Dorian is never annoyed with me," -he answered. "I asked the question for the best reason possible, for -the only reason, indeed, that excuses one for asking any -question--simple curiosity. I have a theory that it is always the -women who propose to us, and not we who propose to the women. Except, -of course, in middle-class life. But then the middle classes are not -modern." - -Dorian Gray laughed, and tossed his head. "You are quite incorrigible, -Harry; but I don't mind. It is impossible to be angry with you. When -you see Sibyl Vane, you will feel that the man who could wrong her -would be a beast, a beast without a heart. I cannot understand how any -one can wish to shame the thing he loves. I love Sibyl Vane. I want -to place her on a pedestal of gold and to see the world worship the -woman who is mine. What is marriage? An irrevocable vow. You mock at -it for that. Ah! don't mock. It is an irrevocable vow that I want to -take. Her trust makes me faithful, her belief makes me good. When I -am with her, I regret all that you have taught me. I become different -from what you have known me to be. I am changed, and the mere touch of -Sibyl Vane's hand makes me forget you and all your wrong, fascinating, -poisonous, delightful theories." - -"And those are ...?" asked Lord Henry, helping himself to some salad. - -"Oh, your theories about life, your theories about love, your theories -about pleasure. All your theories, in fact, Harry." - -"Pleasure is the only thing worth having a theory about," he answered -in his slow melodious voice. "But I am afraid I cannot claim my theory -as my own. It belongs to Nature, not to me. Pleasure is Nature's -test, her sign of approval. When we are happy, we are always good, but -when we are good, we are not always happy." - -"Ah! but what do you mean by good?" cried Basil Hallward. - -"Yes," echoed Dorian, leaning back in his chair and looking at Lord -Henry over the heavy clusters of purple-lipped irises that stood in the -centre of the table, "what do you mean by good, Harry?" - -"To be good is to be in harmony with one's self," he replied, touching -the thin stem of his glass with his pale, fine-pointed fingers. -"Discord is to be forced to be in harmony with others. One's own -life--that is the important thing. As for the lives of one's -neighbours, if one wishes to be a prig or a Puritan, one can flaunt -one's moral views about them, but they are not one's concern. Besides, -individualism has really the higher aim. Modern morality consists in -accepting the standard of one's age. I consider that for any man of -culture to accept the standard of his age is a form of the grossest -immorality." - -"But, surely, if one lives merely for one's self, Harry, one pays a -terrible price for doing so?" suggested the painter. - -"Yes, we are overcharged for everything nowadays. I should fancy that -the real tragedy of the poor is that they can afford nothing but -self-denial. Beautiful sins, like beautiful things, are the privilege -of the rich." - -"One has to pay in other ways but money." - -"What sort of ways, Basil?" - -"Oh! I should fancy in remorse, in suffering, in ... well, in the -consciousness of degradation." - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "My dear fellow, mediaeval art is -charming, but mediaeval emotions are out of date. One can use them in -fiction, of course. But then the only things that one can use in -fiction are the things that one has ceased to use in fact. Believe me, -no civilized man ever regrets a pleasure, and no uncivilized man ever -knows what a pleasure is." - -"I know what pleasure is," cried Dorian Gray. "It is to adore some -one." - -"That is certainly better than being adored," he answered, toying with -some fruits. "Being adored is a nuisance. Women treat us just as -humanity treats its gods. They worship us, and are always bothering us -to do something for them." - -"I should have said that whatever they ask for they had first given to -us," murmured the lad gravely. "They create love in our natures. They -have a right to demand it back." - -"That is quite true, Dorian," cried Hallward. - -"Nothing is ever quite true," said Lord Henry. - -"This is," interrupted Dorian. "You must admit, Harry, that women give -to men the very gold of their lives." - -"Possibly," he sighed, "but they invariably want it back in such very -small change. That is the worry. Women, as some witty Frenchman once -put it, inspire us with the desire to do masterpieces and always -prevent us from carrying them out." - -"Harry, you are dreadful! I don't know why I like you so much." - -"You will always like me, Dorian," he replied. "Will you have some -coffee, you fellows? Waiter, bring coffee, and fine-champagne, and -some cigarettes. No, don't mind the cigarettes--I have some. Basil, I -can't allow you to smoke cigars. You must have a cigarette. A -cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, -and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want? Yes, Dorian, -you will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you -have never had the courage to commit." - -"What nonsense you talk, Harry!" cried the lad, taking a light from a -fire-breathing silver dragon that the waiter had placed on the table. -"Let us go down to the theatre. When Sibyl comes on the stage you will -have a new ideal of life. She will represent something to you that you -have never known." - -"I have known everything," said Lord Henry, with a tired look in his -eyes, "but I am always ready for a new emotion. I am afraid, however, -that, for me at any rate, there is no such thing. Still, your -wonderful girl may thrill me. I love acting. It is so much more real -than life. Let us go. Dorian, you will come with me. I am so sorry, -Basil, but there is only room for two in the brougham. You must follow -us in a hansom." - -They got up and put on their coats, sipping their coffee standing. The -painter was silent and preoccupied. There was a gloom over him. He -could not bear this marriage, and yet it seemed to him to be better -than many other things that might have happened. After a few minutes, -they all passed downstairs. He drove off by himself, as had been -arranged, and watched the flashing lights of the little brougham in -front of him. A strange sense of loss came over him. He felt that -Dorian Gray would never again be to him all that he had been in the -past. Life had come between them.... His eyes darkened, and the -crowded flaring streets became blurred to his eyes. When the cab drew -up at the theatre, it seemed to him that he had grown years older. - - - -CHAPTER 7 - -For some reason or other, the house was crowded that night, and the fat -Jew manager who met them at the door was beaming from ear to ear with -an oily tremulous smile. He escorted them to their box with a sort of -pompous humility, waving his fat jewelled hands and talking at the top -of his voice. Dorian Gray loathed him more than ever. He felt as if -he had come to look for Miranda and had been met by Caliban. Lord -Henry, upon the other hand, rather liked him. At least he declared he -did, and insisted on shaking him by the hand and assuring him that he -was proud to meet a man who had discovered a real genius and gone -bankrupt over a poet. Hallward amused himself with watching the faces -in the pit. The heat was terribly oppressive, and the huge sunlight -flamed like a monstrous dahlia with petals of yellow fire. The youths -in the gallery had taken off their coats and waistcoats and hung them -over the side. They talked to each other across the theatre and shared -their oranges with the tawdry girls who sat beside them. Some women -were laughing in the pit. Their voices were horribly shrill and -discordant. The sound of the popping of corks came from the bar. - -"What a place to find one's divinity in!" said Lord Henry. - -"Yes!" answered Dorian Gray. "It was here I found her, and she is -divine beyond all living things. When she acts, you will forget -everything. These common rough people, with their coarse faces and -brutal gestures, become quite different when she is on the stage. They -sit silently and watch her. They weep and laugh as she wills them to -do. She makes them as responsive as a violin. She spiritualizes them, -and one feels that they are of the same flesh and blood as one's self." - -"The same flesh and blood as one's self! Oh, I hope not!" exclaimed -Lord Henry, who was scanning the occupants of the gallery through his -opera-glass. - -"Don't pay any attention to him, Dorian," said the painter. "I -understand what you mean, and I believe in this girl. Any one you love -must be marvellous, and any girl who has the effect you describe must -be fine and noble. To spiritualize one's age--that is something worth -doing. If this girl can give a soul to those who have lived without -one, if she can create the sense of beauty in people whose lives have -been sordid and ugly, if she can strip them of their selfishness and -lend them tears for sorrows that are not their own, she is worthy of -all your adoration, worthy of the adoration of the world. This -marriage is quite right. I did not think so at first, but I admit it -now. The gods made Sibyl Vane for you. Without her you would have -been incomplete." - -"Thanks, Basil," answered Dorian Gray, pressing his hand. "I knew that -you would understand me. Harry is so cynical, he terrifies me. But -here is the orchestra. It is quite dreadful, but it only lasts for -about five minutes. Then the curtain rises, and you will see the girl -to whom I am going to give all my life, to whom I have given everything -that is good in me." - -A quarter of an hour afterwards, amidst an extraordinary turmoil of -applause, Sibyl Vane stepped on to the stage. Yes, she was certainly -lovely to look at--one of the loveliest creatures, Lord Henry thought, -that he had ever seen. There was something of the fawn in her shy -grace and startled eyes. A faint blush, like the shadow of a rose in a -mirror of silver, came to her cheeks as she glanced at the crowded -enthusiastic house. She stepped back a few paces and her lips seemed -to tremble. Basil Hallward leaped to his feet and began to applaud. -Motionless, and as one in a dream, sat Dorian Gray, gazing at her. -Lord Henry peered through his glasses, murmuring, "Charming! charming!" - -The scene was the hall of Capulet's house, and Romeo in his pilgrim's -dress had entered with Mercutio and his other friends. The band, such -as it was, struck up a few bars of music, and the dance began. Through -the crowd of ungainly, shabbily dressed actors, Sibyl Vane moved like a -creature from a finer world. Her body swayed, while she danced, as a -plant sways in the water. The curves of her throat were the curves of -a white lily. Her hands seemed to be made of cool ivory. - -Yet she was curiously listless. She showed no sign of joy when her -eyes rested on Romeo. The few words she had to speak-- - - Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, - Which mannerly devotion shows in this; - For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch, - And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss-- - -with the brief dialogue that follows, were spoken in a thoroughly -artificial manner. The voice was exquisite, but from the point of view -of tone it was absolutely false. It was wrong in colour. It took away -all the life from the verse. It made the passion unreal. - -Dorian Gray grew pale as he watched her. He was puzzled and anxious. -Neither of his friends dared to say anything to him. She seemed to -them to be absolutely incompetent. They were horribly disappointed. - -Yet they felt that the true test of any Juliet is the balcony scene of -the second act. They waited for that. If she failed there, there was -nothing in her. - -She looked charming as she came out in the moonlight. That could not -be denied. But the staginess of her acting was unbearable, and grew -worse as she went on. Her gestures became absurdly artificial. She -overemphasized everything that she had to say. The beautiful passage-- - - Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face, - Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek - For that which thou hast heard me speak to-night-- - -was declaimed with the painful precision of a schoolgirl who has been -taught to recite by some second-rate professor of elocution. When she -leaned over the balcony and came to those wonderful lines-- - - Although I joy in thee, - I have no joy of this contract to-night: - It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden; - Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be - Ere one can say, "It lightens." Sweet, good-night! - This bud of love by summer's ripening breath - May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet-- - -she spoke the words as though they conveyed no meaning to her. It was -not nervousness. Indeed, so far from being nervous, she was absolutely -self-contained. It was simply bad art. She was a complete failure. - -Even the common uneducated audience of the pit and gallery lost their -interest in the play. They got restless, and began to talk loudly and -to whistle. The Jew manager, who was standing at the back of the -dress-circle, stamped and swore with rage. The only person unmoved was -the girl herself. - -When the second act was over, there came a storm of hisses, and Lord -Henry got up from his chair and put on his coat. "She is quite -beautiful, Dorian," he said, "but she can't act. Let us go." - -"I am going to see the play through," answered the lad, in a hard -bitter voice. "I am awfully sorry that I have made you waste an -evening, Harry. I apologize to you both." - -"My dear Dorian, I should think Miss Vane was ill," interrupted -Hallward. "We will come some other night." - -"I wish she were ill," he rejoined. "But she seems to me to be simply -callous and cold. She has entirely altered. Last night she was a -great artist. This evening she is merely a commonplace mediocre -actress." - -"Don't talk like that about any one you love, Dorian. Love is a more -wonderful thing than art." - -"They are both simply forms of imitation," remarked Lord Henry. "But -do let us go. Dorian, you must not stay here any longer. It is not -good for one's morals to see bad acting. Besides, I don't suppose you -will want your wife to act, so what does it matter if she plays Juliet -like a wooden doll? She is very lovely, and if she knows as little -about life as she does about acting, she will be a delightful -experience. There are only two kinds of people who are really -fascinating--people who know absolutely everything, and people who know -absolutely nothing. Good heavens, my dear boy, don't look so tragic! -The secret of remaining young is never to have an emotion that is -unbecoming. Come to the club with Basil and myself. We will smoke -cigarettes and drink to the beauty of Sibyl Vane. She is beautiful. -What more can you want?" - -"Go away, Harry," cried the lad. "I want to be alone. Basil, you must -go. Ah! can't you see that my heart is breaking?" The hot tears came -to his eyes. His lips trembled, and rushing to the back of the box, he -leaned up against the wall, hiding his face in his hands. - -"Let us go, Basil," said Lord Henry with a strange tenderness in his -voice, and the two young men passed out together. - -A few moments afterwards the footlights flared up and the curtain rose -on the third act. Dorian Gray went back to his seat. He looked pale, -and proud, and indifferent. The play dragged on, and seemed -interminable. Half of the audience went out, tramping in heavy boots -and laughing. The whole thing was a fiasco. The last act was played -to almost empty benches. The curtain went down on a titter and some -groans. - -As soon as it was over, Dorian Gray rushed behind the scenes into the -greenroom. The girl was standing there alone, with a look of triumph -on her face. Her eyes were lit with an exquisite fire. There was a -radiance about her. Her parted lips were smiling over some secret of -their own. - -When he entered, she looked at him, and an expression of infinite joy -came over her. "How badly I acted to-night, Dorian!" she cried. - -"Horribly!" he answered, gazing at her in amazement. "Horribly! It -was dreadful. Are you ill? You have no idea what it was. You have no -idea what I suffered." - -The girl smiled. "Dorian," she answered, lingering over his name with -long-drawn music in her voice, as though it were sweeter than honey to -the red petals of her mouth. "Dorian, you should have understood. But -you understand now, don't you?" - -"Understand what?" he asked, angrily. - -"Why I was so bad to-night. Why I shall always be bad. Why I shall -never act well again." - -He shrugged his shoulders. "You are ill, I suppose. When you are ill -you shouldn't act. You make yourself ridiculous. My friends were -bored. I was bored." - -She seemed not to listen to him. She was transfigured with joy. An -ecstasy of happiness dominated her. - -"Dorian, Dorian," she cried, "before I knew you, acting was the one -reality of my life. It was only in the theatre that I lived. I -thought that it was all true. I was Rosalind one night and Portia the -other. The joy of Beatrice was my joy, and the sorrows of Cordelia -were mine also. I believed in everything. The common people who acted -with me seemed to me to be godlike. The painted scenes were my world. -I knew nothing but shadows, and I thought them real. You came--oh, my -beautiful love!--and you freed my soul from prison. You taught me what -reality really is. To-night, for the first time in my life, I saw -through the hollowness, the sham, the silliness of the empty pageant in -which I had always played. To-night, for the first time, I became -conscious that the Romeo was hideous, and old, and painted, that the -moonlight in the orchard was false, that the scenery was vulgar, and -that the words I had to speak were unreal, were not my words, were not -what I wanted to say. You had brought me something higher, something -of which all art is but a reflection. You had made me understand what -love really is. My love! My love! Prince Charming! Prince of life! -I have grown sick of shadows. You are more to me than all art can ever -be. What have I to do with the puppets of a play? When I came on -to-night, I could not understand how it was that everything had gone -from me. I thought that I was going to be wonderful. I found that I -could do nothing. Suddenly it dawned on my soul what it all meant. -The knowledge was exquisite to me. I heard them hissing, and I smiled. -What could they know of love such as ours? Take me away, Dorian--take -me away with you, where we can be quite alone. I hate the stage. I -might mimic a passion that I do not feel, but I cannot mimic one that -burns me like fire. Oh, Dorian, Dorian, you understand now what it -signifies? Even if I could do it, it would be profanation for me to -play at being in love. You have made me see that." - -He flung himself down on the sofa and turned away his face. "You have -killed my love," he muttered. - -She looked at him in wonder and laughed. He made no answer. She came -across to him, and with her little fingers stroked his hair. She knelt -down and pressed his hands to her lips. He drew them away, and a -shudder ran through him. - -Then he leaped up and went to the door. "Yes," he cried, "you have -killed my love. You used to stir my imagination. Now you don't even -stir my curiosity. You simply produce no effect. I loved you because -you were marvellous, because you had genius and intellect, because you -realized the dreams of great poets and gave shape and substance to the -shadows of art. You have thrown it all away. You are shallow and -stupid. My God! how mad I was to love you! What a fool I have been! -You are nothing to me now. I will never see you again. I will never -think of you. I will never mention your name. You don't know what you -were to me, once. Why, once ... Oh, I can't bear to think of it! I -wish I had never laid eyes upon you! You have spoiled the romance of -my life. How little you can know of love, if you say it mars your art! -Without your art, you are nothing. I would have made you famous, -splendid, magnificent. The world would have worshipped you, and you -would have borne my name. What are you now? A third-rate actress with -a pretty face." - -The girl grew white, and trembled. She clenched her hands together, -and her voice seemed to catch in her throat. "You are not serious, -Dorian?" she murmured. "You are acting." - -"Acting! I leave that to you. You do it so well," he answered -bitterly. - -She rose from her knees and, with a piteous expression of pain in her -face, came across the room to him. She put her hand upon his arm and -looked into his eyes. He thrust her back. "Don't touch me!" he cried. - -A low moan broke from her, and she flung herself at his feet and lay -there like a trampled flower. "Dorian, Dorian, don't leave me!" she -whispered. "I am so sorry I didn't act well. I was thinking of you -all the time. But I will try--indeed, I will try. It came so suddenly -across me, my love for you. I think I should never have known it if -you had not kissed me--if we had not kissed each other. Kiss me again, -my love. Don't go away from me. I couldn't bear it. Oh! don't go -away from me. My brother ... No; never mind. He didn't mean it. He -was in jest.... But you, oh! can't you forgive me for to-night? I will -work so hard and try to improve. Don't be cruel to me, because I love -you better than anything in the world. After all, it is only once that -I have not pleased you. But you are quite right, Dorian. I should -have shown myself more of an artist. It was foolish of me, and yet I -couldn't help it. Oh, don't leave me, don't leave me." A fit of -passionate sobbing choked her. She crouched on the floor like a -wounded thing, and Dorian Gray, with his beautiful eyes, looked down at -her, and his chiselled lips curled in exquisite disdain. There is -always something ridiculous about the emotions of people whom one has -ceased to love. Sibyl Vane seemed to him to be absurdly melodramatic. -Her tears and sobs annoyed him. - -"I am going," he said at last in his calm clear voice. "I don't wish -to be unkind, but I can't see you again. You have disappointed me." - -She wept silently, and made no answer, but crept nearer. Her little -hands stretched blindly out, and appeared to be seeking for him. He -turned on his heel and left the room. In a few moments he was out of -the theatre. - -Where he went to he hardly knew. He remembered wandering through dimly -lit streets, past gaunt, black-shadowed archways and evil-looking -houses. Women with hoarse voices and harsh laughter had called after -him. Drunkards had reeled by, cursing and chattering to themselves -like monstrous apes. He had seen grotesque children huddled upon -door-steps, and heard shrieks and oaths from gloomy courts. - -As the dawn was just breaking, he found himself close to Covent Garden. -The darkness lifted, and, flushed with faint fires, the sky hollowed -itself into a perfect pearl. Huge carts filled with nodding lilies -rumbled slowly down the polished empty street. The air was heavy with -the perfume of the flowers, and their beauty seemed to bring him an -anodyne for his pain. He followed into the market and watched the men -unloading their waggons. A white-smocked carter offered him some -cherries. He thanked him, wondered why he refused to accept any money -for them, and began to eat them listlessly. They had been plucked at -midnight, and the coldness of the moon had entered into them. A long -line of boys carrying crates of striped tulips, and of yellow and red -roses, defiled in front of him, threading their way through the huge, -jade-green piles of vegetables. Under the portico, with its grey, -sun-bleached pillars, loitered a troop of draggled bareheaded girls, -waiting for the auction to be over. Others crowded round the swinging -doors of the coffee-house in the piazza. The heavy cart-horses slipped -and stamped upon the rough stones, shaking their bells and trappings. -Some of the drivers were lying asleep on a pile of sacks. Iris-necked -and pink-footed, the pigeons ran about picking up seeds. - -After a little while, he hailed a hansom and drove home. For a few -moments he loitered upon the doorstep, looking round at the silent -square, with its blank, close-shuttered windows and its staring blinds. -The sky was pure opal now, and the roofs of the houses glistened like -silver against it. From some chimney opposite a thin wreath of smoke -was rising. It curled, a violet riband, through the nacre-coloured air. - -In the huge gilt Venetian lantern, spoil of some Doge's barge, that -hung from the ceiling of the great, oak-panelled hall of entrance, -lights were still burning from three flickering jets: thin blue petals -of flame they seemed, rimmed with white fire. He turned them out and, -having thrown his hat and cape on the table, passed through the library -towards the door of his bedroom, a large octagonal chamber on the -ground floor that, in his new-born feeling for luxury, he had just had -decorated for himself and hung with some curious Renaissance tapestries -that had been discovered stored in a disused attic at Selby Royal. As -he was turning the handle of the door, his eye fell upon the portrait -Basil Hallward had painted of him. He started back as if in surprise. -Then he went on into his own room, looking somewhat puzzled. After he -had taken the button-hole out of his coat, he seemed to hesitate. -Finally, he came back, went over to the picture, and examined it. In -the dim arrested light that struggled through the cream-coloured silk -blinds, the face appeared to him to be a little changed. The -expression looked different. One would have said that there was a -touch of cruelty in the mouth. It was certainly strange. - -He turned round and, walking to the window, drew up the blind. The -bright dawn flooded the room and swept the fantastic shadows into dusky -corners, where they lay shuddering. But the strange expression that he -had noticed in the face of the portrait seemed to linger there, to be -more intensified even. The quivering ardent sunlight showed him the -lines of cruelty round the mouth as clearly as if he had been looking -into a mirror after he had done some dreadful thing. - -He winced and, taking up from the table an oval glass framed in ivory -Cupids, one of Lord Henry's many presents to him, glanced hurriedly -into its polished depths. No line like that warped his red lips. What -did it mean? - -He rubbed his eyes, and came close to the picture, and examined it -again. There were no signs of any change when he looked into the -actual painting, and yet there was no doubt that the whole expression -had altered. It was not a mere fancy of his own. The thing was -horribly apparent. - -He threw himself into a chair and began to think. Suddenly there -flashed across his mind what he had said in Basil Hallward's studio the -day the picture had been finished. Yes, he remembered it perfectly. -He had uttered a mad wish that he himself might remain young, and the -portrait grow old; that his own beauty might be untarnished, and the -face on the canvas bear the burden of his passions and his sins; that -the painted image might be seared with the lines of suffering and -thought, and that he might keep all the delicate bloom and loveliness -of his then just conscious boyhood. Surely his wish had not been -fulfilled? Such things were impossible. It seemed monstrous even to -think of them. And, yet, there was the picture before him, with the -touch of cruelty in the mouth. - -Cruelty! Had he been cruel? It was the girl's fault, not his. He had -dreamed of her as a great artist, had given his love to her because he -had thought her great. Then she had disappointed him. She had been -shallow and unworthy. And, yet, a feeling of infinite regret came over -him, as he thought of her lying at his feet sobbing like a little -child. He remembered with what callousness he had watched her. Why -had he been made like that? Why had such a soul been given to him? -But he had suffered also. During the three terrible hours that the -play had lasted, he had lived centuries of pain, aeon upon aeon of -torture. His life was well worth hers. She had marred him for a -moment, if he had wounded her for an age. Besides, women were better -suited to bear sorrow than men. They lived on their emotions. They -only thought of their emotions. When they took lovers, it was merely -to have some one with whom they could have scenes. Lord Henry had told -him that, and Lord Henry knew what women were. 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. - -Yet it was watching him, with its beautiful marred face and its cruel -smile. Its bright hair gleamed in the early sunlight. Its blue eyes -met his own. A sense of infinite pity, not for himself, but for the -painted image of himself, came over him. It had altered already, and -would alter more. Its gold would wither into grey. Its red and white -roses would die. For every sin that he committed, a stain would fleck -and wreck its fairness. But he would not sin. The picture, changed or -unchanged, would be to him the visible emblem of conscience. He would -resist temptation. He would not see Lord Henry any more--would not, at -any rate, listen to those subtle poisonous theories that in Basil -Hallward's garden had first stirred within him the passion for -impossible things. He would go back to Sibyl Vane, make her amends, -marry her, try to love her again. Yes, it was his duty to do so. She -must have suffered more than he had. Poor child! He had been selfish -and cruel to her. The fascination that she had exercised over him -would return. They would be happy together. His life with her would -be beautiful and pure. - -He got up from his chair and drew a large screen right in front of the -portrait, shuddering as he glanced at it. "How horrible!" he murmured -to himself, and he walked across to the window and opened it. When he -stepped out on to the grass, he drew a deep breath. The fresh morning -air seemed to drive away all his sombre passions. He thought only of -Sibyl. A faint echo of his love came back to him. He repeated her -name over and over again. The birds that were singing in the -dew-drenched garden seemed to be telling the flowers about her. - - - -CHAPTER 8 - -It was long past noon when he awoke. His valet had crept several times -on tiptoe into the room to see if he was stirring, and had wondered -what made his young master sleep so late. Finally his bell sounded, -and Victor came in softly with a cup of tea, and a pile of letters, on -a small tray of old Sevres china, and drew back the olive-satin -curtains, with their shimmering blue lining, that hung in front of the -three tall windows. - -"Monsieur has well slept this morning," he said, smiling. - -"What o'clock is it, Victor?" asked Dorian Gray drowsily. - -"One hour and a quarter, Monsieur." - -How late it was! He sat up, and having sipped some tea, turned over -his letters. One of them was from Lord Henry, and had been brought by -hand that morning. He hesitated for a moment, and then put it aside. -The others he opened listlessly. They contained the usual collection -of cards, invitations to dinner, tickets for private views, programmes -of charity concerts, and the like that are showered on fashionable -young men every morning during the season. There was a rather heavy -bill for a chased silver Louis-Quinze toilet-set that he had not yet -had the courage to send on to his guardians, who were extremely -old-fashioned people and did not realize that we live in an age when -unnecessary things are our only necessities; and there were several -very courteously worded communications from Jermyn Street money-lenders -offering to advance any sum of money at a moment's notice and at the -most reasonable rates of interest. - -After about ten minutes he got up, and throwing on an elaborate -dressing-gown of silk-embroidered cashmere wool, passed into the -onyx-paved bathroom. The cool water refreshed him after his long -sleep. He seemed to have forgotten all that he had gone through. A -dim sense of having taken part in some strange tragedy came to him once -or twice, but there was the unreality of a dream about it. - -As soon as he was dressed, he went into the library and sat down to a -light French breakfast that had been laid out for him on a small round -table close to the open window. It was an exquisite day. The warm air -seemed laden with spices. A bee flew in and buzzed round the -blue-dragon bowl that, filled with sulphur-yellow roses, stood before -him. He felt perfectly happy. - -Suddenly his eye fell on the screen that he had placed in front of the -portrait, and he started. - -"Too cold for Monsieur?" asked his valet, putting an omelette on the -table. "I shut the window?" - -Dorian shook his head. "I am not cold," he murmured. - -Was it all true? Had the portrait really changed? Or had it been -simply his own imagination that had made him see a look of evil where -there had been a look of joy? Surely a painted canvas could not alter? -The thing was absurd. It would serve as a tale to tell Basil some day. -It would make him smile. - -And, yet, how vivid was his recollection of the whole thing! First in -the dim twilight, and then in the bright dawn, he had seen the touch of -cruelty round the warped lips. He almost dreaded his valet leaving the -room. He knew that when he was alone he would have to examine the -portrait. He was afraid of certainty. When the coffee and cigarettes -had been brought and the man turned to go, he felt a wild desire to -tell him to remain. As the door was closing behind him, he called him -back. The man stood waiting for his orders. Dorian looked at him for -a moment. "I am not at home to any one, Victor," he said with a sigh. -The man bowed and retired. - -Then he rose from the table, lit a cigarette, and flung himself down on -a luxuriously cushioned couch that stood facing the screen. The screen -was an old one, of gilt Spanish leather, stamped and wrought with a -rather florid Louis-Quatorze pattern. He scanned it curiously, -wondering if ever before it had concealed the secret of a man's life. - -Should he move it aside, after all? Why not let it stay there? What -was the use of knowing? If the thing was true, it was terrible. If it -was not true, why trouble about it? But what if, by some fate or -deadlier chance, eyes other than his spied behind and saw the horrible -change? What should he do if Basil Hallward came and asked to look at -his own picture? Basil would be sure to do that. No; the thing had to -be examined, and at once. Anything would be better than this dreadful -state of doubt. - -He got up and locked both doors. At least he would be alone when he -looked upon the mask of his shame. Then he drew the screen aside and -saw himself face to face. It was perfectly true. The portrait had -altered. - -As he often remembered afterwards, and always with no small wonder, he -found himself at first gazing at the portrait with a feeling of almost -scientific interest. That such a change should have taken place was -incredible to him. And yet it was a fact. Was there some subtle -affinity between the chemical atoms that shaped themselves into form -and colour on the canvas and the soul that was within him? Could it be -that what that soul thought, they realized?--that what it dreamed, they -made true? Or was there some other, more terrible reason? He -shuddered, and felt afraid, and, going back to the couch, lay there, -gazing at the picture in sickened horror. - -One thing, however, he felt that it had done for him. It had made him -conscious how unjust, how cruel, he had been to Sibyl Vane. It was not -too late to make reparation for that. She could still be his wife. -His unreal and selfish love would yield to some higher influence, would -be transformed into some nobler passion, and the portrait that Basil -Hallward had painted of him would be a guide to him through life, would -be to him what holiness is to some, and conscience to others, and the -fear of God to us all. There were opiates for remorse, drugs that -could lull the moral sense to sleep. But here was a visible symbol of -the degradation of sin. Here was an ever-present sign of the ruin men -brought upon their souls. - -Three o'clock struck, and four, and the half-hour rang its double -chime, but Dorian Gray did not stir. He was trying to gather up the -scarlet threads of life and to weave them into a pattern; to find his -way through the sanguine labyrinth of passion through which he was -wandering. He did not know what to do, or what to think. Finally, he -went over to the table and wrote a passionate letter to the girl he had -loved, imploring her forgiveness and accusing himself of madness. He -covered page after page with wild words of sorrow and wilder words of -pain. There is a luxury in self-reproach. When we blame ourselves, we -feel that no one else has a right to blame us. It is the confession, -not the priest, that gives us absolution. When Dorian had finished the -letter, he felt that he had been forgiven. - -Suddenly there came a knock to the door, and he heard Lord Henry's -voice outside. "My dear boy, I must see you. Let me in at once. I -can't bear your shutting yourself up like this." - -He made no answer at first, but remained quite still. The knocking -still continued and grew louder. Yes, it was better to let Lord Henry -in, and to explain to him the new life he was going to lead, to quarrel -with him if it became necessary to quarrel, to part if parting was -inevitable. He jumped up, drew the screen hastily across the picture, -and unlocked the door. - -"I am so sorry for it all, Dorian," said Lord Henry as he entered. -"But you must not think too much about it." - -"Do you mean about Sibyl Vane?" asked the lad. - -"Yes, of course," answered Lord Henry, sinking into a chair and slowly -pulling off his yellow gloves. "It is dreadful, from one point of -view, but it was not your fault. Tell me, did you go behind and see -her, after the play was over?" - -"Yes." - -"I felt sure you had. Did you make a scene with her?" - -"I was brutal, Harry--perfectly brutal. But it is all right now. I am -not sorry for anything that has happened. It has taught me to know -myself better." - -"Ah, Dorian, I am so glad you take it in that way! I was afraid I -would find you plunged in remorse and tearing that nice curly hair of -yours." - -"I have got through all that," said Dorian, shaking his head and -smiling. "I am perfectly happy now. I know what conscience is, to -begin with. It is not what you told me it was. It is the divinest -thing in us. Don't sneer at it, Harry, any more--at least not before -me. I want to be good. I can't bear the idea of my soul being -hideous." - -"A very charming artistic basis for ethics, Dorian! I congratulate you -on it. But how are you going to begin?" - -"By marrying Sibyl Vane." - -"Marrying Sibyl Vane!" cried Lord Henry, standing up and looking at him -in perplexed amazement. "But, my dear Dorian--" - -"Yes, Harry, I know what you are going to say. Something dreadful -about marriage. Don't say it. Don't ever say things of that kind to -me again. Two days ago I asked Sibyl to marry me. I am not going to -break my word to her. She is to be my wife." - -"Your wife! Dorian! ... Didn't you get my letter? I wrote to you this -morning, and sent the note down by my own man." - -"Your letter? Oh, yes, I remember. I have not read it yet, Harry. I -was afraid there might be something in it that I wouldn't like. You -cut life to pieces with your epigrams." - -"You know nothing then?" - -"What do you mean?" - -Lord Henry walked across the room, and sitting down by Dorian Gray, -took both his hands in his own and held them tightly. "Dorian," he -said, "my letter--don't be frightened--was to tell you that Sibyl Vane -is dead." - -A cry of pain broke from the lad's lips, and he leaped to his feet, -tearing his hands away from Lord Henry's grasp. "Dead! Sibyl dead! -It is not true! It is a horrible lie! How dare you say it?" - -"It is quite true, Dorian," said Lord Henry, gravely. "It is in all -the morning papers. I wrote down to you to ask you not to see any one -till I came. There will have to be an inquest, of course, and you must -not be mixed up in it. Things like that make a man fashionable in -Paris. But in London people are so prejudiced. Here, one should never -make one's debut with a scandal. One should reserve that to give an -interest to one's old age. I suppose they don't know your name at the -theatre? If they don't, it is all right. Did any one see you going -round to her room? That is an important point." - -Dorian did not answer for a few moments. He was dazed with horror. -Finally he stammered, in a stifled voice, "Harry, did you say an -inquest? What did you mean by that? Did Sibyl--? Oh, Harry, I can't -bear it! But be quick. Tell me everything at once." - -"I have no doubt it was not an accident, Dorian, though it must be put -in that way to the public. It seems that as she was leaving the -theatre with her mother, about half-past twelve or so, she said she had -forgotten something upstairs. They waited some time for her, but she -did not come down again. They ultimately found her lying dead on the -floor of her dressing-room. She had swallowed something by mistake, -some dreadful thing they use at theatres. I don't know what it was, -but it had either prussic acid or white lead in it. I should fancy it -was prussic acid, as she seems to have died instantaneously." - -"Harry, Harry, it is terrible!" cried the lad. - -"Yes; it is very tragic, of course, but you must not get yourself mixed -up in it. I see by The Standard that she was seventeen. I should have -thought she was almost younger than that. She looked such a child, and -seemed to know so little about acting. Dorian, you mustn't let this -thing get on your nerves. You must come and dine with me, and -afterwards we will look in at the opera. It is a Patti night, and -everybody will be there. You can come to my sister's box. She has got -some smart women with her." - -"So I have murdered Sibyl Vane," said Dorian Gray, half to himself, -"murdered her as surely as if I had cut her little throat with a knife. -Yet the roses are not less lovely for all that. The birds sing just as -happily in my garden. And to-night I am to dine with you, and then go -on to the opera, and sup somewhere, I suppose, afterwards. How -extraordinarily dramatic life is! If I had read all this in a book, -Harry, I think I would have wept over it. Somehow, now that it has -happened actually, and to me, it seems far too wonderful for tears. -Here is the first passionate love-letter I have ever written in my -life. Strange, that my first passionate love-letter should have been -addressed to a dead girl. Can they feel, I wonder, those white silent -people we call the dead? Sibyl! Can she feel, or know, or listen? -Oh, Harry, how I loved her once! It seems years ago to me now. She -was everything to me. Then came that dreadful night--was it really -only last night?--when she played so badly, and my heart almost broke. -She explained it all to me. It was terribly pathetic. But I was not -moved a bit. I thought her shallow. Suddenly something happened that -made me afraid. I can't tell you what it was, but it was terrible. I -said I would go back to her. I felt I had done wrong. And now she is -dead. My God! My God! Harry, what shall I do? You don't know the -danger I am in, and there is nothing to keep me straight. She would -have done that for me. She had no right to kill herself. It was -selfish of her." - -"My dear Dorian," answered Lord Henry, taking a cigarette from his case -and producing a gold-latten matchbox, "the only way a woman can ever -reform a man is by boring him so completely that he loses all possible -interest in life. If you had married this girl, you would have been -wretched. Of course, you would have treated her kindly. One can -always be kind to people about whom one cares nothing. But she would -have soon found out that you were absolutely indifferent to her. And -when a woman finds that out about her husband, she either becomes -dreadfully dowdy, or wears very smart bonnets that some other woman's -husband has to pay for. I say nothing about the social mistake, which -would have been abject--which, of course, I would not have allowed--but -I assure you that in any case the whole thing would have been an -absolute failure." - -"I suppose it would," muttered the lad, walking up and down the room -and looking horribly pale. "But I thought it was my duty. It is not -my fault that this terrible tragedy has prevented my doing what was -right. I remember your saying once that there is a fatality about good -resolutions--that they are always made too late. Mine certainly were." - -"Good resolutions are useless attempts to interfere with scientific -laws. Their origin is pure vanity. Their result is absolutely nil. -They give us, now and then, some of those luxurious sterile emotions -that have a certain charm for the weak. That is all that can be said -for them. They are simply cheques that men draw on a bank where they -have no account." - -"Harry," cried Dorian Gray, coming over and sitting down beside him, -"why is it that I cannot feel this tragedy as much as I want to? I -don't think I am heartless. Do you?" - -"You have done too many foolish things during the last fortnight to be -entitled to give yourself that name, Dorian," answered Lord Henry with -his sweet melancholy smile. - -The lad frowned. "I don't like that explanation, Harry," he rejoined, -"but I am glad you don't think I am heartless. I am nothing of the -kind. I know I am not. And yet I must admit that this thing that has -happened does not affect me as it should. It seems to me to be simply -like a wonderful ending to a wonderful play. It has all the terrible -beauty of a Greek tragedy, a tragedy in which I took a great part, but -by which I have not been wounded." - -"It is an interesting question," said Lord Henry, who found an -exquisite pleasure in playing on the lad's unconscious egotism, "an -extremely interesting question. I fancy that the true explanation is -this: It often happens that the real tragedies of life occur in such -an inartistic manner that they hurt us by their crude violence, their -absolute incoherence, their absurd want of meaning, their entire lack -of style. They affect us just as vulgarity affects us. They give us -an impression of sheer brute force, and we revolt against that. -Sometimes, however, a tragedy that possesses artistic elements of -beauty crosses our lives. If these elements of beauty are real, the -whole thing simply appeals to our sense of dramatic effect. Suddenly -we find that we are no longer the actors, but the spectators of the -play. Or rather we are both. We watch ourselves, and the mere wonder -of the spectacle enthralls us. In the present case, what is it that -has really happened? Some one has killed herself for love of you. I -wish that I had ever had such an experience. It would have made me in -love with love for the rest of my life. The people who have adored -me--there have not been very many, but there have been some--have -always insisted on living on, long after I had ceased to care for them, -or they to care for me. They have become stout and tedious, and when I -meet them, they go in at once for reminiscences. That awful memory of -woman! What a fearful thing it is! And what an utter intellectual -stagnation it reveals! One should absorb the colour of life, but one -should never remember its details. Details are always vulgar." - -"I must sow poppies in my garden," sighed Dorian. - -"There is no necessity," rejoined his companion. "Life has always -poppies in her hands. Of course, now and then things linger. I once -wore nothing but violets all through one season, as a form of artistic -mourning for a romance that would not die. Ultimately, however, it did -die. I forget what killed it. I think it was her proposing to -sacrifice the whole world for me. That is always a dreadful moment. -It fills one with the terror of eternity. Well--would you believe -it?--a week ago, at Lady Hampshire's, I found myself seated at dinner -next the lady in question, and she insisted on going over the whole -thing again, and digging up the past, and raking up the future. I had -buried my romance in a bed of asphodel. She dragged it out again and -assured me that I had spoiled her life. I am bound to state that she -ate an enormous dinner, so I did not feel any anxiety. But what a lack -of taste she showed! The one charm of the past is that it is the past. -But women never know when the curtain has fallen. They always want a -sixth act, and as soon as the interest of the play is entirely over, -they propose to continue it. If they were allowed their own way, every -comedy would have a tragic ending, and every tragedy would culminate in -a farce. They are charmingly artificial, but they have no sense of -art. You are more fortunate than I am. I assure you, Dorian, that not -one of the women I have known would have done for me what Sibyl Vane -did for you. Ordinary women always console themselves. Some of them -do it by going in for sentimental colours. Never trust a woman who -wears mauve, whatever her age may be, or a woman over thirty-five who -is fond of pink ribbons. It always means that they have a history. -Others find a great consolation in suddenly discovering the good -qualities of their husbands. They flaunt their conjugal felicity in -one's face, as if it were the most fascinating of sins. Religion -consoles some. Its mysteries have all the charm of a flirtation, a -woman once told me, and I can quite understand it. Besides, nothing -makes one so vain as being told that one is a sinner. Conscience makes -egotists of us all. Yes; there is really no end to the consolations -that women find in modern life. Indeed, I have not mentioned the most -important one." - -"What is that, Harry?" said the lad listlessly. - -"Oh, the obvious consolation. Taking some one else's admirer when one -loses one's own. In good society that always whitewashes a woman. But -really, Dorian, how different Sibyl Vane must have been from all the -women one meets! There is something to me quite beautiful about her -death. I am glad I am living in a century when such wonders happen. -They make one believe in the reality of the things we all play with, -such as romance, passion, and love." - -"I was terribly cruel to her. You forget that." - -"I am afraid that women appreciate cruelty, downright cruelty, more -than anything else. They have wonderfully primitive instincts. We -have emancipated them, but they remain slaves looking for their -masters, all the same. They love being dominated. I am sure you were -splendid. I have never seen you really and absolutely angry, but I can -fancy how delightful you looked. And, after all, you said something to -me the day before yesterday that seemed to me at the time to be merely -fanciful, but that I see now was absolutely true, and it holds the key -to everything." - -"What was that, Harry?" - -"You said to me that Sibyl Vane represented to you all the heroines of -romance--that she was Desdemona one night, and Ophelia the other; that -if she died as Juliet, she came to life as Imogen." - -"She will never come to life again now," muttered the lad, burying his -face in his hands. - -"No, she will never come to life. She has played her last part. But -you must think of that lonely death in the tawdry dressing-room simply -as a strange lurid fragment from some Jacobean tragedy, as a wonderful -scene from Webster, or Ford, or Cyril Tourneur. The girl never really -lived, and so she has never really died. To you at least she was -always a dream, a phantom that flitted through Shakespeare's plays and -left them lovelier for its presence, a reed through which Shakespeare's -music sounded richer and more full of joy. The moment she touched -actual life, she marred it, and it marred her, and so she passed away. -Mourn for Ophelia, if you like. Put ashes on your head because -Cordelia was strangled. Cry out against Heaven because the daughter of -Brabantio died. But don't waste your tears over Sibyl Vane. She was -less real than they are." - -There was a silence. The evening darkened in the room. Noiselessly, -and with silver feet, the shadows crept in from the garden. The -colours faded wearily out of things. - -After some time Dorian Gray looked up. "You have explained me to -myself, Harry," he murmured with something of a sigh of relief. "I -felt all that you have said, but somehow I was afraid of it, and I -could not express it to myself. How well you know me! But we will not -talk again of what has happened. It has been a marvellous experience. -That is all. I wonder if life has still in store for me anything as -marvellous." - -"Life has everything in store for you, Dorian. There is nothing that -you, with your extraordinary good looks, will not be able to do." - -"But suppose, Harry, I became haggard, and old, and wrinkled? What -then?" - -"Ah, then," said Lord Henry, rising to go, "then, my dear Dorian, you -would have to fight for your victories. As it is, they are brought to -you. No, you must keep your good looks. We live in an age that reads -too much to be wise, and that thinks too much to be beautiful. We -cannot spare you. And now you had better dress and drive down to the -club. We are rather late, as it is." - -"I think I shall join you at the opera, Harry. I feel too tired to eat -anything. What is the number of your sister's box?" - -"Twenty-seven, I believe. It is on the grand tier. You will see her -name on the door. But I am sorry you won't come and dine." - -"I don't feel up to it," said Dorian listlessly. "But I am awfully -obliged to you for all that you have said to me. You are certainly my -best friend. No one has ever understood me as you have." - -"We are only at the beginning of our friendship, Dorian," answered Lord -Henry, shaking him by the hand. "Good-bye. I shall see you before -nine-thirty, I hope. Remember, Patti is singing." - -As he closed the door behind him, Dorian Gray touched the bell, and in -a few minutes Victor appeared with the lamps and drew the blinds down. -He waited impatiently for him to go. The man seemed to take an -interminable time over everything. - -As soon as he had left, he rushed to the screen and drew it back. No; -there was no further change in the picture. It had received the news -of Sibyl Vane's death before he had known of it himself. It was -conscious of the events of life as they occurred. The vicious cruelty -that marred the fine lines of the mouth had, no doubt, appeared at the -very moment that the girl had drunk the poison, whatever it was. Or -was it indifferent to results? Did it merely take cognizance of what -passed within the soul? He wondered, and hoped that some day he would -see the change taking place before his very eyes, shuddering as he -hoped it. - -Poor Sibyl! What a romance it had all been! She had often mimicked -death on the stage. Then Death himself had touched her and taken her -with him. How had she played that dreadful last scene? Had she cursed -him, as she died? No; she had died for love of him, and love would -always be a sacrament to him now. She had atoned for everything by the -sacrifice she had made of her life. He would not think any more of -what she had made him go through, on that horrible night at the -theatre. When he thought of her, it would be as a wonderful tragic -figure sent on to the world's stage to show the supreme reality of -love. A wonderful tragic figure? Tears came to his eyes as he -remembered her childlike look, and winsome fanciful ways, and shy -tremulous grace. He brushed them away hastily and looked again at the -picture. - -He felt that the time had really come for making his choice. Or had -his choice already been made? Yes, life had decided that for -him--life, and his own infinite curiosity about life. Eternal youth, -infinite passion, pleasures subtle and secret, wild joys and wilder -sins--he was to have all these things. The portrait was to bear the -burden of his shame: that was all. - -A feeling of pain crept over him as he thought of the desecration that -was in store for the fair face on the canvas. Once, in boyish mockery -of Narcissus, he had kissed, or feigned to kiss, those painted lips -that now smiled so cruelly at him. Morning after morning he had sat -before the portrait wondering at its beauty, almost enamoured of it, as -it seemed to him at times. Was it to alter now with every mood to -which he yielded? Was it to become a monstrous and loathsome thing, to -be hidden away in a locked room, to be shut out from the sunlight that -had so often touched to brighter gold the waving wonder of its hair? -The pity of it! the pity of it! - -For a moment, he thought of praying that the horrible sympathy that -existed between him and the picture might cease. It had changed in -answer to a prayer; perhaps in answer to a prayer it might remain -unchanged. And yet, who, that knew anything about life, would -surrender the chance of remaining always young, however fantastic that -chance might be, or with what fateful consequences it might be fraught? -Besides, was it really under his control? Had it indeed been prayer -that had produced the substitution? Might there not be some curious -scientific reason for it all? If thought could exercise its influence -upon a living organism, might not thought exercise an influence upon -dead and inorganic things? Nay, without thought or conscious desire, -might not things external to ourselves vibrate in unison with our moods -and passions, atom calling to atom in secret love or strange affinity? -But the reason was of no importance. He would never again tempt by a -prayer any terrible power. If the picture was to alter, it was to -alter. That was all. Why inquire too closely into it? - -For there would be a real pleasure in watching it. He would be able to -follow his mind into its secret places. This portrait would be to him -the most magical of mirrors. As it had revealed to him his own body, -so it would reveal to him his own soul. And when winter came upon it, -he would still be standing where spring trembles on the verge of -summer. When the blood crept from its face, and left behind a pallid -mask of chalk with leaden eyes, he would keep the glamour of boyhood. -Not one blossom of his loveliness would ever fade. Not one pulse of -his life would ever weaken. Like the gods of the Greeks, he would be -strong, and fleet, and joyous. What did it matter what happened to the -coloured image on the canvas? He would be safe. That was everything. - -He drew the screen back into its former place in front of the picture, -smiling as he did so, and passed into his bedroom, where his valet was -already waiting for him. An hour later he was at the opera, and Lord -Henry was leaning over his chair. - - - -CHAPTER 9 - -As he was sitting at breakfast next morning, Basil Hallward was shown -into the room. - -"I am so glad I have found you, Dorian," he said gravely. "I called -last night, and they told me you were at the opera. Of course, I knew -that was impossible. But I wish you had left word where you had really -gone to. I passed a dreadful evening, half afraid that one tragedy -might be followed by another. I think you might have telegraphed for -me when you heard of it first. I read of it quite by chance in a late -edition of The Globe that I picked up at the club. I came here at once -and was miserable at not finding you. I can't tell you how -heart-broken I am about the whole thing. I know what you must suffer. -But where were you? Did you go down and see the girl's mother? For a -moment I thought of following you there. They gave the address in the -paper. Somewhere in the Euston Road, isn't it? But I was afraid of -intruding upon a sorrow that I could not lighten. Poor woman! What a -state she must be in! And her only child, too! What did she say about -it all?" - -"My dear Basil, how do I know?" murmured Dorian Gray, sipping some -pale-yellow wine from a delicate, gold-beaded bubble of Venetian glass -and looking dreadfully bored. "I was at the opera. You should have -come on there. I met Lady Gwendolen, Harry's sister, for the first -time. We were in her box. She is perfectly charming; and Patti sang -divinely. Don't talk about horrid subjects. If one doesn't talk about -a thing, it has never happened. It is simply expression, as Harry -says, that gives reality to things. I may mention that she was not the -woman's only child. There is a son, a charming fellow, I believe. But -he is not on the stage. He is a sailor, or something. And now, tell -me about yourself and what you are painting." - -"You went to the opera?" said Hallward, speaking very slowly and with a -strained touch of pain in his voice. "You went to the opera while -Sibyl Vane was lying dead in some sordid lodging? You can talk to me -of other women being charming, and of Patti singing divinely, before -the girl you loved has even the quiet of a grave to sleep in? Why, -man, there are horrors in store for that little white body of hers!" - -"Stop, Basil! I won't hear it!" cried Dorian, leaping to his feet. -"You must not tell me about things. What is done is done. What is -past is past." - -"You call yesterday the past?" - -"What has the actual lapse of time got to do with it? It is only -shallow people who require years to get rid of an emotion. A man who -is master of himself can end a sorrow as easily as he can invent a -pleasure. I don't want to be at the mercy of my emotions. I want to -use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them." - -"Dorian, this is horrible! Something has changed you completely. You -look exactly the same wonderful boy who, day after day, used to come -down to my studio to sit for his picture. But you were simple, -natural, and affectionate then. You were the most unspoiled creature -in the whole world. Now, I don't know what has come over you. You -talk as if you had no heart, no pity in you. It is all Harry's -influence. I see that." - -The lad flushed up and, going to the window, looked out for a few -moments on the green, flickering, sun-lashed garden. "I owe a great -deal to Harry, Basil," he said at last, "more than I owe to you. You -only taught me to be vain." - -"Well, I am punished for that, Dorian--or shall be some day." - -"I don't know what you mean, Basil," he exclaimed, turning round. "I -don't know what you want. What do you want?" - -"I want the Dorian Gray I used to paint," said the artist sadly. - -"Basil," said the lad, going over to him and putting his hand on his -shoulder, "you have come too late. Yesterday, when I heard that Sibyl -Vane had killed herself--" - -"Killed herself! Good heavens! is there no doubt about that?" cried -Hallward, looking up at him with an expression of horror. - -"My dear Basil! Surely you don't think it was a vulgar accident? Of -course she killed herself." - -The elder man buried his face in his hands. "How fearful," he -muttered, and a shudder ran through him. - -"No," said Dorian Gray, "there is nothing fearful about it. It is one -of the great romantic tragedies of the age. As a rule, people who act -lead the most commonplace lives. They are good husbands, or faithful -wives, or something tedious. You know what I mean--middle-class virtue -and all that kind of thing. How different Sibyl was! She lived her -finest tragedy. She was always a heroine. The last night she -played--the night you saw her--she acted badly because she had known -the reality of love. When she knew its unreality, she died, as Juliet -might have died. She passed again into the sphere of art. There is -something of the martyr about her. Her death has all the pathetic -uselessness of martyrdom, all its wasted beauty. But, as I was saying, -you must not think I have not suffered. If you had come in yesterday -at a particular moment--about half-past five, perhaps, or a quarter to -six--you would have found me in tears. Even Harry, who was here, who -brought me the news, in fact, had no idea what I was going through. I -suffered immensely. Then it passed away. I cannot repeat an emotion. -No one can, except sentimentalists. And you are awfully unjust, Basil. -You come down here to console me. That is charming of you. You find -me consoled, and you are furious. How like a sympathetic person! You -remind me of a story Harry told me about a certain philanthropist who -spent twenty years of his life in trying to get some grievance -redressed, or some unjust law altered--I forget exactly what it was. -Finally he succeeded, and nothing could exceed his disappointment. He -had absolutely nothing to do, almost died of ennui, and became a -confirmed misanthrope. And besides, my dear old Basil, if you really -want to console me, teach me rather to forget what has happened, or to -see it from a proper artistic point of view. Was it not Gautier who -used to write about la consolation des arts? I remember picking up a -little vellum-covered book in your studio one day and chancing on that -delightful phrase. Well, I am not like that young man you told me of -when we were down at Marlow together, the young man who used to say -that yellow satin could console one for all the miseries of life. I -love beautiful things that one can touch and handle. Old brocades, -green bronzes, lacquer-work, carved ivories, exquisite surroundings, -luxury, pomp--there is much to be got from all these. But the artistic -temperament that they create, or at any rate reveal, is still more to -me. To become the spectator of one's own life, as Harry says, is to -escape the suffering of life. I know you are surprised at my talking -to you like this. You have not realized how I have developed. I was a -schoolboy when you knew me. I am a man now. I have new passions, new -thoughts, new ideas. I am different, but you must not like me less. I -am changed, but you must always be my friend. Of course, I am very -fond of Harry. But I know that you are better than he is. You are not -stronger--you are too much afraid of life--but you are better. And how -happy we used to be together! Don't leave me, Basil, and don't quarrel -with me. I am what I am. There is nothing more to be said." - -The painter felt strangely moved. The lad was infinitely dear to him, -and his personality had been the great turning point in his art. He -could not bear the idea of reproaching him any more. After all, his -indifference was probably merely a mood that would pass away. There -was so much in him that was good, so much in him that was noble. - -"Well, Dorian," he said at length, with a sad smile, "I won't speak to -you again about this horrible thing, after to-day. I only trust your -name won't be mentioned in connection with it. The inquest is to take -place this afternoon. Have they summoned you?" - -Dorian shook his head, and a look of annoyance passed over his face at -the mention of the word "inquest." There was something so crude and -vulgar about everything of the kind. "They don't know my name," he -answered. - -"But surely she did?" - -"Only my Christian name, and that I am quite sure she never mentioned -to any one. She told me once that they were all rather curious to -learn who I was, and that she invariably told them my name was Prince -Charming. It was pretty of her. You must do me a drawing of Sibyl, -Basil. I should like to have something more of her than the memory of -a few kisses and some broken pathetic words." - -"I will try and do something, Dorian, if it would please you. But you -must come and sit to me yourself again. I can't get on without you." - -"I can never sit to you again, Basil. It is impossible!" he exclaimed, -starting back. - -The painter stared at him. "My dear boy, what nonsense!" he cried. -"Do you mean to say you don't like what I did of you? Where is it? -Why have you pulled the screen in front of it? Let me look at it. It -is the best thing I have ever done. Do take the screen away, Dorian. -It is simply disgraceful of your servant hiding my work like that. I -felt the room looked different as I came in." - -"My servant has nothing to do with it, Basil. You don't imagine I let -him arrange my room for me? He settles my flowers for me -sometimes--that is all. No; I did it myself. The light was too strong -on the portrait." - -"Too strong! Surely not, my dear fellow? It is an admirable place for -it. Let me see it." And Hallward walked towards the corner of the -room. - -A cry of terror broke from Dorian Gray's lips, and he rushed between -the painter and the screen. "Basil," he said, looking very pale, "you -must not look at it. I don't wish you to." - -"Not look at my own work! You are not serious. Why shouldn't I look -at it?" exclaimed Hallward, laughing. - -"If you try to look at it, Basil, on my word of honour I will never -speak to you again as long as I live. I am quite serious. I don't -offer any explanation, and you are not to ask for any. But, remember, -if you touch this screen, everything is over between us." - -Hallward was thunderstruck. He looked at Dorian Gray in absolute -amazement. He had never seen him like this before. The lad was -actually pallid with rage. His hands were clenched, and the pupils of -his eyes were like disks of blue fire. He was trembling all over. - -"Dorian!" - -"Don't speak!" - -"But what is the matter? Of course I won't look at it if you don't -want me to," he said, rather coldly, turning on his heel and going over -towards the window. "But, really, it seems rather absurd that I -shouldn't see my own work, especially as I am going to exhibit it in -Paris in the autumn. I shall probably have to give it another coat of -varnish before that, so I must see it some day, and why not to-day?" - -"To exhibit it! You want to exhibit it?" exclaimed Dorian Gray, a -strange sense of terror creeping over him. Was the world going to be -shown his secret? Were people to gape at the mystery of his life? -That was impossible. Something--he did not know what--had to be done -at once. - -"Yes; I don't suppose you will object to that. Georges Petit is going -to collect all my best pictures for a special exhibition in the Rue de -Seze, which will open the first week in October. The portrait will -only be away a month. I should think you could easily spare it for -that time. In fact, you are sure to be out of town. And if you keep -it always behind a screen, you can't care much about it." - -Dorian Gray passed his hand over his forehead. There were beads of -perspiration there. He felt that he was on the brink of a horrible -danger. "You told me a month ago that you would never exhibit it," he -cried. "Why have you changed your mind? You people who go in for -being consistent have just as many moods as others have. The only -difference is that your moods are rather meaningless. You can't have -forgotten that you assured me most solemnly that nothing in the world -would induce you to send it to any exhibition. You told Harry exactly -the same thing." He stopped suddenly, and a gleam of light came into -his eyes. He remembered that Lord Henry had said to him once, half -seriously and half in jest, "If you want to have a strange quarter of -an hour, get Basil to tell you why he won't exhibit your picture. He -told me why he wouldn't, and it was a revelation to me." Yes, perhaps -Basil, too, had his secret. He would ask him and try. - -"Basil," he said, coming over quite close and looking him straight in -the face, "we have each of us a secret. Let me know yours, and I shall -tell you mine. What was your reason for refusing to exhibit my -picture?" - -The painter shuddered in spite of himself. "Dorian, if I told you, you -might like me less than you do, and you would certainly laugh at me. I -could not bear your doing either of those two things. If you wish me -never to look at your picture again, I am content. I have always you -to look at. If you wish the best work I have ever done to be hidden -from the world, I am satisfied. Your friendship is dearer to me than -any fame or reputation." - -"No, Basil, you must tell me," insisted Dorian Gray. "I think I have a -right to know." His feeling of terror had passed away, and curiosity -had taken its place. He was determined to find out Basil Hallward's -mystery. - -"Let us sit down, Dorian," said the painter, looking troubled. "Let us -sit down. And just answer me one question. Have you noticed in the -picture something curious?--something that probably at first did not -strike you, but that revealed itself to you suddenly?" - -"Basil!" cried the lad, clutching the arms of his chair with trembling -hands and gazing at him with wild startled eyes. - -"I see you did. Don't speak. Wait till you hear what I have to say. -Dorian, from the moment I met you, your personality had the most -extraordinary influence over me. I was dominated, soul, brain, and -power, by you. You became to me the visible incarnation of that unseen -ideal whose memory haunts us artists like an exquisite dream. I -worshipped you. I grew jealous of every one to whom you spoke. I -wanted to have you all to myself. I was only happy when I was with -you. When you were away from me, you were still present in my art.... -Of course, I never let you know anything about this. It would have -been impossible. You would not have understood it. I hardly -understood it myself. I only knew that I had seen perfection face to -face, and that the world had become wonderful to my eyes--too -wonderful, perhaps, for in such mad worships there is peril, the peril -of losing them, no less than the peril of keeping them.... Weeks and -weeks went on, and I grew more and more absorbed in you. Then came a -new development. I had drawn you as Paris in dainty armour, and as -Adonis with huntsman's cloak and polished boar-spear. Crowned with -heavy lotus-blossoms you had sat on the prow of Adrian's barge, gazing -across the green turbid Nile. You had leaned over the still pool of -some Greek woodland and seen in the water's silent silver the marvel of -your own face. And it had all been what art should be--unconscious, -ideal, and remote. One day, a fatal day I sometimes think, I -determined to paint a wonderful portrait of you as you actually are, -not in the costume of dead ages, but in your own dress and in your own -time. Whether it was the realism of the method, or the mere wonder of -your own personality, thus directly presented to me without mist or -veil, I cannot tell. But I know that as I worked at it, every flake -and film of colour seemed to me to reveal my secret. I grew afraid -that others would know of my idolatry. I felt, Dorian, that I had told -too much, that I had put too much of myself into it. Then it was that -I resolved never to allow the picture to be exhibited. You were a -little annoyed; but then you did not realize all that it meant to me. -Harry, to whom I talked about it, laughed at me. But I did not mind -that. When the picture was finished, and I sat alone with it, I felt -that I was right.... Well, after a few days the thing left my studio, -and as soon as I had got rid of the intolerable fascination of its -presence, it seemed to me that I had been foolish in imagining that I -had seen anything in it, more than that you were extremely good-looking -and that I could paint. Even now I cannot help feeling that it is a -mistake to think that the passion one feels in creation is ever really -shown in the work one creates. Art is always more abstract than we -fancy. Form and colour tell us of form and colour--that is all. It -often seems to me that art conceals the artist far more completely than -it ever reveals him. And so when I got this offer from Paris, I -determined to make your portrait the principal thing in my exhibition. -It never occurred to me that you would refuse. I see now that you were -right. The picture cannot be shown. You must not be angry with me, -Dorian, for what I have told you. As I said to Harry, once, you are -made to be worshipped." - -Dorian Gray drew a long breath. The colour came back to his cheeks, -and a smile played about his lips. The peril was over. He was safe -for the time. Yet he could not help feeling infinite pity for the -painter who had just made this strange confession to him, and wondered -if he himself would ever be so dominated by the personality of a -friend. Lord Henry had the charm of being very dangerous. But that -was all. He was too clever and too cynical to be really fond of. -Would there ever be some one who would fill him with a strange -idolatry? Was that one of the things that life had in store? - -"It is extraordinary to me, Dorian," said Hallward, "that you should -have seen this in the portrait. Did you really see it?" - -"I saw something in it," he answered, "something that seemed to me very -curious." - -"Well, you don't mind my looking at the thing now?" - -Dorian shook his head. "You must not ask me that, Basil. I could not -possibly let you stand in front of that picture." - -"You will some day, surely?" - -"Never." - -"Well, perhaps you are right. And now good-bye, Dorian. You have been -the one person in my life who has really influenced my art. Whatever I -have done that is good, I owe to you. Ah! you don't know what it cost -me to tell you all that I have told you." - -"My dear Basil," said Dorian, "what have you told me? Simply that you -felt that you admired me too much. That is not even a compliment." - -"It was not intended as a compliment. It was a confession. Now that I -have made it, something seems to have gone out of me. Perhaps one -should never put one's worship into words." - -"It was a very disappointing confession." - -"Why, what did you expect, Dorian? You didn't see anything else in the -picture, did you? There was nothing else to see?" - -"No; there was nothing else to see. Why do you ask? But you mustn't -talk about worship. It is foolish. You and I are friends, Basil, and -we must always remain so." - -"You have got Harry," said the painter sadly. - -"Oh, Harry!" cried the lad, with a ripple of laughter. "Harry spends -his days in saying what is incredible and his evenings in doing what is -improbable. Just the sort of life I would like to lead. But still I -don't think I would go to Harry if I were in trouble. I would sooner -go to you, Basil." - -"You will sit to me again?" - -"Impossible!" - -"You spoil my life as an artist by refusing, Dorian. No man comes -across two ideal things. Few come across one." - -"I can't explain it to you, Basil, but I must never sit to you again. -There is something fatal about a portrait. It has a life of its own. -I will come and have tea with you. That will be just as pleasant." - -"Pleasanter for you, I am afraid," murmured Hallward regretfully. "And -now good-bye. I am sorry you won't let me look at the picture once -again. But that can't be helped. I quite understand what you feel -about it." - -As he left the room, Dorian Gray smiled to himself. Poor Basil! How -little he knew of the true reason! And how strange it was that, -instead of having been forced to reveal his own secret, he had -succeeded, almost by chance, in wresting a secret from his friend! How -much that strange confession explained to him! The painter's absurd -fits of jealousy, his wild devotion, his extravagant panegyrics, his -curious reticences--he understood them all now, and he felt sorry. -There seemed to him to be something tragic in a friendship so coloured -by romance. - -He sighed and touched the bell. The portrait must be hidden away at -all costs. He could not run such a risk of discovery again. It had -been mad of him to have allowed the thing to remain, even for an hour, -in a room to which any of his friends had access. - - - -CHAPTER 10 - -When his servant entered, he looked at him steadfastly and wondered if -he had thought of peering behind the screen. The man was quite -impassive and waited for his orders. Dorian lit a cigarette and walked -over to the glass and glanced into it. He could see the reflection of -Victor's face perfectly. It was like a placid mask of servility. -There was nothing to be afraid of, there. Yet he thought it best to be -on his guard. - -Speaking very slowly, he told him to tell the house-keeper that he -wanted to see her, and then to go to the frame-maker and ask him to -send two of his men round at once. It seemed to him that as the man -left the room his eyes wandered in the direction of the screen. Or was -that merely his own fancy? - -After a few moments, in her black silk dress, with old-fashioned thread -mittens on her wrinkled hands, Mrs. Leaf bustled into the library. He -asked her for the key of the schoolroom. - -"The old schoolroom, Mr. Dorian?" she exclaimed. "Why, it is full of -dust. I must get it arranged and put straight before you go into it. -It is not fit for you to see, sir. It is not, indeed." - -"I don't want it put straight, Leaf. I only want the key." - -"Well, sir, you'll be covered with cobwebs if you go into it. Why, it -hasn't been opened for nearly five years--not since his lordship died." - -He winced at the mention of his grandfather. He had hateful memories -of him. "That does not matter," he answered. "I simply want to see -the place--that is all. Give me the key." - -"And here is the key, sir," said the old lady, going over the contents -of her bunch with tremulously uncertain hands. "Here is the key. I'll -have it off the bunch in a moment. But you don't think of living up -there, sir, and you so comfortable here?" - -"No, no," he cried petulantly. "Thank you, Leaf. That will do." - -She lingered for a few moments, and was garrulous over some detail of -the household. He sighed and told her to manage things as she thought -best. She left the room, wreathed in smiles. - -As the door closed, Dorian put the key in his pocket and looked round -the room. His eye fell on a large, purple satin coverlet heavily -embroidered with gold, a splendid piece of late seventeenth-century -Venetian work that his grandfather had found in a convent near Bologna. -Yes, that would serve to wrap the dreadful thing in. It had perhaps -served often as a pall for the dead. Now it was to hide something that -had a corruption of its own, worse than the corruption of death -itself--something that would breed horrors and yet would never die. -What the worm was to the corpse, his sins would be to the painted image -on the canvas. They would mar its beauty and eat away its grace. They -would defile it and make it shameful. And yet the thing would still -live on. It would be always alive. - -He shuddered, and for a moment he regretted that he had not told Basil -the true reason why he had wished to hide the picture away. Basil -would have helped him to resist Lord Henry's influence, and the still -more poisonous influences that came from his own temperament. The love -that he bore him--for it was really love--had nothing in it that was -not noble and intellectual. It was not that mere physical admiration -of beauty that is born of the senses and that dies when the senses -tire. It was such love as Michelangelo had known, and Montaigne, and -Winckelmann, and Shakespeare himself. Yes, Basil could have saved him. -But it was too late now. The past could always be annihilated. -Regret, denial, or forgetfulness could do that. But the future was -inevitable. There were passions in him that would find their terrible -outlet, dreams that would make the shadow of their evil real. - -He took up from the couch the great purple-and-gold texture that -covered it, and, holding it in his hands, passed behind the screen. -Was the face on the canvas viler than before? It seemed to him that it -was unchanged, and yet his loathing of it was intensified. Gold hair, -blue eyes, and rose-red lips--they all were there. It was simply the -expression that had altered. That was horrible in its cruelty. -Compared to what he saw in it of censure or rebuke, how shallow Basil's -reproaches about Sibyl Vane had been!--how shallow, and of what little -account! His own soul was looking out at him from the canvas and -calling him to judgement. A look of pain came across him, and he flung -the rich pall over the picture. As he did so, a knock came to the -door. He passed out as his servant entered. - -"The persons are here, Monsieur." - -He felt that the man must be got rid of at once. He must not be -allowed to know where the picture was being taken to. There was -something sly about him, and he had thoughtful, treacherous eyes. -Sitting down at the writing-table he scribbled a note to Lord Henry, -asking him to send him round something to read and reminding him that -they were to meet at eight-fifteen that evening. - -"Wait for an answer," he said, handing it to him, "and show the men in -here." - -In two or three minutes there was another knock, and Mr. Hubbard -himself, the celebrated frame-maker of South Audley Street, came in -with a somewhat rough-looking young assistant. Mr. Hubbard was a -florid, red-whiskered little man, whose admiration for art was -considerably tempered by the inveterate impecuniosity of most of the -artists who dealt with him. As a rule, he never left his shop. He -waited for people to come to him. But he always made an exception in -favour of Dorian Gray. There was something about Dorian that charmed -everybody. It was a pleasure even to see him. - -"What can I do for you, Mr. Gray?" he said, rubbing his fat freckled -hands. "I thought I would do myself the honour of coming round in -person. I have just got a beauty of a frame, sir. Picked it up at a -sale. Old Florentine. Came from Fonthill, I believe. Admirably -suited for a religious subject, Mr. Gray." - -"I am so sorry you have given yourself the trouble of coming round, Mr. -Hubbard. I shall certainly drop in and look at the frame--though I -don't go in much at present for religious art--but to-day I only want a -picture carried to the top of the house for me. It is rather heavy, so -I thought I would ask you to lend me a couple of your men." - -"No trouble at all, Mr. Gray. I am delighted to be of any service to -you. Which is the work of art, sir?" - -"This," replied Dorian, moving the screen back. "Can you move it, -covering and all, just as it is? I don't want it to get scratched -going upstairs." - -"There will be no difficulty, sir," said the genial frame-maker, -beginning, with the aid of his assistant, to unhook the picture from -the long brass chains by which it was suspended. "And, now, where -shall we carry it to, Mr. Gray?" - -"I will show you the way, Mr. Hubbard, if you will kindly follow me. -Or perhaps you had better go in front. I am afraid it is right at the -top of the house. We will go up by the front staircase, as it is -wider." - -He held the door open for them, and they passed out into the hall and -began the ascent. The elaborate character of the frame had made the -picture extremely bulky, and now and then, in spite of the obsequious -protests of Mr. Hubbard, who had the true tradesman's spirited dislike -of seeing a gentleman doing anything useful, Dorian put his hand to it -so as to help them. - -"Something of a load to carry, sir," gasped the little man when they -reached the top landing. And he wiped his shiny forehead. - -"I am afraid it is rather heavy," murmured Dorian as he unlocked the -door that opened into the room that was to keep for him the curious -secret of his life and hide his soul from the eyes of men. - -He had not entered the place for more than four years--not, indeed, -since he had used it first as a play-room when he was a child, and then -as a study when he grew somewhat older. It was a large, -well-proportioned room, which had been specially built by the last Lord -Kelso for the use of the little grandson whom, for his strange likeness -to his mother, and also for other reasons, he had always hated and -desired to keep at a distance. It appeared to Dorian to have but -little changed. There was the huge Italian cassone, with its -fantastically painted panels and its tarnished gilt mouldings, in which -he had so often hidden himself as a boy. There the satinwood book-case -filled with his dog-eared schoolbooks. On the wall behind it was -hanging the same ragged Flemish tapestry where a faded king and queen -were playing chess in a garden, while a company of hawkers rode by, -carrying hooded birds on their gauntleted wrists. How well he -remembered it all! Every moment of his lonely childhood came back to -him as he looked round. He recalled the stainless purity of his boyish -life, and it seemed horrible to him that it was here the fatal portrait -was to be hidden away. How little he had thought, in those dead days, -of all that was in store for him! - -But there was no other place in the house so secure from prying eyes as -this. He had the key, and no one else could enter it. Beneath its -purple pall, the face painted on the canvas could grow bestial, sodden, -and unclean. What did it matter? No one could see it. He himself -would not see it. Why should he watch the hideous corruption of his -soul? He kept his youth--that was enough. And, besides, might not -his nature grow finer, after all? There was no reason that the future -should be so full of shame. Some love might come across his life, and -purify him, and shield him from those sins that seemed to be already -stirring in spirit and in flesh--those curious unpictured sins whose -very mystery lent them their subtlety and their charm. Perhaps, some -day, the cruel look would have passed away from the scarlet sensitive -mouth, and he might show to the world Basil Hallward's masterpiece. - -No; that was impossible. Hour by hour, and week by week, the thing -upon the canvas was growing old. It might escape the hideousness of -sin, but the hideousness of age was in store for it. The cheeks would -become hollow or flaccid. Yellow crow's feet would creep round the -fading eyes and make them horrible. The hair would lose its -brightness, the mouth would gape or droop, would be foolish or gross, -as the mouths of old men are. There would be the wrinkled throat, the -cold, blue-veined hands, the twisted body, that he remembered in the -grandfather who had been so stern to him in his boyhood. The picture -had to be concealed. There was no help for it. - -"Bring it in, Mr. Hubbard, please," he said, wearily, turning round. -"I am sorry I kept you so long. I was thinking of something else." - -"Always glad to have a rest, Mr. Gray," answered the frame-maker, who -was still gasping for breath. "Where shall we put it, sir?" - -"Oh, anywhere. Here: this will do. I don't want to have it hung up. -Just lean it against the wall. Thanks." - -"Might one look at the work of art, sir?" - -Dorian started. "It would not interest you, Mr. Hubbard," he said, -keeping his eye on the man. He felt ready to leap upon him and fling -him to the ground if he dared to lift the gorgeous hanging that -concealed the secret of his life. "I shan't trouble you any more now. -I am much obliged for your kindness in coming round." - -"Not at all, not at all, Mr. Gray. Ever ready to do anything for you, -sir." And Mr. Hubbard tramped downstairs, followed by the assistant, -who glanced back at Dorian with a look of shy wonder in his rough -uncomely face. He had never seen any one so marvellous. - -When the sound of their footsteps had died away, Dorian locked the door -and put the key in his pocket. He felt safe now. No one would ever -look upon the horrible thing. No eye but his would ever see his shame. - -On reaching the library, he found that it was just after five o'clock -and that the tea had been already brought up. On a little table of -dark perfumed wood thickly incrusted with nacre, a present from Lady -Radley, his guardian's wife, a pretty professional invalid who had -spent the preceding winter in Cairo, was lying a note from Lord Henry, -and beside it was a book bound in yellow paper, the cover slightly torn -and the edges soiled. A copy of the third edition of The St. James's -Gazette had been placed on the tea-tray. It was evident that Victor had -returned. He wondered if he had met the men in the hall as they were -leaving the house and had wormed out of them what they had been doing. -He would be sure to miss the picture--had no doubt missed it already, -while he had been laying the tea-things. The screen had not been set -back, and a blank space was visible on the wall. Perhaps some night he -might find him creeping upstairs and trying to force the door of the -room. It was a horrible thing to have a spy in one's house. He had -heard of rich men who had been blackmailed all their lives by some -servant who had read a letter, or overheard a conversation, or picked -up a card with an address, or found beneath a pillow a withered flower -or a shred of crumpled lace. - -He sighed, and having poured himself out some tea, opened Lord Henry's -note. It was simply to say that he sent him round the evening paper, -and a book that might interest him, and that he would be at the club at -eight-fifteen. He opened The St. James's languidly, and looked through -it. A red pencil-mark on the fifth page caught his eye. It drew -attention to the following paragraph: - - -INQUEST ON AN ACTRESS.--An inquest was held this morning at the Bell -Tavern, Hoxton Road, by Mr. Danby, the District Coroner, on the body of -Sibyl Vane, a young actress recently engaged at the Royal Theatre, -Holborn. A verdict of death by misadventure was returned. -Considerable sympathy was expressed for the mother of the deceased, who -was greatly affected during the giving of her own evidence, and that of -Dr. Birrell, who had made the post-mortem examination of the deceased. - - -He frowned, and tearing the paper in two, went across the room and -flung the pieces away. How ugly it all was! And how horribly real -ugliness made things! He felt a little annoyed with Lord Henry for -having sent him the report. And it was certainly stupid of him to have -marked it with red pencil. Victor might have read it. The man knew -more than enough English for that. - -Perhaps he had read it and had begun to suspect something. And, yet, -what did it matter? What had Dorian Gray to do with Sibyl Vane's -death? There was nothing to fear. Dorian Gray had not killed her. - -His eye fell on the yellow book that Lord Henry had sent him. What was -it, he wondered. He went towards the little, pearl-coloured octagonal -stand that had always looked to him like the work of some strange -Egyptian bees that wrought in silver, and taking up the volume, flung -himself into an arm-chair and began to turn over the leaves. After a -few minutes he became absorbed. It was the strangest book that he had -ever read. It seemed to him that in exquisite raiment, and to the -delicate sound of flutes, the sins of the world were passing in dumb -show before him. Things that he had dimly dreamed of were suddenly -made real to him. Things of which he had never dreamed were gradually -revealed. - -It was a novel without a plot and with only one character, being, -indeed, simply a psychological study of a certain young Parisian who -spent his life trying to realize in the nineteenth century all the -passions and modes of thought that belonged to every century except his -own, and to sum up, as it were, in himself the various moods through -which the world-spirit had ever passed, loving for their mere -artificiality those renunciations that men have unwisely called virtue, -as much as those natural rebellions that wise men still call sin. The -style in which it was written was that curious jewelled style, vivid -and obscure at once, full of argot and of archaisms, of technical -expressions and of elaborate paraphrases, that characterizes the work -of some of the finest artists of the French school of Symbolistes. -There were in it metaphors as monstrous as orchids and as subtle in -colour. The life of the senses was described in the terms of mystical -philosophy. One hardly knew at times whether one was reading the -spiritual ecstasies of some mediaeval saint or the morbid confessions -of a modern sinner. It was a poisonous book. The heavy odour of -incense seemed to cling about its pages and to trouble the brain. The -mere cadence of the sentences, the subtle monotony of their music, so -full as it was of complex refrains and movements elaborately repeated, -produced in the mind of the lad, as he passed from chapter to chapter, -a form of reverie, a malady of dreaming, that made him unconscious of -the falling day and creeping shadows. - -Cloudless, and pierced by one solitary star, a copper-green sky gleamed -through the windows. He read on by its wan light till he could read no -more. Then, after his valet had reminded him several times of the -lateness of the hour, he got up, and going into the next room, placed -the book on the little Florentine table that always stood at his -bedside and began to dress for dinner. - -It was almost nine o'clock before he reached the club, where he found -Lord Henry sitting alone, in the morning-room, looking very much bored. - -"I am so sorry, Harry," he cried, "but really it is entirely your -fault. That book you sent me so fascinated me that I forgot how the -time was going." - -"Yes, I thought you would like it," replied his host, rising from his -chair. - -"I didn't say I liked it, Harry. I said it fascinated me. There is a -great difference." - -"Ah, you have discovered that?" murmured Lord Henry. And they passed -into the dining-room. - - - -CHAPTER 11 - -For years, Dorian Gray could not free himself from the influence of -this book. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that he never -sought to free himself from it. He procured from Paris no less than -nine large-paper copies of the first edition, and had them bound in -different colours, so that they might suit his various moods and the -changing fancies of a nature over which he seemed, at times, to have -almost entirely lost control. The hero, the wonderful young Parisian -in whom the romantic and the scientific temperaments were so strangely -blended, became to him a kind of prefiguring type of himself. And, -indeed, the whole book seemed to him to contain the story of his own -life, written before he had lived it. - -In one point he was more fortunate than the novel's fantastic hero. He -never knew--never, indeed, had any cause to know--that somewhat -grotesque dread of mirrors, and polished metal surfaces, and still -water which came upon the young Parisian so early in his life, and was -occasioned by the sudden decay of a beau that had once, apparently, -been so remarkable. It was with an almost cruel joy--and perhaps in -nearly every joy, as certainly in every pleasure, cruelty has its -place--that he used to read the latter part of the book, with its -really tragic, if somewhat overemphasized, account of the sorrow and -despair of one who had himself lost what in others, and the world, he -had most dearly valued. - -For the wonderful beauty that had so fascinated Basil Hallward, and -many others besides him, seemed never to leave him. Even those who had -heard the most evil things against him--and from time to time strange -rumours about his mode of life crept through London and became the -chatter of the clubs--could not believe anything to his dishonour when -they saw him. He had always the look of one who had kept himself -unspotted from the world. Men who talked grossly became silent when -Dorian Gray entered the room. There was something in the purity of his -face that rebuked them. His mere presence seemed to recall to them the -memory of the innocence that they had tarnished. They wondered how one -so charming and graceful as he was could have escaped the stain of an -age that was at once sordid and sensual. - -Often, on returning home from one of those mysterious and prolonged -absences that gave rise to such strange conjecture among those who were -his friends, or thought that they were so, he himself would creep -upstairs to the locked room, open the door with the key that never left -him now, and stand, with a mirror, in front of the portrait that Basil -Hallward had painted of him, looking now at the evil and aging face on -the canvas, and now at the fair young face that laughed back at him -from the polished glass. The very sharpness of the contrast used to -quicken his sense of pleasure. He grew more and more enamoured of his -own beauty, more and more interested in the corruption of his own soul. -He would examine with minute care, and sometimes with a monstrous and -terrible delight, the hideous lines that seared the wrinkling forehead -or crawled around the heavy sensual mouth, wondering sometimes which -were the more horrible, the signs of sin or the signs of age. He would -place his white hands beside the coarse bloated hands of the picture, -and smile. He mocked the misshapen body and the failing limbs. - -There were moments, indeed, at night, when, lying sleepless in his own -delicately scented chamber, or in the sordid room of the little -ill-famed tavern near the docks which, under an assumed name and in -disguise, it was his habit to frequent, he would think of the ruin he -had brought upon his soul with a pity that was all the more poignant -because it was purely selfish. But moments such as these were rare. -That curiosity about life which Lord Henry had first stirred in him, as -they sat together in the garden of their friend, seemed to increase -with gratification. The more he knew, the more he desired to know. He -had mad hungers that grew more ravenous as he fed them. - -Yet he was not really reckless, at any rate in his relations to -society. Once or twice every month during the winter, and on each -Wednesday evening while the season lasted, he would throw open to the -world his beautiful house and have the most celebrated musicians of the -day to charm his guests with the wonders of their art. His little -dinners, in the settling of which Lord Henry always assisted him, were -noted as much for the careful selection and placing of those invited, -as for the exquisite taste shown in the decoration of the table, with -its subtle symphonic arrangements of exotic flowers, and embroidered -cloths, and antique plate of gold and silver. Indeed, there were many, -especially among the very young men, who saw, or fancied that they saw, -in Dorian Gray the true realization of a type of which they had often -dreamed in Eton or Oxford days, a type that was to combine something of -the real culture of the scholar with all the grace and distinction and -perfect manner of a citizen of the world. To them he seemed to be of -the company of those whom Dante describes as having sought to "make -themselves perfect by the worship of beauty." Like Gautier, he was one -for whom "the visible world existed." - -And, certainly, to him life itself was the first, the greatest, of the -arts, and for it all the other arts seemed to be but a preparation. -Fashion, by which what is really fantastic becomes for a moment -universal, and dandyism, which, in its own way, is an attempt to assert -the absolute modernity of beauty, had, of course, their fascination for -him. His mode of dressing, and the particular styles that from time to -time he affected, had their marked influence on the young exquisites of -the Mayfair balls and Pall Mall club windows, who copied him in -everything that he did, and tried to reproduce the accidental charm of -his graceful, though to him only half-serious, fopperies. - -For, while he was but too ready to accept the position that was almost -immediately offered to him on his coming of age, and found, indeed, a -subtle pleasure in the thought that he might really become to the -London of his own day what to imperial Neronian Rome the author of the -Satyricon once had been, yet in his inmost heart he desired to be -something more than a mere arbiter elegantiarum, to be consulted on the -wearing of a jewel, or the knotting of a necktie, or the conduct of a -cane. He sought to elaborate some new scheme of life that would have -its reasoned philosophy and its ordered principles, and find in the -spiritualizing of the senses its highest realization. - -The worship of the senses has often, and with much justice, been -decried, men feeling a natural instinct of terror about passions and -sensations that seem stronger than themselves, and that they are -conscious of sharing with the less highly organized forms of existence. -But it appeared to Dorian Gray that the true nature of the senses had -never been understood, and that they had remained savage and animal -merely because the world had sought to starve them into submission or -to kill them by pain, instead of aiming at making them elements of a -new spirituality, of which a fine instinct for beauty was to be the -dominant characteristic. As he looked back upon man moving through -history, he was haunted by a feeling of loss. So much had been -surrendered! and to such little purpose! There had been mad wilful -rejections, monstrous forms of self-torture and self-denial, whose -origin was fear and whose result was a degradation infinitely more -terrible than that fancied degradation from which, in their ignorance, -they had sought to escape; Nature, in her wonderful irony, driving out -the anchorite to feed with the wild animals of the desert and giving to -the hermit the beasts of the field as his companions. - -Yes: there was to be, as Lord Henry had prophesied, a new Hedonism -that was to recreate life and to save it from that harsh uncomely -puritanism that is having, in our own day, its curious revival. It was -to have its service of the intellect, certainly, yet it was never to -accept any theory or system that would involve the sacrifice of any -mode of passionate experience. Its aim, indeed, was to be experience -itself, and not the fruits of experience, sweet or bitter as they might -be. Of the asceticism that deadens the senses, as of the vulgar -profligacy that dulls them, it was to know nothing. But it was to -teach man to concentrate himself upon the moments of a life that is -itself but a moment. - -There are few of us who have not sometimes wakened before dawn, either -after one of those dreamless nights that make us almost enamoured of -death, or one of those nights of horror and misshapen joy, when through -the chambers of the brain sweep phantoms more terrible than reality -itself, and instinct with that vivid life that lurks in all grotesques, -and that lends to Gothic art its enduring vitality, this art being, one -might fancy, especially the art of those whose minds have been troubled -with the malady of reverie. Gradually white fingers creep through the -curtains, and they appear to tremble. In black fantastic shapes, dumb -shadows crawl into the corners of the room and crouch there. Outside, -there is the stirring of birds among the leaves, or the sound of men -going forth to their work, or the sigh and sob of the wind coming down -from the hills and wandering round the silent house, as though it -feared to wake the sleepers and yet must needs call forth sleep from -her purple cave. Veil after veil of thin dusky gauze is lifted, and by -degrees the forms and colours of things are restored to them, and we -watch the dawn remaking the world in its antique pattern. The wan -mirrors get back their mimic life. The flameless tapers stand where we -had left them, and beside them lies the half-cut book that we had been -studying, or the wired flower that we had worn at the ball, or the -letter that we had been afraid to read, or that we had read too often. -Nothing seems to us changed. Out of the unreal shadows of the night -comes back the real life that we had known. We have to resume it where -we had left off, and there steals over us a terrible sense of the -necessity for the continuance of energy in the same wearisome round of -stereotyped habits, or a wild longing, it may be, that our eyelids -might open some morning upon a world that had been refashioned anew in -the darkness for our pleasure, a world in which things would have fresh -shapes and colours, and be changed, or have other secrets, a world in -which the past would have little or no place, or survive, at any rate, -in no conscious form of obligation or regret, the remembrance even of -joy having its bitterness and the memories of pleasure their pain. - -It was the creation of such worlds as these that seemed to Dorian Gray -to be the true object, or amongst the true objects, of life; and in his -search for sensations that would be at once new and delightful, and -possess that element of strangeness that is so essential to romance, he -would often adopt certain modes of thought that he knew to be really -alien to his nature, abandon himself to their subtle influences, and -then, having, as it were, caught their colour and satisfied his -intellectual curiosity, leave them with that curious indifference that -is not incompatible with a real ardour of temperament, and that, -indeed, according to certain modern psychologists, is often a condition -of it. - -It was rumoured of him once that he was about to join the Roman -Catholic communion, and certainly the Roman ritual had always a great -attraction for him. The daily sacrifice, more awful really than all -the sacrifices of the antique world, stirred him as much by its superb -rejection of the evidence of the senses as by the primitive simplicity -of its elements and the eternal pathos of the human tragedy that it -sought to symbolize. He loved to kneel down on the cold marble -pavement and watch the priest, in his stiff flowered dalmatic, slowly -and with white hands moving aside the veil of the tabernacle, or -raising aloft the jewelled, lantern-shaped monstrance with that pallid -wafer that at times, one would fain think, is indeed the "panis -caelestis," the bread of angels, or, robed in the garments of the -Passion of Christ, breaking the Host into the chalice and smiting his -breast for his sins. The fuming censers that the grave boys, in their -lace and scarlet, tossed into the air like great gilt flowers had their -subtle fascination for him. As he passed out, he used to look with -wonder at the black confessionals and long to sit in the dim shadow of -one of them and listen to men and women whispering through the worn -grating the true story of their lives. - -But he never fell into the error of arresting his intellectual -development by any formal acceptance of creed or system, or of -mistaking, for a house in which to live, an inn that is but suitable -for the sojourn of a night, or for a few hours of a night in which -there are no stars and the moon is in travail. Mysticism, with its -marvellous power of making common things strange to us, and the subtle -antinomianism that always seems to accompany it, moved him for a -season; and for a season he inclined to the materialistic doctrines of -the Darwinismus movement in Germany, and found a curious pleasure in -tracing the thoughts and passions of men to some pearly cell in the -brain, or some white nerve in the body, delighting in the conception of -the absolute dependence of the spirit on certain physical conditions, -morbid or healthy, normal or diseased. Yet, as has been said of him -before, no theory of life seemed to him to be of any importance -compared with life itself. He felt keenly conscious of how barren all -intellectual speculation is when separated from action and experiment. -He knew that the senses, no less than the soul, have their spiritual -mysteries to reveal. - -And so he would now study perfumes and the secrets of their -manufacture, distilling heavily scented oils and burning odorous gums -from the East. He saw that there was no mood of the mind that had not -its counterpart in the sensuous life, and set himself to discover their -true relations, wondering what there was in frankincense that made one -mystical, and in ambergris that stirred one's passions, and in violets -that woke the memory of dead romances, and in musk that troubled the -brain, and in champak that stained the imagination; and seeking often -to elaborate a real psychology of perfumes, and to estimate the several -influences of sweet-smelling roots and scented, pollen-laden flowers; -of aromatic balms and of dark and fragrant woods; of spikenard, that -sickens; of hovenia, that makes men mad; and of aloes, that are said to -be able to expel melancholy from the soul. - -At another time he devoted himself entirely to music, and in a long -latticed room, with a vermilion-and-gold ceiling and walls of -olive-green lacquer, he used to give curious concerts in which mad -gipsies tore wild music from little zithers, or grave, yellow-shawled -Tunisians plucked at the strained strings of monstrous lutes, while -grinning Negroes beat monotonously upon copper drums and, crouching -upon scarlet mats, slim turbaned Indians blew through long pipes of -reed or brass and charmed--or feigned to charm--great hooded snakes and -horrible horned adders. The harsh intervals and shrill discords of -barbaric music stirred him at times when Schubert's grace, and Chopin's -beautiful sorrows, and the mighty harmonies of Beethoven himself, fell -unheeded on his ear. He collected together from all parts of the world -the strangest instruments that could be found, either in the tombs of -dead nations or among the few savage tribes that have survived contact -with Western civilizations, and loved to touch and try them. He had -the mysterious juruparis of the Rio Negro Indians, that women are not -allowed to look at and that even youths may not see till they have been -subjected to fasting and scourging, and the earthen jars of the -Peruvians that have the shrill cries of birds, and flutes of human -bones such as Alfonso de Ovalle heard in Chile, and the sonorous green -jaspers that are found near Cuzco and give forth a note of singular -sweetness. He had painted gourds filled with pebbles that rattled when -they were shaken; the long clarin of the Mexicans, into which the -performer does not blow, but through which he inhales the air; the -harsh ture of the Amazon tribes, that is sounded by the sentinels who -sit all day long in high trees, and can be heard, it is said, at a -distance of three leagues; the teponaztli, that has two vibrating -tongues of wood and is beaten with sticks that are smeared with an -elastic gum obtained from the milky juice of plants; the yotl-bells of -the Aztecs, that are hung in clusters like grapes; and a huge -cylindrical drum, covered with the skins of great serpents, like the -one that Bernal Diaz saw when he went with Cortes into the Mexican -temple, and of whose doleful sound he has left us so vivid a -description. The fantastic character of these instruments fascinated -him, and he felt a curious delight in the thought that art, like -Nature, has her monsters, things of bestial shape and with hideous -voices. Yet, after some time, he wearied of them, and would sit in his -box at the opera, either alone or with Lord Henry, listening in rapt -pleasure to "Tannhauser" and seeing in the prelude to that great work -of art a presentation of the tragedy of his own soul. - -On one occasion he took up the study of jewels, and appeared at a -costume ball as Anne de Joyeuse, Admiral of France, in a dress covered -with five hundred and sixty pearls. This taste enthralled him for -years, and, indeed, may be said never to have left him. He would often -spend a whole day settling and resettling in their cases the various -stones that he had collected, such as the olive-green chrysoberyl that -turns red by lamplight, the cymophane with its wirelike line of silver, -the pistachio-coloured peridot, rose-pink and wine-yellow topazes, -carbuncles of fiery scarlet with tremulous, four-rayed stars, flame-red -cinnamon-stones, orange and violet spinels, and amethysts with their -alternate layers of ruby and sapphire. He loved the red gold of the -sunstone, and the moonstone's pearly whiteness, and the broken rainbow -of the milky opal. He procured from Amsterdam three emeralds of -extraordinary size and richness of colour, and had a turquoise de la -vieille roche that was the envy of all the connoisseurs. - -He discovered wonderful stories, also, about jewels. In Alphonso's -Clericalis Disciplina a serpent was mentioned with eyes of real -jacinth, and in the romantic history of Alexander, the Conqueror of -Emathia was said to have found in the vale of Jordan snakes "with -collars of real emeralds growing on their backs." There was a gem in -the brain of the dragon, Philostratus told us, and "by the exhibition -of golden letters and a scarlet robe" the monster could be thrown into -a magical sleep and slain. According to the great alchemist, Pierre de -Boniface, the diamond rendered a man invisible, and the agate of India -made him eloquent. The cornelian appeased anger, and the hyacinth -provoked sleep, and the amethyst drove away the fumes of wine. The -garnet cast out demons, and the hydropicus deprived the moon of her -colour. The selenite waxed and waned with the moon, and the meloceus, -that discovers thieves, could be affected only by the blood of kids. -Leonardus Camillus had seen a white stone taken from the brain of a -newly killed toad, that was a certain antidote against poison. The -bezoar, that was found in the heart of the Arabian deer, was a charm -that could cure the plague. In the nests of Arabian birds was the -aspilates, that, according to Democritus, kept the wearer from any -danger by fire. - -The King of Ceilan rode through his city with a large ruby in his hand, -as the ceremony of his coronation. The gates of the palace of John the -Priest were "made of sardius, with the horn of the horned snake -inwrought, so that no man might bring poison within." Over the gable -were "two golden apples, in which were two carbuncles," so that the -gold might shine by day and the carbuncles by night. In Lodge's -strange romance 'A Margarite of America', it was stated that in the -chamber of the queen one could behold "all the chaste ladies of the -world, inchased out of silver, looking through fair mirrours of -chrysolites, carbuncles, sapphires, and greene emeraults." Marco Polo -had seen the inhabitants of Zipangu place rose-coloured pearls in the -mouths of the dead. A sea-monster had been enamoured of the pearl that -the diver brought to King Perozes, and had slain the thief, and mourned -for seven moons over its loss. When the Huns lured the king into the -great pit, he flung it away--Procopius tells the story--nor was it ever -found again, though the Emperor Anastasius offered five hundred-weight -of gold pieces for it. The King of Malabar had shown to a certain -Venetian a rosary of three hundred and four pearls, one for every god -that he worshipped. - -When the Duke de Valentinois, son of Alexander VI, visited Louis XII of -France, his horse was loaded with gold leaves, according to Brantome, -and his cap had double rows of rubies that threw out a great light. -Charles of England had ridden in stirrups hung with four hundred and -twenty-one diamonds. Richard II had a coat, valued at thirty thousand -marks, which was covered with balas rubies. Hall described Henry VIII, -on his way to the Tower previous to his coronation, as wearing "a -jacket of raised gold, the placard embroidered with diamonds and other -rich stones, and a great bauderike about his neck of large balasses." -The favourites of James I wore ear-rings of emeralds set in gold -filigrane. Edward II gave to Piers Gaveston a suit of red-gold armour -studded with jacinths, a collar of gold roses set with -turquoise-stones, and a skull-cap parseme with pearls. Henry II wore -jewelled gloves reaching to the elbow, and had a hawk-glove sewn with -twelve rubies and fifty-two great orients. The ducal hat of Charles -the Rash, the last Duke of Burgundy of his race, was hung with -pear-shaped pearls and studded with sapphires. - -How exquisite life had once been! How gorgeous in its pomp and -decoration! Even to read of the luxury of the dead was wonderful. - -Then he turned his attention to embroideries and to the tapestries that -performed the office of frescoes in the chill rooms of the northern -nations of Europe. As he investigated the subject--and he always had -an extraordinary faculty of becoming absolutely absorbed for the moment -in whatever he took up--he was almost saddened by the reflection of the -ruin that time brought on beautiful and wonderful things. He, at any -rate, had escaped that. Summer followed summer, and the yellow -jonquils bloomed and died many times, and nights of horror repeated the -story of their shame, but he was unchanged. No winter marred his face -or stained his flowerlike bloom. How different it was with material -things! Where had they passed to? Where was the great crocus-coloured -robe, on which the gods fought against the giants, that had been worked -by brown girls for the pleasure of Athena? Where the huge velarium -that Nero had stretched across the Colosseum at Rome, that Titan sail -of purple on which was represented the starry sky, and Apollo driving a -chariot drawn by white, gilt-reined steeds? He longed to see the -curious table-napkins wrought for the Priest of the Sun, on which were -displayed all the dainties and viands that could be wanted for a feast; -the mortuary cloth of King Chilperic, with its three hundred golden -bees; the fantastic robes that excited the indignation of the Bishop of -Pontus and were figured with "lions, panthers, bears, dogs, forests, -rocks, hunters--all, in fact, that a painter can copy from nature"; and -the coat that Charles of Orleans once wore, on the sleeves of which -were embroidered the verses of a song beginning "Madame, je suis tout -joyeux," the musical accompaniment of the words being wrought in gold -thread, and each note, of square shape in those days, formed with four -pearls. He read of the room that was prepared at the palace at Rheims -for the use of Queen Joan of Burgundy and was decorated with "thirteen -hundred and twenty-one parrots, made in broidery, and blazoned with the -king's arms, and five hundred and sixty-one butterflies, whose wings -were similarly ornamented with the arms of the queen, the whole worked -in gold." Catherine de Medicis had a mourning-bed made for her of -black velvet powdered with crescents and suns. Its curtains were of -damask, with leafy wreaths and garlands, figured upon a gold and silver -ground, and fringed along the edges with broideries of pearls, and it -stood in a room hung with rows of the queen's devices in cut black -velvet upon cloth of silver. Louis XIV had gold embroidered caryatides -fifteen feet high in his apartment. The state bed of Sobieski, King of -Poland, was made of Smyrna gold brocade embroidered in turquoises with -verses from the Koran. Its supports were of silver gilt, beautifully -chased, and profusely set with enamelled and jewelled medallions. It -had been taken from the Turkish camp before Vienna, and the standard of -Mohammed had stood beneath the tremulous gilt of its canopy. - -And so, for a whole year, he sought to accumulate the most exquisite -specimens that he could find of textile and embroidered work, getting -the dainty Delhi muslins, finely wrought with gold-thread palmates and -stitched over with iridescent beetles' wings; the Dacca gauzes, that -from their transparency are known in the East as "woven air," and -"running water," and "evening dew"; strange figured cloths from Java; -elaborate yellow Chinese hangings; books bound in tawny satins or fair -blue silks and wrought with fleurs-de-lis, birds and images; veils of -lacis worked in Hungary point; Sicilian brocades and stiff Spanish -velvets; Georgian work, with its gilt coins, and Japanese Foukousas, -with their green-toned golds and their marvellously plumaged birds. - -He had a special passion, also, for ecclesiastical vestments, as indeed -he had for everything connected with the service of the Church. In the -long cedar chests that lined the west gallery of his house, he had -stored away many rare and beautiful specimens of what is really the -raiment of the Bride of Christ, who must wear purple and jewels and -fine linen that she may hide the pallid macerated body that is worn by -the suffering that she seeks for and wounded by self-inflicted pain. -He possessed a gorgeous cope of crimson silk and gold-thread damask, -figured with a repeating pattern of golden pomegranates set in -six-petalled formal blossoms, beyond which on either side was the -pine-apple device wrought in seed-pearls. The orphreys were divided -into panels representing scenes from the life of the Virgin, and the -coronation of the Virgin was figured in coloured silks upon the hood. -This was Italian work of the fifteenth century. Another cope was of -green velvet, embroidered with heart-shaped groups of acanthus-leaves, -from which spread long-stemmed white blossoms, the details of which -were picked out with silver thread and coloured crystals. The morse -bore a seraph's head in gold-thread raised work. The orphreys were -woven in a diaper of red and gold silk, and were starred with -medallions of many saints and martyrs, among whom was St. Sebastian. -He had chasubles, also, of amber-coloured silk, and blue silk and gold -brocade, and yellow silk damask and cloth of gold, figured with -representations of the Passion and Crucifixion of Christ, and -embroidered with lions and peacocks and other emblems; dalmatics of -white satin and pink silk damask, decorated with tulips and dolphins -and fleurs-de-lis; altar frontals of crimson velvet and blue linen; and -many corporals, chalice-veils, and sudaria. In the mystic offices to -which such things were put, there was something that quickened his -imagination. - -For these treasures, and everything that he collected in his lovely -house, were to be to him means of forgetfulness, modes by which he -could escape, for a season, from the fear that seemed to him at times -to be almost too great to be borne. Upon the walls of the lonely -locked room where he had spent so much of his boyhood, he had hung with -his own hands the terrible portrait whose changing features showed him -the real degradation of his life, and in front of it had draped the -purple-and-gold pall as a curtain. For weeks he would not go there, -would forget the hideous painted thing, and get back his light heart, -his wonderful joyousness, his passionate absorption in mere existence. -Then, suddenly, some night he would creep out of the house, go down to -dreadful places near Blue Gate Fields, and stay there, day after day, -until he was driven away. On his return he would sit in front of the -picture, sometimes loathing it and himself, but filled, at other -times, with that pride of individualism that is half the -fascination of sin, and smiling with secret pleasure at the misshapen -shadow that had to bear the burden that should have been his own. - -After a few years he could not endure to be long out of England, and -gave up the villa that he had shared at Trouville with Lord Henry, as -well as the little white walled-in house at Algiers where they had more -than once spent the winter. He hated to be separated from the picture -that was such a part of his life, and was also afraid that during his -absence some one might gain access to the room, in spite of the -elaborate bars that he had caused to be placed upon the door. - -He was quite conscious that this would tell them nothing. It was true -that the portrait still preserved, under all the foulness and ugliness -of the face, its marked likeness to himself; but what could they learn -from that? He would laugh at any one who tried to taunt him. He had -not painted it. What was it to him how vile and full of shame it -looked? Even if he told them, would they believe it? - -Yet he was afraid. Sometimes when he was down at his great house in -Nottinghamshire, entertaining the fashionable young men of his own rank -who were his chief companions, and astounding the county by the wanton -luxury and gorgeous splendour of his mode of life, he would suddenly -leave his guests and rush back to town to see that the door had not -been tampered with and that the picture was still there. What if it -should be stolen? The mere thought made him cold with horror. Surely -the world would know his secret then. Perhaps the world already -suspected it. - -For, while he fascinated many, there were not a few who distrusted him. -He was very nearly blackballed at a West End club of which his birth -and social position fully entitled him to become a member, and it was -said that on one occasion, when he was brought by a friend into the -smoking-room of the Churchill, the Duke of Berwick and another -gentleman got up in a marked manner and went out. Curious stories -became current about him after he had passed his twenty-fifth year. It -was rumoured that he had been seen brawling with foreign sailors in a -low den in the distant parts of Whitechapel, and that he consorted with -thieves and coiners and knew the mysteries of their trade. His -extraordinary absences became notorious, and, when he used to reappear -again in society, men would whisper to each other in corners, or pass -him with a sneer, or look at him with cold searching eyes, as though -they were determined to discover his secret. - -Of such insolences and attempted slights he, of course, took no notice, -and in the opinion of most people his frank debonair manner, his -charming boyish smile, and the infinite grace of that wonderful youth -that seemed never to leave him, were in themselves a sufficient answer -to the calumnies, for so they termed them, that were circulated about -him. It was remarked, however, that some of those who had been most -intimate with him appeared, after a time, to shun him. Women who had -wildly adored him, and for his sake had braved all social censure and -set convention at defiance, were seen to grow pallid with shame or -horror if Dorian Gray entered the room. - -Yet these whispered scandals only increased in the eyes of many his -strange and dangerous charm. His great wealth was a certain element of -security. Society--civilized society, at least--is never very ready to -believe anything to the detriment of those who are both rich and -fascinating. It feels instinctively that manners are of more -importance than morals, and, in its opinion, the highest respectability -is of much less value than the possession of a good chef. And, after -all, it is a very poor consolation to be told that the man who has -given one a bad dinner, or poor wine, is irreproachable in his private -life. Even the cardinal virtues cannot atone for half-cold entrees, as -Lord Henry remarked once, in a discussion on the subject, and there is -possibly a good deal to be said for his view. For the canons of good -society are, or should be, the same as the canons of art. Form is -absolutely essential to it. It should have the dignity of a ceremony, -as well as its unreality, and should combine the insincere character of -a romantic play with the wit and beauty that make such plays delightful -to us. Is insincerity such a terrible thing? I think not. It is -merely a method by which we can multiply our personalities. - -Such, at any rate, was Dorian Gray's opinion. He used to wonder at the -shallow psychology of those who conceive the ego in man as a thing -simple, permanent, reliable, and of one essence. To him, man was a -being with myriad lives and myriad sensations, a complex multiform -creature that bore within itself strange legacies of thought and -passion, and whose very flesh was tainted with the monstrous maladies -of the dead. He loved to stroll through the gaunt cold picture-gallery -of his country house and look at the various portraits of those whose -blood flowed in his veins. Here was Philip Herbert, described by -Francis Osborne, in his Memoires on the Reigns of Queen Elizabeth and -King James, as one who was "caressed by the Court for his handsome -face, which kept him not long company." Was it young Herbert's life -that he sometimes led? Had some strange poisonous germ crept from body -to body till it had reached his own? Was it some dim sense of that -ruined grace that had made him so suddenly, and almost without cause, -give utterance, in Basil Hallward's studio, to the mad prayer that had -so changed his life? Here, in gold-embroidered red doublet, jewelled -surcoat, and gilt-edged ruff and wristbands, stood Sir Anthony Sherard, -with his silver-and-black armour piled at his feet. What had this -man's legacy been? Had the lover of Giovanna of Naples bequeathed him -some inheritance of sin and shame? Were his own actions merely the -dreams that the dead man had not dared to realize? Here, from the -fading canvas, smiled Lady Elizabeth Devereux, in her gauze hood, pearl -stomacher, and pink slashed sleeves. A flower was in her right hand, -and her left clasped an enamelled collar of white and damask roses. On -a table by her side lay a mandolin and an apple. There were large -green rosettes upon her little pointed shoes. He knew her life, and -the strange stories that were told about her lovers. Had he something -of her temperament in him? These oval, heavy-lidded eyes seemed to -look curiously at him. What of George Willoughby, with his powdered -hair and fantastic patches? How evil he looked! The face was -saturnine and swarthy, and the sensual lips seemed to be twisted with -disdain. Delicate lace ruffles fell over the lean yellow hands that -were so overladen with rings. He had been a macaroni of the eighteenth -century, and the friend, in his youth, of Lord Ferrars. What of the -second Lord Beckenham, the companion of the Prince Regent in his -wildest days, and one of the witnesses at the secret marriage with Mrs. -Fitzherbert? How proud and handsome he was, with his chestnut curls -and insolent pose! What passions had he bequeathed? The world had -looked upon him as infamous. He had led the orgies at Carlton House. -The star of the Garter glittered upon his breast. Beside him hung the -portrait of his wife, a pallid, thin-lipped woman in black. Her blood, -also, stirred within him. How curious it all seemed! And his mother -with her Lady Hamilton face and her moist, wine-dashed lips--he knew -what he had got from her. He had got from her his beauty, and his -passion for the beauty of others. She laughed at him in her loose -Bacchante dress. There were vine leaves in her hair. The purple -spilled from the cup she was holding. The carnations of the painting -had withered, but the eyes were still wonderful in their depth and -brilliancy of colour. They seemed to follow him wherever he went. - -Yet one had ancestors in literature as well as in one's own race, -nearer perhaps in type and temperament, many of them, and certainly -with an influence of which one was more absolutely conscious. There -were times when it appeared to Dorian Gray that the whole of history -was merely the record of his own life, not as he had lived it in act -and circumstance, but as his imagination had created it for him, as it -had been in his brain and in his passions. He felt that he had known -them all, those strange terrible figures that had passed across the -stage of the world and made sin so marvellous and evil so full of -subtlety. It seemed to him that in some mysterious way their lives had -been his own. - -The hero of the wonderful novel that had so influenced his life had -himself known this curious fancy. In the seventh chapter he tells how, -crowned with laurel, lest lightning might strike him, he had sat, as -Tiberius, in a garden at Capri, reading the shameful books of -Elephantis, while dwarfs and peacocks strutted round him and the -flute-player mocked the swinger of the censer; and, as Caligula, had -caroused with the green-shirted jockeys in their stables and supped in -an ivory manger with a jewel-frontleted horse; and, as Domitian, had -wandered through a corridor lined with marble mirrors, looking round -with haggard eyes for the reflection of the dagger that was to end his -days, and sick with that ennui, that terrible taedium vitae, that comes -on those to whom life denies nothing; and had peered through a clear -emerald at the red shambles of the circus and then, in a litter of -pearl and purple drawn by silver-shod mules, been carried through the -Street of Pomegranates to a House of Gold and heard men cry on Nero -Caesar as he passed by; and, as Elagabalus, had painted his face with -colours, and plied the distaff among the women, and brought the Moon -from Carthage and given her in mystic marriage to the Sun. - -Over and over again Dorian used to read this fantastic chapter, and the -two chapters immediately following, in which, as in some curious -tapestries or cunningly wrought enamels, were pictured the awful and -beautiful forms of those whom vice and blood and weariness had made -monstrous or mad: Filippo, Duke of Milan, who slew his wife and -painted her lips with a scarlet poison that her lover might suck death -from the dead thing he fondled; Pietro Barbi, the Venetian, known as -Paul the Second, who sought in his vanity to assume the title of -Formosus, and whose tiara, valued at two hundred thousand florins, was -bought at the price of a terrible sin; Gian Maria Visconti, who used -hounds to chase living men and whose murdered body was covered with -roses by a harlot who had loved him; the Borgia on his white horse, -with Fratricide riding beside him and his mantle stained with the blood -of Perotto; Pietro Riario, the young Cardinal Archbishop of Florence, -child and minion of Sixtus IV, whose beauty was equalled only by his -debauchery, and who received Leonora of Aragon in a pavilion of white -and crimson silk, filled with nymphs and centaurs, and gilded a boy -that he might serve at the feast as Ganymede or Hylas; Ezzelin, whose -melancholy could be cured only by the spectacle of death, and who had a -passion for red blood, as other men have for red wine--the son of the -Fiend, as was reported, and one who had cheated his father at dice when -gambling with him for his own soul; Giambattista Cibo, who in mockery -took the name of Innocent and into whose torpid veins the blood of -three lads was infused by a Jewish doctor; Sigismondo Malatesta, the -lover of Isotta and the lord of Rimini, whose effigy was burned at Rome -as the enemy of God and man, who strangled Polyssena with a napkin, and -gave poison to Ginevra d'Este in a cup of emerald, and in honour of a -shameful passion built a pagan church for Christian worship; Charles -VI, who had so wildly adored his brother's wife that a leper had warned -him of the insanity that was coming on him, and who, when his brain had -sickened and grown strange, could only be soothed by Saracen cards -painted with the images of love and death and madness; and, in his -trimmed jerkin and jewelled cap and acanthuslike curls, Grifonetto -Baglioni, who slew Astorre with his bride, and Simonetto with his page, -and whose comeliness was such that, as he lay dying in the yellow -piazza of Perugia, those who had hated him could not choose but weep, -and Atalanta, who had cursed him, blessed him. - -There was a horrible fascination in them all. He saw them at night, -and they troubled his imagination in the day. The Renaissance knew of -strange manners of poisoning--poisoning by a helmet and a lighted -torch, by an embroidered glove and a jewelled fan, by a gilded pomander -and by an amber chain. Dorian Gray had been poisoned by a book. There -were moments when he looked on evil simply as a mode through which he -could realize his conception of the beautiful. - - - -CHAPTER 12 - -It was on the ninth of November, the eve of his own thirty-eighth -birthday, as he often remembered afterwards. - -He was walking home about eleven o'clock from Lord Henry's, where he -had been dining, and was wrapped in heavy furs, as the night was cold -and foggy. At the corner of Grosvenor Square and South Audley Street, -a man passed him in the mist, walking very fast and with the collar of -his grey ulster turned up. He had a bag in his hand. Dorian -recognized him. It was Basil Hallward. A strange sense of fear, for -which he could not account, came over him. He made no sign of -recognition and went on quickly in the direction of his own house. - -But Hallward had seen him. Dorian heard him first stopping on the -pavement and then hurrying after him. In a few moments, his hand was -on his arm. - -"Dorian! What an extraordinary piece of luck! I have been waiting for -you in your library ever since nine o'clock. Finally I took pity on -your tired servant and told him to go to bed, as he let me out. I am -off to Paris by the midnight train, and I particularly wanted to see -you before I left. I thought it was you, or rather your fur coat, as -you passed me. But I wasn't quite sure. Didn't you recognize me?" - -"In this fog, my dear Basil? Why, I can't even recognize Grosvenor -Square. I believe my house is somewhere about here, but I don't feel -at all certain about it. I am sorry you are going away, as I have not -seen you for ages. But I suppose you will be back soon?" - -"No: I am going to be out of England for six months. I intend to take -a studio in Paris and shut myself up till I have finished a great -picture I have in my head. However, it wasn't about myself I wanted to -talk. Here we are at your door. Let me come in for a moment. I have -something to say to you." - -"I shall be charmed. But won't you miss your train?" said Dorian Gray -languidly as he passed up the steps and opened the door with his -latch-key. - -The lamplight struggled out through the fog, and Hallward looked at his -watch. "I have heaps of time," he answered. "The train doesn't go -till twelve-fifteen, and it is only just eleven. In fact, I was on my -way to the club to look for you, when I met you. You see, I shan't -have any delay about luggage, as I have sent on my heavy things. All I -have with me is in this bag, and I can easily get to Victoria in twenty -minutes." - -Dorian looked at him and smiled. "What a way for a fashionable painter -to travel! A Gladstone bag and an ulster! Come in, or the fog will -get into the house. And mind you don't talk about anything serious. -Nothing is serious nowadays. At least nothing should be." - -Hallward shook his head, as he entered, and followed Dorian into the -library. There was a bright wood fire blazing in the large open -hearth. The lamps were lit, and an open Dutch silver spirit-case -stood, with some siphons of soda-water and large cut-glass tumblers, on -a little marqueterie table. - -"You see your servant made me quite at home, Dorian. He gave me -everything I wanted, including your best gold-tipped cigarettes. He is -a most hospitable creature. I like him much better than the Frenchman -you used to have. What has become of the Frenchman, by the bye?" - -Dorian shrugged his shoulders. "I believe he married Lady Radley's -maid, and has established her in Paris as an English dressmaker. -Anglomania is very fashionable over there now, I hear. It seems silly -of the French, doesn't it? But--do you know?--he was not at all a bad -servant. I never liked him, but I had nothing to complain about. One -often imagines things that are quite absurd. He was really very -devoted to me and seemed quite sorry when he went away. Have another -brandy-and-soda? Or would you like hock-and-seltzer? I always take -hock-and-seltzer myself. There is sure to be some in the next room." - -"Thanks, I won't have anything more," said the painter, taking his cap -and coat off and throwing them on the bag that he had placed in the -corner. "And now, my dear fellow, I want to speak to you seriously. -Don't frown like that. You make it so much more difficult for me." - -"What is it all about?" cried Dorian in his petulant way, flinging -himself down on the sofa. "I hope it is not about myself. I am tired -of myself to-night. I should like to be somebody else." - -"It is about yourself," answered Hallward in his grave deep voice, "and -I must say it to you. I shall only keep you half an hour." - -Dorian sighed and lit a cigarette. "Half an hour!" he murmured. - -"It is not much to ask of you, Dorian, and it is entirely for your own -sake that I am speaking. I think it right that you should know that -the most dreadful things are being said against you in London." - -"I don't wish to know anything about them. I love scandals about other -people, but scandals about myself don't interest me. They have not got -the charm of novelty." - -"They must interest you, Dorian. Every gentleman is interested in his -good name. You don't want people to talk of you as something vile and -degraded. Of course, you have your position, and your wealth, and all -that kind of thing. But position and wealth are not everything. Mind -you, I don't believe these rumours at all. At least, I can't believe -them when I see you. Sin is a thing that writes itself across a man's -face. It cannot be concealed. People talk sometimes of secret vices. -There are no such things. If a wretched man has a vice, it shows -itself in the lines of his mouth, the droop of his eyelids, the -moulding of his hands even. Somebody--I won't mention his name, but -you know him--came to me last year to have his portrait done. I had -never seen him before, and had never heard anything about him at the -time, though I have heard a good deal since. He offered an extravagant -price. I refused him. There was something in the shape of his fingers -that I hated. I know now that I was quite right in what I fancied -about him. His life is dreadful. But you, Dorian, with your pure, -bright, innocent face, and your marvellous untroubled youth--I can't -believe anything against you. And yet I see you very seldom, and you -never come down to the studio now, and when I am away from you, and I -hear all these hideous things that people are whispering about you, I -don't know what to say. Why is it, Dorian, that a man like the Duke of -Berwick leaves the room of a club when you enter it? Why is it that so -many gentlemen in London will neither go to your house or invite you to -theirs? You used to be a friend of Lord Staveley. I met him at dinner -last week. Your name happened to come up in conversation, in -connection with the miniatures you have lent to the exhibition at the -Dudley. Staveley curled his lip and said that you might have the most -artistic tastes, but that you were a man whom no pure-minded girl -should be allowed to know, and whom no chaste woman should sit in the -same room with. I reminded him that I was a friend of yours, and asked -him what he meant. He told me. He told me right out before everybody. -It was horrible! Why is your friendship so fatal to young men? There -was that wretched boy in the Guards who committed suicide. You were -his great friend. There was Sir Henry Ashton, who had to leave England -with a tarnished name. You and he were inseparable. What about Adrian -Singleton and his dreadful end? What about Lord Kent's only son and -his career? I met his father yesterday in St. James's Street. He -seemed broken with shame and sorrow. What about the young Duke of -Perth? What sort of life has he got now? What gentleman would -associate with him?" - -"Stop, Basil. You are talking about things of which you know nothing," -said Dorian Gray, biting his lip, and with a note of infinite contempt -in his voice. "You ask me why Berwick leaves a room when I enter it. -It is because I know everything about his life, not because he knows -anything about mine. With such blood as he has in his veins, how could -his record be clean? You ask me about Henry Ashton and young Perth. -Did I teach the one his vices, and the other his debauchery? If Kent's -silly son takes his wife from the streets, what is that to me? If -Adrian Singleton writes his friend's name across a bill, am I his -keeper? I know how people chatter in England. The middle classes air -their moral prejudices over their gross dinner-tables, and whisper -about what they call the profligacies of their betters in order to try -and pretend that they are in smart society and on intimate terms with -the people they slander. In this country, it is enough for a man to -have distinction and brains for every common tongue to wag against him. -And what sort of lives do these people, who pose as being moral, lead -themselves? My dear fellow, you forget that we are in the native land -of the hypocrite." - -"Dorian," cried Hallward, "that is not the question. England is bad -enough I know, and English society is all wrong. That is the reason -why I want you to be fine. You have not been fine. One has a right to -judge of a man by the effect he has over his friends. Yours seem to -lose all sense of honour, of goodness, of purity. You have filled them -with a madness for pleasure. They have gone down into the depths. You -led them there. Yes: you led them there, and yet you can smile, as -you are smiling now. And there is worse behind. I know you and Harry -are inseparable. Surely for that reason, if for none other, you should -not have made his sister's name a by-word." - -"Take care, Basil. You go too far." - -"I must speak, and you must listen. You shall listen. When you met -Lady Gwendolen, not a breath of scandal had ever touched her. Is there -a single decent woman in London now who would drive with her in the -park? Why, even her children are not allowed to live with her. Then -there are other stories--stories that you have been seen creeping at -dawn out of dreadful houses and slinking in disguise into the foulest -dens in London. Are they true? Can they be true? When I first heard -them, I laughed. I hear them now, and they make me shudder. What -about your country-house and the life that is led there? Dorian, you -don't know what is said about you. I won't tell you that I don't want -to preach to you. I remember Harry saying once that every man who -turned himself into an amateur curate for the moment always began by -saying that, and then proceeded to break his word. I do want to preach -to you. I want you to lead such a life as will make the world respect -you. I want you to have a clean name and a fair record. I want you to -get rid of the dreadful people you associate with. Don't shrug your -shoulders like that. Don't be so indifferent. You have a wonderful -influence. Let it be for good, not for evil. They say that you -corrupt every one with whom you become intimate, and that it is quite -sufficient for you to enter a house for shame of some kind to follow -after. I don't know whether it is so or not. How should I know? But -it is said of you. I am told things that it seems impossible to doubt. -Lord Gloucester was one of my greatest friends at Oxford. He showed me -a letter that his wife had written to him when she was dying alone in -her villa at Mentone. Your name was implicated in the most terrible -confession I ever read. I told him that it was absurd--that I knew you -thoroughly and that you were incapable of anything of the kind. Know -you? I wonder do I know you? Before I could answer that, I should -have to see your soul." - -"To see my soul!" muttered Dorian Gray, starting up from the sofa and -turning almost white from fear. - -"Yes," answered Hallward gravely, and with deep-toned sorrow in his -voice, "to see your soul. But only God can do that." - -A bitter laugh of mockery broke from the lips of the younger man. "You -shall see it yourself, to-night!" he cried, seizing a lamp from the -table. "Come: it is your own handiwork. Why shouldn't you look at -it? You can tell the world all about it afterwards, if you choose. -Nobody would believe you. If they did believe you, they would like me -all the better for it. I know the age better than you do, though you -will prate about it so tediously. Come, I tell you. You have -chattered enough about corruption. Now you shall look on it face to -face." - -There was the madness of pride in every word he uttered. He stamped -his foot upon the ground in his boyish insolent manner. He felt a -terrible joy at the thought that some one else was to share his secret, -and that the man who had painted the portrait that was the origin of -all his shame was to be burdened for the rest of his life with the -hideous memory of what he had done. - -"Yes," he continued, coming closer to him and looking steadfastly into -his stern eyes, "I shall show you my soul. You shall see the thing -that you fancy only God can see." - -Hallward started back. "This is blasphemy, Dorian!" he cried. "You -must not say things like that. They are horrible, and they don't mean -anything." - -"You think so?" He laughed again. - -"I know so. As for what I said to you to-night, I said it for your -good. You know I have been always a stanch friend to you." - -"Don't touch me. Finish what you have to say." - -A twisted flash of pain shot across the painter's face. He paused for -a moment, and a wild feeling of pity came over him. After all, what -right had he to pry into the life of Dorian Gray? If he had done a -tithe of what was rumoured about him, how much he must have suffered! -Then he straightened himself up, and walked over to the fire-place, and -stood there, looking at the burning logs with their frostlike ashes and -their throbbing cores of flame. - -"I am waiting, Basil," said the young man in a hard clear voice. - -He turned round. "What I have to say is this," he cried. "You must -give me some answer to these horrible charges that are made against -you. If you tell me that they are absolutely untrue from beginning to -end, I shall believe you. Deny them, Dorian, deny them! Can't you see -what I am going through? My God! don't tell me that you are bad, and -corrupt, and shameful." - -Dorian Gray smiled. There was a curl of contempt in his lips. "Come -upstairs, Basil," he said quietly. "I keep a diary of my life from day -to day, and it never leaves the room in which it is written. I shall -show it to you if you come with me." - -"I shall come with you, Dorian, if you wish it. I see I have missed my -train. That makes no matter. I can go to-morrow. But don't ask me to -read anything to-night. All I want is a plain answer to my question." - -"That shall be given to you upstairs. I could not give it here. You -will not have to read long." - - - -CHAPTER 13 - -He passed out of the room and began the ascent, Basil Hallward -following close behind. They walked softly, as men do instinctively at -night. The lamp cast fantastic shadows on the wall and staircase. A -rising wind made some of the windows rattle. - -When they reached the top landing, Dorian set the lamp down on the -floor, and taking out the key, turned it in the lock. "You insist on -knowing, Basil?" he asked in a low voice. - -"Yes." - -"I am delighted," he answered, smiling. Then he added, somewhat -harshly, "You are the one man in the world who is entitled to know -everything about me. You have had more to do with my life than you -think"; and, taking up the lamp, he opened the door and went in. A -cold current of air passed them, and the light shot up for a moment in -a flame of murky orange. He shuddered. "Shut the door behind you," he -whispered, as he placed the lamp on the table. - -Hallward glanced round him with a puzzled expression. The room looked -as if it had not been lived in for years. A faded Flemish tapestry, a -curtained picture, an old Italian cassone, and an almost empty -book-case--that was all that it seemed to contain, besides a chair and -a table. As Dorian Gray was lighting a half-burned candle that was -standing on the mantelshelf, he saw that the whole place was covered -with dust and that the carpet was in holes. A mouse ran scuffling -behind the wainscoting. There was a damp odour of mildew. - -"So you think that it is only God who sees the soul, Basil? Draw that -curtain back, and you will see mine." - -The voice that spoke was cold and cruel. "You are mad, Dorian, or -playing a part," muttered Hallward, frowning. - -"You won't? Then I must do it myself," said the young man, and he tore -the curtain from its rod and flung it on the ground. - -An exclamation of horror broke from the painter's lips as he saw in the -dim light the hideous face on the canvas grinning at him. There was -something in its expression that filled him with disgust and loathing. -Good heavens! it was Dorian Gray's own face that he was looking at! -The horror, whatever it was, had not yet entirely spoiled that -marvellous beauty. There was still some gold in the thinning hair and -some scarlet on the sensual mouth. The sodden eyes had kept something -of the loveliness of their blue, the noble curves had not yet -completely passed away from chiselled nostrils and from plastic throat. -Yes, it was Dorian himself. But who had done it? He seemed to -recognize his own brushwork, and the frame was his own design. The -idea was monstrous, yet he felt afraid. He seized the lighted candle, -and held it to the picture. In the left-hand corner was his own name, -traced in long letters of bright vermilion. - -It was some foul parody, some infamous ignoble satire. He had never -done that. Still, it was his own picture. He knew it, and he felt as -if his blood had changed in a moment from fire to sluggish ice. His -own picture! What did it mean? Why had it altered? He turned and -looked at Dorian Gray with the eyes of a sick man. His mouth twitched, -and his parched tongue seemed unable to articulate. He passed his hand -across his forehead. It was dank with clammy sweat. - -The young man was leaning against the mantelshelf, watching him with -that strange expression that one sees on the faces of those who are -absorbed in a play when some great artist is acting. There was neither -real sorrow in it nor real joy. There was simply the passion of the -spectator, with perhaps a flicker of triumph in his eyes. He had taken -the flower out of his coat, and was smelling it, or pretending to do so. - -"What does this mean?" cried Hallward, at last. His own voice sounded -shrill and curious in his ears. - -"Years ago, when I was a boy," said Dorian Gray, crushing the flower in -his hand, "you met me, flattered me, and taught me to be vain of my -good looks. One day you introduced me to a friend of yours, who -explained to me the wonder of youth, and you finished a portrait of me -that revealed to me the wonder of beauty. In a mad moment that, even -now, I don't know whether I regret or not, I made a wish, perhaps you -would call it a prayer...." - -"I remember it! Oh, how well I remember it! No! the thing is -impossible. The room is damp. Mildew has got into the canvas. The -paints I used had some wretched mineral poison in them. I tell you the -thing is impossible." - -"Ah, what is impossible?" murmured the young man, going over to the -window and leaning his forehead against the cold, mist-stained glass. - -"You told me you had destroyed it." - -"I was wrong. It has destroyed me." - -"I don't believe it is my picture." - -"Can't you see your ideal in it?" said Dorian bitterly. - -"My ideal, as you call it..." - -"As you called it." - -"There was nothing evil in it, nothing shameful. You were to me such -an ideal as I shall never meet again. This is the face of a satyr." - -"It is the face of my soul." - -"Christ! what a thing I must have worshipped! It has the eyes of a -devil." - -"Each of us has heaven and hell in him, Basil," cried Dorian with a -wild gesture of despair. - -Hallward turned again to the portrait and gazed at it. "My God! If it -is true," he exclaimed, "and this is what you have done with your life, -why, you must be worse even than those who talk against you fancy you -to be!" He held the light up again to the canvas and examined it. The -surface seemed to be quite undisturbed and as he had left it. It was -from within, apparently, that the foulness and horror had come. -Through some strange quickening of inner life the leprosies of sin were -slowly eating the thing away. The rotting of a corpse in a watery -grave was not so fearful. - -His hand shook, and the candle fell from its socket on the floor and -lay there sputtering. He placed his foot on it and put it out. Then -he flung himself into the rickety chair that was standing by the table -and buried his face in his hands. - -"Good God, Dorian, what a lesson! What an awful lesson!" There was no -answer, but he could hear the young man sobbing at the window. "Pray, -Dorian, pray," he murmured. "What is it that one was taught to say in -one's boyhood? 'Lead us not into temptation. Forgive us our sins. -Wash away our iniquities.' Let us say that together. The prayer of -your pride has been answered. The prayer of your repentance will be -answered also. I worshipped you too much. I am punished for it. You -worshipped yourself too much. We are both punished." - -Dorian Gray turned slowly around and looked at him with tear-dimmed -eyes. "It is too late, Basil," he faltered. - -"It is never too late, Dorian. Let us kneel down and try if we cannot -remember a prayer. Isn't there a verse somewhere, 'Though your sins be -as scarlet, yet I will make them as white as snow'?" - -"Those words mean nothing to me now." - -"Hush! Don't say that. You have done enough evil in your life. My -God! Don't you see that accursed thing leering at us?" - -Dorian Gray glanced at the picture, and suddenly an uncontrollable -feeling of hatred for Basil Hallward came over him, as though it had -been suggested to him by the image on the canvas, whispered into his -ear by those grinning lips. The mad passions of a hunted animal -stirred within him, and he loathed the man who was seated at the table, -more than in his whole life he had ever loathed anything. He glanced -wildly around. Something glimmered on the top of the painted chest -that faced him. His eye fell on it. He knew what it was. It was a -knife that he had brought up, some days before, to cut a piece of cord, -and had forgotten to take away with him. He moved slowly towards it, -passing Hallward as he did so. As soon as he got behind him, he seized -it and turned round. Hallward stirred in his chair as if he was going -to rise. He rushed at him and dug the knife into the great vein that -is behind the ear, crushing the man's head down on the table and -stabbing again and again. - -There was a stifled groan and the horrible sound of some one choking -with blood. Three times the outstretched arms shot up convulsively, -waving grotesque, stiff-fingered hands in the air. He stabbed him -twice more, but the man did not move. Something began to trickle on -the floor. He waited for a moment, still pressing the head down. Then -he threw the knife on the table, and listened. - -He could hear nothing, but the drip, drip on the threadbare carpet. He -opened the door and went out on the landing. The house was absolutely -quiet. No one was about. For a few seconds he stood bending over the -balustrade and peering down into the black seething well of darkness. -Then he took out the key and returned to the room, locking himself in -as he did so. - -The thing was still seated in the chair, straining over the table with -bowed head, and humped back, and long fantastic arms. Had it not been -for the red jagged tear in the neck and the clotted black pool that was -slowly widening on the table, one would have said that the man was -simply asleep. - -How quickly it had all been done! He felt strangely calm, and walking -over to the window, opened it and stepped out on the balcony. The wind -had blown the fog away, and the sky was like a monstrous peacock's -tail, starred with myriads of golden eyes. He looked down and saw the -policeman going his rounds and flashing the long beam of his lantern on -the doors of the silent houses. The crimson spot of a prowling hansom -gleamed at the corner and then vanished. A woman in a fluttering shawl -was creeping slowly by the railings, staggering as she went. Now and -then she stopped and peered back. Once, she began to sing in a hoarse -voice. The policeman strolled over and said something to her. She -stumbled away, laughing. A bitter blast swept across the square. The -gas-lamps flickered and became blue, and the leafless trees shook their -black iron branches to and fro. He shivered and went back, closing the -window behind him. - -Having reached the door, he turned the key and opened it. He did not -even glance at the murdered man. He felt that the secret of the whole -thing was not to realize the situation. The friend who had painted the -fatal portrait to which all his misery had been due had gone out of his -life. That was enough. - -Then he remembered the lamp. It was a rather curious one of Moorish -workmanship, made of dull silver inlaid with arabesques of burnished -steel, and studded with coarse turquoises. Perhaps it might be missed -by his servant, and questions would be asked. He hesitated for a -moment, then he turned back and took it from the table. He could not -help seeing the dead thing. How still it was! How horribly white the -long hands looked! It was like a dreadful wax image. - -Having locked the door behind him, he crept quietly downstairs. The -woodwork creaked and seemed to cry out as if in pain. He stopped -several times and waited. No: everything was still. It was merely -the sound of his own footsteps. - -When he reached the library, he saw the bag and coat in the corner. -They must be hidden away somewhere. He unlocked a secret press that -was in the wainscoting, a press in which he kept his own curious -disguises, and put them into it. He could easily burn them afterwards. -Then he pulled out his watch. It was twenty minutes to two. - -He sat down and began to think. Every year--every month, almost--men -were strangled in England for what he had done. There had been a -madness of murder in the air. Some red star had come too close to the -earth.... And yet, what evidence was there against him? Basil Hallward -had left the house at eleven. No one had seen him come in again. Most -of the servants were at Selby Royal. His valet had gone to bed.... -Paris! Yes. It was to Paris that Basil had gone, and by the midnight -train, as he had intended. With his curious reserved habits, it would -be months before any suspicions would be roused. Months! Everything -could be destroyed long before then. - -A sudden thought struck him. He put on his fur coat and hat and went -out into the hall. There he paused, hearing the slow heavy tread of -the policeman on the pavement outside and seeing the flash of the -bull's-eye reflected in the window. He waited and held his breath. - -After a few moments he drew back the latch and slipped out, shutting -the door very gently behind him. Then he began ringing the bell. In -about five minutes his valet appeared, half-dressed and looking very -drowsy. - -"I am sorry to have had to wake you up, Francis," he said, stepping in; -"but I had forgotten my latch-key. What time is it?" - -"Ten minutes past two, sir," answered the man, looking at the clock and -blinking. - -"Ten minutes past two? How horribly late! You must wake me at nine -to-morrow. I have some work to do." - -"All right, sir." - -"Did any one call this evening?" - -"Mr. Hallward, sir. He stayed here till eleven, and then he went away -to catch his train." - -"Oh! I am sorry I didn't see him. Did he leave any message?" - -"No, sir, except that he would write to you from Paris, if he did not -find you at the club." - -"That will do, Francis. Don't forget to call me at nine to-morrow." - -"No, sir." - -The man shambled down the passage in his slippers. - -Dorian Gray threw his hat and coat upon the table and passed into the -library. For a quarter of an hour he walked up and down the room, -biting his lip and thinking. Then he took down the Blue Book from one -of the shelves and began to turn over the leaves. "Alan Campbell, 152, -Hertford Street, Mayfair." Yes; that was the man he wanted. - - - -CHAPTER 14 - -At nine o'clock the next morning his servant came in with a cup of -chocolate on a tray and opened the shutters. Dorian was sleeping quite -peacefully, lying on his right side, with one hand underneath his -cheek. He looked like a boy who had been tired out with play, or study. - -The man had to touch him twice on the shoulder before he woke, and as -he opened his eyes a faint smile passed across his lips, as though he -had been lost in some delightful dream. Yet he had not dreamed at all. -His night had been untroubled by any images of pleasure or of pain. -But youth smiles without any reason. It is one of its chiefest charms. - -He turned round, and leaning upon his elbow, began to sip his -chocolate. The mellow November sun came streaming into the room. The -sky was bright, and there was a genial warmth in the air. It was -almost like a morning in May. - -Gradually the events of the preceding night crept with silent, -blood-stained feet into his brain and reconstructed themselves there -with terrible distinctness. He winced at the memory of all that he had -suffered, and for a moment the same curious feeling of loathing for -Basil Hallward that had made him kill him as he sat in the chair came -back to him, and he grew cold with passion. The dead man was still -sitting there, too, and in the sunlight now. How horrible that was! -Such hideous things were for the darkness, not for the day. - -He felt that if he brooded on what he had gone through he would sicken -or grow mad. There were sins whose fascination was more in the memory -than in the doing of them, strange triumphs that gratified the pride -more than the passions, and gave to the intellect a quickened sense of -joy, greater than any joy they brought, or could ever bring, to the -senses. But this was not one of them. It was a thing to be driven out -of the mind, to be drugged with poppies, to be strangled lest it might -strangle one itself. - -When the half-hour struck, he passed his hand across his forehead, and -then got up hastily and dressed himself with even more than his usual -care, giving a good deal of attention to the choice of his necktie and -scarf-pin and changing his rings more than once. He spent a long time -also over breakfast, tasting the various dishes, talking to his valet -about some new liveries that he was thinking of getting made for the -servants at Selby, and going through his correspondence. At some of -the letters, he smiled. Three of them bored him. One he read several -times over and then tore up with a slight look of annoyance in his -face. "That awful thing, a woman's memory!" as Lord Henry had once -said. - -After he had drunk his cup of black coffee, he wiped his lips slowly -with a napkin, motioned to his servant to wait, and going over to the -table, sat down and wrote two letters. One he put in his pocket, the -other he handed to the valet. - -"Take this round to 152, Hertford Street, Francis, and if Mr. Campbell -is out of town, get his address." - -As soon as he was alone, he lit a cigarette and began sketching upon a -piece of paper, drawing first flowers and bits of architecture, and -then human faces. Suddenly he remarked that every face that he drew -seemed to have a fantastic likeness to Basil Hallward. He frowned, and -getting up, went over to the book-case and took out a volume at hazard. -He was determined that he would not think about what had happened until -it became absolutely necessary that he should do so. - -When he had stretched himself on the sofa, he looked at the title-page -of the book. It was Gautier's Emaux et Camees, Charpentier's -Japanese-paper edition, with the Jacquemart etching. The binding was -of citron-green leather, with a design of gilt trellis-work and dotted -pomegranates. It had been given to him by Adrian Singleton. As he -turned over the pages, his eye fell on the poem about the hand of -Lacenaire, the cold yellow hand "du supplice encore mal lavee," with -its downy red hairs and its "doigts de faune." He glanced at his own -white taper fingers, shuddering slightly in spite of himself, and -passed on, till he came to those lovely stanzas upon Venice: - - Sur une gamme chromatique, - Le sein de peries ruisselant, - La Venus de l'Adriatique - Sort de l'eau son corps rose et blanc. - - Les domes, sur l'azur des ondes - Suivant la phrase au pur contour, - S'enflent comme des gorges rondes - Que souleve un soupir d'amour. - - L'esquif aborde et me depose, - Jetant son amarre au pilier, - Devant une facade rose, - Sur le marbre d'un escalier. - - -How exquisite they were! As one read them, one seemed to be floating -down the green water-ways of the pink and pearl city, seated in a black -gondola with silver prow and trailing curtains. The mere lines looked -to him like those straight lines of turquoise-blue that follow one as -one pushes out to the Lido. The sudden flashes of colour reminded him -of the gleam of the opal-and-iris-throated birds that flutter round the -tall honeycombed Campanile, or stalk, with such stately grace, through -the dim, dust-stained arcades. Leaning back with half-closed eyes, he -kept saying over and over to himself: - - "Devant une facade rose, - Sur le marbre d'un escalier." - -The whole of Venice was in those two lines. He remembered the autumn -that he had passed there, and a wonderful love that had stirred him to -mad delightful follies. There was romance in every place. But Venice, -like Oxford, had kept the background for romance, and, to the true -romantic, background was everything, or almost everything. Basil had -been with him part of the time, and had gone wild over Tintoret. Poor -Basil! What a horrible way for a man to die! - -He sighed, and took up the volume again, and tried to forget. He read -of the swallows that fly in and out of the little cafe at Smyrna where -the Hadjis sit counting their amber beads and the turbaned merchants -smoke their long tasselled pipes and talk gravely to each other; he -read of the Obelisk in the Place de la Concorde that weeps tears of -granite in its lonely sunless exile and longs to be back by the hot, -lotus-covered Nile, where there are Sphinxes, and rose-red ibises, and -white vultures with gilded claws, and crocodiles with small beryl eyes -that crawl over the green steaming mud; he began to brood over those -verses which, drawing music from kiss-stained marble, tell of that -curious statue that Gautier compares to a contralto voice, the "monstre -charmant" that couches in the porphyry-room of the Louvre. But after a -time the book fell from his hand. He grew nervous, and a horrible fit -of terror came over him. What if Alan Campbell should be out of -England? Days would elapse before he could come back. Perhaps he -might refuse to come. What could he do then? Every moment was of -vital importance. - -They had been great friends once, five years before--almost -inseparable, indeed. Then the intimacy had come suddenly to an end. -When they met in society now, it was only Dorian Gray who smiled: Alan -Campbell never did. - -He was an extremely clever young man, though he had no real -appreciation of the visible arts, and whatever little sense of the -beauty of poetry he possessed he had gained entirely from Dorian. His -dominant intellectual passion was for science. At Cambridge he had -spent a great deal of his time working in the laboratory, and had taken -a good class in the Natural Science Tripos of his year. Indeed, he was -still devoted to the study of chemistry, and had a laboratory of his -own in which he used to shut himself up all day long, greatly to the -annoyance of his mother, who had set her heart on his standing for -Parliament and had a vague idea that a chemist was a person who made up -prescriptions. He was an excellent musician, however, as well, and -played both the violin and the piano better than most amateurs. In -fact, it was music that had first brought him and Dorian Gray -together--music and that indefinable attraction that Dorian seemed to -be able to exercise whenever he wished--and, indeed, exercised often -without being conscious of it. They had met at Lady Berkshire's the -night that Rubinstein played there, and after that used to be always -seen together at the opera and wherever good music was going on. For -eighteen months their intimacy lasted. Campbell was always either at -Selby Royal or in Grosvenor Square. To him, as to many others, Dorian -Gray was the type of everything that is wonderful and fascinating in -life. Whether or not a quarrel had taken place between them no one -ever knew. But suddenly people remarked that they scarcely spoke when -they met and that Campbell seemed always to go away early from any -party at which Dorian Gray was present. He had changed, too--was -strangely melancholy at times, appeared almost to dislike hearing -music, and would never himself play, giving as his excuse, when he was -called upon, that he was so absorbed in science that he had no time -left in which to practise. And this was certainly true. Every day he -seemed to become more interested in biology, and his name appeared once -or twice in some of the scientific reviews in connection with certain -curious experiments. - -This was the man Dorian Gray was waiting for. Every second he kept -glancing at the clock. As the minutes went by he became horribly -agitated. At last he got up and began to pace up and down the room, -looking like a beautiful caged thing. He took long stealthy strides. -His hands were curiously cold. - -The suspense became unbearable. Time seemed to him to be crawling with -feet of lead, while he by monstrous winds was being swept towards the -jagged edge of some black cleft of precipice. He knew what was waiting -for him there; saw it, indeed, and, shuddering, crushed with dank hands -his burning lids as though he would have robbed the very brain of sight -and driven the eyeballs back into their cave. It was useless. The -brain had its own food on which it battened, and the imagination, made -grotesque by terror, twisted and distorted as a living thing by pain, -danced like some foul puppet on a stand and grinned through moving -masks. Then, suddenly, time stopped for him. Yes: that blind, -slow-breathing thing crawled no more, and horrible thoughts, time being -dead, raced nimbly on in front, and dragged a hideous future from its -grave, and showed it to him. He stared at it. Its very horror made -him stone. - -At last the door opened and his servant entered. He turned glazed eyes -upon him. - -"Mr. Campbell, sir," said the man. - -A sigh of relief broke from his parched lips, and the colour came back -to his cheeks. - -"Ask him to come in at once, Francis." He felt that he was himself -again. His mood of cowardice had passed away. - -The man bowed and retired. In a few moments, Alan Campbell walked in, -looking very stern and rather pale, his pallor being intensified by his -coal-black hair and dark eyebrows. - -"Alan! This is kind of you. I thank you for coming." - -"I had intended never to enter your house again, Gray. But you said it -was a matter of life and death." His voice was hard and cold. He -spoke with slow deliberation. There was a look of contempt in the -steady searching gaze that he turned on Dorian. He kept his hands in -the pockets of his Astrakhan coat, and seemed not to have noticed the -gesture with which he had been greeted. - -"Yes: it is a matter of life and death, Alan, and to more than one -person. Sit down." - -Campbell took a chair by the table, and Dorian sat opposite to him. -The two men's eyes met. In Dorian's there was infinite pity. He knew -that what he was going to do was dreadful. - -After a strained moment of silence, he leaned across and said, very -quietly, but watching the effect of each word upon the face of him he -had sent for, "Alan, in a locked room at the top of this house, a room -to which nobody but myself has access, a dead man is seated at a table. -He has been dead ten hours now. Don't stir, and don't look at me like -that. Who the man is, why he died, how he died, are matters that do -not concern you. What you have to do is this--" - -"Stop, Gray. I don't want to know anything further. Whether what you -have told me is true or not true doesn't concern me. I entirely -decline to be mixed up in your life. Keep your horrible secrets to -yourself. They don't interest me any more." - -"Alan, they will have to interest you. This one will have to interest -you. I am awfully sorry for you, Alan. But I can't help myself. You -are the one man who is able to save me. I am forced to bring you into -the matter. I have no option. Alan, you are scientific. You know -about chemistry and things of that kind. You have made experiments. -What you have got to do is to destroy the thing that is upstairs--to -destroy it so that not a vestige of it will be left. Nobody saw this -person come into the house. Indeed, at the present moment he is -supposed to be in Paris. He will not be missed for months. When he is -missed, there must be no trace of him found here. You, Alan, you must -change him, and everything that belongs to him, into a handful of ashes -that I may scatter in the air." - -"You are mad, Dorian." - -"Ah! I was waiting for you to call me Dorian." - -"You are mad, I tell you--mad to imagine that I would raise a finger to -help you, mad to make this monstrous confession. I will have nothing -to do with this matter, whatever it is. Do you think I am going to -peril my reputation for you? What is it to me what devil's work you -are up to?" - -"It was suicide, Alan." - -"I am glad of that. But who drove him to it? You, I should fancy." - -"Do you still refuse to do this for me?" - -"Of course I refuse. I will have absolutely nothing to do with it. I -don't care what shame comes on you. You deserve it all. I should not -be sorry to see you disgraced, publicly disgraced. How dare you ask -me, of all men in the world, to mix myself up in this horror? I should -have thought you knew more about people's characters. Your friend Lord -Henry Wotton can't have taught you much about psychology, whatever else -he has taught you. Nothing will induce me to stir a step to help you. -You have come to the wrong man. Go to some of your friends. Don't -come to me." - -"Alan, it was murder. I killed him. You don't know what he had made -me suffer. Whatever my life is, he had more to do with the making or -the marring of it than poor Harry has had. He may not have intended -it, the result was the same." - -"Murder! Good God, Dorian, is that what you have come to? I shall not -inform upon you. It is not my business. Besides, without my stirring -in the matter, you are certain to be arrested. Nobody ever commits a -crime without doing something stupid. But I will have nothing to do -with it." - -"You must have something to do with it. Wait, wait a moment; listen to -me. Only listen, Alan. All I ask of you is to perform a certain -scientific experiment. You go to hospitals and dead-houses, and the -horrors that you do there don't affect you. If in some hideous -dissecting-room or fetid laboratory you found this man lying on a -leaden table with red gutters scooped out in it for the blood to flow -through, you would simply look upon him as an admirable subject. You -would not turn a hair. You would not believe that you were doing -anything wrong. On the contrary, you would probably feel that you were -benefiting the human race, or increasing the sum of knowledge in the -world, or gratifying intellectual curiosity, or something of that kind. -What I want you to do is merely what you have often done before. -Indeed, to destroy a body must be far less horrible than what you are -accustomed to work at. And, remember, it is the only piece of evidence -against me. If it is discovered, I am lost; and it is sure to be -discovered unless you help me." - -"I have no desire to help you. You forget that. I am simply -indifferent to the whole thing. It has nothing to do with me." - -"Alan, I entreat you. Think of the position I am in. Just before you -came I almost fainted with terror. You may know terror yourself some -day. No! don't think of that. Look at the matter purely from the -scientific point of view. You don't inquire where the dead things on -which you experiment come from. Don't inquire now. I have told you -too much as it is. But I beg of you to do this. We were friends once, -Alan." - -"Don't speak about those days, Dorian--they are dead." - -"The dead linger sometimes. The man upstairs will not go away. He is -sitting at the table with bowed head and outstretched arms. Alan! -Alan! If you don't come to my assistance, I am ruined. Why, they will -hang me, Alan! Don't you understand? They will hang me for what I -have done." - -"There is no good in prolonging this scene. I absolutely refuse to do -anything in the matter. It is insane of you to ask me." - -"You refuse?" - -"Yes." - -"I entreat you, Alan." - -"It is useless." - -The same look of pity came into Dorian Gray's eyes. Then he stretched -out his hand, took a piece of paper, and wrote something on it. He -read it over twice, folded it carefully, and pushed it across the -table. Having done this, he got up and went over to the window. - -Campbell looked at him in surprise, and then took up the paper, and -opened it. As he read it, his face became ghastly pale and he fell -back in his chair. A horrible sense of sickness came over him. He -felt as if his heart was beating itself to death in some empty hollow. - -After two or three minutes of terrible silence, Dorian turned round and -came and stood behind him, putting his hand upon his shoulder. - -"I am so sorry for you, Alan," he murmured, "but you leave me no -alternative. I have a letter written already. Here it is. You see -the address. If you don't help me, I must send it. If you don't help -me, I will send it. You know what the result will be. But you are -going to help me. It is impossible for you to refuse now. I tried to -spare you. You will do me the justice to admit that. You were stern, -harsh, offensive. You treated me as no man has ever dared to treat -me--no living man, at any rate. I bore it all. Now it is for me to -dictate terms." - -Campbell buried his face in his hands, and a shudder passed through him. - -"Yes, it is my turn to dictate terms, Alan. You know what they are. -The thing is quite simple. Come, don't work yourself into this fever. -The thing has to be done. Face it, and do it." - -A groan broke from Campbell's lips and he shivered all over. The -ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece seemed to him to be dividing -time into separate atoms of agony, each of which was too terrible to be -borne. He felt as if an iron ring was being slowly tightened round his -forehead, as if the disgrace with which he was threatened had already -come upon him. The hand upon his shoulder weighed like a hand of lead. -It was intolerable. It seemed to crush him. - -"Come, Alan, you must decide at once." - -"I cannot do it," he said, mechanically, as though words could alter -things. - -"You must. You have no choice. Don't delay." - -He hesitated a moment. "Is there a fire in the room upstairs?" - -"Yes, there is a gas-fire with asbestos." - -"I shall have to go home and get some things from the laboratory." - -"No, Alan, you must not leave the house. Write out on a sheet of -notepaper what you want and my servant will take a cab and bring the -things back to you." - -Campbell scrawled a few lines, blotted them, and addressed an envelope -to his assistant. Dorian took the note up and read it carefully. Then -he rang the bell and gave it to his valet, with orders to return as -soon as possible and to bring the things with him. - -As the hall door shut, Campbell started nervously, and having got up -from the chair, went over to the chimney-piece. He was shivering with a -kind of ague. For nearly twenty minutes, neither of the men spoke. A -fly buzzed noisily about the room, and the ticking of the clock was -like the beat of a hammer. - -As the chime struck one, Campbell turned round, and looking at Dorian -Gray, saw that his eyes were filled with tears. There was something in -the purity and refinement of that sad face that seemed to enrage him. -"You are infamous, absolutely infamous!" he muttered. - -"Hush, Alan. You have saved my life," said Dorian. - -"Your life? Good heavens! what a life that is! You have gone from -corruption to corruption, and now you have culminated in crime. In -doing what I am going to do--what you force me to do--it is not of your -life that I am thinking." - -"Ah, Alan," murmured Dorian with a sigh, "I wish you had a thousandth -part of the pity for me that I have for you." He turned away as he -spoke and stood looking out at the garden. Campbell made no answer. - -After about ten minutes a knock came to the door, and the servant -entered, carrying a large mahogany chest of chemicals, with a long coil -of steel and platinum wire and two rather curiously shaped iron clamps. - -"Shall I leave the things here, sir?" he asked Campbell. - -"Yes," said Dorian. "And I am afraid, Francis, that I have another -errand for you. What is the name of the man at Richmond who supplies -Selby with orchids?" - -"Harden, sir." - -"Yes--Harden. You must go down to Richmond at once, see Harden -personally, and tell him to send twice as many orchids as I ordered, -and to have as few white ones as possible. In fact, I don't want any -white ones. It is a lovely day, Francis, and Richmond is a very pretty -place--otherwise I wouldn't bother you about it." - -"No trouble, sir. At what time shall I be back?" - -Dorian looked at Campbell. "How long will your experiment take, Alan?" -he said in a calm indifferent voice. The presence of a third person in -the room seemed to give him extraordinary courage. - -Campbell frowned and bit his lip. "It will take about five hours," he -answered. - -"It will be time enough, then, if you are back at half-past seven, -Francis. Or stay: just leave my things out for dressing. You can -have the evening to yourself. I am not dining at home, so I shall not -want you." - -"Thank you, sir," said the man, leaving the room. - -"Now, Alan, there is not a moment to be lost. How heavy this chest is! -I'll take it for you. You bring the other things." He spoke rapidly -and in an authoritative manner. Campbell felt dominated by him. They -left the room together. - -When they reached the top landing, Dorian took out the key and turned -it in the lock. Then he stopped, and a troubled look came into his -eyes. He shuddered. "I don't think I can go in, Alan," he murmured. - -"It is nothing to me. I don't require you," said Campbell coldly. - -Dorian half opened the door. As he did so, he saw the face of his -portrait leering in the sunlight. On the floor in front of it the torn -curtain was lying. He remembered that the night before he had -forgotten, for the first time in his life, to hide the fatal canvas, -and was about to rush forward, when he drew back with a shudder. - -What was that loathsome red dew that gleamed, wet and glistening, on -one of the hands, as though the canvas had sweated blood? How horrible -it was!--more horrible, it seemed to him for the moment, than the -silent thing that he knew was stretched across the table, the thing -whose grotesque misshapen shadow on the spotted carpet showed him that -it had not stirred, but was still there, as he had left it. - -He heaved a deep breath, opened the door a little wider, and with -half-closed eyes and averted head, walked quickly in, determined that -he would not look even once upon the dead man. Then, stooping down and -taking up the gold-and-purple hanging, he flung it right over the -picture. - -There he stopped, feeling afraid to turn round, and his eyes fixed -themselves on the intricacies of the pattern before him. He heard -Campbell bringing in the heavy chest, and the irons, and the other -things that he had required for his dreadful work. He began to wonder -if he and Basil Hallward had ever met, and, if so, what they had -thought of each other. - -"Leave me now," said a stern voice behind him. - -He turned and hurried out, just conscious that the dead man had been -thrust back into the chair and that Campbell was gazing into a -glistening yellow face. As he was going downstairs, he heard the key -being turned in the lock. - -It was long after seven when Campbell came back into the library. He -was pale, but absolutely calm. "I have done what you asked me to do," -he muttered "And now, good-bye. Let us never see each other again." - -"You have saved me from ruin, Alan. I cannot forget that," said Dorian -simply. - -As soon as Campbell had left, he went upstairs. There was a horrible -smell of nitric acid in the room. But the thing that had been sitting -at the table was gone. - - - -CHAPTER 15 - -That evening, at eight-thirty, exquisitely dressed and wearing a large -button-hole of Parma violets, Dorian Gray was ushered into Lady -Narborough's drawing-room by bowing servants. His forehead was -throbbing with maddened nerves, and he felt wildly excited, but his -manner as he bent over his hostess's hand was as easy and graceful as -ever. Perhaps one never seems so much at one's ease as when one has to -play a part. Certainly no one looking at Dorian Gray that night could -have believed that he had passed through a tragedy as horrible as any -tragedy of our age. Those finely shaped fingers could never have -clutched a knife for sin, nor those smiling lips have cried out on God -and goodness. He himself could not help wondering at the calm of his -demeanour, and for a moment felt keenly the terrible pleasure of a -double life. - -It was a small party, got up rather in a hurry by Lady Narborough, who -was a very clever woman with what Lord Henry used to describe as the -remains of really remarkable ugliness. She had proved an excellent -wife to one of our most tedious ambassadors, and having buried her -husband properly in a marble mausoleum, which she had herself designed, -and married off her daughters to some rich, rather elderly men, she -devoted herself now to the pleasures of French fiction, French cookery, -and French esprit when she could get it. - -Dorian was one of her especial favourites, and she always told him that -she was extremely glad she had not met him in early life. "I know, my -dear, I should have fallen madly in love with you," she used to say, -"and thrown my bonnet right over the mills for your sake. It is most -fortunate that you were not thought of at the time. As it was, our -bonnets were so unbecoming, and the mills were so occupied in trying to -raise the wind, that I never had even a flirtation with anybody. -However, that was all Narborough's fault. He was dreadfully -short-sighted, and there is no pleasure in taking in a husband who -never sees anything." - -Her guests this evening were rather tedious. The fact was, as she -explained to Dorian, behind a very shabby fan, one of her married -daughters had come up quite suddenly to stay with her, and, to make -matters worse, had actually brought her husband with her. "I think it -is most unkind of her, my dear," she whispered. "Of course I go and -stay with them every summer after I come from Homburg, but then an old -woman like me must have fresh air sometimes, and besides, I really wake -them up. You don't know what an existence they lead down there. It is -pure unadulterated country life. They get up early, because they have -so much to do, and go to bed early, because they have so little to -think about. There has not been a scandal in the neighbourhood since -the time of Queen Elizabeth, and consequently they all fall asleep -after dinner. You shan't sit next either of them. You shall sit by me -and amuse me." - -Dorian murmured a graceful compliment and looked round the room. Yes: -it was certainly a tedious party. Two of the people he had never seen -before, and the others consisted of Ernest Harrowden, one of those -middle-aged mediocrities so common in London clubs who have no enemies, -but are thoroughly disliked by their friends; Lady Ruxton, an -overdressed woman of forty-seven, with a hooked nose, who was always -trying to get herself compromised, but was so peculiarly plain that to -her great disappointment no one would ever believe anything against -her; Mrs. Erlynne, a pushing nobody, with a delightful lisp and -Venetian-red hair; Lady Alice Chapman, his hostess's daughter, a dowdy -dull girl, with one of those characteristic British faces that, once -seen, are never remembered; and her husband, a red-cheeked, -white-whiskered creature who, like so many of his class, was under the -impression that inordinate joviality can atone for an entire lack of -ideas. - -He was rather sorry he had come, till Lady Narborough, looking at the -great ormolu gilt clock that sprawled in gaudy curves on the -mauve-draped mantelshelf, exclaimed: "How horrid of Henry Wotton to be -so late! I sent round to him this morning on chance and he promised -faithfully not to disappoint me." - -It was some consolation that Harry was to be there, and when the door -opened and he heard his slow musical voice lending charm to some -insincere apology, he ceased to feel bored. - -But at dinner he could not eat anything. Plate after plate went away -untasted. Lady Narborough kept scolding him for what she called "an -insult to poor Adolphe, who invented the menu specially for you," and -now and then Lord Henry looked across at him, wondering at his silence -and abstracted manner. From time to time the butler filled his glass -with champagne. He drank eagerly, and his thirst seemed to increase. - -"Dorian," said Lord Henry at last, as the chaud-froid was being handed -round, "what is the matter with you to-night? You are quite out of -sorts." - -"I believe he is in love," cried Lady Narborough, "and that he is -afraid to tell me for fear I should be jealous. He is quite right. I -certainly should." - -"Dear Lady Narborough," murmured Dorian, smiling, "I have not been in -love for a whole week--not, in fact, since Madame de Ferrol left town." - -"How you men can fall in love with that woman!" exclaimed the old lady. -"I really cannot understand it." - -"It is simply because she remembers you when you were a little girl, -Lady Narborough," said Lord Henry. "She is the one link between us and -your short frocks." - -"She does not remember my short frocks at all, Lord Henry. But I -remember her very well at Vienna thirty years ago, and how decolletee -she was then." - -"She is still decolletee," he answered, taking an olive in his long -fingers; "and when she is in a very smart gown she looks like an -edition de luxe of a bad French novel. She is really wonderful, and -full of surprises. Her capacity for family affection is extraordinary. -When her third husband died, her hair turned quite gold from grief." - -"How can you, Harry!" cried Dorian. - -"It is a most romantic explanation," laughed the hostess. "But her -third husband, Lord Henry! You don't mean to say Ferrol is the fourth?" - -"Certainly, Lady Narborough." - -"I don't believe a word of it." - -"Well, ask Mr. Gray. He is one of her most intimate friends." - -"Is it true, Mr. Gray?" - -"She assures me so, Lady Narborough," said Dorian. "I asked her -whether, like Marguerite de Navarre, she had their hearts embalmed and -hung at her girdle. She told me she didn't, because none of them had -had any hearts at all." - -"Four husbands! Upon my word that is trop de zele." - -"Trop d'audace, I tell her," said Dorian. - -"Oh! she is audacious enough for anything, my dear. And what is Ferrol -like? I don't know him." - -"The husbands of very beautiful women belong to the criminal classes," -said Lord Henry, sipping his wine. - -Lady Narborough hit him with her fan. "Lord Henry, I am not at all -surprised that the world says that you are extremely wicked." - -"But what world says that?" asked Lord Henry, elevating his eyebrows. -"It can only be the next world. This world and I are on excellent -terms." - -"Everybody I know says you are very wicked," cried the old lady, -shaking her head. - -Lord Henry looked serious for some moments. "It is perfectly -monstrous," he said, at last, "the way people go about nowadays saying -things against one behind one's back that are absolutely and entirely -true." - -"Isn't he incorrigible?" cried Dorian, leaning forward in his chair. - -"I hope so," said his hostess, laughing. "But really, if you all -worship Madame de Ferrol in this ridiculous way, I shall have to marry -again so as to be in the fashion." - -"You will never marry again, Lady Narborough," broke in Lord Henry. -"You were far too happy. When a woman marries again, it is because she -detested her first husband. When a man marries again, it is because he -adored his first wife. Women try their luck; men risk theirs." - -"Narborough wasn't perfect," cried the old lady. - -"If he had been, you would not have loved him, my dear lady," was the -rejoinder. "Women love us for our defects. If we have enough of them, -they will forgive us everything, even our intellects. You will never -ask me to dinner again after saying this, I am afraid, Lady Narborough, -but it is quite true." - -"Of course it is true, Lord Henry. If we women did not love you for -your defects, where would you all be? Not one of you would ever be -married. You would be a set of unfortunate bachelors. Not, however, -that that would alter you much. Nowadays all the married men live like -bachelors, and all the bachelors like married men." - -"Fin de siecle," murmured Lord Henry. - -"Fin du globe," answered his hostess. - -"I wish it were fin du globe," said Dorian with a sigh. "Life is a -great disappointment." - -"Ah, my dear," cried Lady Narborough, putting on her gloves, "don't -tell me that you have exhausted life. When a man says that one knows -that life has exhausted him. Lord Henry is very wicked, and I -sometimes wish that I had been; but you are made to be good--you look -so good. I must find you a nice wife. Lord Henry, don't you think -that Mr. Gray should get married?" - -"I am always telling him so, Lady Narborough," said Lord Henry with a -bow. - -"Well, we must look out for a suitable match for him. I shall go -through Debrett carefully to-night and draw out a list of all the -eligible young ladies." - -"With their ages, Lady Narborough?" asked Dorian. - -"Of course, with their ages, slightly edited. But nothing must be done -in a hurry. I want it to be what The Morning Post calls a suitable -alliance, and I want you both to be happy." - -"What nonsense people talk about happy marriages!" exclaimed Lord -Henry. "A man can be happy with any woman, as long as he does not love -her." - -"Ah! what a cynic you are!" cried the old lady, pushing back her chair -and nodding to Lady Ruxton. "You must come and dine with me soon -again. You are really an admirable tonic, much better than what Sir -Andrew prescribes for me. You must tell me what people you would like -to meet, though. I want it to be a delightful gathering." - -"I like men who have a future and women who have a past," he answered. -"Or do you think that would make it a petticoat party?" - -"I fear so," she said, laughing, as she stood up. "A thousand pardons, -my dear Lady Ruxton," she added, "I didn't see you hadn't finished your -cigarette." - -"Never mind, Lady Narborough. I smoke a great deal too much. I am -going to limit myself, for the future." - -"Pray don't, Lady Ruxton," said Lord Henry. "Moderation is a fatal -thing. Enough is as bad as a meal. More than enough is as good as a -feast." - -Lady Ruxton glanced at him curiously. "You must come and explain that -to me some afternoon, Lord Henry. It sounds a fascinating theory," she -murmured, as she swept out of the room. - -"Now, mind you don't stay too long over your politics and scandal," -cried Lady Narborough from the door. "If you do, we are sure to -squabble upstairs." - -The men laughed, and Mr. Chapman got up solemnly from the foot of the -table and came up to the top. Dorian Gray changed his seat and went -and sat by Lord Henry. Mr. Chapman began to talk in a loud voice about -the situation in the House of Commons. He guffawed at his adversaries. -The word doctrinaire--word full of terror to the British -mind--reappeared from time to time between his explosions. An -alliterative prefix served as an ornament of oratory. He hoisted the -Union Jack on the pinnacles of thought. The inherited stupidity of the -race--sound English common sense he jovially termed it--was shown to be -the proper bulwark for society. - -A smile curved Lord Henry's lips, and he turned round and looked at -Dorian. - -"Are you better, my dear fellow?" he asked. "You seemed rather out of -sorts at dinner." - -"I am quite well, Harry. I am tired. That is all." - -"You were charming last night. The little duchess is quite devoted to -you. She tells me she is going down to Selby." - -"She has promised to come on the twentieth." - -"Is Monmouth to be there, too?" - -"Oh, yes, Harry." - -"He bores me dreadfully, almost as much as he bores her. She is very -clever, too clever for a woman. She lacks the indefinable charm of -weakness. It is the feet of clay that make the gold of the image -precious. Her feet are very pretty, but they are not feet of clay. -White porcelain feet, if you like. They have been through the fire, -and what fire does not destroy, it hardens. She has had experiences." - -"How long has she been married?" asked Dorian. - -"An eternity, she tells me. I believe, according to the peerage, it is -ten years, but ten years with Monmouth must have been like eternity, -with time thrown in. Who else is coming?" - -"Oh, the Willoughbys, Lord Rugby and his wife, our hostess, Geoffrey -Clouston, the usual set. I have asked Lord Grotrian." - -"I like him," said Lord Henry. "A great many people don't, but I find -him charming. He atones for being occasionally somewhat overdressed by -being always absolutely over-educated. He is a very modern type." - -"I don't know if he will be able to come, Harry. He may have to go to -Monte Carlo with his father." - -"Ah! what a nuisance people's people are! Try and make him come. By -the way, Dorian, you ran off very early last night. You left before -eleven. What did you do afterwards? Did you go straight home?" - -Dorian glanced at him hurriedly and frowned. - -"No, Harry," he said at last, "I did not get home till nearly three." - -"Did you go to the club?" - -"Yes," he answered. Then he bit his lip. "No, I don't mean that. I -didn't go to the club. I walked about. I forget what I did.... How -inquisitive you are, Harry! You always want to know what one has been -doing. I always want to forget what I have been doing. I came in at -half-past two, if you wish to know the exact time. I had left my -latch-key at home, and my servant had to let me in. If you want any -corroborative evidence on the subject, you can ask him." - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "My dear fellow, as if I cared! -Let us go up to the drawing-room. No sherry, thank you, Mr. Chapman. -Something has happened to you, Dorian. Tell me what it is. You are -not yourself to-night." - -"Don't mind me, Harry. I am irritable, and out of temper. I shall -come round and see you to-morrow, or next day. Make my excuses to Lady -Narborough. I shan't go upstairs. I shall go home. I must go home." - -"All right, Dorian. I dare say I shall see you to-morrow at tea-time. -The duchess is coming." - -"I will try to be there, Harry," he said, leaving the room. As he -drove back to his own house, he was conscious that the sense of terror -he thought he had strangled had come back to him. Lord Henry's casual -questioning had made him lose his nerve for the moment, and he wanted -his nerve still. Things that were dangerous had to be destroyed. He -winced. He hated the idea of even touching them. - -Yet it had to be done. He realized that, and when he had locked the -door of his library, he opened the secret press into which he had -thrust Basil Hallward's coat and bag. A huge fire was blazing. He -piled another log on it. The smell of the singeing clothes and burning -leather was horrible. It took him three-quarters of an hour to consume -everything. At the end he felt faint and sick, and having lit some -Algerian pastilles in a pierced copper brazier, he bathed his hands and -forehead with a cool musk-scented vinegar. - -Suddenly he started. His eyes grew strangely bright, and he gnawed -nervously at his underlip. Between two of the windows stood a large -Florentine cabinet, made out of ebony and inlaid with ivory and blue -lapis. He watched it as though it were a thing that could fascinate -and make afraid, as though it held something that he longed for and yet -almost loathed. His breath quickened. A mad craving came over him. -He lit a cigarette and then threw it away. His eyelids drooped till -the long fringed lashes almost touched his cheek. But he still watched -the cabinet. At last he got up from the sofa on which he had been -lying, went over to it, and having unlocked it, touched some hidden -spring. A triangular drawer passed slowly out. His fingers moved -instinctively towards it, dipped in, and closed on something. It was a -small Chinese box of black and gold-dust lacquer, elaborately wrought, -the sides patterned with curved waves, and the silken cords hung with -round crystals and tasselled in plaited metal threads. He opened it. -Inside was a green paste, waxy in lustre, the odour curiously heavy and -persistent. - -He hesitated for some moments, with a strangely immobile smile upon his -face. Then shivering, though the atmosphere of the room was terribly -hot, he drew himself up and glanced at the clock. It was twenty -minutes to twelve. He put the box back, shutting the cabinet doors as -he did so, and went into his bedroom. - -As midnight was striking bronze blows upon the dusky air, Dorian Gray, -dressed commonly, and with a muffler wrapped round his throat, crept -quietly out of his house. In Bond Street he found a hansom with a good -horse. He hailed it and in a low voice gave the driver an address. - -The man shook his head. "It is too far for me," he muttered. - -"Here is a sovereign for you," said Dorian. "You shall have another if -you drive fast." - -"All right, sir," answered the man, "you will be there in an hour," and -after his fare had got in he turned his horse round and drove rapidly -towards the river. - - - -CHAPTER 16 - -A cold rain began to fall, and the blurred street-lamps looked ghastly -in the dripping mist. The public-houses were just closing, and dim men -and women were clustering in broken groups round their doors. From -some of the bars came the sound of horrible laughter. In others, -drunkards brawled and screamed. - -Lying back in the hansom, with his hat pulled over his forehead, Dorian -Gray watched with listless eyes the sordid shame of the great city, and -now and then he repeated to himself the words that Lord Henry had said -to him on the first day they had met, "To cure the soul by means of the -senses, and the senses by means of the soul." Yes, that was the -secret. He had often tried it, and would try it again now. There were -opium dens where one could buy oblivion, dens of horror where the -memory of old sins could be destroyed by the madness of sins that were -new. - -The moon hung low in the sky like a yellow skull. From time to time a -huge misshapen cloud stretched a long arm across and hid it. The -gas-lamps grew fewer, and the streets more narrow and gloomy. Once the -man lost his way and had to drive back half a mile. A steam rose from -the horse as it splashed up the puddles. The sidewindows of the hansom -were clogged with a grey-flannel mist. - -"To cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses by means of -the soul!" How the words rang in his ears! His soul, certainly, was -sick to death. Was it true that the senses could cure it? Innocent -blood had been spilled. What could atone for that? Ah! for that there -was no atonement; but though forgiveness was impossible, forgetfulness -was possible still, and he was determined to forget, to stamp the thing -out, to crush it as one would crush the adder that had stung one. -Indeed, what right had Basil to have spoken to him as he had done? Who -had made him a judge over others? He had said things that were -dreadful, horrible, not to be endured. - -On and on plodded the hansom, going slower, it seemed to him, at each -step. He thrust up the trap and called to the man to drive faster. -The hideous hunger for opium began to gnaw at him. His throat burned -and his delicate hands twitched nervously together. He struck at the -horse madly with his stick. The driver laughed and whipped up. He -laughed in answer, and the man was silent. - -The way seemed interminable, and the streets like the black web of some -sprawling spider. The monotony became unbearable, and as the mist -thickened, he felt afraid. - -Then they passed by lonely brickfields. The fog was lighter here, and -he could see the strange, bottle-shaped kilns with their orange, -fanlike tongues of fire. A dog barked as they went by, and far away in -the darkness some wandering sea-gull screamed. The horse stumbled in a -rut, then swerved aside and broke into a gallop. - -After some time they left the clay road and rattled again over -rough-paven streets. Most of the windows were dark, but now and then -fantastic shadows were silhouetted against some lamplit blind. He -watched them curiously. They moved like monstrous marionettes and made -gestures like live things. He hated them. A dull rage was in his -heart. As they turned a corner, a woman yelled something at them from -an open door, and two men ran after the hansom for about a hundred -yards. The driver beat at them with his whip. - -It is said that passion makes one think in a circle. Certainly with -hideous iteration the bitten lips of Dorian Gray shaped and reshaped -those subtle words that dealt with soul and sense, till he had found in -them the full expression, as it were, of his mood, and justified, by -intellectual approval, passions that without such justification would -still have dominated his temper. From cell to cell of his brain crept -the one thought; and the wild desire to live, most terrible of all -man's appetites, quickened into force each trembling nerve and fibre. -Ugliness that had once been hateful to him because it made things real, -became dear to him now for that very reason. Ugliness was the one -reality. The coarse brawl, the loathsome den, the crude violence of -disordered life, the very vileness of thief and outcast, were more -vivid, in their intense actuality of impression, than all the gracious -shapes of art, the dreamy shadows of song. They were what he needed -for forgetfulness. In three days he would be free. - -Suddenly the man drew up with a jerk at the top of a dark lane. Over -the low roofs and jagged chimney-stacks of the houses rose the black -masts of ships. Wreaths of white mist clung like ghostly sails to the -yards. - -"Somewhere about here, sir, ain't it?" he asked huskily through the -trap. - -Dorian started and peered round. "This will do," he answered, and -having got out hastily and given the driver the extra fare he had -promised him, he walked quickly in the direction of the quay. Here and -there a lantern gleamed at the stern of some huge merchantman. The -light shook and splintered in the puddles. A red glare came from an -outward-bound steamer that was coaling. The slimy pavement looked like -a wet mackintosh. - -He hurried on towards the left, glancing back now and then to see if he -was being followed. In about seven or eight minutes he reached a small -shabby house that was wedged in between two gaunt factories. In one of -the top-windows stood a lamp. He stopped and gave a peculiar knock. - -After a little time he heard steps in the passage and the chain being -unhooked. The door opened quietly, and he went in without saying a -word to the squat misshapen figure that flattened itself into the -shadow as he passed. At the end of the hall hung a tattered green -curtain that swayed and shook in the gusty wind which had followed him -in from the street. He dragged it aside and entered a long low room -which looked as if it had once been a third-rate dancing-saloon. Shrill -flaring gas-jets, dulled and distorted in the fly-blown mirrors that -faced them, were ranged round the walls. Greasy reflectors of ribbed -tin backed them, making quivering disks of light. The floor was -covered with ochre-coloured sawdust, trampled here and there into mud, -and stained with dark rings of spilled liquor. Some Malays were -crouching by a little charcoal stove, playing with bone counters and -showing their white teeth as they chattered. In one corner, with his -head buried in his arms, a sailor sprawled over a table, and by the -tawdrily painted bar that ran across one complete side stood two -haggard women, mocking an old man who was brushing the sleeves of his -coat with an expression of disgust. "He thinks he's got red ants on -him," laughed one of them, as Dorian passed by. The man looked at her -in terror and began to whimper. - -At the end of the room there was a little staircase, leading to a -darkened chamber. As Dorian hurried up its three rickety steps, the -heavy odour of opium met him. He heaved a deep breath, and his -nostrils quivered with pleasure. When he entered, a young man with -smooth yellow hair, who was bending over a lamp lighting a long thin -pipe, looked up at him and nodded in a hesitating manner. - -"You here, Adrian?" muttered Dorian. - -"Where else should I be?" he answered, listlessly. "None of the chaps -will speak to me now." - -"I thought you had left England." - -"Darlington is not going to do anything. My brother paid the bill at -last. George doesn't speak to me either.... I don't care," he added -with a sigh. "As long as one has this stuff, one doesn't want friends. -I think I have had too many friends." - -Dorian winced and looked round at the grotesque things that lay in such -fantastic postures on the ragged mattresses. The twisted limbs, the -gaping mouths, the staring lustreless eyes, fascinated him. He knew in -what strange heavens they were suffering, and what dull hells were -teaching them the secret of some new joy. They were better off than he -was. He was prisoned in thought. Memory, like a horrible malady, was -eating his soul away. From time to time he seemed to see the eyes of -Basil Hallward looking at him. Yet he felt he could not stay. The -presence of Adrian Singleton troubled him. He wanted to be where no -one would know who he was. He wanted to escape from himself. - -"I am going on to the other place," he said after a pause. - -"On the wharf?" - -"Yes." - -"That mad-cat is sure to be there. They won't have her in this place -now." - -Dorian shrugged his shoulders. "I am sick of women who love one. -Women who hate one are much more interesting. Besides, the stuff is -better." - -"Much the same." - -"I like it better. Come and have something to drink. I must have -something." - -"I don't want anything," murmured the young man. - -"Never mind." - -Adrian Singleton rose up wearily and followed Dorian to the bar. A -half-caste, in a ragged turban and a shabby ulster, grinned a hideous -greeting as he thrust a bottle of brandy and two tumblers in front of -them. The women sidled up and began to chatter. Dorian turned his -back on them and said something in a low voice to Adrian Singleton. - -A crooked smile, like a Malay crease, writhed across the face of one of -the women. "We are very proud to-night," she sneered. - -"For God's sake don't talk to me," cried Dorian, stamping his foot on -the ground. "What do you want? Money? Here it is. Don't ever talk -to me again." - -Two red sparks flashed for a moment in the woman's sodden eyes, then -flickered out and left them dull and glazed. She tossed her head and -raked the coins off the counter with greedy fingers. Her companion -watched her enviously. - -"It's no use," sighed Adrian Singleton. "I don't care to go back. -What does it matter? I am quite happy here." - -"You will write to me if you want anything, won't you?" said Dorian, -after a pause. - -"Perhaps." - -"Good night, then." - -"Good night," answered the young man, passing up the steps and wiping -his parched mouth with a handkerchief. - -Dorian walked to the door with a look of pain in his face. As he drew -the curtain aside, a hideous laugh broke from the painted lips of the -woman who had taken his money. "There goes the devil's bargain!" she -hiccoughed, in a hoarse voice. - -"Curse you!" he answered, "don't call me that." - -She snapped her fingers. "Prince Charming is what you like to be -called, ain't it?" she yelled after him. - -The drowsy sailor leaped to his feet as she spoke, and looked wildly -round. The sound of the shutting of the hall door fell on his ear. He -rushed out as if in pursuit. - -Dorian Gray hurried along the quay through the drizzling rain. His -meeting with Adrian Singleton had strangely moved him, and he wondered -if the ruin of that young life was really to be laid at his door, as -Basil Hallward had said to him with such infamy of insult. He bit his -lip, and for a few seconds his eyes grew sad. Yet, after all, what did -it matter to him? One's days were too brief to take the burden of -another's errors on one's shoulders. Each man lived his own life and -paid his own price for living it. The only pity was one had to pay so -often for a single fault. One had to pay over and over again, indeed. -In her dealings with man, destiny never closed her accounts. - -There are moments, psychologists tell us, when the passion for sin, or -for what the world calls sin, so dominates a nature that every fibre of -the body, as every cell of the brain, seems to be instinct with fearful -impulses. Men and women at such moments lose the freedom of their -will. They move to their terrible end as automatons move. Choice is -taken from them, and conscience is either killed, or, if it lives at -all, lives but to give rebellion its fascination and disobedience its -charm. For all sins, as theologians weary not of reminding us, are -sins of disobedience. When that high spirit, that morning star of -evil, fell from heaven, it was as a rebel that he fell. - -Callous, concentrated on evil, with stained mind, and soul hungry for -rebellion, Dorian Gray hastened on, quickening his step as he went, but -as he darted aside into a dim archway, that had served him often as a -short cut to the ill-famed place where he was going, he felt himself -suddenly seized from behind, and before he had time to defend himself, -he was thrust back against the wall, with a brutal hand round his -throat. - -He struggled madly for life, and by a terrible effort wrenched the -tightening fingers away. In a second he heard the click of a revolver, -and saw the gleam of a polished barrel, pointing straight at his head, -and the dusky form of a short, thick-set man facing him. - -"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 to-night 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 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. - - - -CHAPTER 17 - -A week later Dorian Gray was sitting in the conservatory at Selby -Royal, talking to the pretty Duchess of Monmouth, who with her husband, -a jaded-looking man of sixty, was amongst his guests. It was tea-time, -and the mellow light of the huge, lace-covered lamp that stood on the -table lit up the delicate china and hammered silver of the service at -which the duchess was presiding. Her white hands were moving daintily -among the cups, and her full red lips were smiling at something that -Dorian had whispered to her. Lord Henry was lying back in a -silk-draped wicker chair, looking at them. On a peach-coloured divan -sat Lady Narborough, pretending to listen to the duke's description of -the last Brazilian beetle that he had added to his collection. Three -young men in elaborate smoking-suits were handing tea-cakes to some of -the women. The house-party consisted of twelve people, and there were -more expected to arrive on the next day. - -"What are you two talking about?" said Lord Henry, strolling over to -the table and putting his cup down. "I hope Dorian has told you about -my plan for rechristening everything, Gladys. It is a delightful idea." - -"But I don't want to be rechristened, Harry," rejoined the duchess, -looking up at him with her wonderful eyes. "I am quite satisfied with -my own name, and I am sure Mr. Gray should be satisfied with his." - -"My dear Gladys, I would not alter either name for the world. They are -both perfect. I was thinking chiefly of flowers. Yesterday I cut an -orchid, for my button-hole. It was a marvellous spotted thing, as -effective as the seven deadly sins. In a thoughtless moment I asked -one of the gardeners what it was called. He told me it was a fine -specimen of Robinsoniana, or something dreadful of that kind. It is a -sad truth, but we have lost the faculty of giving lovely names to -things. Names are everything. I never quarrel with actions. My one -quarrel is with words. That is the reason I hate vulgar realism in -literature. The man who could call a spade a spade should be compelled -to use one. It is the only thing he is fit for." - -"Then what should we call you, Harry?" she asked. - -"His name is Prince Paradox," said Dorian. - -"I recognize him in a flash," exclaimed the duchess. - -"I won't hear of it," laughed Lord Henry, sinking into a chair. "From -a label there is no escape! I refuse the title." - -"Royalties may not abdicate," fell as a warning from pretty lips. - -"You wish me to defend my throne, then?" - -"Yes." - -"I give the truths of to-morrow." - -"I prefer the mistakes of to-day," she answered. - -"You disarm me, Gladys," he cried, catching the wilfulness of her mood. - -"Of your shield, Harry, not of your spear." - -"I never tilt against beauty," he said, with a wave of his hand. - -"That is your error, Harry, believe me. You value beauty far too much." - -"How can you say that? I admit that I think that it is better to be -beautiful than to be good. But on the other hand, no one is more ready -than I am to acknowledge that it is better to be good than to be ugly." - -"Ugliness is one of the seven deadly sins, then?" cried the duchess. -"What becomes of your simile about the orchid?" - -"Ugliness is one of the seven deadly virtues, Gladys. You, as a good -Tory, must not underrate them. Beer, the Bible, and the seven deadly -virtues have made our England what she is." - -"You don't like your country, then?" she asked. - -"I live in it." - -"That you may censure it the better." - -"Would you have me take the verdict of Europe on it?" he inquired. - -"What do they say of us?" - -"That Tartuffe has emigrated to England and opened a shop." - -"Is that yours, Harry?" - -"I give it to you." - -"I could not use it. It is too true." - -"You need not be afraid. Our countrymen never recognize a description." - -"They are practical." - -"They are more cunning than practical. When they make up their ledger, -they balance stupidity by wealth, and vice by hypocrisy." - -"Still, we have done great things." - -"Great things have been thrust on us, Gladys." - -"We have carried their burden." - -"Only as far as the Stock Exchange." - -She shook her head. "I believe in the race," she cried. - -"It represents the survival of the pushing." - -"It has development." - -"Decay fascinates me more." - -"What of art?" she asked. - -"It is a malady." - -"Love?" - -"An illusion." - -"Religion?" - -"The fashionable substitute for belief." - -"You are a sceptic." - -"Never! Scepticism is the beginning of faith." - -"What are you?" - -"To define is to limit." - -"Give me a clue." - -"Threads snap. You would lose your way in the labyrinth." - -"You bewilder me. Let us talk of some one else." - -"Our host is a delightful topic. Years ago he was christened Prince -Charming." - -"Ah! don't remind me of that," cried Dorian Gray. - -"Our host is rather horrid this evening," answered the duchess, -colouring. "I believe he thinks that Monmouth married me on purely -scientific principles as the best specimen he could find of a modern -butterfly." - -"Well, I hope he won't stick pins into you, Duchess," laughed Dorian. - -"Oh! my maid does that already, Mr. Gray, when she is annoyed with me." - -"And what does she get annoyed with you about, Duchess?" - -"For the most trivial things, Mr. Gray, I assure you. Usually because -I come in at ten minutes to nine and tell her that I must be dressed by -half-past eight." - -"How unreasonable of her! You should give her warning." - -"I daren't, Mr. Gray. Why, she invents hats for me. You remember the -one I wore at Lady Hilstone's garden-party? You don't, but it is nice -of you to pretend that you do. Well, she made it out of nothing. All -good hats are made out of nothing." - -"Like all good reputations, Gladys," interrupted Lord Henry. "Every -effect that one produces gives one an enemy. To be popular one must be -a mediocrity." - -"Not with women," said the duchess, shaking her head; "and women rule -the world. I assure you we can't bear mediocrities. We women, as some -one says, love with our ears, just as you men love with your eyes, if -you ever love at all." - -"It seems to me that we never do anything else," murmured Dorian. - -"Ah! then, you never really love, Mr. Gray," answered the duchess with -mock sadness. - -"My dear Gladys!" cried Lord Henry. "How can you say that? Romance -lives by repetition, and repetition converts an appetite into an art. -Besides, each time that one loves is the only time one has ever loved. -Difference of object does not alter singleness of passion. It merely -intensifies it. We can have in life but one great experience at best, -and the secret of life is to reproduce that experience as often as -possible." - -"Even when one has been wounded by it, Harry?" asked the duchess after -a pause. - -"Especially when one has been wounded by it," answered Lord Henry. - -The duchess turned and looked at Dorian Gray with a curious expression -in her eyes. "What do you say to that, Mr. Gray?" she inquired. - -Dorian hesitated for a moment. Then he threw his head back and -laughed. "I always agree with Harry, Duchess." - -"Even when he is wrong?" - -"Harry is never wrong, Duchess." - -"And does his philosophy make you happy?" - -"I have never searched for happiness. Who wants happiness? I have -searched for pleasure." - -"And found it, Mr. Gray?" - -"Often. Too often." - -The duchess sighed. "I am searching for peace," she said, "and if I -don't go and dress, I shall have none this evening." - -"Let me get you some orchids, Duchess," cried Dorian, starting to his -feet and walking down the conservatory. - -"You are flirting disgracefully with him," said Lord Henry to his -cousin. "You had better take care. He is very fascinating." - -"If he were not, there would be no battle." - -"Greek meets Greek, then?" - -"I am on the side of the Trojans. They fought for a woman." - -"They were defeated." - -"There are worse things than capture," she answered. - -"You gallop with a loose rein." - -"Pace gives life," was the riposte. - -"I shall write it in my diary to-night." - -"What?" - -"That a burnt child loves the fire." - -"I am not even singed. My wings are untouched." - -"You use them for everything, except flight." - -"Courage has passed from men to women. It is a new experience for us." - -"You have a rival." - -"Who?" - -He laughed. "Lady Narborough," he whispered. "She perfectly adores -him." - -"You fill me with apprehension. The appeal to antiquity is fatal to us -who are romanticists." - -"Romanticists! You have all the methods of science." - -"Men have educated us." - -"But not explained you." - -"Describe us as a sex," was her challenge. - -"Sphinxes without secrets." - -She looked at him, smiling. "How long Mr. Gray is!" she said. "Let us -go and help him. I have not yet told him the colour of my frock." - -"Ah! you must suit your frock to his flowers, Gladys." - -"That would be a premature surrender." - -"Romantic art begins with its climax." - -"I must keep an opportunity for retreat." - -"In the Parthian manner?" - -"They found safety in the desert. I could not do that." - -"Women are not always allowed a choice," he answered, but hardly had he -finished the sentence before from the far end of the conservatory came -a stifled groan, followed by the dull sound of a heavy fall. Everybody -started up. The duchess stood motionless in horror. And with fear in -his eyes, Lord Henry rushed through the flapping palms to find Dorian -Gray lying face downwards on the tiled floor in a deathlike swoon. - -He was carried at once into the blue drawing-room and laid upon one of -the sofas. After a short time, he came to himself and looked round -with a dazed expression. - -"What has happened?" he asked. "Oh! I remember. Am I safe here, -Harry?" He began to tremble. - -"My dear Dorian," answered Lord Henry, "you merely fainted. That was -all. You must have overtired yourself. You had better not come down -to dinner. I will take your place." - -"No, I will come down," he said, struggling to his feet. "I would -rather come down. I must not be alone." - -He went to his room and dressed. There was a wild recklessness of -gaiety in his manner as he sat at table, but now and then a thrill of -terror ran through him when he remembered that, pressed against the -window of the conservatory, like a white handkerchief, he had seen the -face of James Vane watching him. - - - -CHAPTER 18 - -The next day he did not leave the house, and, indeed, spent most of the -time in his own room, sick with a wild terror of dying, and yet -indifferent to life itself. The consciousness of being hunted, snared, -tracked down, had begun to dominate him. If the tapestry did but -tremble in the wind, he shook. The dead leaves that were blown against -the leaded panes seemed to him like his own wasted resolutions and wild -regrets. When he closed his eyes, he saw again the sailor's face -peering through the mist-stained glass, and horror seemed once more to -lay its hand upon his heart. - -But perhaps it had been only his fancy that had called vengeance out of -the night and set the hideous shapes of punishment before him. Actual -life was chaos, but there was something terribly logical in the -imagination. It was the imagination that set remorse to dog the feet -of sin. It was the imagination that made each crime bear its misshapen -brood. In the common world of fact the wicked were not punished, nor -the good rewarded. Success was given to the strong, failure thrust -upon the weak. That was all. Besides, had any stranger been prowling -round the house, he would have been seen by the servants or the -keepers. Had any foot-marks been found on the flower-beds, the -gardeners would have reported it. Yes, it had been merely fancy. -Sibyl Vane's brother had not come back to kill him. He had sailed away -in his ship to founder in some winter sea. From him, at any rate, he -was safe. Why, the man did not know who he was, could not know who he -was. The mask of youth had saved him. - -And yet if it had been merely an illusion, how terrible it was to think -that conscience could raise such fearful phantoms, and give them -visible form, and make them move before one! What sort of life would -his be if, day and night, shadows of his crime were to peer at him from -silent corners, to mock him from secret places, to whisper in his ear -as he sat at the feast, to wake him with icy fingers as he lay asleep! -As the thought crept through his brain, he grew pale with terror, and -the air seemed to him to have become suddenly colder. Oh! in what a -wild hour of madness he had killed his friend! How ghastly the mere -memory of the scene! He saw it all again. Each hideous detail came -back to him with added horror. Out of the black cave of time, terrible -and swathed in scarlet, rose the image of his sin. When Lord Henry -came in at six o'clock, he found him crying as one whose heart will -break. - -It was not till the third day that he ventured to go out. There was -something in the clear, pine-scented air of that winter morning that -seemed to bring him back his joyousness and his ardour for life. But -it was not merely the physical conditions of environment that had -caused the change. His own nature had revolted against the excess of -anguish that had sought to maim and mar the perfection of its calm. -With subtle and finely wrought temperaments it is always so. Their -strong passions must either bruise or bend. They either slay the man, -or themselves die. Shallow sorrows and shallow loves live on. The -loves and sorrows that are great are destroyed by their own plenitude. -Besides, he had convinced himself that he had been the victim of a -terror-stricken imagination, and looked back now on his fears with -something of pity and not a little of contempt. - -After breakfast, he walked with the duchess for an hour in the garden -and then drove across the park to join the shooting-party. The crisp -frost lay like salt upon the grass. The sky was an inverted cup of -blue metal. A thin film of ice bordered the flat, reed-grown lake. - -At the corner of the pine-wood he caught sight of Sir Geoffrey -Clouston, the duchess's brother, jerking two spent cartridges out of -his gun. He jumped from the cart, and having told the groom to take -the mare home, made his way towards his guest through the withered -bracken and rough undergrowth. - -"Have you had good sport, Geoffrey?" he asked. - -"Not very good, Dorian. I think most of the birds have gone to the -open. I dare say it will be better after lunch, when we get to new -ground." - -Dorian strolled along by his side. The keen aromatic air, the brown -and red lights that glimmered in the wood, the hoarse cries of the -beaters ringing out from time to time, and the sharp snaps of the guns -that followed, fascinated him and filled him with a sense of delightful -freedom. He was dominated by the carelessness of happiness, by the -high indifference of joy. - -Suddenly from a lumpy tussock of old grass some twenty yards in front -of them, with black-tipped ears erect and long hinder limbs throwing it -forward, started a hare. It bolted for a thicket of alders. Sir -Geoffrey put his gun to his shoulder, but there was something in the -animal's grace of movement that strangely charmed Dorian Gray, and he -cried out at once, "Don't shoot it, Geoffrey. Let it live." - -"What nonsense, Dorian!" laughed his companion, and as the hare bounded -into the thicket, he fired. There were two cries heard, the cry of a -hare in pain, which is dreadful, the cry of a man in agony, which is -worse. - -"Good heavens! I have hit a beater!" exclaimed Sir Geoffrey. "What an -ass the man was to get in front of the guns! Stop shooting there!" he -called out at the top of his voice. "A man is hurt." - -The head-keeper came running up with a stick in his hand. - -"Where, sir? Where is he?" he shouted. At the same time, the firing -ceased along the line. - -"Here," answered Sir Geoffrey angrily, hurrying towards the thicket. -"Why on earth don't you keep your men back? Spoiled my shooting for -the day." - -Dorian watched them as they plunged into the alder-clump, brushing the -lithe swinging branches aside. In a few moments they emerged, dragging -a body after them into the sunlight. He turned away in horror. It -seemed to him that misfortune followed wherever he went. He heard Sir -Geoffrey ask if the man was really dead, and the affirmative answer of -the keeper. The wood seemed to him to have become suddenly alive with -faces. There was the trampling of myriad feet and the low buzz of -voices. A great copper-breasted pheasant came beating through the -boughs overhead. - -After a few moments--that were to him, in his perturbed state, like -endless hours of pain--he felt a hand laid on his shoulder. He started -and looked round. - -"Dorian," said Lord Henry, "I had better tell them that the shooting is -stopped for to-day. It would not look well to go on." - -"I wish it were stopped for ever, Harry," he answered bitterly. "The -whole thing is hideous and cruel. Is the man ...?" - -He could not finish the sentence. - -"I am afraid so," rejoined Lord Henry. "He got the whole charge of -shot in his chest. He must have died almost instantaneously. Come; -let us go home." - -They walked side by side in the direction of the avenue for nearly -fifty yards without speaking. Then Dorian looked at Lord Henry and -said, with a heavy sigh, "It is a bad omen, Harry, a very bad omen." - -"What is?" asked Lord Henry. "Oh! this accident, I suppose. My dear -fellow, it can't be helped. It was the man's own fault. Why did he -get in front of the guns? Besides, it is nothing to us. It is rather -awkward for Geoffrey, of course. It does not do to pepper beaters. It -makes people think that one is a wild shot. And Geoffrey is not; he -shoots very straight. But there is no use talking about the matter." - -Dorian shook his head. "It is a bad omen, Harry. I feel as if -something horrible were going to happen to some of us. To myself, -perhaps," he added, passing his hand over his eyes, with a gesture of -pain. - -The elder man laughed. "The only horrible thing in the world is ennui, -Dorian. That is the one sin for which there is no forgiveness. But we -are not likely to suffer from it unless these fellows keep chattering -about this thing at dinner. I must tell them that the subject is to be -tabooed. As for omens, there is no such thing as an omen. Destiny -does not send us heralds. She is too wise or too cruel for that. -Besides, what on earth could happen to you, Dorian? You have -everything in the world that a man can want. There is no one who would -not be delighted to change places with you." - -"There is no one with whom I would not change places, Harry. Don't -laugh like that. I am telling you the truth. The wretched peasant who -has just died is better off than I am. I have no terror of death. It -is the coming of death that terrifies me. Its monstrous wings seem to -wheel in the leaden air around me. Good heavens! don't you see a man -moving behind the trees there, watching me, waiting for me?" - -Lord Henry looked in the direction in which the trembling gloved hand -was pointing. "Yes," he said, smiling, "I see the gardener waiting for -you. I suppose he wants to ask you what flowers you wish to have on -the table to-night. How absurdly nervous you are, my dear fellow! You -must come and see my doctor, when we get back to town." - -Dorian heaved a sigh of relief as he saw the gardener approaching. The -man touched his hat, glanced for a moment at Lord Henry in a hesitating -manner, and then produced a letter, which he handed to his master. -"Her Grace told me to wait for an answer," he murmured. - -Dorian put the letter into his pocket. "Tell her Grace that I am -coming in," he said, coldly. The man turned round and went rapidly in -the direction of the house. - -"How fond women are of doing dangerous things!" laughed Lord Henry. -"It is one of the qualities in them that I admire most. A woman will -flirt with anybody in the world as long as other people are looking on." - -"How fond you are of saying dangerous things, Harry! In the present -instance, you are quite astray. I like the duchess very much, but I -don't love her." - -"And the duchess loves you very much, but she likes you less, so you -are excellently matched." - -"You are talking scandal, Harry, and there is never any basis for -scandal." - -"The basis of every scandal is an immoral certainty," said Lord Henry, -lighting a cigarette. - -"You would sacrifice anybody, Harry, for the sake of an epigram." - -"The world goes to the altar of its own accord," was the answer. - -"I wish I could love," cried Dorian Gray with a deep note of pathos in -his voice. "But I seem to have lost the passion and forgotten the -desire. I am too much concentrated on myself. My own personality has -become a burden to me. I want to escape, to go away, to forget. It -was silly of me to come down here at all. I think I shall send a wire -to Harvey to have the yacht got ready. On a yacht one is safe." - -"Safe from what, Dorian? You are in some trouble. Why not tell me -what it is? You know I would help you." - -"I can't tell you, Harry," he answered sadly. "And I dare say it is -only a fancy of mine. This unfortunate accident has upset me. I have -a horrible presentiment that something of the kind may happen to me." - -"What nonsense!" - -"I hope it is, but I can't help feeling it. Ah! here is the duchess, -looking like Artemis in a tailor-made gown. You see we have come back, -Duchess." - -"I have heard all about it, Mr. Gray," she answered. "Poor Geoffrey is -terribly upset. And it seems that you asked him not to shoot the hare. -How curious!" - -"Yes, it was very curious. I don't know what made me say it. Some -whim, I suppose. It looked the loveliest of little live things. But I -am sorry they told you about the man. It is a hideous subject." - -"It is an annoying subject," broke in Lord Henry. "It has no -psychological value at all. Now if Geoffrey had done the thing on -purpose, how interesting he would be! I should like to know some one -who had committed a real murder." - -"How horrid of you, Harry!" cried the duchess. "Isn't it, Mr. Gray? -Harry, Mr. Gray is ill again. He is going to faint." - -Dorian drew himself up with an effort and smiled. "It is nothing, -Duchess," he murmured; "my nerves are dreadfully out of order. That is -all. I am afraid I walked too far this morning. I didn't hear what -Harry said. Was it very bad? You must tell me some other time. I -think I must go and lie down. You will excuse me, won't you?" - -They had reached the great flight of steps that led from the -conservatory on to the terrace. As the glass door closed behind -Dorian, Lord Henry turned and looked at the duchess with his slumberous -eyes. "Are you very much in love with him?" he asked. - -She did not answer for some time, but stood gazing at the landscape. -"I wish I knew," she said at last. - -He shook his head. "Knowledge would be fatal. It is the uncertainty -that charms one. A mist makes things wonderful." - -"One may lose one's way." - -"All ways end at the same point, my dear Gladys." - -"What is that?" - -"Disillusion." - -"It was my debut in life," she sighed. - -"It came to you crowned." - -"I am tired of strawberry leaves." - -"They become you." - -"Only in public." - -"You would miss them," said Lord Henry. - -"I will not part with a petal." - -"Monmouth has ears." - -"Old age is dull of hearing." - -"Has he never been jealous?" - -"I wish he had been." - -He glanced about as if in search of something. "What are you looking -for?" she inquired. - -"The button from your foil," he answered. "You have dropped it." - -She laughed. "I have still the mask." - -"It makes your eyes lovelier," was his reply. - -She laughed again. Her teeth showed like white seeds in a scarlet -fruit. - -Upstairs, in his own room, Dorian Gray was lying on a sofa, with terror -in every tingling fibre of his body. Life had suddenly become too -hideous a burden for him to bear. The dreadful death of the unlucky -beater, shot in the thicket like a wild animal, had seemed to him to -pre-figure death for himself also. He had nearly swooned at what Lord -Henry had said in a chance mood of cynical jesting. - -At five o'clock he rang his bell for his servant and gave him orders to -pack his things for the night-express to town, and to have the brougham -at the door by eight-thirty. He was determined not to sleep another -night at Selby Royal. It was an ill-omened place. Death walked there -in the sunlight. The grass of the forest had been spotted with blood. - -Then he wrote a note to Lord Henry, telling him that he was going up to -town to consult his doctor and asking him to entertain his guests in -his absence. As he was putting it into the envelope, a knock came to -the door, and his valet informed him that the head-keeper wished to see -him. He frowned and bit his lip. "Send him in," he muttered, after -some moments' hesitation. - -As soon as the man entered, Dorian pulled his chequebook out of a -drawer and spread it out before him. - -"I suppose you have come about the unfortunate accident of this -morning, Thornton?" he said, taking up a pen. - -"Yes, sir," answered the gamekeeper. - -"Was the poor fellow married? Had he any people dependent on him?" -asked Dorian, looking bored. "If so, I should not like them to be left -in want, and will send them any sum of money you may think necessary." - -"We don't know who he is, sir. That is what I took the liberty of -coming to you about." - -"Don't know who he is?" said Dorian, listlessly. "What do you mean? -Wasn't he one of your men?" - -"No, sir. Never saw him before. Seems like a sailor, sir." - -The pen dropped from Dorian Gray's hand, and he felt as if his heart -had suddenly stopped beating. "A sailor?" he cried out. "Did you say -a sailor?" - -"Yes, sir. He looks as if he had been a sort of sailor; tattooed on -both arms, and that kind of thing." - -"Was there anything found on him?" said Dorian, leaning forward and -looking at the man with startled eyes. "Anything that would tell his -name?" - -"Some money, sir--not much, and a six-shooter. There was no name of any -kind. A decent-looking man, sir, but rough-like. A sort of sailor we -think." - -Dorian started to his feet. A terrible hope fluttered past him. He -clutched at it madly. "Where is the body?" he exclaimed. "Quick! I -must see it at once." - -"It is in an empty stable in the Home Farm, sir. The folk don't like -to have that sort of thing in their houses. They say a corpse brings -bad luck." - -"The Home Farm! Go there at once and meet me. Tell one of the grooms -to bring my horse round. No. Never mind. I'll go to the stables -myself. It will save time." - -In less than a quarter of an hour, Dorian Gray was galloping down the -long avenue as hard as he could go. The trees seemed to sweep past him -in spectral procession, and wild shadows to fling themselves across his -path. Once the mare swerved at a white gate-post and nearly threw him. -He lashed her across the neck with his crop. She cleft the dusky air -like an arrow. The stones flew from her hoofs. - -At last he reached the Home Farm. Two men were loitering in the yard. -He leaped from the saddle and threw the reins to one of them. In the -farthest stable a light was glimmering. Something seemed to tell him -that the body was there, and he hurried to the door and put his hand -upon the latch. - -There he paused for a moment, feeling that he was on the brink of a -discovery that would either make or mar his life. Then he thrust the -door open and entered. - -On a heap of sacking in the far corner was lying the dead body of a man -dressed in a coarse shirt and a pair of blue trousers. A spotted -handkerchief had been placed over the face. A coarse candle, stuck in -a bottle, sputtered beside it. - -Dorian Gray shuddered. He felt that his could not be the hand to take -the handkerchief away, and called out to one of the farm-servants to -come to him. - -"Take that thing off the face. I wish to see it," he said, clutching -at the door-post for support. - -When the farm-servant had done so, he stepped forward. A cry of joy -broke from his lips. The man who had been shot in the thicket was -James Vane. - -He stood there for some minutes looking at the dead body. As he rode -home, his eyes were full of tears, for he knew he was safe. - - - -CHAPTER 19 - -"There is no use your telling me that you are going to be good," cried -Lord Henry, dipping his white fingers into a red copper bowl filled -with rose-water. "You are quite perfect. Pray, don't change." - -Dorian Gray shook his head. "No, Harry, I have done too many dreadful -things in my life. I am not going to do any more. I began my good -actions yesterday." - -"Where were you yesterday?" - -"In the country, Harry. I was staying at a little inn by myself." - -"My dear boy," said Lord Henry, smiling, "anybody can be good in the -country. There are no temptations there. That is the reason why -people who live out of town are so absolutely uncivilized. -Civilization is not by any means an easy thing to attain to. There are -only two ways by which man can reach it. One is by being cultured, the -other by being corrupt. Country people have no opportunity of being -either, so they stagnate." - -"Culture and corruption," echoed Dorian. "I have known something of -both. It seems terrible to me now that they should ever be found -together. For I have a new ideal, Harry. I am going to alter. I -think I have altered." - -"You have not yet told me what your good action was. Or did you say -you had done more than one?" asked his companion as he spilled into his -plate a little crimson pyramid of seeded strawberries and, through a -perforated, shell-shaped spoon, snowed white sugar upon them. - -"I can tell you, Harry. It is not a story I could tell to any one -else. I spared somebody. It sounds vain, but you understand what I -mean. She was quite beautiful and wonderfully like Sibyl Vane. I -think it was that which first attracted me to her. You remember Sibyl, -don't you? How long ago that seems! Well, Hetty was not one of our -own class, of course. She was simply a girl in a village. But I -really loved her. I am quite sure that I loved her. All during this -wonderful May that we have been having, I used to run down and see her -two or three times a week. Yesterday she met me in a little orchard. -The apple-blossoms kept tumbling down on her hair, and she was -laughing. We were to have gone away together this morning at dawn. -Suddenly I determined to leave her as flowerlike as I had found her." - -"I should think the novelty of the emotion must have given you a thrill -of real pleasure, Dorian," interrupted Lord Henry. "But I can finish -your idyll for you. You gave her good advice and broke her heart. -That was the beginning of your reformation." - -"Harry, you are horrible! You mustn't say these dreadful things. -Hetty's heart is not broken. Of course, she cried and all that. But -there is no disgrace upon her. She can live, like Perdita, in her -garden of mint and marigold." - -"And weep over a faithless Florizel," said Lord Henry, laughing, as he -leaned back in his chair. "My dear Dorian, you have the most curiously -boyish moods. Do you think this girl will ever be really content now -with any one of her own rank? I suppose she will be married some day -to a rough carter or a grinning ploughman. Well, the fact of having -met you, and loved you, will teach her to despise her husband, and she -will be wretched. From a moral point of view, I cannot say that I -think much of your great renunciation. Even as a beginning, it is -poor. Besides, how do you know that Hetty isn't floating at the -present moment in some starlit mill-pond, with lovely water-lilies -round her, like Ophelia?" - -"I can't bear this, Harry! You mock at everything, and then suggest -the most serious tragedies. I am sorry I told you now. I don't care -what you say to me. I know I was right in acting as I did. Poor -Hetty! As I rode past the farm this morning, I saw her white face at -the window, like a spray of jasmine. Don't let us talk about it any -more, and don't try to persuade me that the first good action I have -done for years, the first little bit of self-sacrifice I have ever -known, is really a sort of sin. I want to be better. I am going to be -better. Tell me something about yourself. What is going on in town? -I have not been to the club for days." - -"The people are still discussing poor Basil's disappearance." - -"I should have thought they had got tired of that by this time," said -Dorian, pouring himself out some wine and frowning slightly. - -"My dear boy, they have only been talking about it for six weeks, and -the British public are really not equal to the mental strain of having -more than one topic every three months. They have been very fortunate -lately, however. They have had my own divorce-case and Alan Campbell's -suicide. Now they have got the mysterious disappearance of an artist. -Scotland Yard still insists that the man in the grey ulster who left -for Paris by the midnight train on the ninth of November was poor -Basil, and the French police declare that Basil never arrived in Paris -at all. I suppose in about a fortnight we shall be told that he has -been seen in San Francisco. It is an odd thing, but every one who -disappears is said to be seen at San Francisco. It must be a -delightful city, and possess all the attractions of the next world." - -"What do you think has happened to Basil?" asked Dorian, holding up his -Burgundy against the light and wondering how it was that he could -discuss the matter so calmly. - -"I have not the slightest idea. If Basil chooses to hide himself, it -is no business of mine. If he is dead, I don't want to think about -him. Death is the only thing that ever terrifies me. I hate it." - -"Why?" said the younger man wearily. - -"Because," said Lord Henry, passing beneath his nostrils the gilt -trellis of an open vinaigrette box, "one can survive everything -nowadays except that. Death and vulgarity are the only two facts in -the nineteenth century that one cannot explain away. Let us have our -coffee in the music-room, Dorian. You must play Chopin to me. The man -with whom my wife ran away played Chopin exquisitely. Poor Victoria! -I was very fond of her. The house is rather lonely without her. Of -course, married life is merely a habit, a bad habit. But then one -regrets the loss even of one's worst habits. Perhaps one regrets them -the most. They are such an essential part of one's personality." - -Dorian said nothing, but rose from the table, and passing into the next -room, sat down to the piano and let his fingers stray across the white -and black ivory of the keys. After the coffee had been brought in, he -stopped, and looking over at Lord Henry, said, "Harry, did it ever -occur to you that Basil was murdered?" - -Lord Henry yawned. "Basil was very popular, and always wore a -Waterbury watch. Why should he have been murdered? He was not clever -enough to have enemies. Of course, he had a wonderful genius for -painting. But a man can paint like Velasquez and yet be as dull as -possible. Basil was really rather dull. He only interested me once, -and that was when he told me, years ago, that he had a wild adoration -for you and that you were the dominant motive of his art." - -"I was very fond of Basil," said Dorian with a note of sadness in his -voice. "But don't people say that he was murdered?" - -"Oh, some of the papers do. It does not seem to me to be at all -probable. I know there are dreadful places in Paris, but Basil was not -the sort of man to have gone to them. He had no curiosity. It was his -chief defect." - -"What would you say, Harry, if I told you that I had murdered Basil?" -said the younger man. He watched him intently after he had spoken. - -"I would say, my dear fellow, that you were posing for a character that -doesn't suit you. All crime is vulgar, just as all vulgarity is crime. -It is not in you, Dorian, to commit a murder. I am sorry if I hurt -your vanity by saying so, but I assure you it is true. Crime belongs -exclusively to the lower orders. I don't blame them in the smallest -degree. I should fancy that crime was to them what art is to us, -simply a method of procuring extraordinary sensations." - -"A method of procuring sensations? Do you think, then, that a man who -has once committed a murder could possibly do the same crime again? -Don't tell me that." - -"Oh! anything becomes a pleasure if one does it too often," cried Lord -Henry, laughing. "That is one of the most important secrets of life. -I should fancy, however, that murder is always a mistake. One should -never do anything that one cannot talk about after dinner. But let us -pass from poor Basil. I wish I could believe that he had come to such -a really romantic end as you suggest, but I can't. I dare say he fell -into the Seine off an omnibus and that the conductor hushed up the -scandal. Yes: I should fancy that was his end. I see him lying now -on his back under those dull-green waters, with the heavy barges -floating over him and long weeds catching in his hair. Do you know, I -don't think he would have done much more good work. During the last -ten years his painting had gone off very much." - -Dorian heaved a sigh, and Lord Henry strolled across the room and began -to stroke the head of a curious Java parrot, a large, grey-plumaged -bird with pink crest and tail, that was balancing itself upon a bamboo -perch. As his pointed fingers touched it, it dropped the white scurf -of crinkled lids over black, glasslike eyes and began to sway backwards -and forwards. - -"Yes," he continued, turning round and taking his handkerchief out of -his pocket; "his painting had quite gone off. It seemed to me to have -lost something. It had lost an ideal. When you and he ceased to be -great friends, he ceased to be a great artist. What was it separated -you? I suppose he bored you. If so, he never forgave you. It's a -habit bores have. By the way, what has become of that wonderful -portrait he did of you? I don't think I have ever seen it since he -finished it. Oh! I remember your telling me years ago that you had -sent it down to Selby, and that it had got mislaid or stolen on the -way. You never got it back? What a pity! it was really a -masterpiece. I remember I wanted to buy it. I wish I had now. It -belonged to Basil's best period. Since then, his work was that curious -mixture of bad painting and good intentions that always entitles a man -to be called a representative British artist. Did you advertise for -it? You should." - -"I forget," said Dorian. "I suppose I did. But I never really liked -it. I am sorry I sat for it. The memory of the thing is hateful to -me. Why do you talk of it? It used to remind me of those curious -lines in some play--Hamlet, I think--how do they run?-- - - "Like the painting of a sorrow, - A face without a heart." - -Yes: that is what it was like." - -Lord Henry laughed. "If a man treats life artistically, his brain is -his heart," he answered, sinking into an arm-chair. - -Dorian Gray shook his head and struck some soft chords on the piano. -"'Like the painting of a sorrow,'" he repeated, "'a face without a -heart.'" - -The elder man lay back and looked at him with half-closed eyes. "By -the way, Dorian," he said after a pause, "'what does it profit a man if -he gain the whole world and lose--how does the quotation run?--his own -soul'?" - -The music jarred, and Dorian Gray started and stared at his friend. -"Why do you ask me that, Harry?" - -"My dear fellow," said Lord Henry, elevating his eyebrows in surprise, -"I asked you because I thought you might be able to give me an answer. -That is all. I was going through the park last Sunday, and close by -the Marble Arch there stood a little crowd of shabby-looking people -listening to some vulgar street-preacher. As I passed by, I heard the -man yelling out that question to his audience. It struck me as being -rather dramatic. London is very rich in curious effects of that kind. -A wet Sunday, an uncouth Christian in a mackintosh, a ring of sickly -white faces under a broken roof of dripping umbrellas, and a wonderful -phrase flung into the air by shrill hysterical lips--it was really very -good in its way, quite a suggestion. I thought of telling the prophet -that art had a soul, but that man had not. I am afraid, however, he -would not have understood me." - -"Don't, Harry. The soul is a terrible reality. It can be bought, and -sold, and bartered away. It can be poisoned, or made perfect. There -is a soul in each one of us. I know it." - -"Do you feel quite sure of that, Dorian?" - -"Quite sure." - -"Ah! then it must be an illusion. The things one feels absolutely -certain about are never true. That is the fatality of faith, and the -lesson of romance. How grave you are! Don't be so serious. What have -you or I to do with the superstitions of our age? No: we have given -up our belief in the soul. Play me something. Play me a nocturne, -Dorian, and, as you play, tell me, in a low voice, how you have kept -your youth. You must have some secret. I am only ten years older than -you are, and I am wrinkled, and worn, and yellow. You are really -wonderful, Dorian. You have never looked more charming than you do -to-night. You remind me of the day I saw you first. You were rather -cheeky, very shy, and absolutely extraordinary. You have changed, of -course, but not in appearance. I wish you would tell me your secret. -To get back my youth I would do anything in the world, except take -exercise, get up early, or be respectable. Youth! There is nothing -like it. It's absurd to talk of the ignorance of youth. The only -people to whose opinions I listen now with any respect are people much -younger than myself. They seem in front of me. Life has revealed to -them her latest wonder. As for the aged, I always contradict the aged. -I do it on principle. If you ask them their opinion on something that -happened yesterday, they solemnly give you the opinions current in -1820, when people wore high stocks, believed in everything, and knew -absolutely nothing. How lovely that thing you are playing is! I -wonder, did Chopin write it at Majorca, with the sea weeping round the -villa and the salt spray dashing against the panes? It is marvellously -romantic. What a blessing it is that there is one art left to us that -is not imitative! Don't stop. I want music to-night. It seems to me -that you are the young Apollo and that I am Marsyas listening to you. -I have sorrows, Dorian, of my own, that even you know nothing of. The -tragedy of old age is not that one is old, but that one is young. I am -amazed sometimes at my own sincerity. Ah, Dorian, how happy you are! -What an exquisite life you have had! You have drunk deeply of -everything. You have crushed the grapes against your palate. Nothing -has been hidden from you. And it has all been to you no more than the -sound of music. It has not marred you. You are still the same." - -"I am not the same, Harry." - -"Yes, you are the same. I wonder what the rest of your life will be. -Don't spoil it by renunciations. At present you are a perfect type. -Don't make yourself incomplete. You are quite flawless now. You need -not shake your head: you know you are. Besides, Dorian, don't deceive -yourself. Life is not governed by will or intention. Life is a -question of nerves, and fibres, and slowly built-up cells in which -thought hides itself and passion has its dreams. You may fancy -yourself safe and think yourself strong. But a chance tone of colour -in a room or a morning sky, a particular perfume that you had once -loved and that brings subtle memories with it, a line from a forgotten -poem that you had come across again, a cadence from a piece of music -that you had ceased to play--I tell you, Dorian, that it is on things -like these that our lives depend. Browning writes about that -somewhere; but our own senses will imagine them for us. There are -moments when the odour of lilas blanc passes suddenly across me, and I -have to live the strangest month of my life over again. I wish I could -change places with you, Dorian. The world has cried out against us -both, but it has always worshipped you. It always will worship you. -You are the type of what the age is searching for, and what it is -afraid it has found. I am so glad that you have never done anything, -never carved a statue, or painted a picture, or produced anything -outside of yourself! Life has been your art. You have set yourself to -music. Your days are your sonnets." - -Dorian rose up from the piano and passed his hand through his hair. -"Yes, life has been exquisite," he murmured, "but I am not going to -have the same life, Harry. And you must not say these extravagant -things to me. You don't know everything about me. I think that if you -did, even you would turn from me. You laugh. Don't laugh." - -"Why have you stopped playing, Dorian? Go back and give me the -nocturne over again. Look at that great, honey-coloured moon that -hangs in the dusky air. She is waiting for you to charm her, and if -you play she will come closer to the earth. You won't? Let us go to -the club, then. It has been a charming evening, and we must end it -charmingly. There is some one at White's who wants immensely to know -you--young Lord Poole, Bournemouth's eldest son. He has already copied -your neckties, and has begged me to introduce him to you. He is quite -delightful and rather reminds me of you." - -"I hope not," said Dorian with a sad look in his eyes. "But I am tired -to-night, Harry. I shan't go to the club. It is nearly eleven, and I -want to go to bed early." - -"Do stay. You have never played so well as to-night. There was -something in your touch that was wonderful. It had more expression -than I had ever heard from it before." - -"It is because I am going to be good," he answered, smiling. "I am a -little changed already." - -"You cannot change to me, Dorian," said Lord Henry. "You and I will -always be friends." - -"Yet you poisoned me with a book once. I should not forgive that. -Harry, promise me that you will never lend that book to any one. It -does harm." - -"My dear boy, you are really beginning to moralize. You will soon be -going about like the converted, and the revivalist, warning people -against all the sins of which you have grown tired. You are much too -delightful to do that. Besides, it is no use. You and I are what we -are, and will be what we will be. As for being poisoned by a book, -there is no such thing as that. Art has no influence upon action. It -annihilates the desire to act. It is superbly sterile. The books that -the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame. -That is all. But we won't discuss literature. Come round to-morrow. I -am going to ride at eleven. We might go together, and I will take you -to lunch afterwards with Lady Branksome. She is a charming woman, and -wants to consult you about some tapestries she is thinking of buying. -Mind you come. Or shall we lunch with our little duchess? She says -she never sees you now. Perhaps you are tired of Gladys? I thought -you would be. Her clever tongue gets on one's nerves. Well, in any -case, be here at eleven." - -"Must I really come, Harry?" - -"Certainly. The park is quite lovely now. I don't think there have -been such lilacs since the year I met you." - -"Very well. I shall be here at eleven," said Dorian. "Good night, -Harry." As he reached the door, he hesitated for a moment, as if he -had something more to say. Then he sighed and went out. - - - -CHAPTER 20 - -It was a lovely night, so warm that he threw his coat over his arm and -did not even put his silk scarf round his throat. As he strolled home, -smoking his cigarette, two young men in evening dress passed him. He -heard one of them whisper to the other, "That is Dorian Gray." He -remembered how pleased he used to be when he was pointed out, or stared -at, or talked about. He was tired of hearing his own name now. Half -the charm of the little village where he had been so often lately was -that no one knew who he was. He had often told the girl whom he had -lured to love him that he was poor, and she had believed him. He had -told her once that he was wicked, and she had laughed at him and -answered that wicked people were always very old and very ugly. What a -laugh she had!--just like a thrush singing. And how pretty she had -been in her cotton dresses and her large hats! She knew nothing, but -she had everything that he had lost. - -When he reached home, he found his servant waiting up for him. He sent -him to bed, and threw himself down on the sofa in the library, and -began to think over some of the things that Lord Henry had said to him. - -Was it really true that one could never change? He felt a wild longing -for the unstained purity of his boyhood--his rose-white boyhood, as -Lord Henry had once called it. He knew that he had tarnished himself, -filled his mind with corruption and given horror to his fancy; that he -had been an evil influence to others, and had experienced a terrible -joy in being so; and that of the lives that had crossed his own, it had -been the fairest and the most full of promise that he had brought to -shame. But was it all irretrievable? Was there no hope for him? - -Ah! in what a monstrous moment of pride and passion he had prayed that -the portrait should bear the burden of his days, and he keep the -unsullied splendour of eternal youth! All his failure had been due to -that. Better for him that each sin of his life had brought its sure -swift penalty along with it. There was purification in punishment. -Not "Forgive us our sins" but "Smite us for our iniquities" should be -the prayer of man to a most just God. - -The curiously carved mirror that Lord Henry had given to him, so many -years ago now, was standing on the table, and the white-limbed Cupids -laughed round it as of old. He took it up, as he had done on that -night of horror when he had first noted the change in the fatal -picture, and with wild, tear-dimmed eyes looked into its polished -shield. Once, some one who had terribly loved him had written to him a -mad letter, ending with these idolatrous words: "The world is changed -because you are made of ivory and gold. The curves of your lips -rewrite history." The phrases came back to his memory, and he repeated -them over and over to himself. Then he loathed his own beauty, and -flinging the mirror on the floor, crushed it into silver splinters -beneath his heel. It was his beauty that had ruined him, his beauty -and the youth that he had prayed for. But for those two things, his -life might have been free from stain. His beauty had been to him but a -mask, his youth but a mockery. What was youth at best? A green, an -unripe time, a time of shallow moods, and sickly thoughts. Why had he -worn its livery? Youth had spoiled him. - -It was better not to think of the past. Nothing could alter that. It -was of himself, and of his own future, that he had to think. James -Vane was hidden in a nameless grave in Selby churchyard. Alan Campbell -had shot himself one night in his laboratory, but had not revealed the -secret that he had been forced to know. The excitement, such as it -was, over Basil Hallward's disappearance would soon pass away. It was -already waning. He was perfectly safe there. Nor, indeed, was it the -death of Basil Hallward that weighed most upon his mind. It was the -living death of his own soul that troubled him. Basil had painted the -portrait that had marred his life. He could not forgive him that. It -was the portrait that had done everything. Basil had said things to -him that were unbearable, and that he had yet borne with patience. The -murder had been simply the madness of a moment. As for Alan Campbell, -his suicide had been his own act. He had chosen to do it. It was -nothing to him. - -A new life! That was what he wanted. That was what he was waiting -for. Surely he had begun it already. He had spared one innocent -thing, at any rate. He would never again tempt innocence. He would be -good. - -As he thought of Hetty Merton, he began to wonder if the portrait in -the locked room had changed. Surely it was not still so horrible as it -had been? Perhaps if his life became pure, he would be able to expel -every sign of evil passion from the face. Perhaps the signs of evil -had already gone away. He would go and look. - -He took the lamp from the table and crept upstairs. As he unbarred the -door, a smile of joy flitted across his strangely young-looking face -and lingered for a moment about his lips. Yes, he would be good, and -the hideous thing that he had hidden away would no longer be a terror -to him. He felt as if the load had been lifted from him already. - -He went in quietly, locking the door behind him, as was his custom, and -dragged the purple hanging from the portrait. A cry of pain and -indignation broke from him. He could see no change, save that in the -eyes there was a look of cunning and in the mouth the curved wrinkle of -the hypocrite. The thing was still loathsome--more loathsome, if -possible, than before--and the scarlet dew that spotted the hand seemed -brighter, and more like blood newly spilled. Then he trembled. Had it -been merely vanity that had made him do his one good deed? Or the -desire for a new sensation, as Lord Henry had hinted, with his mocking -laugh? Or that passion to act a part that sometimes makes us do things -finer than we are ourselves? Or, perhaps, all these? And why was the -red stain larger than it had been? It seemed to have crept like a -horrible disease over the wrinkled fingers. There was blood on the -painted feet, as though the thing had dripped--blood even on the hand -that had not held the knife. Confess? Did it mean that he was to -confess? To give himself up and be put to death? He laughed. He felt -that the idea was monstrous. Besides, even if he did confess, who -would believe him? There was no trace of the murdered man anywhere. -Everything belonging to him had been destroyed. He himself had burned -what had been below-stairs. The world would simply say that he was mad. -They would shut him up if he persisted in his story.... Yet it was -his duty to confess, to suffer public shame, and to make public -atonement. There was a God who called upon men to tell their sins to -earth as well as to heaven. Nothing that he could do would cleanse him -till he had told his own sin. His sin? He shrugged his shoulders. -The death of Basil Hallward seemed very little to him. He was thinking -of Hetty Merton. For it was an unjust mirror, this mirror of his soul -that he was looking at. Vanity? Curiosity? Hypocrisy? Had there -been nothing more in his renunciation than that? There had been -something more. At least he thought so. But who could tell? ... No. -There had been nothing more. Through vanity he had spared her. In -hypocrisy he had worn the mask of goodness. For curiosity's sake he -had tried the denial of self. He recognized that now. - -But this murder--was it to dog him all his life? Was he always to be -burdened by his past? Was he really to confess? Never. There was -only one bit of evidence left against him. The picture itself--that -was evidence. He would destroy it. Why had he kept it so long? Once -it had given him pleasure to watch it changing and growing old. Of -late he had felt no such pleasure. It had kept him awake at night. -When he had been away, he had been filled with terror lest other eyes -should look upon it. It had brought melancholy across his passions. -Its mere memory had marred many moments of joy. It had been like -conscience to him. Yes, it had been conscience. He would destroy it. - -He looked round and saw the knife that had stabbed Basil Hallward. He -had cleaned it many times, till there was no stain left upon it. It -was bright, and glistened. As it had killed the painter, so it would -kill the painter's work, and all that that meant. It would kill the -past, and when that was dead, he would be free. It would kill this -monstrous soul-life, and without its hideous warnings, he would be at -peace. He seized the thing, and stabbed the picture with it. - -There was a cry heard, and a crash. The cry was so horrible in its -agony that the frightened servants woke and crept out of their rooms. -Two gentlemen, who were passing in the square below, stopped and looked -up at the great house. They walked on till they met a policeman and -brought him back. The man rang the bell several times, but there was -no answer. Except for a light in one of the top windows, the house was -all dark. After a time, he went away and stood in an adjoining portico -and watched. - -"Whose house is that, Constable?" asked the elder of the two gentlemen. - -"Mr. Dorian Gray's, sir," answered the policeman. - -They looked at each other, as they walked away, and sneered. One of -them was Sir Henry Ashton's uncle. - -Inside, in the servants' part of the house, the half-clad domestics -were talking in low whispers to each other. Old Mrs. Leaf was crying -and wringing her hands. Francis was as pale as death. - -After about a quarter of an hour, he got the coachman and one of the -footmen and crept upstairs. They knocked, but there was no reply. -They called out. Everything was still. Finally, after vainly trying -to force the door, they got on the roof and dropped down on to the -balcony. The windows yielded easily--their bolts were old. - -When they entered, they found hanging upon the wall a splendid portrait -of their master as they had last seen him, in all the wonder of his -exquisite youth and beauty. Lying on the floor was a dead man, in -evening dress, with a knife in his heart. He was withered, wrinkled, -and loathsome of visage. It was not till they had examined the rings -that they recognized who it was. - - - - - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY *** - -***** This file should be named 174.txt or 174.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/1/7/174/ - -Produced by Judith Boss. HTML version by Al Haines. - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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We can be reached at: - -Project Gutenberg Director of Communications (PGDIRCOM) - -Internet: pgdircom@vmd.cso.uiuc.edu -Bitnet: pgdircom@uiucvmd -CompuServe: >internet:pgdircom@.vmd.cso.uiuc.edu -Attmail: internet!vmd.cso.uiuc.edu!pgdircom - -Drafted by CHARLES B. KRAMER, Attorney -CompuServe: 72600,2026 - Internet: 72600.2026@compuserve.com - Tel: (212) 254-5093 -*END*THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.07.02.92*END* - - - - -The Picture of Dorian Gray - -by - -Oscar Wilde - - -THE PREFACE - -The artist is the creator of beautiful things. To reveal art and conceal -the artist is art's aim. The critic is he who can translate into another -manner or a new material his impression of beautiful things. - -The highest as the lowest form of criticism is a mode of autobiography. -Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without -being charming. This is a fault. - -Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. -For these there is hope. They are the elect to whom beautiful things -mean only beauty. - -There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. -Books are well written, or badly written. That is all. - -The nineteenth century dislike of realism is the rage of Caliban -seeing his own face in a glass. - -The nineteenth century dislike of romanticism is the rage of -Caliban not seeing his own face in a glass. The moral life of man -forms part of the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality -of art consists in the perfect use of an imperfect medium. -No artist desires to prove anything. Even things that are true -can be proved. No artist has ethical sympathies. An ethical -sympathy in an artist is an unpardonable mannerism of style. -No artist is ever morbid. The artist can express everything. -Thought and language are to the artist instruments of an art. -Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for an art. -From the point of view of form, the type of all the arts is the art -of the musician. From the point of view of feeling, the actor's -craft is the type. All art is at once surface and symbol. -Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. -Those who read the symbol do so at their peril. -It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors. -Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work -is new, complex, and vital. When critics disagree, -the artist is in accord with himself. We can forgive a man -for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. -The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one -admires it intensely. - - All art is quite useless. - - OSCAR WILDE - - -CHAPTER 1 - -The studio was filled with the rich odour of roses, and when -the light summer wind stirred amidst the trees of the garden, -there came through the open door the heavy scent of the lilac, -or the more delicate perfume of the pink-flowering thorn. - -From the corner of the divan of Persian saddle-bags on which -he was lying, smoking, as was his custom, innumerable cigarettes, -Lord Henry Wotton could just catch the gleam of the honey-sweet and -honey-coloured blossoms of a laburnum, whose tremulous branches seemed -hardly able to bear the burden of a beauty so flamelike as theirs; -and now and then the fantastic shadows of birds in flight flitted -across the long tussore-silk curtains that were stretched in front -of the huge window, producing a kind of momentary Japanese effect, -and making him think of those pallid, jade-faced painters of Tokyo who, -through the medium of an art that is necessarily immobile, -seek to convey the sense of swiftness and motion. The sullen murmur -of the bees shouldering their way through the long unmown grass, -or circling with monotonous insistence round the dusty gilt horns of -the straggling woodbine, seemed to make the stillness more oppressive. -The dim roar of London was like the bourdon note of a distant organ. - -In the centre of the room, clamped to an upright easel, stood the full-length -portrait of a young man of extraordinary personal beauty, and in front of it, -some little distance away, was sitting the artist himself, Basil Hallward, -whose sudden disappearance some years ago caused, at the time, such public -excitement and gave rise to so many strange conjectures. - -As the painter looked at the gracious and comely form he had so skilfully -mirrored in his art, a smile of pleasure passed across his face, and seemed -about to linger there. But he suddenly started up, and closing his eyes, -placed his fingers upon the lids, as though he sought to imprison within his -brain some curious dream from which he feared he might awake. - -"It is your best work, Basil, the best thing you have ever done," -said Lord Henry languidly. "You must certainly send it next year -to the Grosvenor. The Academy is too large and too vulgar. -Whenever I have gone there, there have been either so many people that I -have not been able to see the pictures, which was dreadful, or so many -pictures that I have not been able to see the people, which was worse. -The Grosvenor is really the only place." - -"I don't think I shall send it anywhere," he answered, tossing his head -back in that odd way that used to make his friends laugh at him at Oxford. -"No, I won't send it anywhere." - -Lord Henry elevated his eyebrows and looked at him in amazement through -the thin blue wreaths of smoke that curled up in such fanciful whorls -from his heavy, opium-tainted cigarette. "Not send it anywhere? -My dear fellow, why? Have you any reason? What odd chaps you -painters are! You do anything in the world to gain a reputation. -As soon as you have one, you seem to want to throw it away. -It is silly of you, for there is only one thing in the world worse -than being talked about, and that is not being talked about. -A portrait like this would set you far above all the young men in England, -and make the old men quite jealous, if old men are ever capable of -any emotion." - -"I know you will laugh at me," he replied, "but I really can't exhibit it. -I have put too much of myself into it." - -Lord Henry stretched himself out on the divan and laughed. - -"Yes, I knew you would; but it is quite true, all the same." - -"Too much of yourself in it! Upon my word, Basil, -I didn't know you were so vain; and I really can't see any resemblance -between you, with your rugged strong face and your coal-black hair, -and this young Adonis, who looks as if he was made out of ivory -and rose-leaves. Why, my dear Basil, he is a Narcissus, and you-- -well, of course you have an intellectual expression and all that. -But beauty, real beauty, ends where an intellectual expression begins. -Intellect is in itself a mode of exaggeration, and destroys -the harmony of any face. The moment one sits down to think, -one becomes all nose, or all forehead, or something horrid. -Look at the successful men in any of the learned professions. -How perfectly hideous they are! Except, of course, in the Church. -But then in the Church they don't think. A bishop keeps on saying at -the age of eighty what he was told to say when he was a boy of eighteen, -and as a natural consequence he always looks absolutely delightful. -Your mysterious young friend, whose name you have never told me, -but whose picture really fascinates me, never thinks. I feel quite -sure of that. He is some brainless beautiful creature who should be -always here in winter when we have no flowers to look at, and always -here in summer when we want something to chill our intelligence. -Don't flatter yourself, Basil: you are not in the least like -him." - -"You don't understand me, Harry," answered the artist. "Of course I am -not like him. I know that perfectly well. Indeed, I should be sorry -to look like him. You shrug your shoulders? I am telling you the truth. -There is a fatality about all physical and intellectual distinction, -the sort of fatality that seems to dog through history the faltering -steps of kings. It is better not to be different from one's fellows. -The ugly and the stupid have the best of it in this world. They can sit -at their ease and gape at the play. If they know nothing of victory, -they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat. They live as we -all should live--undisturbed, indifferent, and without disquiet. -They neither bring ruin upon others, nor ever receive it from alien hands. -Your rank and wealth, Harry; my brains, such as they are--my art, whatever it -may be worth; Dorian Gray's good looks--we shall all suffer for what the gods -have given us, suffer terribly." - -"Dorian Gray? Is that his name?" asked Lord Henry, walking across -the studio towards Basil Hallward. - -"Yes, that is his name. I didn't intend to tell it to you." - -"But why not?" - -"Oh, I can't explain. When I like people immensely, I never tell -their names to any one. It is like surrendering a part of them. -I have grown to love secrecy. It seems to be the one thing -that can make modern life mysterious or marvellous to us. -The commonest thing is delightful if one only hides it. -When I leave town now I never tell my people where I am going. -If I did, I would lose all my pleasure. It is a silly habit, -I dare say, but somehow it seems to bring a great deal of romance -into one's life. I suppose you think me awfully foolish -about it?" - -"Not at all," answered Lord Henry, "not at all, my dear Basil. -You seem to forget that I am married, and the one charm of marriage is -that it makes a life of deception absolutely necessary for both parties. -I never know where my wife is, and my wife never knows what I am doing. -When we meet--we do meet occasionally, when we dine out together, or go -down to the Duke's--we tell each other the most absurd stories with the most -serious faces. My wife is very good at it--much better, in fact, than I am. -She never gets confused over her dates, and I always do. But when she -does find me out, she makes no row at all. I sometimes wish she would; -but she merely laughs at me." - -"I hate the way you talk about your married life, Harry," -said Basil Hallward, strolling towards the door that led into -the garden. "I believe that you are really a very good husband, -but that you are thoroughly ashamed of your own virtues. -You are an extraordinary fellow. You never say a moral thing, -and you never do a wrong thing. Your cynicism is simply -a pose." - -"Being natural is simply a pose, and the most irritating pose I know," -cried Lord Henry, laughing; and the two young men went out into the garden -together and ensconced themselves on a long bamboo seat that stood in the -shade of a tall laurel bush. The sunlight slipped over the polished leaves. -In the grass, white daisies were tremulous. - -After a pause, Lord Henry pulled out his watch. "I am afraid I -must be going, Basil," he murmured, "and before I go, I insist -on your answering a question I put to you some time ago." - -"What is that?" said the painter, keeping his eyes fixed on the ground. - -"You know quite well." - -"I do not, Harry." - -"Well, I will tell you what it is. I want you to explain to me why you -won't exhibit Dorian Gray's picture. I want the real reason." - -"I told you the real reason." - -"No, you did not. You said it was because there was too much -of yourself in it. Now, that is childish." - -"Harry," said Basil Hallward, looking him straight in the face, -"every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, -not of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. -It is not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, -on the coloured canvas, reveals himself. The reason I will not exhibit -this picture is that I am afraid that I have shown in it the secret of my -own soul." - -Lord Henry laughed. "And what is that?" he asked. - -"I will tell you," said Hallward; but an expression of perplexity -came over his face. - -"I am all expectation, Basil," continued his companion, -glancing at him. - -"Oh, there is really very little to tell, Harry," answered the painter; -"and I am afraid you will hardly understand it. Perhaps you will hardly -believe it." - -Lord Henry smiled, and leaning down, plucked a pink-petalled daisy from -the grass and examined it. "I am quite sure I shall understand it," -he replied, gazing intently at the little golden, white-feathered disk, -"and as for believing things, I can believe anything, provided that it is -quite incredible." - -The wind shook some blossoms from the trees, and the heavy lilac-blooms, -with their clustering stars, moved to and fro in the languid air. -A grasshopper began to chirrup by the wall, and like a blue thread -a long thin dragon-fly floated past on its brown gauze wings. -Lord Henry felt as if he could hear Basil Hallward's heart beating, -and wondered what was coming. - -"The story is simply this," said the painter after some time. -"Two months ago I went to a crush at Lady Brandon's. You know -we poor artists have to show ourselves in society from time -to time, just to remind the public that we are not savages. -With an evening coat and a white tie, as you told me once, anybody, -even a stock-broker, can gain a reputation for being civilized. -Well, after I had been in the room about ten minutes, -talking to huge overdressed dowagers and tedious academicians, -I suddenly became conscious that some one was looking at me. -I turned half-way round and saw Dorian Gray for the first time. -When our eyes met, I felt that I was growing pale. -A curious sensation of terror came over me. I knew that I -had come face to face with some one whose mere personality -was so fascinating that, if I allowed it to do so, it would -absorb my whole nature, my whole soul, my very art itself. -I did not want any external influence in my life. -You know yourself, Harry, how independent I am by nature. -I have always been my own master; had at least always been so, -till I met Dorian Gray. Then--but I don't know how to explain -it to you. Something seemed to tell me that I was on the verge -of a terrible crisis in my life. I had a strange feeling that -fate had in store for me exquisite joys and exquisite sorrows. -I grew afraid and turned to quit the room. It was not conscience -that made me do so: it was a sort of cowardice. I take no -credit to myself for trying to escape." - -"Conscience and cowardice are really the same things, Basil. -Conscience is the trade-name of the firm. That is all." - -"I don't believe that, Harry, and I don't believe you do either. -However, whatever was my motive--and it may have been pride, -for I used to be very proud--I certainly struggled to the door. -There, of course, I stumbled against Lady Brandon. 'You are not -going to run away so soon, Mr. Hallward?' she screamed out. -You know her curiously shrill voice?" - -"Yes; she is a peacock in everything but beauty," said Lord Henry, -pulling the daisy to bits with his long nervous fingers. - -"I could not get rid of her. She brought me up to royalties, -and people with stars and garters, and elderly ladies with gigantic -tiaras and parrot noses. She spoke of me as her dearest friend. -I had only met her once before, but she took it into her head to lionize me. -I believe some picture of mine had made a great success at the time, -at least had been chattered about in the penny newspapers, which is -the nineteenth-century standard of immortality. Suddenly I found myself -face to face with the young man whose personality had so strangely -stirred me. We were quite close, almost touching. Our eyes met again. -It was reckless of me, but I asked Lady Brandon to introduce me to him. -Perhaps it was not so reckless, after all. It was simply inevitable. -We would have spoken to each other without any introduction. -I am sure of that. Dorian told me so afterwards. He, too, felt that we -were destined to know each other." - -"And how did Lady Brandon describe this wonderful young man?" -asked his companion. "I know she goes in for giving -a rapid precis of all her guests. I remember her bringing -me up to a truculent and red-faced old gentleman covered -all over with orders and ribbons, and hissing into my ear, -in a tragic whisper which must have been perfectly audible -to everybody in the room, the most astounding details. -I simply fled. I like to find out people for myself. -But Lady Brandon treats her guests exactly as an auctioneer -treats his goods. She either explains them entirely away, -or tells one everything about them except what one wants -to know." - -"Poor Lady Brandon! You are hard on her, Harry!" said Hallward listlessly. - -"My dear fellow, she tried to found a salon, and only succeeded -in opening a restaurant. How could I admire her? But tell me, -what did she say about Mr. Dorian Gray?" - -"Oh, something like, 'Charming boy--poor dear mother and I -absolutely inseparable. Quite forget what he does--afraid he-- -doesn't do anything--oh, yes, plays the piano--or is it -the violin, dear Mr. Gray?' Neither of us could help laughing, -and we became friends at once." - -"Laughter is not at all a bad beginning for a friendship, -and it is far the best ending for one," said the young lord, -plucking another daisy. - -Hallward shook his head. "You don't understand what friendship is, Harry," -he murmured--"or what enmity is, for that matter. You like every one; -that is to say, you are indifferent to every one." - -"How horribly unjust of you!" cried Lord Henry, tilting his hat back -and looking up at the little clouds that, like ravelled skeins of glossy -white silk, were drifting across the hollowed turquoise of the summer sky. -"Yes; horribly unjust of you. I make a great difference between people. -I choose my friends for their good looks, my acquaintances for -their good characters, and my enemies for their good intellects. -A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies. I have not -got one who is a fool. They are all men of some intellectual power, -and consequently they all appreciate me. Is that very vain of me? -I think it is rather vain." - -"I should think it was, Harry. But according to your category I -must be merely an acquaintance." - -"My dear old Basil, you are much more than an acquaintance." - -"And much less than a friend. A sort of brother, I suppose?" - -"Oh, brothers! I don't care for brothers. My elder brother won't die, -and my younger brothers seem never to do anything else." - -"Harry!" exclaimed Hallward, frowning. - -"My dear fellow, I am not quite serious. But I can't help detesting -my relations. I suppose it comes from the fact that none of us -can stand other people having the same faults as ourselves. -I quite sympathize with the rage of the English democracy against -what they call the vices of the upper orders. The masses feel -that drunkenness, stupidity, and immorality should be their own -special property, and that if any one of us makes an ass of himself, -he is poaching on their preserves. When poor Southwark got -into the divorce court, their indignation was quite magnificent. -And yet I don't suppose that ten per cent of the proletariat -live correctly." - -"I don't agree with a single word that you have said, and, what is more, -Harry, I feel sure you don't either." - -Lord Henry stroked his pointed brown beard and tapped the toe -of his patent-leather boot with a tasselled ebony cane. -"How English you are Basil! That is the second time you -have made that observation. If one puts forward an idea -to a true Englishman--always a rash thing to do--he never -dreams of considering whether the idea is right or wrong. -The only thing he considers of any importance is whether one -believes it oneself. Now, the value of an idea has nothing -whatsoever to do with the sincerity of the man who expresses it. -Indeed, the probabilities are that the more insincere -the man is, the more purely intellectual will the idea be, -as in that case it will not be coloured by either his wants, -his desires, or his prejudices. However, I don't propose -to discuss politics, sociology, or metaphysics with you. -I like persons better than principles, and I like persons -with no principles better than anything else in the world. -Tell me more about Mr. Dorian Gray. How often do you -see him?" - -"Every day. I couldn't be happy if I didn't see him every day. -He is absolutely necessary to me." - -"How extraordinary! I thought you would never care for anything -but your art." - -"He is all my art to me now," said the painter gravely. -"I sometimes think, Harry, that there are only two eras of any -importance in the world's history. The first is the appearance -of a new medium for art, and the second is the appearance -of a new personality for art also. What the invention -of oil-painting was to the Venetians, the face of Antinous -was to late Greek sculpture, and the face of Dorian Gray will -some day be to me. It is not merely that I paint from him, -draw from him, sketch from him. Of course, I have done all that. -But he is much more to me than a model or a sitter. -I won't tell you that I am dissatisfied with what I have done -of him, or that his beauty is such that art cannot express it. -There is nothing that art cannot express, and I know that -the work I have done, since I met Dorian Gray, is good work, -is the best work of my life. But in some curious way--I wonder -will you understand me?--his personality has suggested to me -an entirely new manner in art, an entirely new mode of style. -I see things differently, I think of them differently. -I can now recreate life in a way that was hidden from me before. -'A dream of form in days of thought'--who is it who says that? -I forget; but it is what Dorian Gray has been to me. -The merely visible presence of this lad--for he seems to me -little more than a lad, though he is really over twenty-- -his merely visible presence--ah! I wonder can you realize -all that that means? Unconsciously he defines for me -the lines of a fresh school, a school that is to have in it -all the passion of the romantic spirit, all the perfection -of the spirit that is Greek. The harmony of soul and body-- -how much that is! We in our madness have separated the two, -and have invented a realism that is vulgar, an ideality that -is void. Harry! if you only knew what Dorian Gray is to me! -You remember that landscape of mine, for which Agnew offered -me such a huge price but which I would not part with? -It is one of the best things I have ever done. And why -is it so? Because, while I was painting it, Dorian Gray sat -beside me. Some subtle influence passed from him to me, -and for the first time in my life I saw in the plain -woodland the wonder I had always looked for and always -missed." - -"Basil, this is extraordinary! I must see Dorian Gray." - -Hallward got up from the seat and walked up and down the garden. -After some time he came back. "Harry," he said, "Dorian Gray -is to me simply a motive in art. You might see nothing in him. -I see everything in him. He is never more present in my work than -when no image of him is there. He is a suggestion, as I have said, -of a new manner. I find him in the curves of certain lines, -in the loveliness and subtleties of certain colours. -That is all." - -"Then why won't you exhibit his portrait?" asked Lord Henry. - -"Because, without intending it, I have put into it some expression -of all this curious artistic idolatry, of which, of course, -I have never cared to speak to him. He knows nothing about it. -He shall never know anything about it. But the world might guess it, -and I will not bare my soul to their shallow prying eyes. -My heart shall never be put under their microscope. There is too much -of myself in the thing, Harry--too much of myself!" - -"Poets are not so scrupulous as you are. They know how useful passion -is for publication. Nowadays a broken heart will run to many editions." - -"I hate them for it," cried Hallward. "An artist should create -beautiful things, but should put nothing of his own life into them. -We live in an age when men treat art as if it were meant to be a form -of autobiography. We have lost the abstract sense of beauty. -Some day I will show the world what it is; and for that reason the world -shall never see my portrait of Dorian Gray." - -"I think you are wrong, Basil, but I won't argue with you. -It is only the intellectually lost who ever argue. Tell me, -is Dorian Gray very fond of you?" - -The painter considered for a few moments. "He likes me," -he answered after a pause; "I know he likes me. Of course I -flatter him dreadfully. I find a strange pleasure in saying -things to him that I know I shall be sorry for having said. -As a rule, he is charming to me, and we sit in the studio and talk -of a thousand things. Now and then, however, he is horribly -thoughtless, and seems to take a real delight in giving me pain. -Then I feel, Harry, that I have given away my whole soul to some -one who treats it as if it were a flower to put in his coat, -a bit of decoration to charm his vanity, an ornament for a -summer's day." - -"Days in summer, Basil, are apt to linger," murmured Lord Henry. -"Perhaps you will tire sooner than he will. It is a sad thing to think of, -but there is no doubt that genius lasts longer than beauty. That accounts -for the fact that we all take such pains to over-educate ourselves. -In the wild struggle for existence, we want to have something that endures, -and so we fill our minds with rubbish and facts, in the silly hope of keeping -our place. The thoroughly well-informed man--that is the modern ideal. -And the mind of the thoroughly well-informed man is a dreadful thing. -It is like a bric-a-brac shop, all monsters and dust, with everything -priced above its proper value. I think you will tire first, all the same. -Some day you will look at your friend, and he will seem to you to be a little -out of drawing, or you won't like his tone of colour, or something. You will -bitterly reproach him in your own heart, and seriously think that he has -behaved very badly to you. The next time he calls, you will be perfectly -cold and indifferent. It will be a great pity, for it will alter you. -What you have told me is quite a romance, a romance of art one might call it, -and the worst of having a romance of any kind is that it leaves one -so unromantic." - -"Harry, don't talk like that. As long as I live, the personality -of Dorian Gray will dominate me. You can't feel what I feel. -You change too often." - -"Ah, my dear Basil, that is exactly why I can feel it. -Those who are faithful know only the trivial side of love: -it is the faithless who know love's tragedies." And Lord -Henry struck a light on a dainty silver case and began -to smoke a cigarette with a self-conscious and satisfied air, -as if he had summed up the world in a phrase. There was -a rustle of chirruping sparrows in the green lacquer leaves -of the ivy, and the blue cloud-shadows chased themselves across -the grass like swallows. How pleasant it was in the garden! -And how delightful other people's emotions were!-- -much more delightful than their ideas, it seemed to him. -One's own soul, and the passions of one's friends--those were -the fascinating things in life. He pictured to himself -with silent amusement the tedious luncheon that he had missed -by staying so long with Basil Hallward. Had he gone to his -aunt's, he would have been sure to have met Lord Goodbody there, -and the whole conversation would have been about the feeding -of the poor and the necessity for model lodging-houses. Each -class would have preached the importance of those virtues, -for whose exercise there was no necessity in their own lives. -The rich would have spoken on the value of thrift, -and the idle grown eloquent over the dignity of labour. -It was charming to have escaped all that! As he thought of his aunt, -an idea seemed to strike him. He turned to Hallward and said, -"My dear fellow, I have just remembered." - -"Remembered what, Harry?" - -"Where I heard the name of Dorian Gray." - -"Where was it?" asked Hallward, with a slight frown. - -"Don't look so angry, Basil. It was at my aunt, Lady Agatha's. -She told me she had discovered a wonderful young man who was going -to help her in the East End, and that his name was Dorian Gray. -I am bound to state that she never told me he was good-looking. Women -have no appreciation of good looks; at least, good women have not. -She said that he was very earnest and had a beautiful nature. -I at once pictured to myself a creature with spectacles and lank hair, -horribly freckled, and tramping about on huge feet. I wish I had known it -was your friend." - -"I am very glad you didn't, Harry." - -"Why?" - -"I don't want you to meet him." - -"You don't want me to meet him?" - -"No." - -"Mr. Dorian Gray is in the studio, sir," said the butler, -coming into the garden. - -"You must introduce me now," cried Lord Henry, laughing. - -The painter turned to his servant, who stood blinking in the sunlight. -"Ask Mr. Gray to wait, Parker: I shall be in in a few moments." -The man bowed and went up the walk. - -Then he looked at Lord Henry. "Dorian Gray is my dearest friend," -he said. "He has a simple and a beautiful nature. Your aunt -was quite right in what she said of him. Don't spoil him. -Don't try to influence him. Your influence would be bad. -The world is wide, and has many marvellous people in it. -Don't take away from me the one person who gives to my art -whatever charm it possesses: my life as an artist depends -on him. Mind, Harry, I trust you." He spoke very slowly, -and the words seemed wrung out of him almost against -his will. - -"What nonsense you talk!" said Lord Henry, smiling, and taking Hallward -by the arm, he almost led him into the house. - - - -CHAPTER 2 - -As they entered they saw Dorian Gray. He was seated at the piano, -with his back to them, turning over the pages of a volume of Schumann's -"Forest Scenes." "You must lend me these, Basil," he cried. -"I want to learn them. They are perfectly charming." - -"That entirely depends on how you sit to-day, Dorian." - -"Oh, I am tired of sitting, and I don't want a life-sized portrait -of myself," answered the lad, swinging round on the music-stool -in a wilful, petulant manner. When he caught sight of Lord Henry, -a faint blush coloured his cheeks for a moment, and he started up. -"I beg your pardon, Basil, but I didn't know you had any one -with you." - -"This is Lord Henry Wotton, Dorian, an old Oxford friend of mine. -I have just been telling him what a capital sitter you were, -and now you have spoiled everything." - -"You have not spoiled my pleasure in meeting you, Mr. Gray," -said Lord Henry, stepping forward and extending his hand. -"My aunt has often spoken to me about you. You are one of -her favourites, and, I am afraid, one of her victims also." - -"I am in Lady Agatha's black books at present," answered Dorian -with a funny look of penitence. "I promised to go to a club in -Whitechapel with her last Tuesday, and I really forgot all about it. -We were to have played a duet together--three duets, I believe. -I don't know what she will say to me. I am far too frightened -to call." - -"Oh, I will make your peace with my aunt. She is quite devoted to you. -And I don't think it really matters about your not being there. The audience -probably thought it was a duet. When Aunt Agatha sits down to the piano, -she makes quite enough noise for two people." - -"That is very horrid to her, and not very nice to me," -answered Dorian, laughing. - -Lord Henry looked at him. Yes, he was certainly wonderfully handsome, -with his finely curved scarlet lips, his frank blue eyes, his crisp -gold hair. There was something in his face that made one trust him at once. -All the candour of youth was there, as well as all youth's passionate purity. -One felt that he had kept himself unspotted from the world. No wonder Basil -Hallward worshipped him. - -"You are too charming to go in for philanthropy, Mr. Gray--far too charming." -And Lord Henry flung himself down on the divan and opened his cigarette-case. - -The painter had been busy mixing his colours and getting his brushes ready. -He was looking worried, and when he heard Lord Henry's last remark, he glanced -at him, hesitated for a moment, and then said, "Harry, I want to finish this -picture to-day. Would you think it awfully rude of me if I asked you to -go away?" - -Lord Henry smiled and looked at Dorian Gray. "Am I to go, Mr. Gray?" -he asked. - -"Oh, please don't, Lord Henry. I see that Basil is in one of his sulky moods, -and I can't bear him when he sulks. Besides, I want you to tell me why I -should not go in for philanthropy." - -"I don't know that I shall tell you that, Mr. Gray. It is so -tedious a subject that one would have to talk seriously about it. -But I certainly shall not run away, now that you have asked me to stop. -You don't really mind, Basil, do you? You have often told me that you -liked your sitters to have some one to chat to." - -Hallward bit his lip. "If Dorian wishes it, of course you must stay. -Dorian's whims are laws to everybody, except himself." - -Lord Henry took up his hat and gloves. "You are very pressing, Basil, but I -am afraid I must go. I have promised to meet a man at the Orleans. -Good-bye, Mr. Gray. Come and see me some afternoon in Curzon Street. -I am nearly always at home at five o'clock. Write to me when you are coming. -I should be sorry to miss you." - -"Basil," cried Dorian Gray, "if Lord Henry Wotton goes, I shall go, too. -You never open your lips while you are painting, and it is horribly dull -standing on a platform and trying to look pleasant. Ask him to stay. -I insist upon it." - -"Stay, Harry, to oblige Dorian, and to oblige me," said Hallward, -gazing intently at his picture. "It is quite true, I never talk -when I am working, and never listen either, and it must be dreadfully -tedious for my unfortunate sitters. I beg you to stay." - -"But what about my man at the Orleans?" - -The painter laughed. "I don't think there will be any difficulty about that. -Sit down again, Harry. And now, Dorian, get up on the platform, and don't -move about too much, or pay any attention to what Lord Henry says. -He has a very bad influence over all his friends, with the single exception -of myself." - -Dorian Gray stepped up on the dais with the air of a young Greek martyr, -and made a little moue of discontent to Lord Henry, to whom he had rather -taken a fancy. He was so unlike Basil. They made a delightful contrast. -And he had such a beautiful voice. After a few moments he said to him, -"Have you really a very bad influence, Lord Henry? As bad as Basil says?" - -"There is no such thing as a good influence, Mr. Gray. -All influence is immoral--immoral from the scientific point -of view." - -"Why?" - -"Because to influence a person is to give him one's own soul. -He does not think his natural thoughts, or burn with his natural passions. -His virtues are not real to him. His sins, if there are such things -as sins, are borrowed. He becomes an echo of some one else's music, -an actor of a part that has not been written for him. The aim of life -is self-development. To realize one's nature perfectly--that is what -each of us is here for. People are afraid of themselves, nowadays. -They have forgotten the highest of all duties, the duty that one owes -to one's self. Of course, they are charitable. They feed the hungry -and clothe the beggar. But their own souls starve, and are naked. -Courage has gone out of our race. Perhaps we never really had it. -The terror of society, which is the basis of morals, the terror of God, -which is the secret of religion--these are the two things that govern us. -And yet--" - -"Just turn your head a little more to the right, Dorian, like a good boy," -said the painter, deep in his work and conscious only that a look had come -into the lad's face that he had never seen there before. - -"And yet," continued Lord Henry, in his low, musical voice, -and with that graceful wave of the hand that was always so -characteristic of him, and that he had even in his Eton days, -"I believe that if one man were to live out his life fully -and completely, were to give form to every feeling, expression to -every thought, reality to every dream--I believe that the world -would gain such a fresh impulse of joy that we would forget all -the maladies of mediaevalism, and return to the Hellenic ideal-- -to something finer, richer than the Hellenic ideal, it may be. -But the bravest man amongst us is afraid of himself. -The mutilation of the savage has its tragic survival in the -self-denial that mars our lives. We are punished for our refusals. -Every impulse that we strive to strangle broods in the mind -and poisons us. The body sins once, and has done with its sin, -for action is a mode of purification. Nothing remains then -but the recollection of a pleasure, or the luxury of a regret. -The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. -Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things -it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its monstrous -laws have made monstrous and unlawful. It has been said -that the great events of the world take place in the brain. -It is in the brain, and the brain only, that the great sins -of the world take place also. You, Mr. Gray, you yourself, -with your rose-red youth and your rose-white boyhood, you have had -passions that have made you afraid, thoughts that have filled you -with terror, day-dreams and sleeping dreams whose mere memory might -stain your cheek with shame--" - -"Stop!" faltered Dorian Gray, "stop! you bewilder me. -I don't know what to say. There is some answer to you, but I -cannot find it. Don't speak. Let me think. Or, rather, let me -try not to think." - -For nearly ten minutes he stood there, motionless, with parted -lips and eyes strangely bright. He was dimly conscious -that entirely fresh influences were at work within him. -Yet they seemed to him to have come really from himself. -The few words that Basil's friend had said to him--words spoken -by chance, no doubt, and with wilful paradox in them-- -had touched some secret chord that had never been touched before, -but that he felt was now vibrating and throbbing to -curious pulses. - -Music had stirred him like that. Music had troubled him many times. -But music was not articulate. It was not a new world, but rather -another chaos, that it created in us. Words! Mere words! -How terrible they were! How clear, and vivid, and cruel! One could -not escape from them. And yet what a subtle magic there was in them! -They seemed to be able to give a plastic form to formless things, -and to have a music of their own as sweet as that of viol or of lute. -Mere words! Was there anything so real as words? - -Yes; there had been things in his boyhood that he had not understood. -He understood them now. Life suddenly became fiery-coloured to him. -It seemed to him that he had been walking in fire. Why had he not -known it? - -With his subtle smile, Lord Henry watched him. He knew the precise -psychological moment when to say nothing. He felt intensely interested. -He was amazed at the sudden impression that his words had produced, -and, remembering a book that he had read when he was sixteen, -a book which had revealed to him much that he had not known before, -he wondered whether Dorian Gray was passing through a similar experience. -He had merely shot an arrow into the air. Had it hit the mark? -How fascinating the lad was! - -Hallward painted away with that marvellous bold touch of his, -that had the true refinement and perfect delicacy that in art, -at any rate comes only from strength. He was unconscious of -the silence. - -"Basil, I am tired of standing," cried Dorian Gray suddenly. -"I must go out and sit in the garden. The air is stifling here." - -"My dear fellow, I am so sorry. When I am painting, -I can't think of anything else. But you never sat better. -You were perfectly still. And I have caught the effect I wanted-- -the half-parted lips and the bright look in the eyes. -I don't know what Harry has been saying to you, but he has -certainly made you have the most wonderful expression. -I suppose he has been paying you compliments. You mustn't believe -a word that he says." - -"He has certainly not been paying me compliments. Perhaps that is the reason -that I don't believe anything he has told me." - -"You know you believe it all," said Lord Henry, looking at him with -his dreamy languorous eyes. "I will go out to the garden with you. -It is horribly hot in the studio. Basil, let us have something iced -to drink, something with strawberries in it." - -"Certainly, Harry. Just touch the bell, and when Parker comes I -will tell him what you want. I have got to work up this background, -so I will join you later on. Don't keep Dorian too long. -I have never been in better form for painting than I am to-day. This -is going to be my masterpiece. It is my masterpiece as it stands." - -Lord Henry went out to the garden and found Dorian Gray burying his face in -the great cool lilac-blossoms, feverishly drinking in their perfume as if it -had been wine. He came close to him and put his hand upon his shoulder. -"You are quite right to do that," he murmured. "Nothing can cure the soul -but the senses, just as nothing can cure the senses but the soul." - -The lad started and drew back. He was bareheaded, and the leaves -had tossed his rebellious curls and tangled all their gilded threads. -There was a look of fear in his eyes, such as people have when they -are suddenly awakened. His finely chiselled nostrils quivered, -and some hidden nerve shook the scarlet of his lips and left -them trembling. - -"Yes," continued Lord Henry, "that is one of the great secrets of life-- -to cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses by means of the soul. -You are a wonderful creation. You know more than you think you know, just as -you know less than you want to know." - -Dorian Gray frowned and turned his head away. He could not help -liking the tall, graceful young man who was standing by him. -His romantic, olive-coloured face and worn expression interested him. -There was something in his low languid voice that was absolutely fascinating. -His cool, white, flowerlike hands, even, had a curious charm. -They moved, as he spoke, like music, and seemed to have a language -of their own. But he felt afraid of him, and ashamed of being afraid. -Why had it been left for a stranger to reveal him to himself? -He had known Basil Hallward for months, but the friendship between them -had never altered him. Suddenly there had come some one across his life -who seemed to have disclosed to him life's mystery. And, yet, what was -there to be afraid of? He was not a schoolboy or a girl. It was absurd to -be frightened. - -"Let us go and sit in the shade," said Lord Henry. "Parker has -brought out the drinks, and if you stay any longer in this glare, -you will be quite spoiled, and Basil will never paint you again. -You really must not allow yourself to become sunburnt. It would -be unbecoming." - -"What can it matter?" cried Dorian Gray, laughing, as he sat -down on the seat at the end of the garden. - -"It should matter everything to you, Mr. Gray." - -"Why?" - -"Because you have the most marvellous youth, and youth is the one thing -worth having." - -"I don't feel that, Lord Henry." - -"No, you don't feel it now. Some day, when you are old -and wrinkled and ugly, when thought has seared your forehead -with its lines, and passion branded your lips with its -hideous fires, you will feel it, you will feel it terribly. -Now, wherever you go, you charm the world. Will it always -be so? . . . You have a wonderfully beautiful face, Mr. Gray. -Don't frown. You have. And beauty is a form of genius-- -is higher, indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. -It is of the great facts of the world, like sunlight, -or spring-time, or the reflection in dark waters of that silver -shell we call the moon. It cannot be questioned. It has its divine -right of sovereignty. It makes princes of those who have it. -You smile? Ah! when you have lost it you won't smile. -. . . People say sometimes that beauty is only superficial. -That may be so, but at least it is not so superficial -as thought is. To me, beauty is the wonder of wonders. -It is only shallow people who do not judge by appearances. -The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible. -. . . Yes, Mr. Gray, the gods have been good to you. -But what the gods give they quickly take away. You have only -a few years in which to live really, perfectly, and fully. -When your youth goes, your beauty will go with it, and then you -will suddenly discover that there are no triumphs left for you, -or have to content yourself with those mean triumphs that -the memory of your past will make more bitter than defeats. -Every month as it wanes brings you nearer to something dreadful. -Time is jealous of you, and wars against your lilies and your roses. -You will become sallow, and hollow-cheeked, and dull-eyed. -You will suffer horribly.... Ah! realize your youth -while you have it. Don't squander the gold of your days, -listening to the tedious, trying to improve the hopeless failure, -or giving away your life to the ignorant, the common, -and the vulgar. These are the sickly aims, the false ideals, -of our age. Live! Live the wonderful life that is in you! -Let nothing be lost upon you. Be always searching for -new sensations. Be afraid of nothing. . . . A new Hedonism-- -that is what our century wants. You might be its visible symbol. -With your personality there is nothing you could not do. -The world belongs to you for a season. . . . The moment I met -you I saw that you were quite unconscious of what you really are, -of what you really might be. There was so much in you that -charmed me that I felt I must tell you something about yourself. -I thought how tragic it would be if you were wasted. For there is -such a little time that your youth will last--such a little time. -The common hill-flowers wither, but they blossom again. -The laburnum will be as yellow next June as it is now. -In a month there will be purple stars on the clematis, and year -after year the green night of its leaves will hold its purple stars. -But we never get back our youth. The pulse of joy that beats in us -at twenty becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail, our senses rot. -We degenerate into hideous puppets, haunted by the memory -of the passions of which we were too much afraid, and the -exquisite temptations that we had not the courage to yield to. -Youth! Youth! There is absolutely nothing in the world but -youth!" - -Dorian Gray listened, open-eyed and wondering. The spray -of lilac fell from his hand upon the gravel. A furry bee came -and buzzed round it for a moment. Then it began to scramble -all over the oval stellated globe of the tiny blossoms. -He watched it with that strange interest in trivial things -that we try to develop when things of high import make us afraid, -or when we are stirred by some new emotion for which we -cannot find expression, or when some thought that terrifies -us lays sudden siege to the brain and calls on us to yield. -After a time the bee flew away. He saw it creeping into the stained -trumpet of a Tyrian convolvulus. The flower seemed to quiver, -and then swayed gently to and fro. - -Suddenly the painter appeared at the door of the studio and made staccato -signs for them to come in. They turned to each other and smiled. - -"I am waiting," he cried. "Do come in. The light is quite perfect, -and you can bring your drinks." - -They rose up and sauntered down the walk together. Two green-and-white -butterflies fluttered past them, and in the pear-tree at the corner -of the garden a thrush began to sing. - -"You are glad you have met me, Mr. Gray," said Lord Henry, -looking at him. - -"Yes, I am glad now. I wonder shall I always be glad?" - -"Always! That is a dreadful word. It makes me shudder when I hear it. -Women are so fond of using it. They spoil every romance by trying to make -it last for ever. It is a meaningless word, too. The only difference -between a caprice and a lifelong passion is that the caprice lasts a -little longer." - -As they entered the studio, Dorian Gray put his hand upon Lord Henry's arm. -"In that case, let our friendship be a caprice," he murmured, flushing at his -own boldness, then stepped up on the platform and resumed his pose. - -Lord Henry flung himself into a large wicker arm-chair and watched him. -The sweep and dash of the brush on the canvas made the only sound -that broke the stillness, except when, now and then, Hallward stepped -back to look at his work from a distance. In the slanting beams -that streamed through the open doorway the dust danced and was golden. -The heavy scent of the roses seemed to brood over everything. - -After about a quarter of an hour Hallward stopped painting, -looked for a long time at Dorian Gray, and then for a long -time at the picture, biting the end of one of his huge brushes -and frowning. "It is quite finished," he cried at last, -and stooping down he wrote his name in long vermilion letters on -the left-hand corner of the canvas. - -Lord Henry came over and examined the picture. It was certainly -a wonderful work of art, and a wonderful likeness as well. - -"My dear fellow, I congratulate you most warmly," he said. -"It is the finest portrait of modern times. Mr. Gray, come over -and look at yourself." - -The lad started, as if awakened from some dream. - -"Is it really finished?" he murmured, stepping down from the platform. - -"Quite finished," said the painter. "And you have sat splendidly -to-day. I am awfully obliged to you." - -"That is entirely due to me," broke in Lord Henry. "Isn't it, -Mr. Gray?" - -Dorian made no answer, but passed listlessly in front of his -picture and turned towards it. When he saw it he drew back, -and his cheeks flushed for a moment with pleasure. A look of joy came -into his eyes, as if he had recognized himself for the first time. -He stood there motionless and in wonder, dimly conscious that Hallward -was speaking to him, but not catching the meaning of his words. -The sense of his own beauty came on him like a revelation. -He had never felt it before. Basil Hallward's compliments had seemed -to him to be merely the charming exaggeration of friendship. -He had listened to them, laughed at them, forgotten them. -They had not influenced his nature. Then had come Lord Henry -Wotton with his strange panegyric on youth, his terrible warning -of its brevity. That had stirred him at the time, and now, -as he stood gazing at the shadow of his own loveliness, the full -reality of the description flashed across him. Yes, there would -be a day when his face would be wrinkled and wizen, his eyes dim -and colourless, the grace of his figure broken and deformed. -The scarlet would pass away from his lips and the gold steal from -his hair. The life that was to make his soul would mar his body. -He would become dreadful, hideous, and uncouth. - -As he thought of it, a sharp pang of pain struck through him -like a knife and made each delicate fibre of his nature quiver. -His eyes deepened into amethyst, and across them came a mist -of tears. He felt as if a hand of ice had been laid upon -his heart. - -"Don't you like it?" cried Hallward at last, stung a little -by the lad's silence, not understanding what it meant. - -"Of course he likes it," said Lord Henry. "Who wouldn't like it? -It is one of the greatest things in modern art. I will give you -anything you like to ask for it. I must have it." - -"It is not my property, Harry." - -"Whose property is it?" - -"Dorian's, of course," answered the painter. - -"He is a very lucky fellow." - -"How sad it is!" murmured Dorian Gray with his eyes still fixed upon -his own portrait. "How sad it is! I shall grow old, and horrible, -and dreadful. But this picture will remain always young. -It will never be older than this particular day of June. -. . . If it were only the other way! If it were I who was -to be always young, and the picture that was to grow old! -For that--for that--I would give everything! Yes, there is -nothing in the whole world I would not give! I would give my soul -for that!" - -"You would hardly care for such an arrangement, Basil," cried Lord -Henry, laughing. "It would be rather hard lines on your work." - -"I should object very strongly, Harry," said Hallward. - -Dorian Gray turned and looked at him. "I believe you would, Basil. -You like your art better than your friends. I am no more to you -than a green bronze figure. Hardly as much, I dare say." - -The painter stared in amazement. It was so unlike Dorian to speak like that. -What had happened? He seemed quite angry. His face was flushed and his -cheeks burning. - -"Yes," he continued, "I am less to you than your ivory Hermes or your -silver Faun. You will like them always. How long will you like me? -Till I have my first wrinkle, I suppose. I know, now, that when one -loses one's good looks, whatever they may be, one loses everything. -Your picture has taught me that. Lord Henry Wotton is perfectly right. -Youth is the only thing worth having. When I find that I am growing old, I -shall kill myself." - -Hallward turned pale and caught his hand. "Dorian! Dorian!" he cried, -"don't talk like that. I have never had such a friend as you, and I shall -never have such another. You are not jealous of material things, are you?-- -you who are finer than any of them!" - -"I am jealous of everything whose beauty does not die. -I am jealous of the portrait you have painted of me. -Why should it keep what I must lose? Every moment that passes -takes something from me and gives something to it. Oh, if it -were only the other way! If the picture could change, -and I could be always what I am now! Why did you paint it? -It will mock me some day--mock me horribly!" The hot tears -welled into his eyes; he tore his hand away and, flinging himself -on the divan, he buried his face in the cushions, as though he -was praying. - -"This is your doing, Harry," said the painter bitterly. - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "It is the real Dorian Gray-- -that is all." - -"It is not." - -"If it is not, what have I to do with it?" - -"You should have gone away when I asked you," he muttered. - -"I stayed when you asked me," was Lord Henry's answer. - -"Harry, I can't quarrel with my two best friends at once, -but between you both you have made me hate the finest -piece of work I have ever done, and I will destroy it. -What is it but canvas and colour? I will not let it come across -our three lives and mar them." - -Dorian Gray lifted his golden head from the pillow, and with pallid face and -tear-stained eyes, looked at him as he walked over to the deal painting-table -that was set beneath the high curtained window. What was he doing there? -His fingers were straying about among the litter of tin tubes and dry brushes, -seeking for something. Yes, it was for the long palette-knife, with its thin -blade of lithe steel. He had found it at last. He was going to rip up -the canvas. - -With a stifled sob the lad leaped from the couch, and, rushing over -to Hallward, tore the knife out of his hand, and flung it to the end -of the studio. "Don't, Basil, don't!" he cried. "It would be murder!" - -"I am glad you appreciate my work at last, Dorian," said the painter coldly -when he had recovered from his surprise. "I never thought you would." - -"Appreciate it? I am in love with it, Basil. It is part of myself. -I feel that." - -"Well, as soon as you are dry, you shall be varnished, and framed, -and sent home. Then you can do what you like with yourself." -And he walked across the room and rang the bell for tea. -"You will have tea, of course, Dorian? And so will you, Harry? -Or do you object to such simple pleasures?" - -"I adore simple pleasures," said Lord Henry. "They are -the last refuge of the complex. But I don't like scenes, -except on the stage. What absurd fellows you are, both of you! -I wonder who it was defined man as a rational animal. -It was the most premature definition ever given. Man is many things, -but he is not rational. I am glad he is not, after all-- -though I wish you chaps would not squabble over the picture. -You had much better let me have it, Basil. This silly boy doesn't -really want it, and I really do." - -"If you let any one have it but me, Basil, I shall never forgive you!" -cried Dorian Gray; "and I don't allow people to call me a silly boy." - -"You know the picture is yours, Dorian. I gave it to you before it existed." - -"And you know you have been a little silly, Mr. Gray, and that you -don't really object to being reminded that you are extremely young." - -"I should have objected very strongly this morning, Lord Henry." - -"Ah! this morning! You have lived since then." - -There came a knock at the door, and the butler entered with a -laden tea-tray and set it down upon a small Japanese table. -There was a rattle of cups and saucers and the hissing of a fluted -Georgian urn. Two globe-shaped china dishes were brought -in by a page. Dorian Gray went over and poured out the tea. -The two men sauntered languidly to the table and examined what was -under the covers. - -"Let us go to the theatre to-night," said Lord Henry. -"There is sure to be something on, somewhere. I have promised -to dine at White's, but it is only with an old friend, -so I can send him a wire to say that I am ill, or that I am -prevented from coming in consequence of a subsequent engagement. -I think that would be a rather nice excuse: it would have all -the surprise of candour." - -"It is such a bore putting on one's dress-clothes," muttered Hallward. -"And, when one has them on, they are so horrid." - -"Yes," answered Lord Henry dreamily, "the costume of the nineteenth -century is detestable. It is so sombre, so depressing. Sin is the only -real colour-element left in modern life." - -"You really must not say things like that before Dorian, Harry." - -"Before which Dorian? The one who is pouring out tea for us, -or the one in the picture?" - -"Before either." - -"I should like to come to the theatre with you, Lord Henry," -said the lad. - -"Then you shall come; and you will come, too, Basil, won't you?" - -"I can't, really. I would sooner not. I have a lot of work to do." - -"Well, then, you and I will go alone, Mr. Gray." - -"I should like that awfully." - -The painter bit his lip and walked over, cup in hand, to the picture. -"I shall stay with the real Dorian," he said, sadly. - -"Is it the real Dorian?" cried the original of the portrait, -strolling across to him. "Am I really like that?" - -"Yes; you are just like that." - -"How wonderful, Basil!" - -"At least you are like it in appearance. But it will never alter," -sighed Hallward. "That is something." - -"What a fuss people make about fidelity!" exclaimed Lord Henry. -"Why, even in love it is purely a question for physiology. -It has nothing to do with our own will. Young men want to -be faithful, and are not; old men want to be faithless, and cannot: -that is all one can say." - -"Don't go to the theatre to-night, Dorian," said Hallward. -"Stop and dine with me." - -"I can't, Basil." - -"Why?" - -"Because I have promised Lord Henry Wotton to go with him." - -"He won't like you the better for keeping your promises. -He always breaks his own. I beg you not to go." - -Dorian Gray laughed and shook his head. - -"I entreat you." - -The lad hesitated, and looked over at Lord Henry, who was watching -them from the tea-table with an amused smile. - -"I must go, Basil," he answered. - -"Very well," said Hallward, and he went over and laid down his -cup on the tray. "It is rather late, and, as you have to dress, -you had better lose no time. Good-bye, Harry. Good-bye, Dorian. -Come and see me soon. Come to-morrow." - -"Certainly." - -"You won't forget?" - -"No, of course not," cried Dorian. - -"And ... Harry!" - -"Yes, Basil?" - -"Remember what I asked you, when we were in the garden this morning." - -"I have forgotten it." - -"I trust you." - -"I wish I could trust myself," said Lord Henry, laughing. "Come, Mr. Gray, -my hansom is outside, and I can drop you at your own place. Good-bye, Basil. -It has been a most interesting afternoon." - -As the door closed behind them, the painter flung himself down on a sofa, -and a look of pain came into his face. - - - -CHAPTER 3 - -At half-past twelve next day Lord Henry Wotton strolled from Curzon -Street over to the Albany to call on his uncle, Lord Fermor, -a genial if somewhat rough-mannered old bachelor, whom the outside -world called selfish because it derived no particular benefit -from him, but who was considered generous by Society as he fed -the people who amused him. His father had been our ambassador -at Madrid when Isabella was young and Prim unthought of, -but had retired from the diplomatic service in a capricious -moment of annoyance on not being offered the Embassy at Paris, -a post to which he considered that he was fully entitled -by reason of his birth, his indolence, the good English -of his dispatches, and his inordinate passion for pleasure. -The son, who had been his father's secretary, had resigned along -with his chief, somewhat foolishly as was thought at the time, -and on succeeding some months later to the title, had set -himself to the serious study of the great aristocratic art -of doing absolutely nothing. He had two large town houses, -but preferred to live in chambers as it was less trouble, -and took most of his meals at his club. He paid some attention -to the management of his collieries in the Midland counties, -excusing himself for this taint of industry on the ground that -the one advantage of having coal was that it enabled a gentleman -to afford the decency of burning wood on his own hearth. -In politics he was a Tory, except when the Tories were in office, -during which period he roundly abused them for being a pack -of Radicals. He was a hero to his valet, who bullied him, -and a terror to most of his relations, whom he bullied in turn. -Only England could have produced him, and he always said -that the country was going to the dogs. His principles -were out of date, but there was a good deal to be said for -his prejudices. - -When Lord Henry entered the room, he found his uncle sitting in a rough -shooting-coat, smoking a cheroot and grumbling over The Times. -"Well, Harry," said the old gentleman, "what brings you out so early? -I thought you dandies never got up till two, and were not visible -till five." - -"Pure family affection, I assure you, Uncle George. I want to get -something out of you." - -"Money, I suppose," said Lord Fermor, making a wry face. -"Well, sit down and tell me all about it. Young people, -nowadays, imagine that money is everything." - -"Yes," murmured Lord Henry, settling his button-hole in his coat; -"and when they grow older they know it. But I don't want money. -It is only people who pay their bills who want that, Uncle George, -and I never pay mine. Credit is the capital of a younger son, -and one lives charmingly upon it. Besides, I always deal with -Dartmoor's tradesmen, and consequently they never bother me. -What I want is information: not useful information, of course; -useless information." - -"Well, I can tell you anything that is in an English Blue Book, -Harry, although those fellows nowadays write a lot of nonsense. -When I was in the Diplomatic, things were much better. -But I hear they let them in now by examination. What can -you expect? Examinations, sir, are pure humbug from beginning -to end. If a man is a gentleman, he knows quite enough, -and if he is not a gentleman, whatever he knows is bad -for him." - -"Mr. Dorian Gray does not belong to Blue Books, Uncle George," -said Lord Henry languidly. - -"Mr. Dorian Gray? Who is he?" asked Lord Fermor, knitting his bushy -white eyebrows. - -"That is what I have come to learn, Uncle George. Or rather, -I know who he is. He is the last Lord Kelso's grandson. -His mother was a Devereux, Lady Margaret Devereaux. -I want you to tell me about his mother. What was she like? -Whom did she marry? You have known nearly everybody -in your time, so you might have known her. I am very much -interested in Mr. Gray at present. I have only just -met him." - -"Kelso's grandson!" echoed the old gentleman. "Kelso's grandson! ... Of -course.... I knew his mother intimately. I believe I was at her christening. -She was an extraordinarily beautiful girl, Margaret Devereux, and made -all the men frantic by running away with a penniless young fellow-- -a mere nobody, sir, a subaltern in a foot regiment, or something -of that kind. Certainly. I remember the whole thing as if it -happened yesterday. The poor chap was killed in a duel at Spa a few -months after the marriage. There was an ugly story about it. -They said Kelso got some rascally adventurer, some Belgian brute, -to insult his son-in-law in public--paid him, sir, to do it, paid him-- -and that the fellow spitted his man as if he had been a pigeon. -The thing was hushed up, but, egad, Kelso ate his chop alone at the club -for some time afterwards. He brought his daughter back with him, I was told, -and she never spoke to him again. Oh, yes; it was a bad business. -The girl died, too, died within a year. So she left a son, did she? -I had forgotten that. What sort of boy is he? If he is like his mother, -he must be a good-looking chap." - -"He is very good-looking," assented Lord Henry. - -"I hope he will fall into proper hands," continued the old man. -"He should have a pot of money waiting for him if Kelso -did the right thing by him. His mother had money, too. -All the Selby property came to her, through her grandfather. -Her grandfather hated Kelso, thought him a mean dog. -He was, too. Came to Madrid once when I was there. Egad, I was -ashamed of him. The Queen used to ask me about the English noble -who was always quarrelling with the cabmen about their fares. -They made quite a story of it. I didn't dare show my face at Court -for a month. I hope he treated his grandson better than he did -the jarvies." - -"I don't know," answered Lord Henry. "I fancy that the boy will be well off. -He is not of age yet. He has Selby, I know. He told me so. And . . . his -mother was very beautiful?" - -"Margaret Devereux was one of the loveliest creatures I ever saw, Harry. -What on earth induced her to behave as she did, I never could understand. -She could have married anybody she chose. Carlington was mad after her. -She was romantic, though. All the women of that family were. -The men were a poor lot, but, egad! the women were wonderful. -Carlington went on his knees to her. Told me so himself. She laughed at him, -and there wasn't a girl in London at the time who wasn't after him. -And by the way, Harry, talking about silly marriages, what is this humbug your -father tells me about Dartmoor wanting to marry an American? Ain't English -girls good enough for him?" - -"It is rather fashionable to marry Americans just now, Uncle George." - -"I'll back English women against the world, Harry," said Lord Fermor, -striking the table with his fist. - -"The betting is on the Americans." - -"They don't last, I am told," muttered his uncle. - -"A long engagement exhausts them, but they are capital at a steeplechase. -They take things flying. I don't think Dartmoor has a chance." - -"Who are her people?" grumbled the old gentleman. "Has she got any?" - -Lord Henry shook his head. "American girls are as clever at concealing -their parents, as English women are at concealing their past," he said, -rising to go. - -"They are pork-packers, I suppose?" - -"I hope so, Uncle George, for Dartmoor's sake. I am told -that pork-packing is the most lucrative profession in America, -after politics." - -"Is she pretty?" - -"She behaves as if she was beautiful. Most American women do. -It is the secret of their charm." - -"Why can't these American women stay in their own country? -They are always telling us that it is the paradise for women." - -"It is. That is the reason why, like Eve, they are so excessively -anxious to get out of it," said Lord Henry. "Good-bye, Uncle George. -I shall be late for lunch, if I stop any longer. Thanks for giving me -the information I wanted. I always like to know everything about my -new friends, and nothing about my old ones." - -"Where are you lunching, Harry?" - -"At Aunt Agatha's. I have asked myself and Mr. Gray. -He is her latest protege." - -"Humph! tell your Aunt Agatha, Harry, not to bother me any more with -her charity appeals. I am sick of them. Why, the good woman thinks -that I have nothing to do but to write cheques for her silly fads." - -"All right, Uncle George, I'll tell her, but it won't have any effect. -Philanthropic people lose all sense of humanity. It is their -distinguishing characteristic." - -The old gentleman growled approvingly and rang the bell for his servant. -Lord Henry passed up the low arcade into Burlington Street and turned his -steps in the direction of Berkeley Square. - -So that was the story of Dorian Gray's parentage. -Crudely as it had been told to him, it had yet stirred him -by its suggestion of a strange, almost modern romance. -A beautiful woman risking everything for a mad passion. -A few wild weeks of happiness cut short by a hideous, -treacherous crime. Months of voiceless agony, and then -a child born in pain. The mother snatched away by death, -the boy left to solitude and the tyranny of an old and -loveless man. Yes; it was an interesting background. -It posed the lad, made him more perfect, as it were. Behind every -exquisite thing that existed, there was something tragic. -Worlds had to be in travail, that the meanest flower might blow. -. . . And how charming he had been at dinner the night before, -as with startled eyes and lips parted in frightened pleasure -he had sat opposite to him at the club, the red candleshades -staining to a richer rose the wakening wonder of his face. -Talking to him was like playing upon an exquisite violin. -He answered to every touch and thrill of the bow. . . . There -was something terribly enthralling in the exercise of influence. -No other activity was like it. To project one's soul into some -gracious form, and let it tarry there for a moment; to hear one's -own intellectual views echoed back to one with all the added -music of passion and youth; to convey one's temperament into -another as though it were a subtle fluid or a strange perfume: -there was a real joy in that--perhaps the most satisfying -joy left to us in an age so limited and vulgar as our own, -an age grossly carnal in its pleasures, and grossly common -in its aims.... He was a marvellous type, too, this lad, -whom by so curious a chance he had met in Basil's studio, -or could be fashioned into a marvellous type, at any rate. -Grace was his, and the white purity of boyhood, and beauty such -as old Greek marbles kept for us. There was nothing that one -could not do with him. He could be made a Titan or a toy. -What a pity it was that such beauty was destined to fade! -. . . And Basil? From a psychological point of view, -how interesting he was! The new manner in art, the fresh -mode of looking at life, suggested so strangely by the merely -visible presence of one who was unconscious of it all; -the silent spirit that dwelt in dim woodland, and walked unseen -in open field, suddenly showing herself, Dryadlike and not afraid, -because in his soul who sought for her there had been wakened -that wonderful vision to which alone are wonderful things revealed; -the mere shapes and patterns of things becoming, as it were, -refined, and gaining a kind of symbolical value, as though -they were themselves patterns of some other and more perfect -form whose shadow they made real: how strange it all was! -He remembered something like it in history. Was it not Plato, -that artist in thought, who had first analyzed it? -Was it not Buonarotti who had carved it in the coloured marbles -of a sonnet-sequence? But in our own century it was strange. -. . . Yes; he would try to be to Dorian Gray what, without knowing it, -the lad was to the painter who had fashioned the wonderful portrait. -He would seek to dominate him--had already, indeed, -half done so. He would make that wonderful spirit his own. -There was something fascinating in this son of love and -death. - -Suddenly he stopped and glanced up at the houses. He found that he had -passed his aunt's some distance, and, smiling to himself, turned back. -When he entered the somewhat sombre hall, the butler told him that they -had gone in to lunch. He gave one of the footmen his hat and stick -and passed into the dining-room. - -"Late as usual, Harry," cried his aunt, shaking her head at him. - -He invented a facile excuse, and having taken the vacant seat -next to her, looked round to see who was there. Dorian bowed -to him shyly from the end of the table, a flush of pleasure -stealing into his cheek. Opposite was the Duchess of Harley, -a lady of admirable good-nature and good temper, much liked -by every one who knew her, and of those ample architectural -proportions that in women who are not duchesses are described -by contemporary historians as stoutness. Next to her sat, -on her right, Sir Thomas Burdon, a Radical member of Parliament, -who followed his leader in public life and in private life -followed the best cooks, dining with the Tories and thinking -with the Liberals, in accordance with a wise and well-known rule. -The post on her left was occupied by Mr. Erskine of Treadley, -an old gentleman of considerable charm and culture, who had fallen, -however, into bad habits of silence, having, as he explained -once to Lady Agatha, said everything that he had to say -before he was thirty. His own neighbour was Mrs. Vandeleur, -one of his aunt's oldest friends, a perfect saint amongst women, -but so dreadfully dowdy that she reminded one of a badly -bound hymn-book. Fortunately for him she had on the other -side Lord Faudel, a most intelligent middle-aged mediocrity, -as bald as a ministerial statement in the House of Commons, -with whom she was conversing in that intensely earnest manner -which is the one unpardonable error, as he remarked once himself, -that all really good people fall into, and from which none of them -ever quite escape. - -"We are talking about poor Dartmoor, Lord Henry," cried the duchess, -nodding pleasantly to him across the table. "Do you think he will really -marry this fascinating young person?" - -"I believe she has made up her mind to propose to him, Duchess." - -"How dreadful!" exclaimed Lady Agatha. "Really, some one should interfere." - -"I am told, on excellent authority, that her father keeps an American -dry-goods store," said Sir Thomas Burdon, looking supercilious. - -"My uncle has already suggested pork-packing Sir Thomas." - -"Dry-goods! What are American dry-goods?" asked the duchess, -raising her large hands in wonder and accentuating the verb. - -"American novels," answered Lord Henry, helping himself to some quail. - -The duchess looked puzzled. - -"Don't mind him, my dear," whispered Lady Agatha. "He never means anything -that he says." - -"When America was discovered," said the Radical member-- -and he began to give some wearisome facts. Like all people -who try to exhaust a subject, he exhausted his listeners. -The duchess sighed and exercised her privilege of interruption. -"I wish to goodness it never had been discovered at all!" -she exclaimed. "Really, our girls have no chance nowadays. It is -most unfair." - -"Perhaps, after all, America never has been discovered," -said Mr. Erskine; "I myself would say that it had merely -been detected." - -"Oh! but I have seen specimens of the inhabitants," answered the -duchess vaguely. "I must confess that most of them are extremely pretty. -And they dress well, too. They get all their dresses in Paris. -I wish I could afford to do the same." - -"They say that when good Americans die they go to Paris," -chuckled Sir Thomas, who had a large wardrobe of Humour's -cast-off clothes. - -"Really! And where do bad Americans go to when they die?" -inquired the duchess. - -"They go to America," murmured Lord Henry. - -Sir Thomas frowned. "I am afraid that your nephew is prejudiced against -that great country," he said to Lady Agatha. "I have travelled all over it -in cars provided by the directors, who, in such matters, are extremely civil. -I assure you that it is an education to visit it." - -"But must we really see Chicago in order to be educated?" -asked Mr. Erskine plaintively. "I don't feel up to the journey." - -Sir Thomas waved his hand. "Mr. Erskine of Treadley has the world on -his shelves. We practical men like to see things, not to read about -them. The Americans are an extremely interesting people. They are -absolutely reasonable. I think that is their distinguishing -characteristic. Yes, Mr. Erskine, an absolutely reasonable people. I -assure you there is no nonsense about the Americans." - -"How dreadful!" cried Lord Henry. "I can stand brute force, but brute -reason is quite unbearable. There is something unfair about its use. -It is hitting below the intellect." - -"I do not understand you," said Sir Thomas, growing rather red. - -"I do, Lord Henry," murmured Mr. Erskine, with a smile. - -"Paradoxes are all very well in their way... ." rejoined the baronet. - -"Was that a paradox?" asked Mr. Erskine. "I did not think so. -Perhaps it was. Well, the way of paradoxes is the way of truth. -To test reality we must see it on the tight rope. When the verities -become acrobats, we can judge them." - -"Dear me!" said Lady Agatha, "how you men argue! I am sure I never can make -out what you are talking about. Oh! Harry, I am quite vexed with you. -Why do you try to persuade our nice Mr. Dorian Gray to give up the East End? -I assure you he would be quite invaluable. They would love his playing." - -"I want him to play to me," cried Lord Henry, smiling, and he looked -down the table and caught a bright answering glance. - -"But they are so unhappy in Whitechapel," continued Lady Agatha. - -"I can sympathize with everything except suffering," -said Lord Henry, shrugging his shoulders. "I cannot sympathize -with that. It is too ugly, too horrible, too distressing. -There is something terribly morbid in the modern sympathy -with pain. One should sympathize with the colour, the beauty, -the joy of life. The less said about life's sores, -the better." - -"Still, the East End is a very important problem," remarked Sir Thomas -with a grave shake of the head. - -"Quite so," answered the young lord. "It is the problem of slavery, -and we try to solve it by amusing the slaves." - -The politician looked at him keenly. "What change do you propose, then?" -he asked. - -Lord Henry laughed. "I don't desire to change anything in England -except the weather," he answered. "I am quite content with -philosophic contemplation. But, as the nineteenth century has -gone bankrupt through an over-expenditure of sympathy, I would -suggest that we should appeal to science to put us straight. -The advantage of the emotions is that they lead us astray, -and the advantage of science is that it is not emotional." - -"But we have such grave responsibilities," ventured Mrs. Vandeleur timidly. - -"Terribly grave," echoed Lady Agatha. - -Lord Henry looked over at Mr. Erskine. "Humanity takes itself too seriously. -It is the world's original sin. If the caveman had known how to laugh, -history would have been different." - -"You are really very comforting," warbled the duchess. -"I have always felt rather guilty when I came to see your -dear aunt, for I take no interest at all in the East End. -For the future I shall be able to look her in the face without -a blush." - -"A blush is very becoming, Duchess," remarked Lord Henry. - -"Only when one is young," she answered. "When an old woman -like myself blushes, it is a very bad sign. Ah! Lord Henry, -I wish you would tell me how to become young again." - -He thought for a moment. "Can you remember any great error -that you committed in your early days, Duchess?" he asked, -looking at her across the table. - -"A great many, I fear," she cried. - -"Then commit them over again," he said gravely. "To get back one's youth, -one has merely to repeat one's follies." - -"A delightful theory!" she exclaimed. "I must put it into practice." - -"A dangerous theory!" came from Sir Thomas's tight lips. -Lady Agatha shook her head, but could not help being amused. -Mr. Erskine listened. - -"Yes," he continued, "that is one of the great secrets of life. -Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, -and discover when it is too late that the only things one never -regrets are one's mistakes." - -A laugh ran round the table. - -He played with the idea and grew wilful; tossed it into -the air and transformed it; let it escape and recaptured it; -made it iridescent with fancy and winged it with paradox. -The praise of folly, as he went on, soared into a philosophy, -and philosophy herself became young, and catching the mad -music of pleasure, wearing, one might fancy, her wine-stained -robe and wreath of ivy, danced like a Bacchante over the hills -of life, and mocked the slow Silenus for being sober. -Facts fled before her like frightened forest things. -Her white feet trod the huge press at which wise Omar sits, -till the seething grape-juice rose round her bare limbs in waves -of purple bubbles, or crawled in red foam over the vat's black, -dripping, sloping sides. It was an extraordinary improvisation. -He felt that the eyes of Dorian Gray were fixed on him, -and the consciousness that amongst his audience there was -one whose temperament he wished to fascinate seemed to give -his wit keenness and to lend colour to his imagination. -He was brilliant, fantastic, irresponsible. He charmed -his listeners out of themselves, and they followed -his pipe, laughing. Dorian Gray never took his gaze -off him, but sat like one under a spell, smiles chasing -each other over his lips and wonder growing grave in his -darkening eyes. - -At last, liveried in the costume of the age, reality entered the room in -the shape of a servant to tell the duchess that her carriage was waiting. -She wrung her hands in mock despair. "How annoying!" she cried. "I must go. -I have to call for my husband at the club, to take him to some absurd meeting -at Willis's Rooms, where he is going to be in the chair. If I am late he is -sure to be furious, and I couldn't have a scene in this bonnet. It is far -too fragile. A harsh word would ruin it. No, I must go, dear Agatha. -Good-bye, Lord Henry, you are quite delightful and dreadfully demoralizing. -I am sure I don't know what to say about your views. You must come and dine -with us some night. Tuesday? Are you disengaged Tuesday?" - -"For you I would throw over anybody, Duchess," said Lord Henry with a bow. - -"Ah! that is very nice, and very wrong of you," she cried; "so mind you come"; -and she swept out of the room, followed by Lady Agatha and the other ladies. - -When Lord Henry had sat down again, Mr. Erskine moved round, -and taking a chair close to him, placed his hand upon his arm. - -"You talk books away," he said; "why don't you write one?" - -"I am too fond of reading books to care to write them, Mr. Erskine. -I should like to write a novel certainly, a novel that would be as lovely -as a Persian carpet and as unreal. But there is no literary public -in England for anything except newspapers, primers, and encyclopaedias. -Of all people in the world the English have the least sense of the beauty -of literature." - -"I fear you are right," answered Mr. Erskine. "I myself used -to have literary ambitions, but I gave them up long ago. -And now, my dear young friend, if you will allow me to call -you so, may I ask if you really meant all that you said to us -at lunch?" - -"I quite forget what I said," smiled Lord Henry. "Was it all very bad?" - -"Very bad indeed. In fact I consider you extremely dangerous, -and if anything happens to our good duchess, we shall all look on you -as being primarily responsible. But I should like to talk to you -about life. The generation into which I was born was tedious. -Some day, when you are tired of London, come down to Treadley and expound -to me your philosophy of pleasure over some admirable Burgundy I am -fortunate enough to possess." - -"I shall be charmed. A visit to Treadley would be a great privilege. -It has a perfect host, and a perfect library." - -"You will complete it," answered the old gentleman with a courteous bow. -"And now I must bid good-bye to your excellent aunt. I am due at -the Athenaeum. It is the hour when we sleep there." - -"All of you, Mr. Erskine?" - -"Forty of us, in forty arm-chairs. We are practising for an English Academy -of Letters." - -Lord Henry laughed and rose. "I am going to the park," -he cried. - -As he was passing out of the door, Dorian Gray touched him on the arm. -"Let me come with you," he murmured. - -"But I thought you had promised Basil Hallward to go and see him," -answered Lord Henry. - -"I would sooner come with you; yes, I feel I must come with you. -Do let me. And you will promise to talk to me all the time? -No one talks so wonderfully as you do." - -"Ah! I have talked quite enough for to-day," said Lord Henry, smiling. -"All I want now is to look at life. You may come and look at it with me, -if you care to." - - - -CHAPTER 4 - -One afternoon, a month later, Dorian Gray was reclining in a luxurious -arm-chair, in the little library of Lord Henry's house in Mayfair. -It was, in its way, a very charming room, with its high panelled -wainscoting of olive-stained oak, its cream-coloured frieze and ceiling -of raised plasterwork, and its brickdust felt carpet strewn with silk, -long-fringed Persian rugs. On a tiny satinwood table stood a statuette -by Clodion, and beside it lay a copy of Les Cent Nouvelles, bound for -Margaret of Valois by Clovis Eve and powdered with the gilt daisies -that Queen had selected for her device. Some large blue china jars -and parrot-tulips were ranged on the mantelshelf, and through the small -leaded panes of the window streamed the apricot-coloured light of a summer -day in London. - -Lord Henry had not yet come in. He was always late on principle, -his principle being that punctuality is the thief of time. -So the lad was looking rather sulky, as with listless fingers -he turned over the pages of an elaborately illustrated edition -of Manon Lescaut that he had found in one of the book-cases. The -formal monotonous ticking of the Louis Quatorze clock annoyed him. -Once or twice he thought of going away. - -At last he heard a step outside, and the door opened. -"How late you are, Harry!" he murmured. - -"I am afraid it is not Harry, Mr. Gray," answered a shrill voice. - -He glanced quickly round and rose to his feet. "I beg your pardon. -I thought--" - -"You thought it was my husband. It is only his wife. -You must let me introduce myself. I know you quite well -by your photographs. I think my husband has got seventeen -of them." - -"Not seventeen, Lady Henry?" - -"Well, eighteen, then. And I saw you with him the other -night at the opera." She laughed nervously as she spoke, -and watched him with her vague forget-me-not eyes. -She was a curious woman, whose dresses always looked as if -they had been designed in a rage and put on in a tempest. -She was usually in love with somebody, and, as her passion -was never returned, she had kept all her illusions. -She tried to look picturesque, but only succeeded in being untidy. -Her name was Victoria, and she had a perfect mania for going -to church. - -"That was at Lohengrin, Lady Henry, I think?" - -"Yes; it was at dear Lohengrin. I like Wagner's music better than -anybody's. It is so loud that one can talk the whole time without -other people hearing what one says. That is a great advantage, -don't you think so, Mr. Gray?" - -The same nervous staccato laugh broke from her thin lips, -and her fingers began to play with a long tortoise-shell -paper-knife. - -Dorian smiled and shook his head: "I am afraid I don't think so, -Lady Henry. I never talk during music--at least, during good music. -If one hears bad music, it is one's duty to drown it in conversation." - -"Ah! that is one of Harry's views, isn't it, Mr. Gray? -I always hear Harry's views from his friends. It is the only -way I get to know of them. But you must not think I don't -like good music. I adore it, but I am afraid of it. -It makes me too romantic. I have simply worshipped pianists-- -two at a time, sometimes, Harry tells me. I don't know what it -is about them. Perhaps it is that they are foreigners. -They all are, ain't they? Even those that are born -in England become foreigners after a time, don't they? -It is so clever of them, and such a compliment to art. -Makes it quite cosmopolitan, doesn't it? You have never been -to any of my parties, have you, Mr. Gray? You must come. -I can't afford orchids, but I share no expense in foreigners. -They make one's rooms look so picturesque. But here is Harry! -Harry, I came in to look for you, to ask you something-- -I forget what it was--and I found Mr. Gray here. -We have had such a pleasant chat about music. We have quite -the same ideas. No; I think our ideas are quite different. -But he has been most pleasant. I am so glad I've seen -him." - -"I am charmed, my love, quite charmed," said Lord Henry, elevating his dark, -crescent-shaped eyebrows and looking at them both with an amused smile. -"So sorry I am late, Dorian. I went to look after a piece of old brocade -in Wardour Street and had to bargain for hours for it. Nowadays people know -the price of everything and the value of nothing." - -"I am afraid I must be going," exclaimed Lady Henry, -breaking an awkward silence with her silly sudden laugh. -"I have promised to drive with the duchess. Good-bye, Mr. Gray. -Good-bye, Harry. You are dining out, I suppose? So am I. Perhaps I -shall see you at Lady Thornbury's." - -"I dare say, my dear," said Lord Henry, shutting the door behind her as, -looking like a bird of paradise that had been out all night in the rain, -she flitted out of the room, leaving a faint odour of frangipanni. -Then he lit a cigarette and flung himself down on the sofa. - -"Never marry a woman with straw-coloured hair, Dorian," he said -after a few puffs. - -"Why, Harry?" - -"Because they are so sentimental." - -"But I like sentimental people." - -"Never marry at all, Dorian. Men marry because they are tired; -women, because they are curious: both are disappointed." - -"I don't think I am likely to marry, Harry. I am too much in love. -That is one of your aphorisms. I am putting it into practice, -as I do everything that you say." - -"Who are you in love with?" asked Lord Henry after a pause. - -"With an actress," said Dorian Gray, blushing. - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "That is a rather commonplace debut." - -"You would not say so if you saw her, Harry." - -"Who is she?" - -"Her name is Sibyl Vane." - -"Never heard of her." - -"No one has. People will some day, however. She is a genius." - -"My dear boy, no woman is a genius. Women are a decorative sex. -They never have anything to say, but they say it charmingly. -Women represent the triumph of matter over mind, just as men -represent the triumph of mind over morals." - -"Harry, how can you?" - -"My dear Dorian, it is quite true. I am analysing women at present, -so I ought to know. The subject is not so abstruse as I thought it was. -I find that, ultimately, there are only two kinds of women, -the plain and the coloured. The plain women are very useful. -If you want to gain a reputation for respectability, you have merely -to take them down to supper. The other women are very charming. -They commit one mistake, however. They paint in order to try and look young. -Our grandmothers painted in order to try and talk brilliantly. -Rouge and esprit used to go together. That is all over now. -As long as a woman can look ten years younger than her own daughter, -she is perfectly satisfied. As for conversation, there are only five -women in London worth talking to, and two of these can't be admitted into -decent society. However, tell me about your genius. How long have you -known her?" - -"Ah! Harry, your views terrify me." - -"Never mind that. How long have you known her?" - -"About three weeks." - -"And where did you come across her?" - -"I will tell you, Harry, but you mustn't be unsympathetic about it. -After all, it never would have happened if I had not met you. -You filled me with a wild desire to know everything about life. -For days after I met you, something seemed to throb in my veins. -As I lounged in the park, or strolled down Piccadilly, I used -to look at every one who passed me and wonder, with a mad curiosity, -what sort of lives they led. Some of them fascinated me. -Others filled me with terror. There was an exquisite poison in the air. -I had a passion for sensations. . . . Well, one evening about seven -o'clock, I determined to go out in search of some adventure. -I felt that this grey monstrous London of ours, with its myriads of people, -its sordid sinners, and its splendid sins, as you once phrased it, -must have something in store for me. I fancied a thousand things. -The mere danger gave me a sense of delight. I remembered what you -had said to me on that wonderful evening when we first dined together, -about the search for beauty being the real secret of life. -I don't know what I expected, but I went out and wandered eastward, -soon losing my way in a labyrinth of grimy streets and black -grassless squares. About half-past eight I passed by an absurd -little theatre, with great flaring gas-jets and gaudy play-bills. -A hideous Jew, in the most amazing waistcoat I ever beheld -in my life, was standing at the entrance, smoking a vile cigar. -He had greasy ringlets, and an enormous diamond blazed in the centre -of a soiled shirt. 'Have a box, my Lord?' he said, when he saw me, -and he took off his hat with an air of gorgeous servility. -There was something about him, Harry, that amused me. -He was such a monster. You will laugh at me, I know, but I -really went in and paid a whole guinea for the stage-box. To -the present day I can't make out why I did so; and yet if I hadn't-- -my dear Harry, if I hadn't--I should have missed the greatest -romance of my life. I see you are laughing. It is horrid of -you!" - -"I am not laughing, Dorian; at least I am not laughing at you. -But you should not say the greatest romance of your life. -You should say the first romance of your life. You will -always be loved, and you will always be in love with love. -A grande passion is the privilege of people who have nothing to do. -That is the one use of the idle classes of a country. -Don't be afraid. There are exquisite things in store for you. -This is merely the beginning." - -"Do you think my nature so shallow?" cried Dorian Gray angrily. - -"No; I think your nature so deep." - -"How do you mean?" - -"My dear boy, the people who love only once in their lives are really -the shallow people. What they call their loyalty, and their fidelity, -I call either the lethargy of custom or their lack of imagination. -Faithfulness is to the emotional life what consistency is to the life -of the intellect--simply a confession of failure. Faithfulness! -I must analyse it some day. The passion for property is in it. -There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid -that others might pick them up. But I don't want to interrupt you. -Go on with your story." - -"Well, I found myself seated in a horrid little private box, -with a vulgar drop-scene staring me in the face. -I looked out from behind the curtain and surveyed the house. -It was a tawdry affair, all Cupids and cornucopias, like a -third-rate wedding-cake. The gallery and pit were fairly full, -but the two rows of dingy stalls were quite empty, and there was -hardly a person in what I suppose they called the dress-circle. -Women went about with oranges and ginger-beer, and there was a -terrible consumption of nuts going on." - -"It must have been just like the palmy days of the British drama." - -"Just like, I should fancy, and very depressing. I began to wonder -what on earth I should do when I caught sight of the play-bill. -What do you think the play was, Harry?" - -"I should think 'The Idiot Boy', or 'Dumb but Innocent'. -Our fathers used to like that sort of piece, I believe. -The longer I live, Dorian, the more keenly I feel that whatever -was good enough for our fathers is not good enough for us. In art, -as in politics, les grandperes ont toujours tort." - -"This play was good enough for us, Harry. It was Romeo and Juliet. -I must admit that I was rather annoyed at the idea of seeing Shakespeare -done in such a wretched hole of a place. Still, I felt interested, -in a sort of way. At any rate, I determined to wait for the first act. -There was a dreadful orchestra, presided over by a young -Hebrew who sat at a cracked piano, that nearly drove me away, -but at last the drop-scene was drawn up and the play began. -Romeo was a stout elderly gentleman, with corked eyebrows, a husky -tragedy voice, and a figure like a beer-barrel. Mercutio was almost -as bad. He was played by the low-comedian, who had introduced -gags of his own and was on most friendly terms with the pit. -They were both as grotesque as the scenery, and that looked as if it -had come out of a country-booth. But Juliet! Harry, imagine a girl, -hardly seventeen years of age, with a little, flowerlike face, -a small Greek head with plaited coils of dark-brown hair, eyes that were -violet wells of passion, lips that were like the petals of a rose. -She was the loveliest thing I had ever seen in my life. -You said to me once that pathos left you unmoved, but that beauty, -mere beauty, could fill your eyes with tears. I tell you, Harry, I could -hardly see this girl for the mist of tears that came across me. -And her voice--I never heard such a voice. It was very low at first, -with deep mellow notes that seemed to fall singly upon one's ear. -Then it became a little louder, and sounded like a flute or a -distant hautboy. In the garden-scene it had all the tremulous ecstasy -that one hears just before dawn when nightingales are singing. -There were moments, later on, when it had the wild passion of violins. -You know how a voice can stir one. Your voice and the voice of -Sibyl Vane are two things that I shall never forget. When I close -my eyes, I hear them, and each of them says something different. -I don't know which to follow. Why should I not love her? -Harry, I do love her. She is everything to me in life. -Night after night I go to see her play. One evening she is Rosalind, -and the next evening she is Imogen. I have seen her die in the gloom -of an Italian tomb, sucking the poison from her lover's lips. -I have watched her wandering through the forest of Arden, -disguised as a pretty boy in hose and doublet and dainty cap. -She has been mad, and has come into the presence of a guilty king, -and given him rue to wear and bitter herbs to taste of. -She has been innocent, and the black hands of jealousy have -crushed her reedlike throat. I have seen her in every age and in -every costume. Ordinary women never appeal to one's imagination. -They are limited to their century. No glamour ever transfigures them. -One knows their minds as easily as one knows their bonnets. -One can always find them. There is no mystery in any of them. They ride -in the park in the morning and chatter at tea-parties in the afternoon. -They have their stereotyped smile and their fashionable manner. -They are quite obvious. But an actress! How different an actress is! -Harry! why didn't you tell me that the only thing worth loving is an -actress?" - -"Because I have loved so many of them, Dorian." - -"Oh, yes, horrid people with dyed hair and painted faces." - -"Don't run down dyed hair and painted faces. There is an extraordinary -charm in them, sometimes," said Lord Henry. - -"I wish now I had not told you about Sibyl Vane." - -"You could not have helped telling me, Dorian. All through your life -you will tell me everything you do." - -"Yes, Harry, I believe that is true. I cannot help telling you things. -You have a curious influence over me. If I ever did a crime, I would come -and confess it to you. You would understand me." - -"People like you--the wilful sunbeams of life--don't commit crimes, Dorian. -But I am much obliged for the compliment, all the same. And now tell me-- -reach me the matches, like a good boy--thanks--what are your actual relations -with Sibyl Vane?" - -Dorian Gray leaped to his feet, with flushed cheeks and burning eyes. -"Harry! Sibyl Vane is sacred!" - -"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," -laughed Dorian. "By this time, however, the lights were being -put out in the theatre, and I had to go. He wanted me to try -some cigars that he strongly recommended. I declined. -The next night, of course, I arrived at the place again. -When he saw me, he made me a low bow and assured me that I -was a munificent patron of art. He was a most offensive brute, -though he had an extraordinary passion for Shakespeare. -He told me once, with an air of pride, that his five bankruptcies -were entirely due to 'The Bard,' as he insisted on calling him. -He seemed to think it a distinction." - -"It was a distinction, my dear Dorian--a great distinction. -Most people become bankrupt through having invested too -heavily in the prose of life. To have ruined one's self over -poetry is an honour. But when did you first speak to Miss -Sibyl Vane?" - -"The third night. She had been playing Rosalind. -I could not help going round. I had thrown her some flowers, -and she had looked at me--at least I fancied that she had. -The old Jew was persistent. He seemed determined to take me behind, -so I consented. It was curious my not wanting to know her, -wasn't it?" - -"No; I don't think so." - -"My dear Harry, why?" - -"I will tell you some other time. Now I want to know about the girl." - -"Sibyl? Oh, she was so shy and so gentle. There is something of a -child about her. Her eyes opened wide in exquisite wonder when I -told her what I thought of her performance, and she seemed quite -unconscious of her power. I think we were both rather nervous. -The old Jew stood grinning at the doorway of the dusty greenroom, -making elaborate speeches about us both, while we stood looking at -each other like children. He would insist on calling me 'My Lord,' -so I had to assure Sibyl that I was not anything of the kind. -She said quite simply to me, 'You look more like a prince. -I must call you Prince Charming.'" - -"Upon my word, Dorian, Miss Sibyl knows how to pay compliments." - -"You don't understand her, Harry. She regarded me merely as a person -in a play. She knows nothing of life. She lives with her mother, -a faded tired woman who played Lady Capulet in a sort of magenta -dressing-wrapper on the first night, and looks as if she had seen -better days." - -"I know that look. It depresses me," murmured Lord Henry, -examining his rings. - -"The Jew wanted to tell me her history, but I said it did not interest me." - -"You were quite right. There is always something infinitely mean -about other people's tragedies." - -"Sibyl is the only thing I care about. What is it to me -where she came from? From her little head to her little feet, -she is absolutely and entirely divine. Every night of my life I -go to see her act, and every night she is more marvellous." - -"That is the reason, I suppose, that you never dine with me now. -I thought you must have some curious romance on hand. You have; -but it is not quite what I expected." - -"My dear Harry, we either lunch or sup together every day, -and I have been to the opera with you several times," said Dorian, -opening his blue eyes in wonder. - -"You always come dreadfully late." - -"Well, I can't help going to see Sibyl play," he cried, "even if it is -only for a single act. I get hungry for her presence; and when I think -of the wonderful soul that is hidden away in that little ivory body, -I am filled with awe." - -"You can dine with me to-night, Dorian, can't you?" - -He shook his head. "To-night she is Imogen," he answered, -"and to-morrow night she will be Juliet." - -"When is she Sibyl Vane?" - -"Never." - -"I congratulate you." - -"How horrid you are! She is all the great heroines of the world in one. -She is more than an individual. You laugh, but I tell you she -has genius. I love her, and I must make her love me. You, who know -all the secrets of life, tell me how to charm Sibyl Vane to love me! -I want to make Romeo jealous. I want the dead lovers of the world -to hear our laughter and grow sad. I want a breath of our passion -to stir their dust into consciousness, to wake their ashes into pain. -My God, Harry, how I worship her!" He was walking up and down the room -as he spoke. Hectic spots of red burned on his cheeks. He was -terribly excited. - -Lord Henry watched him with a subtle sense of pleasure. How different -he was now from the shy frightened boy he had met in Basil Hallward's studio! -His nature had developed like a flower, had borne blossoms of scarlet flame. -Out of its secret hiding-place had crept his soul, and desire had come to meet -it on the way. - -"And what do you propose to do?" said Lord Henry at last. - -"I want you and Basil to come with me some night and see her act. -I have not the slightest fear of the result. You are certain to -acknowledge her genius. Then we must get her out of the Jew's hands. -She is bound to him for three years--at least for two years and eight months-- -from the present time. I shall have to pay him something, of course. -When all that is settled, I shall take a West End theatre and bring -her out properly. She will make the world as mad as she has -made me." - -"That would be impossible, my dear boy." - -"Yes, she will. She has not merely art, consummate art-instinct, -in her, but she has personality also; and you have often told me -that it is personalities, not principles, that move the age." - -"Well, what night shall we go?" - -"Let me see. To-day is Tuesday. Let us fix to-morrow. She plays -Juliet to-morrow." - -"All right. The Bristol at eight o'clock; and I will get Basil." - -"Not eight, Harry, please. Half-past six. We must be there -before the curtain rises. You must see her in the first act, -where she meets Romeo." - -"Half-past six! What an hour! It will be like having a meat-tea, or reading -an English novel. It must be seven. No gentleman dines before seven. -Shall you see Basil between this and then? Or shall I write to him?" - -"Dear Basil! I have not laid eyes on him for a week. -It is rather horrid of me, as he has sent me my portrait in -the most wonderful frame, specially designed by himself, and, -though I am a little jealous of the picture for being a whole -month younger than I am, I must admit that I delight in it. -Perhaps you had better write to him. I don't want to see him alone. -He says things that annoy me. He gives me good advice." - -Lord Henry smiled. "People are very fond of giving away what they -need most themselves. It is what I call the depth of generosity." - -"Oh, Basil is the best of fellows, but he seems to me to be just a bit -of a Philistine. Since I have known you, Harry, I have discovered that." - -"Basil, my dear boy, puts everything that is charming in him -into his work. The consequence is that he has nothing left for -life but his prejudices, his principles, and his common sense. -The only artists I have ever known who are personally delightful -are bad artists. Good artists exist simply in what they make, -and consequently are perfectly uninteresting in what they are. -A great poet, a really great poet, is the most unpoetical of -all creatures. But inferior poets are absolutely fascinating. -The worse their rhymes are, the more picturesque they look. -The mere fact of having published a book of second-rate sonnets -makes a man quite irresistible. He lives the poetry that -he cannot write. The others write the poetry that they dare -not realize." - -"I wonder is that really so, Harry?" said Dorian Gray, -putting some perfume on his handkerchief out of a large, -gold-topped bottle that stood on the table. "It must be, -if you say it. And now I am off. Imogen is waiting for me. -Don't forget about to-morrow. Good-bye." - -As he left the room, Lord Henry's heavy eyelids drooped, and he began -to think. Certainly few people had ever interested him so much -as Dorian Gray, and yet the lad's mad adoration of some one else -caused him not the slightest pang of annoyance or jealousy. -He was pleased by it. It made him a more interesting study. -He had been always enthralled by the methods of natural science, -but the ordinary subject-matter of that science had seemed to him -trivial and of no import. And so he had begun by vivisecting himself, -as he had ended by vivisecting others. Human life--that appeared -to him the one thing worth investigating. Compared to it there -was nothing else of any value. It was true that as one watched -life in its curious crucible of pain and pleasure, one could -not wear over one's face a mask of glass, nor keep the sulphurous -fumes from troubling the brain and making the imagination turbid -with monstrous fancies and misshapen dreams. There were poisons -so subtle that to know their properties one had to sicken of them. -There were maladies so strange that one had to pass through them -if one sought to understand their nature. And, yet, what a great -reward one received! How wonderful the whole world became to one! -To note the curious hard logic of passion, and the emotional -coloured life of the intellect--to observe where they met, -and where they separated, at what point they were in unison, -and at what point they were at discord--there was a delight in that! -What matter what the cost was? One could never pay too high a price for -any sensation. - -He was conscious--and the thought brought a gleam of pleasure into -his brown agate eyes--that it was through certain words of his, -musical words said with musical utterance, that Dorian Gray's soul -had turned to this white girl and bowed in worship before her. -To a large extent the lad was his own creation. He had made -him premature. That was something. Ordinary people waited till -life disclosed to them its secrets, but to the few, to the elect, -the mysteries of life were revealed before the veil was drawn away. -Sometimes this was the effect of art, and chiefly of the art of literature, -which dealt immediately with the passions and the intellect. -But now and then a complex personality took the place and assumed -the office of art, was indeed, in its way, a real work of art, -life having its elaborate masterpieces, just as poetry has, or sculpture, -or painting. - -Yes, the lad was premature. He was gathering his harvest while it -was yet spring. The pulse and passion of youth were in him, -but he was becoming self-conscious. It was delightful to watch him. -With his beautiful face, and his beautiful soul, he was a thing to -wonder at. It was no matter how it all ended, or was destined to end. -He was like one of those gracious figures in a pageant or a play, -whose joys seem to be remote from one, but whose sorrows stir one's sense -of beauty, and whose wounds are like red roses. - -Soul and body, body and soul--how mysterious they were! There was -animalism in the soul, and the body had its moments of spirituality. -The senses could refine, and the intellect could degrade. Who could -say where the fleshly impulse ceased, or the psychical impulse began? -How shallow were the arbitrary definitions of ordinary psychologists! -And yet how difficult to decide between the claims of the various schools! -Was the soul a shadow seated in the house of sin? Or was the body -really in the soul, as Giordano Bruno thought? The separation of spirit -from matter was a mystery, and the union of spirit with matter was a -mystery also. - -He began to wonder whether we could ever make psychology so absolute -a science that each little spring of life would be revealed to us. -As it was, we always misunderstood ourselves and rarely understood others. -Experience was of no ethical value. It was merely the name men gave to -their mistakes. Moralists had, as a rule, regarded it as a mode of warning, -had claimed for it a certain ethical efficacy in the formation of character, -had praised it as something that taught us what to follow and showed -us what to avoid. But there was no motive power in experience. -It was as little of an active cause as conscience itself. All that it -really demonstrated was that our future would be the same as our past, -and that the sin we had done once, and with loathing, we would do many times, -and with joy. - -It was clear to him that the experimental method was the only -method by which one could arrive at any scientific analysis -of the passions; and certainly Dorian Gray was a subject made -to his hand, and seemed to promise rich and fruitful results. -His sudden mad love for Sibyl Vane was a psychological phenomenon -of no small interest. There was no doubt that curiosity had much -to do with it, curiosity and the desire for new experiences, -yet it was not a simple, but rather a very complex passion. -What there was in it of the purely sensuous instinct of boyhood -had been transformed by the workings of the imagination, -changed into something that seemed to the lad himself to be remote -from sense, and was for that very reason all the more dangerous. -It was the passions about whose origin we deceived ourselves -that tyrannized most strongly over us. Our weakest motives -were those of whose nature we were conscious. It often happened -that when we thought we were experimenting on others we were -really experimenting on ourselves. - -While Lord Henry sat dreaming on these things, a knock came to the door, -and his valet entered and reminded him it was time to dress for dinner. -He got up and looked out into the street. The sunset had smitten into -scarlet gold the upper windows of the houses opposite. The panes glowed -like plates of heated metal. The sky above was like a faded rose. -He thought of his friend's young fiery-coloured life and wondered how it was -all going to end. - -When he arrived home, about half-past twelve o'clock, he saw a telegram -lying on the hall table. He opened it and found it was from Dorian Gray. -It was to tell him that he was engaged to be married to Sibyl Vane. - - - -CHAPTER 5 - -"Mother, Mother, I am so happy!" whispered the girl, burying her -face in the lap of the faded, tired-looking woman who, -with back turned to the shrill intrusive light, was sitting -in the one arm-chair that their dingy sitting-room contained. -"I am so happy!" she repeated, "and you must be happy, too!" - -Mrs. Vane winced and put her thin, bismuth-whitened hands on her -daughter's head. "Happy!" she echoed, "I am only happy, Sibyl, when I -see you act. You must not think of anything but your acting. -Mr. Isaacs has been very good to us, and we owe him money." - -The girl looked up and pouted. "Money, Mother?" she cried, -"what does money matter? Love is more than money." - -"Mr. Isaacs has advanced us fifty pounds to pay off our debts and to get -a proper outfit for James. You must not forget that, Sibyl. Fifty pounds -is a very large sum. Mr. Isaacs has been most considerate." - -"He is not a gentleman, Mother, and I hate the way he talks to me," -said the girl, rising to her feet and going over to the window. - -"I don't know how we could manage without him," answered the elder -woman querulously. - -Sibyl Vane tossed her head and laughed. "We don't want him -any more, Mother. Prince Charming rules life for us now." -Then she paused. A rose shook in her blood and shadowed -her cheeks. Quick breath parted the petals of her lips. -They trembled. Some southern wind of passion swept over her -and stirred the dainty folds of her dress. "I love him," -she said simply. - -"Foolish child! foolish child!" was the parrot-phrase flung in answer. -The waving of crooked, false-jewelled fingers gave grotesqueness to -the words. - -The girl laughed again. The joy of a caged bird was in her voice. -Her eyes caught the melody and echoed it in radiance, then closed -for a moment, as though to hide their secret. When they opened, -the mist of a dream had passed across them. - -Thin-lipped wisdom spoke at her from the worn chair, -hinted at prudence, quoted from that book of cowardice whose -author apes the name of common sense. She did not listen. -She was free in her prison of passion. Her prince, Prince Charming, -was with her. She had called on memory to remake him. -She had sent her soul to search for him, and it had brought him back. -His kiss burned again upon her mouth. Her eyelids were warm with -his breath. - -Then wisdom altered its method and spoke of espial and discovery. -This young man might be rich. If so, marriage should be thought of. -Against the shell of her ear broke the waves of worldly cunning. -The arrows of craft shot by her. She saw the thin lips moving, -and smiled. - -Suddenly she felt the need to speak. The wordy silence troubled her. -"Mother, Mother," she cried, "why does he love me so much? I know why I -love him. I love him because he is like what love himself should be. -But what does he see in me? I am not worthy of him. And yet--why, I -cannot tell--though I feel so much beneath him, I don't feel humble. -I feel proud, terribly proud. Mother, did you love my father as I love -Prince Charming?" - -The elder woman grew pale beneath the coarse powder that daubed -her cheeks, and her dry lips twitched with a spasm of pain. -Sybil rushed to her, flung her arms round her neck, and kissed her. -"Forgive me, Mother. I know it pains you to talk about our father. -But it only pains you because you loved him so much. Don't look so sad. -I am as happy to-day as you were twenty years ago. Ah! let me be happy -for ever!" - -"My child, you are far too young to think of falling in love. -Besides, what do you know of this young man? You don't -even know his name. The whole thing is most inconvenient, -and really, when James is going away to Australia, and I have -so much to think of, I must say that you should have shown -more consideration. However, as I said before, if he is rich -. . ." - -"Ah! Mother, Mother, let me be happy!" - -Mrs. Vane glanced at her, and with one of those false -theatrical gestures that so often become a mode of second -nature to a stage-player, clasped her in her arms. -At this moment, the door opened and a young lad with rough -brown hair came into the room. He was thick-set of figure, -and his hands and feet were large and somewhat clumsy in movement. -He was not so finely bred as his sister. One would hardly -have guessed the close relationship that existed between them. -Mrs. Vane fixed her eyes on him and intensified her smile. -She mentally elevated her son to the dignity of an audience. -She felt sure that the tableau was interesting. - -"You might keep some of your kisses for me, Sibyl, I think," -said the lad with a good-natured grumble. - -"Ah! but you don't like being kissed, Jim," she cried. -"You are a dreadful old bear." And she ran across the room and -hugged him. - -James Vane looked into his sister's face with tenderness. -"I want you to come out with me for a walk, Sibyl. -I don't suppose I shall ever see this horrid London again. -I am sure I don't want to." - -"My son, don't say such dreadful things," murmured Mrs. Vane, taking up -a tawdry theatrical dress, with a sigh, and beginning to patch it. -She felt a little disappointed that he had not joined the group. -It would have increased the theatrical picturesqueness of the situation. - -"Why not, Mother? I mean it." - -"You pain me, my son. I trust you will return from Australia in a position -of affluence. I believe there is no society of any kind in the Colonies-- -nothing that I would call society--so when you have made your fortune, -you must come back and assert yourself in London." - -"Society!" muttered the lad. "I don't want to know anything about that. -I should like to make some money to take you and Sibyl off the stage. -I hate it." - -"Oh, Jim!" said Sibyl, laughing, "how unkind of you! -But are you really going for a walk with me? That will be nice! -I was afraid you were going to say good-bye to some of your friends-- -to Tom Hardy, who gave you that hideous pipe, or Ned Langton, -who makes fun of you for smoking it. It is very sweet of you -to let me have your last afternoon. Where shall we go? -Let us go to the park." - -"I am too shabby," he answered, frowning. "Only swell people go to the park." - -"Nonsense, Jim," she whispered, stroking the sleeve of his coat. - -He hesitated for a moment. "Very well," he said at last, -"but don't be too long dressing." She danced out of the door. -One could hear her singing as she ran upstairs. Her little feet -pattered overhead. - -He walked up and down the room two or three times. Then he turned -to the still figure in the chair. "Mother, are my things ready?" -he asked. - -"Quite ready, James," she answered, keeping her eyes on -her work. For some months past she had felt ill at ease -when she was alone with this rough stern son of hers. -Her shallow secret nature was troubled when their eyes met. -She used to wonder if he suspected anything. The silence, -for he made no other observation, became intolerable to her. -She began to complain. Women defend themselves by attacking, -just as they attack by sudden and strange surrenders. -"I hope you will be contented, James, with your sea-faring life," -she said. "You must remember that it is your own choice. -You might have entered a solicitor's office. Solicitors are -a very respectable class, and in the country often dine with -the best families." - -"I hate offices, and I hate clerks," he replied. "But you are quite right. -I have chosen my own life. All I say is, watch over Sibyl. Don't let her -come to any harm. Mother, you must watch over her." - -"James, you really talk very strangely. Of course I watch over Sibyl." - -"I hear a gentleman comes every night to the theatre and goes behind -to talk to her. Is that right? What about that?" - -"You are speaking about things you don't understand, James. In the profession -we are accustomed to receive a great deal of most gratifying attention. -I myself used to receive many bouquets at one time. That was when acting -was really understood. As for Sibyl, I do not know at present whether -her attachment is serious or not. But there is no doubt that the young -man in question is a perfect gentleman. He is always most polite to me. -Besides, he has the appearance of being rich, and the flowers he sends -are lovely." - -"You don't know his name, though," said the lad harshly. - -"No," answered his mother with a placid expression in her face. -"He has not yet revealed his real name. I think it is quite romantic -of him. He is probably a member of the aristocracy." - -James Vane bit his lip. "Watch over Sibyl, Mother," he cried, -"watch over her." - -"My son, you distress me very much. Sibyl is always under my special care. -Of course, if this gentleman is wealthy, there is no reason why she should -not contract an alliance with him. I trust he is one of the aristocracy. -He has all the appearance of it, I must say. It might be a most brilliant -marriage for Sibyl. They would make a charming couple. His good looks are -really quite remarkable; everybody notices them." - -The lad muttered something to himself and drummed on the window-pane -with his coarse fingers. He had just turned round to say something -when the door opened and Sibyl ran in. - -"How serious you both are!" she cried. "What is the matter?" - -"Nothing," he answered. "I suppose one must be serious sometimes. -Good-bye, Mother; I will have my dinner at five o'clock. Everything -is packed, except my shirts, so you need not trouble." - -"Good-bye, my son," she answered with a bow of strained stateliness. - -She was extremely annoyed at the tone he had adopted with her, -and there was something in his look that had made her feel afraid. - -"Kiss me, Mother," said the girl. Her flowerlike lips touched the withered -cheek and warmed its frost. - -"My child! my child!" cried Mrs. Vane, looking up to the ceiling -in search of an imaginary gallery. - -"Come, Sibyl," said her brother impatiently. He hated -his mother's affectations. - -They went out into the flickering, wind-blown sunlight and strolled -down the dreary Euston Road. The passersby glanced in wonder -at the sullen heavy youth who, in coarse, ill-fitting clothes, -was in the company of such a graceful, refined-looking girl. -He was like a common gardener walking with a rose. - -Jim frowned from time to time when he caught the inquisitive -glance of some stranger. He had that dislike of being stared at, -which comes on geniuses late in life and never leaves the commonplace. -Sibyl, however, was quite unconscious of the effect she was producing. -Her love was trembling in laughter on her lips. She was thinking -of Prince Charming, and, that she might think of him all the more, -she did not talk of him, but prattled on about the ship in which -Jim was going to sail, about the gold he was certain to find, -about the wonderful heiress whose life he was to save from the wicked, -red-shirted bushrangers. For he was not to remain a sailor, -or a supercargo, or whatever he was going to be. Oh, no! A sailor's -existence was dreadful. Fancy being cooped up in a horrid ship, -with the hoarse, hump-backed waves trying to get in, and a black wind -blowing the masts down and tearing the sails into long screaming ribands! -He was to leave the vessel at Melbourne, bid a polite good-bye -to the captain, and go off at once to the gold-fields. Before -a week was over he was to come across a large nugget of pure gold, -the largest nugget that had ever been discovered, and bring it -down to the coast in a waggon guarded by six mounted policemen. -The bushrangers were to attack them three times, and be defeated -with immense slaughter. Or, no. He was not to go to the gold-fields -at all. They were horrid places, where men got intoxicated, -and shot each other in bar-rooms, and used bad language. He was -to be a nice sheep-farmer, and one evening, as he was riding home, -he was to see the beautiful heiress being carried off by a robber -on a black horse, and give chase, and rescue her. Of course, -she would fall in love with him, and he with her, and they would -get married, and come home, and live in an immense house in London. -Yes, there were delightful things in store for him. But he must -be very good, and not lose his temper, or spend his money foolishly. -She was only a year older than he was, but she knew so much more -of life. He must be sure, also, to write to her by every mail, -and to say his prayers each night before he went to sleep. -God was very good, and would watch over him. She would pray -for him, too, and in a few years he would come back quite rich and -happy. - -The lad listened sulkily to her and made no answer. He was heart-sick -at leaving home. - -Yet it was not this alone that made him gloomy and morose. -Inexperienced though he was, he had still a strong sense -of the danger of Sibyl's position. This young dandy who was -making love to her could mean her no good. He was a gentleman, -and he hated him for that, hated him through some curious -race-instinct for which he could not account, and which for that -reason was all the more dominant within him. He was conscious -also of the shallowness and vanity of his mother's nature, -and in that saw infinite peril for Sibyl and Sibyl's happiness. -Children begin by loving their parents; as they grow older they -judge them; sometimes they forgive them. - -His mother! He had something on his mind to ask of her, -something that he had brooded on for many months of silence. -A chance phrase that he had heard at the theatre, a whispered -sneer that had reached his ears one night as he waited at -the stage-door, had set loose a train of horrible thoughts. -He remembered it as if it had been the lash of a hunting-crop -across his face. His brows knit together into a wedgelike furrow, -and with a twitch of pain he bit his underlip. - -"You are not listening to a word I am saying, Jim," cried Sibyl, -"and I am making the most delightful plans for your future. -Do say something." - -"What do you want me to say?" - -"Oh! that you will be a good boy and not forget us," she answered, -smiling at him. - -He shrugged his shoulders. "You are more likely to forget me than I am -to forget you, Sibyl." - -She flushed. "What do you mean, Jim?" she asked. - -"You have a new friend, I hear. Who is he? Why have you not told me -about him? He means you no good." - -"Stop, Jim!" she exclaimed. "You must not say anything against him. -I love him." - -"Why, you don't even know his name," answered the lad. "Who is he? -I have a right to know." - -"He is called Prince Charming. Don't you like the name. -Oh! you silly boy! you should never forget it. If you only saw him, -you would think him the most wonderful person in the world. -Some day you will meet him--when you come back from Australia. -You will like him so much. Everybody likes him, and I ... -love him. I wish you could come to the theatre to-night. He -is going to be there, and I am to play Juliet. Oh! how I -shall play it! Fancy, Jim, to be in love and play Juliet! -To have him sitting there! To play for his delight! -I am afraid I may frighten the company, frighten or enthrall them. -To be in love is to surpass one's self. Poor dreadful -Mr. Isaacs will be shouting 'genius' to his loafers at the bar. -He has preached me as a dogma; to-night he will announce me -as a revelation. I feel it. And it is all his, his only, -Prince Charming, my wonderful lover, my god of graces. -But I am poor beside him. Poor? What does that matter? -When poverty creeps in at the door, love flies in through the window. -Our proverbs want rewriting. They were made in winter, and it is -summer now; spring-time for me, I think, a very dance of blossoms -in blue skies." - -"He is a gentleman," said the lad sullenly. - -"A prince!" she cried musically. "What more do you want?" - -"He wants to enslave you." - -"I shudder at the thought of being free." - -"I want you to beware of him." - -"To see him is to worship him; to know him is to trust him." - -"Sibyl, you are mad about him." - -She laughed and took his arm. "You dear old Jim, you talk as -if you were a hundred. Some day you will be in love yourself. -Then you will know what it is. Don't look so sulky. -Surely you should be glad to think that, though you are -going away, you leave me happier than I have ever been before. -Life has been hard for us both, terribly hard and difficult. -But it will be different now. You are going to a new world, -and I have found one. Here are two chairs; let us sit down and see -the smart people go by." - -They took their seats amidst a crowd of watchers. The tulip-beds -across the road flamed like throbbing rings of fire. A white dust-- -tremulous cloud of orris-root it seemed--hung in the panting air. -The brightly coloured parasols danced and dipped like monstrous butterflies. - -She made her brother talk of himself, his hopes, his prospects. -He spoke slowly and with effort. They passed words to each other -as players at a game pass counters. Sibyl felt oppressed. She could -not communicate her joy. A faint smile curving that sullen mouth -was all the echo she could win. After some time she became silent. -Suddenly she caught a glimpse of golden hair and laughing lips, -and in an open carriage with two ladies Dorian Gray drove past. - -She started to her feet. "There he is!" she cried. - -"Who?" said Jim Vane. - -"Prince Charming," she answered, looking after the victoria. - -He jumped up and seized her roughly by the arm. "Show him to me. -Which is he? Point him out. I must see him!" he exclaimed; -but at that moment the Duke of Berwick's four-in-hand came between, -and when it had left the space clear, the carriage had swept out of -the park. - -"He is gone," murmured Sibyl sadly. "I wish you had seen him." - -"I wish I had, for as sure as there is a God in heaven, -if he ever does you any wrong, I shall kill him." - -She looked at him in horror. He repeated his words. -They cut the air like a dagger. The people round began to gape. -A lady standing close to her tittered. - -"Come away, Jim; come away," she whispered. He followed her doggedly -as she passed through the crowd. He felt glad at what he had said. - -When they reached the Achilles Statue, she turned round. -There was pity in her eyes that became laughter on her lips. -She shook her head at him. "You are foolish, Jim, utterly foolish; -a bad-tempered boy, that is all. How can you say such -horrible things? You don't know what you are talking about. -You are simply jealous and unkind. Ah! I wish you would -fall in love. Love makes people good, and what you said -was wicked." - -"I am sixteen," he answered, "and I know what I am about. -Mother is no help to you. She doesn't understand how to look -after you. I wish now that I was not going to Australia at all. -I have a great mind to chuck the whole thing up. I would, if my -articles hadn't been signed." - -"Oh, don't be so serious, Jim. You are like one of the heroes -of those silly melodramas Mother used to be so fond of acting in. -I am not going to quarrel with you. I have seen him, and oh! to see -him is perfect happiness. We won't quarrel. I know you would never -harm any one I love, would you?" - -"Not as long as you love him, I suppose," was the sullen answer. - -"I shall love him for ever!" she cried. - -"And he?" - -"For ever, too!" - -"He had better." - -She shrank from him. Then she laughed and put her hand on his arm. -He was merely a boy. - -At the Marble Arch they hailed an omnibus, which left them close -to their shabby home in the Euston Road. It was after five o'clock, -and Sibyl had to lie down for a couple of hours before acting. -Jim insisted that she should do so. He said that he would sooner -part with her when their mother was not present. She would be sure -to make a scene, and he detested scenes of every kind. - -In Sybil's own room they parted. There was jealousy in the lad's heart, -and a fierce murderous hatred of the stranger who, as it seemed to him, -had come between them. Yet, when her arms were flung round his neck, -and her fingers strayed through his hair, he softened and kissed her with -real affection. There were tears in his eyes as he went downstairs. - -His mother was waiting for him below. She grumbled at his unpunctuality, -as he entered. He made no answer, but sat down to his meagre meal. -The flies buzzed round the table and crawled over the stained cloth. -Through the rumble of omnibuses, and the clatter of street-cabs, -he could hear the droning voice devouring each minute that was left -to him. - -After some time, he thrust away his plate and put his head in his hands. -He felt that he had a right to know. It should have been told to him before, -if it was as he suspected. Leaden with fear, his mother watched him. -Words dropped mechanically from her lips. A tattered lace handkerchief -twitched in her fingers. When the clock struck six, he got up and went -to the door. Then he turned back and looked at her. Their eyes met. -In hers he saw a wild appeal for mercy. It enraged him. - -"Mother, I have something to ask you," he said. Her eyes wandered -vaguely about the room. She made no answer. "Tell me the truth. -I have a right to know. Were you married to my father?" - -She heaved a deep sigh. It was a sigh of relief. The terrible moment, -the moment that night and day, for weeks and months, she had dreaded, -had come at last, and yet she felt no terror. Indeed, in some measure it -was a disappointment to her. The vulgar directness of the question called -for a direct answer. The situation had not been gradually led up to. -It was crude. It reminded her of a bad rehearsal. - -"No," she answered, wondering at the harsh simplicity of life. - -"My father was a scoundrel then!" cried the lad, clenching his fists. - -She shook her head. "I knew he was not free. We loved each other -very much. If he had lived, he would have made provision for us. -Don't speak against him, my son. He was your father, and a gentleman. -Indeed, he was highly connected." - -An oath broke from his lips. "I don't care for myself," -he exclaimed, "but don't let Sibyl. . . . It is a gentleman, -isn't it, who is in love with her, or says he is? -Highly connected, too, I suppose." - -For a moment a hideous sense of humiliation came over the woman. -Her head drooped. She wiped her eyes with shaking hands. -"Sibyl has a mother," she murmured; "I had none." - -The lad was touched. He went towards her, and stooping down, -he kissed her. "I am sorry if I have pained you by asking about -my father," he said, "but I could not help it. I must go now. -Good-bye. Don't forget that you will have only one child now -to look after, and believe me that if this man wrongs my sister, -I will find out who he is, track him down, and kill him like a dog. -I swear it." - -The exaggerated folly of the threat, the passionate gesture -that accompanied it, the mad melodramatic words, made life seem -more vivid to her. She was familiar with the atmosphere. -She breathed more freely, and for the first time for many months -she really admired her son. She would have liked to have continued -the scene on the same emotional scale, but he cut her short. -Trunks had to be carried down and mufflers looked for. -The lodging-house drudge bustled in and out. There was the bargaining -with the cabman. The moment was lost in vulgar details. -It was with a renewed feeling of disappointment that she waved the -tattered lace handkerchief from the window, as her son drove away. -She was conscious that a great opportunity had been wasted. -She consoled herself by telling Sibyl how desolate she felt her -life would be, now that she had only one child to look after. -She remembered the phrase. It had pleased her. Of the threat -she said nothing. It was vividly and dramatically expressed. -She felt that they would all laugh at it some day. - - - -CHAPTER 6 - -"I suppose you have heard the news, Basil?" said Lord Henry -that evening as Hallward was shown into a little private room -at the Bristol where dinner had been laid for three. - -"No, Harry," answered the artist, giving his hat and coat to -the bowing waiter. "What is it? Nothing about politics, I hope! -They don't interest me. There is hardly a single person in the House -of Commons worth painting, though many of them would be the better -for a little whitewashing." - -"Dorian Gray is engaged to be married," said Lord Henry, -watching him as he spoke. - -Hallward started and then frowned. "Dorian engaged to be married!" -he cried. "Impossible!" - -"It is perfectly true." - -"To whom?" - -"To some little actress or other." - -"I can't believe it. Dorian is far too sensible." - -"Dorian is far too wise not to do foolish things now and then, -my dear Basil." - -"Marriage is hardly a thing that one can do now and then, Harry." - -"Except in America," rejoined Lord Henry languidly. "But I -didn't say he was married. I said he was engaged to be married. -There is a great difference. I have a distinct remembrance of -being married, but I have no recollection at all of being engaged. -I am inclined to think that I never was engaged." - -"But think of Dorian's birth, and position, and wealth. -It would be absurd for him to marry so much beneath him." - -"If you want to make him marry this girl, tell him that, Basil. He is -sure to do it, then. Whenever a man does a thoroughly stupid thing, -it is always from the noblest motives." - -"I hope the girl is good, Harry. I don't want to see Dorian tied to some -vile creature, who might degrade his nature and ruin his intellect." - -"Oh, she is better than good--she is beautiful," murmured Lord Henry, -sipping a glass of vermouth and orange-bitters. "Dorian says she -is beautiful, and he is not often wrong about things of that kind. -Your portrait of him has quickened his appreciation of the personal -appearance of other people. It has had that excellent effect, -amongst others. We are to see her to-night, if that boy doesn't forget -his appointment." - -"Are you serious?" - -"Quite serious, Basil. I should be miserable if I thought I -should ever be more serious than I am at the present moment." - -"But do you approve of it, Harry?" asked the painter, -walking up and down the room and biting his lip. "You can't -approve of it, possibly. It is some silly infatuation." - -"I never approve, or disapprove, of anything now. It is an absurd -attitude to take towards life. We are not sent into the world -to air our moral prejudices. I never take any notice of what common -people say, and I never interfere with what charming people do. -If a personality fascinates me, whatever mode of expression that -personality selects is absolutely delightful to me. Dorian Gray -falls in love with a beautiful girl who acts Juliet, and proposes -to marry her. Why not? If he wedded Messalina, he would be none -the less interesting. You know I am not a champion of marriage. -The real drawback to marriage is that it makes one unselfish. -And unselfish people are colourless. They lack individuality. -Still, there are certain temperaments that marriage makes more complex. -They retain their egotism, and add to it many other egos. -They are forced to have more than one life. They become more -highly organized, and to be highly organized is, I should fancy, -the object of man's existence. Besides, every experience -is of value, and whatever one may say against marriage, -it is certainly an experience. I hope that Dorian Gray will -make this girl his wife, passionately adore her for six months, -and then suddenly become fascinated by some one else. He would be a -wonderful study." - -"You don't mean a single word of all that, Harry; you know you don't. If -Dorian Gray's life were spoiled, no one would be sorrier than yourself. -You are much better than you pretend to be." - -Lord Henry laughed. "The reason we all like to think -so well of others is that we are all afraid for ourselves. -The basis of optimism is sheer terror. We think that we are -generous because we credit our neighbour with the possession -of those virtues that are likely to be a benefit to us. -We praise the banker that we may overdraw our account, -and find good qualities in the highwayman in the hope that -he may spare our pockets. I mean everything that I have said. -I have the greatest contempt for optimism. As for a spoiled life, -no life is spoiled but one whose growth is arrested. -If you want to mar a nature, you have merely to reform it. -As for marriage, of course that would be silly, but there are other -and more interesting bonds between men and women. I will certainly -encourage them. They have the charm of being fashionable. -But here is Dorian himself. He will tell you more than -I can." - -"My dear Harry, my dear Basil, you must both congratulate me!" -said the lad, throwing off his evening cape with its satin-lined -wings and shaking each of his friends by the hand in turn. -"I have never been so happy. Of course, it is sudden-- -all really delightful things are. And yet it seems to me -to be the one thing I have been looking for all my life." -He was flushed with excitement and pleasure, and looked -extraordinarily handsome. - -"I hope you will always be very happy, Dorian," said Hallward, "but I -don't quite forgive you for not having let me know of your engagement. -You let Harry know." - -"And I don't forgive you for being late for dinner," broke in Lord Henry, -putting his hand on the lad's shoulder and smiling as he spoke. -"Come, let us sit down and try what the new chef here is like, and then you -will tell us how it all came about." - -"There is really not much to tell," cried Dorian as they took their -seats at the small round table. "What happened was simply this. -After I left you yesterday evening, Harry, I dressed, had some -dinner at that little Italian restaurant in Rupert Street you -introduced me to, and went down at eight o'clock to the theatre. -Sibyl was playing Rosalind. Of course, the scenery was dreadful -and the Orlando absurd. But Sibyl! You should have seen her! -When she came on in her boy's clothes, she was perfectly wonderful. -She wore a moss-coloured velvet jerkin with cinnamon sleeves, -slim, brown, cross-gartered hose, a dainty little green cap with a hawk's -feather caught in a jewel, and a hooded cloak lined with dull red. -She had never seemed to me more exquisite. She had all the delicate -grace of that Tanagra figurine that you have in your studio, Basil. -Her hair clustered round her face like dark leaves round a pale rose. -As for her acting--well, you shall see her to-night. She is simply -a born artist. I sat in the dingy box absolutely enthralled. -I forgot that I was in London and in the nineteenth century. -I was away with my love in a forest that no man had ever seen. -After the performance was over, I went behind and spoke to her. -As we were sitting together, suddenly there came into her eyes a look -that I had never seen there before. My lips moved towards hers. -We kissed each other. I can't describe to you what I felt at that moment. -It seemed to me that all my life had been narrowed to one perfect -point of rose-coloured joy. She trembled all over and shook -like a white narcissus. Then she flung herself on her knees -and kissed my hands. I feel that I should not tell you all this, -but I can't help it. Of course, our engagement is a dead secret. -She has not even told her own mother. I don't know what my guardians -will say. Lord Radley is sure to be furious. I don't care. -I shall be of age in less than a year, and then I can do what I like. -I have been right, Basil, haven't I, to take my love out of poetry -and to find my wife in Shakespeare's plays? Lips that Shakespeare -taught to speak have whispered their secret in my ear. -I have had the arms of Rosalind around me, and kissed Juliet on the -mouth." - -"Yes, Dorian, I suppose you were right," said Hallward slowly. - -"Have you seen her to-day?" asked Lord Henry. - -Dorian Gray shook his head. "I left her in the forest of Arden; -I shall find her in an orchard in Verona." - -Lord Henry sipped his champagne in a meditative manner. -"At what particular point did you mention the word marriage, Dorian? -And what did she say in answer? Perhaps you forgot all about it." - -"My dear Harry, I did not treat it as a business transaction, -and I did not make any formal proposal. I told her that I -loved her, and she said she was not worthy to be my wife. -Not worthy! Why, the whole world is nothing to me compared -with her." - -"Women are wonderfully practical," murmured Lord Henry, -"much more practical than we are. In situations of that kind -we often forget to say anything about marriage, and they always -remind us." - -Hallward laid his hand upon his arm. "Don't, Harry. -You have annoyed Dorian. He is not like other men. -He would never bring misery upon any one. His nature is too fine -for that." - -Lord Henry looked across the table. "Dorian is never annoyed with me," -he answered. "I asked the question for the best reason possible, -for the only reason, indeed, that excuses one for asking any question-- -simple curiosity. I have a theory that it is always the women who -propose to us, and not we who propose to the women. Except, of course, -in middle-class life. But then the middle classes are not modern." - -Dorian Gray laughed, and tossed his head. "You are quite -incorrigible, Harry; but I don't mind. It is impossible to be angry -with you. When you see Sibyl Vane, you will feel that the man -who could wrong her would be a beast, a beast without a heart. -I cannot understand how any one can wish to shame the thing -he loves. I love Sibyl Vane. I want to place her on a pedestal -of gold and to see the world worship the woman who is mine. -What is marriage? An irrevocable vow. You mock at it for that. -Ah! don't mock. It is an irrevocable vow that I want to take. -Her trust makes me faithful, her belief makes me good. -When I am with her, I regret all that you have taught me. -I become different from what you have known me to be. -I am changed, and the mere touch of Sibyl Vane's hand makes -me forget you and all your wrong, fascinating, poisonous, -delightful theories." - -"And those are ... ?" asked Lord Henry, helping himself to some salad. - -"Oh, your theories about life, your theories about love, -your theories about pleasure. All your theories, in fact, Harry." - -"Pleasure is the only thing worth having a theory about," -he answered in his slow melodious voice. "But I am afraid -I cannot claim my theory as my own. It belongs to Nature, -not to me. Pleasure is Nature's test, her sign of approval. -When we are happy, we are always good, but when we are good, -we are not always happy." - -"Ah! but what do you mean by good?" cried Basil Hallward. - -"Yes," echoed Dorian, leaning back in his chair and looking at Lord -Henry over the heavy clusters of purple-lipped irises that stood -in the centre of the table, "what do you mean by good, Harry?" - -"To be good is to be in harmony with one's self," he replied, -touching the thin stem of his glass with his pale, fine-pointed fingers. -"Discord is to be forced to be in harmony with others. -One's own life--that is the important thing. As for the lives -of one's neighbours, if one wishes to be a prig or a Puritan, -one can flaunt one's moral views about them, but they are not -one's concern. Besides, individualism has really the higher aim. -Modern morality consists in accepting the standard of one's age. -I consider that for any man of culture to accept the standard of his age is -a form of the grossest immorality." - -"But, surely, if one lives merely for one's self, Harry, one pays -a terrible price for doing so?" suggested the painter. - -"Yes, we are overcharged for everything nowadays. I should -fancy that the real tragedy of the poor is that they can afford -nothing but self-denial. Beautiful sins, like beautiful things, -are the privilege of the rich." - -"One has to pay in other ways but money." - -"What sort of ways, Basil?" - -"Oh! I should fancy in remorse, in suffering, in . . . well, -in the consciousness of degradation." - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "My dear fellow, mediaeval art -is charming, but mediaeval emotions are out of date. One can use -them in fiction, of course. But then the only things that one can -use in fiction are the things that one has ceased to use in fact. -Believe me, no civilized man ever regrets a pleasure, and no uncivilized -man ever knows what a pleasure is." - -"I know what pleasure is," cried Dorian Gray. "It is to adore some one." - -"That is certainly better than being adored," he answered, -toying with some fruits. "Being adored is a nuisance. -Women treat us just as humanity treats its gods. -They worship us, and are always bothering us to do something -for them." - -"I should have said that whatever they ask for they had first given to us," -murmured the lad gravely. "They create love in our natures. They have a -right to demand it back." - -"That is quite true, Dorian," cried Hallward. - -"Nothing is ever quite true," said Lord Henry. - -"This is," interrupted Dorian. "You must admit, Harry, that women -give to men the very gold of their lives." - -"Possibly," he sighed, "but they invariably want it back in such -very small change. That is the worry. Women, as some witty -Frenchman once put it, inspire us with the desire to do masterpieces -and always prevent us from carrying them out." - -"Harry, you are dreadful! I don't know why I like you so much." - -"You will always like me, Dorian," he replied. "Will you have some coffee, -you fellows? Waiter, bring coffee, and fine-champagne, and some cigarettes. -No, don't mind the cigarettes--I have some. Basil, I can't allow you to -smoke cigars. You must have a cigarette. A cigarette is the perfect type -of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. -What more can one want? Yes, Dorian, you will always be fond of me. -I represent to you all the sins you have never had the courage to commit." - -"What nonsense you talk, Harry!" cried the lad, taking a light from -a fire-breathing silver dragon that the waiter had placed on the table. -"Let us go down to the theatre. When Sibyl comes on the stage you will -have a new ideal of life. She will represent something to you that you -have never known." - -"I have known everything," said Lord Henry, with a tired -look in his eyes, "but I am always ready for a new emotion. -I am afraid, however, that, for me at any rate, there is -no such thing. Still, your wonderful girl may thrill me. -I love acting. It is so much more real than life. Let us go. -Dorian, you will come with me. I am so sorry, Basil, but there -is only room for two in the brougham. You must follow us in -a hansom." - -They got up and put on their coats, sipping their coffee standing. -The painter was silent and preoccupied. There was a gloom over him. -He could not bear this marriage, and yet it seemed to him -to be better than many other things that might have happened. -After a few minutes, they all passed downstairs. He drove off by himself, -as had been arranged, and watched the flashing lights of the little -brougham in front of him. A strange sense of loss came over him. -He felt that Dorian Gray would never again be to him all that he had -been in the past. Life had come between them.... His eyes darkened, -and the crowded flaring streets became blurred to his eyes. -When the cab drew up at the theatre, it seemed to him that he had grown -years older. - - - -CHAPTER 7 - -For some reason or other, the house was crowded that night, -and the fat Jew manager who met them at the door was -beaming from ear to ear with an oily tremulous smile. -He escorted them to their box with a sort of pompous humility, -waving his fat jewelled hands and talking at the top of his voice. -Dorian Gray loathed him more than ever. He felt as if he had -come to look for Miranda and had been met by Caliban. -Lord Henry, upon the other hand, rather liked him. -At least he declared he did, and insisted on shaking him -by the hand and assuring him that he was proud to meet a man -who had discovered a real genius and gone bankrupt over a poet. -Hallward amused himself with watching the faces in the pit. -The heat was terribly oppressive, and the huge sunlight -flamed like a monstrous dahlia with petals of yellow fire. -The youths in the gallery had taken off their coats -and waistcoats and hung them over the side. They talked -to each other across the theatre and shared their oranges -with the tawdry girls who sat beside them. Some women -were laughing in the pit. Their voices were horribly shrill -and discordant. The sound of the popping of corks came from -the bar. - -"What a place to find one's divinity in!" said Lord Henry. - -"Yes!" answered Dorian Gray. "It was here I found her, and she is divine -beyond all living things. When she acts, you will forget everything. -These common rough people, with their coarse faces and brutal gestures, -become quite different when she is on the stage. They sit silently -and watch her. They weep and laugh as she wills them to do. -She makes them as responsive as a violin. She spiritualizes them, -and one feels that they are of the same flesh and blood as one's self." - -"The same flesh and blood as one's self! Oh, I hope not!" -exclaimed Lord Henry, who was scanning the occupants of the gallery -through his opera-glass. - -"Don't pay any attention to him, Dorian," said the painter. -"I understand what you mean, and I believe in this girl. -Any one you love must be marvellous, and any girl -who has the effect you describe must be fine and noble. -To spiritualize one's age--that is something worth doing. -If this girl can give a soul to those who have lived without one, -if she can create the sense of beauty in people whose lives -have been sordid and ugly, if she can strip them of their -selfishness and lend them tears for sorrows that are not -their own, she is worthy of all your adoration, worthy of -the adoration of the world. This marriage is quite right. -I did not think so at first, but I admit it now. -The gods made Sibyl Vane for you. Without her you would have -been incomplete." - -"Thanks, Basil," answered Dorian Gray, pressing his hand. -"I knew that you would understand me. Harry is so cynical, -he terrifies me. But here is the orchestra. It is -quite dreadful, but it only lasts for about five minutes. -Then the curtain rises, and you will see the girl to whom I -am going to give all my life, to whom I have given everything -that is good in me." - -A quarter of an hour afterwards, amidst an extraordinary turmoil of applause, -Sibyl Vane stepped on to the stage. Yes, she was certainly lovely to look at-- -one of the loveliest creatures, Lord Henry thought, that he had ever seen. -There was something of the fawn in her shy grace and startled eyes. -A faint blush, like the shadow of a rose in a mirror of silver, came to her -cheeks as she glanced at the crowded enthusiastic house. She stepped back -a few paces and her lips seemed to tremble. Basil Hallward leaped to his feet -and began to applaud. Motionless, and as one in a dream, sat Dorian Gray, -gazing at her. Lord Henry peered through his glasses, murmuring, -"Charming! charming!" - -The scene was the hall of Capulet's house, and Romeo in his pilgrim's -dress had entered with Mercutio and his other friends. The band, -such as it was, struck up a few bars of music, and the dance began. -Through the crowd of ungainly, shabbily dressed actors, Sibyl Vane -moved like a creature from a finer world. Her body swayed, -while she danced, as a plant sways in the water. The curves of her -throat were the curves of a white lily. Her hands seemed to be made -of cool ivory. - -Yet she was curiously listless. She showed no sign of joy -when her eyes rested on Romeo. The few words she had to speak-- - - Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, - Which mannerly devotion shows in this; - For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch, - And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss-- - -with the brief dialogue that follows, were spoken in a -thoroughly artificial manner. The voice was exquisite, -but from the point of view of tone it was absolutely false. -It was wrong in colour. It took away all the life from the verse. -It made the passion unreal. - -Dorian Gray grew pale as he watched her. He was puzzled and anxious. -Neither of his friends dared to say anything to him. She seemed to them -to be absolutely incompetent. They were horribly disappointed. - -Yet they felt that the true test of any Juliet is the balcony scene -of the second act. They waited for that. If she failed there, -there was nothing in her. - -She looked charming as she came out in the moonlight. -That could not be denied. But the staginess of her acting -was unbearable, and grew worse as she went on. Her gestures -became absurdly artificial. She overemphasized everything -that she had to say. The beautiful passage-- - - Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face, - Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek - For that which thou hast heard me speak to-night-- - -was declaimed with the painful precision of a schoolgirl who has been -taught to recite by some second-rate professor of elocution. When she -leaned over the balcony and came to those wonderful lines-- - - Although I joy in thee, - I have no joy of this contract to-night: - It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden; - Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be - Ere one can say, "It lightens." Sweet, good-night! - This bud of love by summer's ripening breath - May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet-- - -she spoke the words as though they conveyed no meaning to her. It was -not nervousness. Indeed, so far from being nervous, she was absolutely -self-contained. It was simply bad art. She was a complete failure. - -Even the common uneducated audience of the pit and gallery lost their -interest in the play. They got restless, and began to talk loudly and to -whistle. The Jew manager, who was standing at the back of the -dress-circle, stamped and swore with rage. The only person unmoved was -the girl herself. - -When the second act was over, there came a storm of hisses, -and Lord Henry got up from his chair and put on his coat. -"She is quite beautiful, Dorian," he said, "but she can't act. -Let us go." - -"I am going to see the play through," answered the lad, -in a hard bitter voice. "I am awfully sorry that I have made -you waste an evening, Harry. I apologize to you both." - -"My dear Dorian, I should think Miss Vane was ill," interrupted Hallward. -"We will come some other night." - -"I wish she were ill," he rejoined. "But she seems to me -to be simply callous and cold. She has entirely altered. -Last night she was a great artist. This evening she is merely a -commonplace mediocre actress." - -"Don't talk like that about any one you love, Dorian. Love is a more -wonderful thing than art." - -"They are both simply forms of imitation," remarked Lord Henry. -"But do let us go. Dorian, you must not stay here any longer. -It is not good for one's morals to see bad acting. -Besides, I don't suppose you will want your wife to act, -so what does it matter if she plays Juliet like a wooden doll? -She is very lovely, and if she knows as little about life -as she does about acting, she will be a delightful experience. -There are only two kinds of people who are really fascinating-- -people who know absolutely everything, and people who know -absolutely nothing. Good heavens, my dear boy, don't look so tragic! -The secret of remaining young is never to have an emotion -that is unbecoming. Come to the club with Basil and myself. -We will smoke cigarettes and drink to the beauty of Sibyl Vane. -She is beautiful. What more can you want?" - -"Go away, Harry," cried the lad. "I want to be alone. Basil, you must go. -Ah! can't you see that my heart is breaking?" The hot tears came -to his eyes. His lips trembled, and rushing to the back of the box, -he leaned up against the wall, hiding his face in his hands. - -"Let us go, Basil," said Lord Henry with a strange tenderness in his voice, -and the two young men passed out together. - -A few moments afterwards the footlights flared up and the curtain rose -on the third act. Dorian Gray went back to his seat. He looked pale, -and proud, and indifferent. The play dragged on, and seemed interminable. -Half of the audience went out, tramping in heavy boots and laughing. -The whole thing was a fiasco. The last act was played to almost -empty benches. The curtain went down on a titter and some groans. - -As soon as it was over, Dorian Gray rushed behind the scenes into -the greenroom. The girl was standing there alone, with a look -of triumph on her face. Her eyes were lit with an exquisite fire. -There was a radiance about her. Her parted lips were smiling over -some secret of their own. - -When he entered, she looked at him, and an expression of infinite joy -came over her. "How badly I acted to-night, Dorian!" she cried. - -"Horribly!" he answered, gazing at her in amazement. "Horribly! -It was dreadful. Are you ill? You have no idea what it was. -You have no idea what I suffered." - -The girl smiled. "Dorian," she answered, lingering over -his name with long-drawn music in her voice, as though it -were sweeter than honey to the red petals of her mouth. -"Dorian, you should have understood. But you understand now, -don't you?" - -"Understand what?" he asked, angrily. - -"Why I was so bad to-night. Why I shall always be bad. -Why I shall never act well again." - -He shrugged his shoulders. "You are ill, I suppose. -When you are ill you shouldn't act. You make yourself ridiculous. -My friends were bored. I was bored." - -She seemed not to listen to him. She was transfigured with joy. -An ecstasy of happiness dominated her. - -"Dorian, Dorian," she cried, "before I knew you, acting was the one -reality of my life. It was only in the theatre that I lived. I thought -that it was all true. I was Rosalind one night and Portia the other. -The joy of Beatrice was my joy, and the sorrows of Cordelia were mine also. -I believed in everything. The common people who acted with me seemed -to me to be godlike. The painted scenes were my world. I knew nothing -but shadows, and I thought them real. You came--oh, my beautiful love!-- -and you freed my soul from prison. You taught me what reality really is. -To-night, for the first time in my life, I saw through the hollowness, -the sham, the silliness of the empty pageant in which I had always played. -To-night, for the first time, I became conscious that the Romeo was hideous, -and old, and painted, that the moonlight in the orchard was false, -that the scenery was vulgar, and that the words I had to speak were unreal, -were not my words, were not what I wanted to say. You had brought me -something higher, something of which all art is but a reflection. -You had made me understand what love really is. My love! My love! -Prince Charming! Prince of life! I have grown sick of shadows. -You are more to me than all art can ever be. What have I to do with -the puppets of a play? When I came on to-night, I could not understand -how it was that everything had gone from me. I thought that I was going -to be wonderful. I found that I could do nothing. Suddenly it dawned -on my soul what it all meant. The knowledge was exquisite to me. I heard -them hissing, and I smiled. What could they know of love such as ours? -Take me away, Dorian--take me away with you, where we can be quite alone. -I hate the stage. I might mimic a passion that I do not feel, -but I cannot mimic one that burns me like fire. Oh, Dorian, Dorian, -you understand now what it signifies? Even if I could do it, it would -be profanation for me to play at being in love. You have made me see -that." - -He flung himself down on the sofa and turned away his face. -"You have killed my love," he muttered. - -She looked at him in wonder and laughed. He made no answer. -She came across to him, and with her little fingers stroked -his hair. She knelt down and pressed his hands to her lips. -He drew them away, and a shudder ran through him. - -Then he leaped up and went to the door. "Yes," he cried, -"you have killed my love. You used to stir my imagination. -Now you don't even stir my curiosity. You simply produce no effect. -I loved you because you were marvellous, because you had genius -and intellect, because you realized the dreams of great -poets and gave shape and substance to the shadows of art. -You have thrown it all away. You are shallow and stupid. -My God! how mad I was to love you! What a fool I have been! -You are nothing to me now. I will never see you again. -I will never think of you. I will never mention your name. -You don't know what you were to me, once. Why, once . . . Oh, -I can't bear to think of it! I wish I had never laid -eyes upon you! You have spoiled the romance of my life. -How little you can know of love, if you say it mars your art! -Without your art, you are nothing. I would have made -you famous, splendid, magnificent. The world would -have worshipped you, and you would have borne my name. -What are you now? A third-rate actress with a pretty -face." - -The girl grew white, and trembled. She clenched her hands together, -and her voice seemed to catch in her throat. "You are not serious, Dorian?" -she murmured. "You are acting." - -"Acting! I leave that to you. You do it so well," he answered bitterly. - -She rose from her knees and, with a piteous expression of pain -in her face, came across the room to him. She put her hand -upon his arm and looked into his eyes. He thrust her back. -"Don't touch me!" he cried. - -A low moan broke from her, and she flung herself at his feet -and lay there like a trampled flower. "Dorian, Dorian, -don't leave me!" she whispered. "I am so sorry I didn't act well. -I was thinking of you all the time. But I will try--indeed, I -will try. It came so suddenly across me, my love for you. -I think I should never have known it if you had not kissed me-- -if we had not kissed each other. Kiss me again, my love. -Don't go away from me. I couldn't bear it. Oh! don't go away -from me. My brother . . . No; never mind. He didn't mean it. -He was in jest. . . . But you, oh! can't you forgive me for -to-night? I will work so hard and try to improve. Don't be cruel -to me, because I love you better than anything in the world. -After all, it is only once that I have not pleased you. -But you are quite right, Dorian. I should have shown -myself more of an artist. It was foolish of me, and yet I -couldn't help it. Oh, don't leave me, don't leave me." -A fit of passionate sobbing choked her. She crouched on -the floor like a wounded thing, and Dorian Gray, with his -beautiful eyes, looked down at her, and his chiselled lips curled -in exquisite disdain. There is always something ridiculous -about the emotions of people whom one has ceased to love. -Sibyl Vane seemed to him to be absurdly melodramatic. -Her tears and sobs annoyed him. - -"I am going," he said at last in his calm clear voice. -"I don't wish to be unkind, but I can't see you again. -You have disappointed me." - -She wept silently, and made no answer, but crept nearer. -Her little hands stretched blindly out, and appeared to be -seeking for him. He turned on his heel and left the room. -In a few moments he was out of the theatre. - -Where he went to he hardly knew. He remembered wandering through dimly -lit streets, past gaunt, black-shadowed archways and evil-looking houses. -Women with hoarse voices and harsh laughter had called after him. -Drunkards had reeled by, cursing and chattering to themselves like -monstrous apes. He had seen grotesque children huddled upon door-steps, and -heard shrieks and oaths from gloomy courts. - -As the dawn was just breaking, he found himself close to Covent Garden. -The darkness lifted, and, flushed with faint fires, the sky hollowed itself -into a perfect pearl. Huge carts filled with nodding lilies rumbled slowly -down the polished empty street. The air was heavy with the perfume of -the flowers, and their beauty seemed to bring him an anodyne for his pain. -He followed into the market and watched the men unloading their waggons. -A white-smocked carter offered him some cherries. He thanked him, -wondered why he refused to accept any money for them, and began to eat -them listlessly. They had been plucked at midnight, and the coldness -of the moon had entered into them. A long line of boys carrying crates -of striped tulips, and of yellow and red roses, defiled in front of him, -threading their way through the huge, jade-green piles of vegetables. -Under the portico, with its grey, sun-bleached pillars, loitered a troop -of draggled bareheaded girls, waiting for the auction to be over. -Others crowded round the swinging doors of the coffee-house in the piazza. -The heavy cart-horses slipped and stamped upon the rough stones, -shaking their bells and trappings. Some of the drivers were lying asleep -on a pile of sacks. Iris-necked and pink-footed, the pigeons ran about -picking up seeds. - -After a little while, he hailed a hansom and drove home. -For a few moments he loitered upon the doorstep, looking round -at the silent square, with its blank, close-shuttered windows -and its staring blinds. The sky was pure opal now, -and the roofs of the houses glistened like silver against it. -From some chimney opposite a thin wreath of smoke was rising. -It curled, a violet riband, through the nacre-coloured air. - -In the huge gilt Venetian lantern, spoil of some Doge's barge, -that hung from the ceiling of the great, oak-panelled hall -of entrance, lights were still burning from three flickering jets: -thin blue petals of flame they seemed, rimmed with white fire. -He turned them out and, having thrown his hat and cape on the table, -passed through the library towards the door of his bedroom, -a large octagonal chamber on the ground floor that, in his new-born -feeling for luxury, he had just had decorated for himself and hung -with some curious Renaissance tapestries that had been discovered -stored in a disused attic at Selby Royal. As he was turning -the handle of the door, his eye fell upon the portrait Basil -Hallward had painted of him. He started back as if in surprise. -Then he went on into his own room, looking somewhat puzzled. -After he had taken the button-hole out of his coat, he seemed -to hesitate. Finally, he came back, went over to the picture, -and examined it. In the dim arrested light that struggled -through the cream-coloured silk blinds, the face appeared to him -to be a little changed. The expression looked different. -One would have said that there was a touch of cruelty in the mouth. -It was certainly strange. - -He turned round and, walking to the window, drew up the blind. -The bright dawn flooded the room and swept the fantastic -shadows into dusky corners, where they lay shuddering. -But the strange expression that he had noticed in the face of -the portrait seemed to linger there, to be more intensified even. -The quivering ardent sunlight showed him the lines of cruelty round -the mouth as clearly as if he had been looking into a mirror after -he had done some dreadful thing. - -He winced and, taking up from the table an oval glass framed -in ivory Cupids, one of Lord Henry's many presents to him, -glanced hurriedly into its polished depths. No line like that -warped his red lips. What did it mean? - -He rubbed his eyes, and came close to the picture, and examined it again. -There were no signs of any change when he looked into the actual painting, -and yet there was no doubt that the whole expression had altered. It was not -a mere fancy of his own. The thing was horribly apparent. - -He threw himself into a chair and began to think. Suddenly there flashed -across his mind what he had said in Basil Hallward's studio the day -the picture had been finished. Yes, he remembered it perfectly. -He had uttered a mad wish that he himself might remain young, -and the portrait grow old; that his own beauty might be untarnished, -and the face on the canvas bear the burden of his passions and his sins; -that the painted image might be seared with the lines of suffering -and thought, and that he might keep all the delicate bloom and loveliness -of his then just conscious boyhood. Surely his wish had not been fulfilled? -Such things were impossible. It seemed monstrous even to think of them. -And, yet, there was the picture before him, with the touch of cruelty in -the mouth. - -Cruelty! Had he been cruel? It was the girl's fault, not his. -He had dreamed of her as a great artist, had given his love to her -because he had thought her great. Then she had disappointed him. -She had been shallow and unworthy. And, yet, a feeling -of infinite regret came over him, as he thought of her lying -at his feet sobbing like a little child. He remembered with what -callousness he had watched her. Why had he been made like that? -Why had such a soul been given to him? But he had suffered also. -During the three terrible hours that the play had lasted, -he had lived centuries of pain, aeon upon aeon of torture. -His life was well worth hers. She had marred him for a moment, -if he had wounded her for an age. Besides, women were better -suited to bear sorrow than men. They lived on their emotions. -They only thought of their emotions. When they took lovers, -it was merely to have some one with whom they could have scenes. -Lord Henry had told him that, and Lord Henry knew what women were. -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. - -Yet it was watching him, with its beautiful marred face and its cruel smile. -Its bright hair gleamed in the early sunlight. Its blue eyes met his own. -A sense of infinite pity, not for himself, but for the painted image -of himself, came over him. It had altered already, and would alter more. -Its gold would wither into grey. Its red and white roses would die. -For every sin that he committed, a stain would fleck and wreck its fairness. -But he would not sin. The picture, changed or unchanged, would be -to him the visible emblem of conscience. He would resist temptation. -He would not see Lord Henry any more--would not, at any rate, -listen to those subtle poisonous theories that in Basil Hallward's -garden had first stirred within him the passion for impossible things. -He would go back to Sibyl Vane, make her amends, marry her, try to love -her again. Yes, it was his duty to do so. She must have suffered -more than he had. Poor child! He had been selfish and cruel to her. -The fascination that she had exercised over him would return. -They would be happy together. His life with her would be beautiful and -pure. - -He got up from his chair and drew a large screen right in front -of the portrait, shuddering as he glanced at it. "How horrible!" -he murmured to himself, and he walked across to the window and opened it. -When he stepped out on to the grass, he drew a deep breath. -The fresh morning air seemed to drive away all his sombre passions. -He thought only of Sibyl. A faint echo of his love came back to him. -He repeated her name over and over again. The birds that were -singing in the dew-drenched garden seemed to be telling the flowers -about her. - - - -CHAPTER 8 - -It was long past noon when he awoke. His valet had crept -several times on tiptoe into the room to see if he was stirring, -and had wondered what made his young master sleep so late. -Finally his bell sounded, and Victor came in softly with a cup -of tea, and a pile of letters, on a small tray of old Sevres china, -and drew back the olive-satin curtains, with their shimmering -blue lining, that hung in front of the three tall windows. - -"Monsieur has well slept this morning," he said, smiling. - -"What o'clock is it, Victor?" asked Dorian Gray drowsily. - -"One hour and a quarter, Monsieur." - -How late it was! He sat up, and having sipped some tea, -turned over his letters. One of them was from Lord Henry, and had -been brought by hand that morning. He hesitated for a moment, -and then put it aside. The others he opened listlessly. -They contained the usual collection of cards, invitations to dinner, -tickets for private views, programmes of charity concerts, -and the like that are showered on fashionable young men every -morning during the season. There was a rather heavy bill -for a chased silver Louis-Quinze toilet-set that he had not -yet had the courage to send on to his guardians, who were -extremely old-fashioned people and did not realize that we live -in an age when unnecessary things are our only necessities; -and there were several very courteously worded communications -from Jermyn Street money-lenders offering to advance any sum -of money at a moment's notice and at the most reasonable rates -of interest. - -After about ten minutes he got up, and throwing on an elaborate dressing-gown -of silk-embroidered cashmere wool, passed into the onyx-paved bathroom. -The cool water refreshed him after his long sleep. He seemed to have -forgotten all that he had gone through. A dim sense of having taken part -in some strange tragedy came to him once or twice, but there was the unreality -of a dream about it. - -As soon as he was dressed, he went into the library and sat -down to a light French breakfast that had been laid out -for him on a small round table close to the open window. -It was an exquisite day. The warm air seemed laden with spices. -A bee flew in and buzzed round the blue-dragon bowl that, -filled with sulphur-yellow roses, stood before him. He felt -perfectly happy. - -Suddenly his eye fell on the screen that he had placed in front -of the portrait, and he started. - -"Too cold for Monsieur?" asked his valet, putting an omelette on the table. -"I shut the window?" - -Dorian shook his head. "I am not cold," he murmured. - -Was it all true? Had the portrait really changed? -Or had it been simply his own imagination that had made him -see a look of evil where there had been a look of joy? -Surely a painted canvas could not alter? The thing was absurd. -It would serve as a tale to tell Basil some day. It would make -him smile. - -And, yet, how vivid was his recollection of the whole thing! -First in the dim twilight, and then in the bright dawn, -he had seen the touch of cruelty round the warped lips. -He almost dreaded his valet leaving the room. He knew that -when he was alone he would have to examine the portrait. -He was afraid of certainty. When the coffee and cigarettes -had been brought and the man turned to go, he felt a wild desire -to tell him to remain. As the door was closing behind him, -he called him back. The man stood waiting for his orders. -Dorian looked at him for a moment. "I am not at home -to any one, Victor," he said with a sigh. The man bowed -and retired. - -Then he rose from the table, lit a cigarette, and flung -himself down on a luxuriously cushioned couch that stood facing -the screen. The screen was an old one, of gilt Spanish leather, -stamped and wrought with a rather florid Louis-Quatorze pattern. -He scanned it curiously, wondering if ever before it had concealed -the secret of a man's life. - -Should he move it aside, after all? Why not let it stay there? -What was the use of knowing? If the thing was true, -it was terrible. If it was not true, why trouble about it? -But what if, by some fate or deadlier chance, eyes other than -his spied behind and saw the horrible change? What should he do -if Basil Hallward came and asked to look at his own picture? -Basil would be sure to do that. No; the thing had to be examined, -and at once. Anything would be better than this dreadful state -of doubt. - -He got up and locked both doors. At least he would be alone when he looked -upon the mask of his shame. Then he drew the screen aside and saw himself -face to face. It was perfectly true. The portrait had altered. - -As he often remembered afterwards, and always with no small wonder, -he found himself at first gazing at the portrait with a feeling -of almost scientific interest. That such a change should have -taken place was incredible to him. And yet it was a fact. -Was there some subtle affinity between the chemical atoms that -shaped themselves into form and colour on the canvas and the soul -that was within him? Could it be that what that soul thought, -they realized?--that what it dreamed, they made true? -Or was there some other, more terrible reason? He shuddered, -and felt afraid, and, going back to the couch, lay there, -gazing at the picture in sickened horror. - -One thing, however, he felt that it had done for him. -It had made him conscious how unjust, how cruel, he had been -to Sibyl Vane. It was not too late to make reparation for that. -She could still be his wife. His unreal and selfish love -would yield to some higher influence, would be transformed -into some nobler passion, and the portrait that Basil Hallward -had painted of him would be a guide to him through life, -would be to him what holiness is to some, and conscience -to others, and the fear of God to us all. There were opiates -for remorse, drugs that could lull the moral sense to sleep. -But here was a visible symbol of the degradation of sin. -Here was an ever-present sign of the ruin men brought upon -their souls. - -Three o'clock struck, and four, and the half-hour rang its double chime, -but Dorian Gray did not stir. He was trying to gather up the scarlet -threads of life and to weave them into a pattern; to find his way through -the sanguine labyrinth of passion through which he was wandering. -He did not know what to do, or what to think. Finally, he went over -to the table and wrote a passionate letter to the girl he had loved, -imploring her forgiveness and accusing himself of madness. He covered -page after page with wild words of sorrow and wilder words of pain. -There is a luxury in self-reproach. When we blame ourselves, we feel that no -one else has a right to blame us. It is the confession, not the priest, -that gives us absolution. When Dorian had finished the letter, he felt that -he had been forgiven. - -Suddenly there came a knock to the door, and he heard Lord Henry's -voice outside. "My dear boy, I must see you. Let me in at once. -I can't bear your shutting yourself up like this." - -He made no answer at first, but remained quite still. -The knocking still continued and grew louder. Yes, it was -better to let Lord Henry in, and to explain to him the new -life he was going to lead, to quarrel with him if it became -necessary to quarrel, to part if parting was inevitable. -He jumped up, drew the screen hastily across the picture, -and unlocked the door. - -"I am so sorry for it all, Dorian," said Lord Henry as he entered. -"But you must not think too much about it." - -"Do you mean about Sibyl Vane?" asked the lad. - -"Yes, of course," answered Lord Henry, sinking into a chair -and slowly pulling off his yellow gloves. "It is dreadful, -from one point of view, but it was not your fault. Tell me, -did you go behind and see her, after the play was over?" - -"Yes." - -"I felt sure you had. Did you make a scene with her?" - -"I was brutal, Harry--perfectly brutal. But it is all right now. -I am not sorry for anything that has happened. It has taught me to know -myself better." - -"Ah, Dorian, I am so glad you take it in that way! I was afraid I -would find you plunged in remorse and tearing that nice curly hair -of yours." - -"I have got through all that," said Dorian, shaking his head and smiling. -"I am perfectly happy now. I know what conscience is, to begin with. -It is not what you told me it was. It is the divinest thing in us. -Don't sneer at it, Harry, any more--at least not before me. I want to -be good. I can't bear the idea of my soul being hideous." - -"A very charming artistic basis for ethics, Dorian! I congratulate you -on it. But how are you going to begin?" - -"By marrying Sibyl Vane." - -"Marrying Sibyl Vane!" cried Lord Henry, standing up and looking -at him in perplexed amazement. "But, my dear Dorian--" - -"Yes, Harry, I know what you are going to say. Something dreadful -about marriage. Don't say it. Don't ever say things of that -kind to me again. Two days ago I asked Sibyl to marry me. -I am not going to break my word to her. She is to be my wife." - -"Your wife! Dorian! . . . Didn't you get my letter? -I wrote to you this morning, and sent the note down by my -own man." - -"Your letter? Oh, yes, I remember. I have not read it yet, Harry. -I was afraid there might be something in it that I wouldn't like. -You cut life to pieces with your epigrams." - -"You know nothing then?" - -"What do you mean?" - -Lord Henry walked across the room, and sitting down by Dorian Gray, -took both his hands in his own and held them tightly. "Dorian," he said, -"my letter--don't be frightened--was to tell you that Sibyl Vane -is dead." - -A cry of pain broke from the lad's lips, and he leaped to his feet, -tearing his hands away from Lord Henry's grasp. "Dead! Sibyl dead! -It is not true! It is a horrible lie! How dare you say it?" - -"It is quite true, Dorian," said Lord Henry, gravely. "It is in -all the morning papers. I wrote down to you to ask you not to see -any one till I came. There will have to be an inquest, of course, -and you must not be mixed up in it. Things like that make a man -fashionable in Paris. But in London people are so prejudiced. -Here, one should never make one's debut with a scandal. -One should reserve that to give an interest to one's old age. -I suppose they don't know your name at the theatre? If they don't, -it is all right. Did any one see you going round to her room? -That is an important point." - -Dorian did not answer for a few moments. He was dazed with horror. -Finally he stammered, in a stifled voice, "Harry, did you say an inquest? -What did you mean by that? Did Sibyl--? Oh, Harry, I can't bear it! -But be quick. Tell me everything at once." - -"I have no doubt it was not an accident, Dorian, though it -must be put in that way to the public. It seems that as she -was leaving the theatre with her mother, about half-past -twelve or so, she said she had forgotten something upstairs. -They waited some time for her, but she did not come down again. -They ultimately found her lying dead on the floor of her -dressing-room. She had swallowed something by mistake, -some dreadful thing they use at theatres. I don't know what -it was, but it had either prussic acid or white lead in it. -I should fancy it was prussic acid, as she seems to have -died instantaneously." - -"Harry, Harry, it is terrible!" cried the lad. - -"Yes; it is very tragic, of course, but you must not get yourself -mixed up in it. I see by The Standard that she was seventeen. -I should have thought she was almost younger than that. -She looked such a child, and seemed to know so little about acting. -Dorian, you mustn't let this thing get on your nerves. -You must come and dine with me, and afterwards we will look in at -the opera. It is a Patti night, and everybody will be there. -You can come to my sister's box. She has got some smart women -with her." - -"So I have murdered Sibyl Vane," said Dorian Gray, half to himself, -"murdered her as surely as if I had cut her little throat -with a knife. Yet the roses are not less lovely for all that. -The birds sing just as happily in my garden. And to-night I am -to dine with you, and then go on to the opera, and sup somewhere, -I suppose, afterwards. How extraordinarily dramatic life is! -If I had read all this in a book, Harry, I think I would have -wept over it. Somehow, now that it has happened actually, -and to me, it seems far too wonderful for tears. -Here is the first passionate love-letter I have ever written -in my life. Strange, that my first passionate love-letter should -have been addressed to a dead girl. Can they feel, I wonder, -those white silent people we call the dead? Sibyl! Can she feel, -or know, or listen? Oh, Harry, how I loved her once! -It seems years ago to me now. She was everything to me. -Then came that dreadful night--was it really only last night?-- -when she played so badly, and my heart almost broke. -She explained it all to me. It was terribly pathetic. -But I was not moved a bit. I thought her shallow. -Suddenly something happened that made me afraid. -I can't tell you what it was, but it was terrible. -I said I would go back to her. I felt I had done wrong. -And now she is dead. My God! My God! Harry, what shall I do? -You don't know the danger I am in, and there is nothing -to keep me straight. She would have done that for me. -She had no right to kill herself. It was selfish of -her." - -"My dear Dorian," answered Lord Henry, taking a cigarette -from his case and producing a gold-latten matchbox, -"the only way a woman can ever reform a man is by boring him -so completely that he loses all possible interest in life. -If you had married this girl, you would have been wretched. -Of course, you would have treated her kindly. One can always -be kind to people about whom one cares nothing. But she would -have soon found out that you were absolutely indifferent -to her. And when a woman finds that out about her husband, -she either becomes dreadfully dowdy, or wears very smart -bonnets that some other woman's husband has to pay for. -I say nothing about the social mistake, which would have -been abject--which, of course, I would not have allowed-- -but I assure you that in any case the whole thing would have been an -absolute failure." - -"I suppose it would," muttered the lad, walking up and down the room -and looking horribly pale. "But I thought it was my duty. -It is not my fault that this terrible tragedy has prevented my doing -what was right. I remember your saying once that there is a fatality -about good resolutions--that they are always made too late. -Mine certainly were." - -"Good resolutions are useless attempts to interfere -with scientific laws. Their origin is pure vanity. -Their result is absolutely nil. They give us, now and then, -some of those luxurious sterile emotions that have a certain -charm for the weak. That is all that can be said for them. -They are simply cheques that men draw on a bank where they have -no account." - -"Harry," cried Dorian Gray, coming over and sitting down beside him, -"why is it that I cannot feel this tragedy as much as I want to? -I don't think I am heartless. Do you?" - -"You have done too many foolish things during the last fortnight -to be entitled to give yourself that name, Dorian," answered Lord -Henry with his sweet melancholy smile. - -The lad frowned. "I don't like that explanation, Harry," he rejoined, -"but I am glad you don't think I am heartless. I am nothing of the kind. -I know I am not. And yet I must admit that this thing that has happened -does not affect me as it should. It seems to me to be simply like a -wonderful ending to a wonderful play. It has all the terrible beauty -of a Greek tragedy, a tragedy in which I took a great part, but by which I -have not been wounded." - -"It is an interesting question," said Lord Henry, who found -an exquisite pleasure in playing on the lad's unconscious egotism, -"an extremely interesting question. I fancy that the true -explanation is this: It often happens that the real tragedies -of life occur in such an inartistic manner that they hurt -us by their crude violence, their absolute incoherence, -their absurd want of meaning, their entire lack of style. -They affect us just as vulgarity affects us. They give us -an impression of sheer brute force, and we revolt against that. -Sometimes, however, a tragedy that possesses artistic elements -of beauty crosses our lives. If these elements of beauty are real, -the whole thing simply appeals to our sense of dramatic effect. -Suddenly we find that we are no longer the actors, -but the spectators of the play. Or rather we are both. -We watch ourselves, and the mere wonder of the spectacle -enthralls us. In the present case, what is it that has -really happened? Some one has killed herself for love of you. -I wish that I had ever had such an experience. It would -have made me in love with love for the rest of my life. -The people who have adored me--there have not been very many, -but there have been some--have always insisted on living on, -long after I had ceased to care for them, or they to care for me. -They have become stout and tedious, and when I meet them, -they go in at once for reminiscences. That awful memory of woman! -What a fearful thing it is! And what an utter intellectual -stagnation it reveals! One should absorb the colour of life, -but one should never remember its details. Details are always -vulgar." - -"I must sow poppies in my garden," sighed Dorian. - -"There is no necessity," rejoined his companion. "Life has always -poppies in her hands. Of course, now and then things linger. -I once wore nothing but violets all through one season, -as a form of artistic mourning for a romance that would not die. -Ultimately, however, it did die. I forget what killed it. -I think it was her proposing to sacrifice the whole world for me. -That is always a dreadful moment. It fills one with the terror -of eternity. Well--would you believe it?--a week ago, -at Lady Hampshire's, I found myself seated at dinner next -the lady in question, and she insisted on going over the whole -thing again, and digging up the past, and raking up the future. -I had buried my romance in a bed of asphodel. She dragged -it out again and assured me that I had spoiled her life. -I am bound to state that she ate an enormous dinner, so I did -not feel any anxiety. But what a lack of taste she showed! -The one charm of the past is that it is the past. -But women never know when the curtain has fallen. -They always want a sixth act, and as soon as the interest -of the play is entirely over, they propose to continue it. -If they were allowed their own way, every comedy would have -a tragic ending, and every tragedy would culminate in a farce. -They are charmingly artificial, but they have no sense of art. -You are more fortunate than I am. I assure you, Dorian, that not -one of the women I have known would have done for me what Sibyl -Vane did for you. Ordinary women always console themselves. -Some of them do it by going in for sentimental colours. -Never trust a woman who wears mauve, whatever her age may be, -or a woman over thirty-five who is fond of pink ribbons. -It always means that they have a history. Others find -a great consolation in suddenly discovering the good qualities -of their husbands. They flaunt their conjugal felicity -in one's face, as if it were the most fascinating of sins. -Religion consoles some. Its mysteries have all the charm -of a flirtation, a woman once told me, and I can quite -understand it. Besides, nothing makes one so vain as being told -that one is a sinner. Conscience makes egotists of us all. -Yes; there is really no end to the consolations that women find -in modern life. Indeed, I have not mentioned the most important -one." - -"What is that, Harry?" said the lad listlessly. - -"Oh, the obvious consolation. Taking some one else's admirer when one -loses one's own. In good society that always whitewashes a woman. -But really, Dorian, how different Sibyl Vane must have been from all the women -one meets! There is something to me quite beautiful about her death. -I am glad I am living in a century when such wonders happen. -They make one believe in the reality of the things we all play with, -such as romance, passion, and love." - -"I was terribly cruel to her. You forget that." - -"I am afraid that women appreciate cruelty, downright cruelty, -more than anything else. They have wonderfully primitive instincts. -We have emancipated them, but they remain slaves looking for their masters, -all the same. They love being dominated. I am sure you were splendid. -I have never seen you really and absolutely angry, but I can fancy how -delightful you looked. And, after all, you said something to me the day -before yesterday that seemed to me at the time to be merely fanciful, -but that I see now was absolutely true, and it holds the key -to everything." - -"What was that, Harry?" - -"You said to me that Sibyl Vane represented to you all the heroines -of romance--that she was Desdemona one night, and Ophelia the other; -that if she died as Juliet, she came to life as Imogen." - -"She will never come to life again now," muttered the lad, -burying his face in his hands. - -"No, she will never come to life. She has played her last part. -But you must think of that lonely death in the tawdry dressing-room -simply as a strange lurid fragment from some Jacobean tragedy, -as a wonderful scene from Webster, or Ford, or Cyril Tourneur. -The girl never really lived, and so she has never really died. -To you at least she was always a dream, a phantom that flitted -through Shakespeare's plays and left them lovelier for its presence, -a reed through which Shakespeare's music sounded richer and more -full of joy. The moment she touched actual life, she marred it, -and it marred her, and so she passed away. Mourn for Ophelia, -if you like. Put ashes on your head because Cordelia was strangled. -Cry out against Heaven because the daughter of Brabantio died. -But don't waste your tears over Sibyl Vane. She was less real than they -are." - -There was a silence. The evening darkened in the room. -Noiselessly, and with silver feet, the shadows crept in from -the garden. The colours faded wearily out of things. - -After some time Dorian Gray looked up. "You have explained me -to myself, Harry," he murmured with something of a sigh of relief. -"I felt all that you have said, but somehow I was afraid of it, -and I could not express it to myself. How well you know me! -But we will not talk again of what has happened. It has been -a marvellous experience. That is all. I wonder if life has still -in store for me anything as marvellous." - -"Life has everything in store for you, Dorian. There is nothing that you, -with your extraordinary good looks, will not be able to do." - -"But suppose, Harry, I became haggard, and old, and wrinkled? -What then?" - -"Ah, then," said Lord Henry, rising to go, "then, my dear Dorian, -you would have to fight for your victories. As it is, -they are brought to you. No, you must keep your good looks. -We live in an age that reads too much to be wise, and that -thinks too much to be beautiful. We cannot spare you. -And now you had better dress and drive down to the club. -We are rather late, as it is." - -"I think I shall join you at the opera, Harry. I feel too tired -to eat anything. What is the number of your sister's box?" - -"Twenty-seven, I believe. It is on the grand tier. -You will see her name on the door. But I am sorry you won't -come and dine." - -"I don't feel up to it," said Dorian listlessly. "But I am -awfully obliged to you for all that you have said to me. -You are certainly my best friend. No one has ever understood me -as you have." - -"We are only at the beginning of our friendship, Dorian," answered Lord Henry, -shaking him by the hand. "Good-bye. I shall see you before nine-thirty, -I hope. Remember, Patti is singing." - -As he closed the door behind him, Dorian Gray touched the bell, -and in a few minutes Victor appeared with the lamps and drew -the blinds down. He waited impatiently for him to go. -The man seemed to take an interminable time over everything. - -As soon as he had left, he rushed to the screen and drew it back. -No; there was no further change in the picture. It had received -the news of Sibyl Vane's death before he had known of it himself. -It was conscious of the events of life as they occurred. -The vicious cruelty that marred the fine lines of the mouth had, -no doubt, appeared at the very moment that the girl had drunk -the poison, whatever it was. Or was it indifferent to results? -Did it merely take cognizance of what passed within the soul? -He wondered, and hoped that some day he would see the change taking place -before his very eyes, shuddering as he hoped it. - -Poor Sibyl! What a romance it had all been! She had often mimicked -death on the stage. Then Death himself had touched her and taken -her with him. How had she played that dreadful last scene? -Had she cursed him, as she died? No; she had died for love of him, -and love would always be a sacrament to him now. She had atoned -for everything by the sacrifice she had made of her life. -He would not think any more of what she had made him go through, -on that horrible night at the theatre. When he thought of her, -it would be as a wonderful tragic figure sent on to the world's stage -to show the supreme reality of love. A wonderful tragic figure? -Tears came to his eyes as he remembered her childlike look, and winsome -fanciful ways, and shy tremulous grace. He brushed them away hastily and -looked again at the picture. - -He felt that the time had really come for making his choice. -Or had his choice already been made? Yes, life had decided -that for him--life, and his own infinite curiosity about life. -Eternal youth, infinite passion, pleasures subtle and secret, -wild joys and wilder sins--he was to have all these things. -The portrait was to bear the burden of his shame: -that was all. - -A feeling of pain crept over him as he thought of the desecration -that was in store for the fair face on the canvas. Once, in boyish -mockery of Narcissus, he had kissed, or feigned to kiss, -those painted lips that now smiled so cruelly at him. -Morning after morning he had sat before the portrait wondering at -its beauty, almost enamoured of it, as it seemed to him at times. -Was it to alter now with every mood to which he yielded? -Was it to become a monstrous and loathsome thing, to be hidden -away in a locked room, to be shut out from the sunlight that had -so often touched to brighter gold the waving wonder of its hair? -The pity of it! the pity of it! - -For a moment, he thought of praying that the horrible sympathy -that existed between him and the picture might cease. -It had changed in answer to a prayer; perhaps in answer to a prayer -it might remain unchanged. And yet, who, that knew anything -about life, would surrender the chance of remaining always young, -however fantastic that chance might be, or with what fateful consequences -it might be fraught? Besides, was it really under his control? -Had it indeed been prayer that had produced the substitution? -Might there not be some curious scientific reason for it all? -If thought could exercise its influence upon a living organism, -might not thought exercise an influence upon dead and inorganic things? -Nay, without thought or conscious desire, might not things external -to ourselves vibrate in unison with our moods and passions, -atom calling to atom in secret love or strange affinity? -But the reason was of no importance. He would never again tempt -by a prayer any terrible power. If the picture was to alter, -it was to alter. That was all. Why inquire too closely -into it? - -For there would be a real pleasure in watching it. -He would be able to follow his mind into its secret places. -This portrait would be to him the most magical of mirrors. -As it had revealed to him his own body, so it would reveal -to him his own soul. And when winter came upon it, he would -still be standing where spring trembles on the verge of summer. -When the blood crept from its face, and left behind a pallid mask -of chalk with leaden eyes, he would keep the glamour of boyhood. -Not one blossom of his loveliness would ever fade. Not one pulse -of his life would ever weaken. Like the gods of the Greeks, -he would be strong, and fleet, and joyous. What did it matter what -happened to the coloured image on the canvas? He would be safe. -That was everything. - -He drew the screen back into its former place in front of the picture, -smiling as he did so, and passed into his bedroom, where his valet was -already waiting for him. An hour later he was at the opera, and Lord -Henry was leaning over his chair. - - -CHAPTER 9 - -As he was sitting at breakfast next morning, Basil Hallward was shown -into the room. - -"I am so glad I have found you, Dorian," he said gravely. -"I called last night, and they told me you were at the opera. -Of course, I knew that was impossible. But I wish you had left -word where you had really gone to. I passed a dreadful evening, -half afraid that one tragedy might be followed by another. -I think you might have telegraphed for me when you heard of it first. -I read of it quite by chance in a late edition of The Globe -that I picked up at the club. I came here at once and was -miserable at not finding you. I can't tell you how heart-broken -I am about the whole thing. I know what you must suffer. -But where were you? Did you go down and see the girl's mother? -For a moment I thought of following you there. They gave -the address in the paper. Somewhere in the Euston Road, isn't it? -But I was afraid of intruding upon a sorrow that I could -not lighten. Poor woman! What a state she must be in! -And her only child, too! What did she say about it -all?" - -"My dear Basil, how do I know?" murmured Dorian Gray, sipping some -pale-yellow wine from a delicate, gold-beaded bubble of Venetian -glass and looking dreadfully bored. "I was at the opera. -You should have come on there. I met Lady Gwendolen, Harry's sister, -for the first time. We were in her box. She is perfectly charming; -and Patti sang divinely. Don't talk about horrid subjects. -If one doesn't talk about a thing, it has never happened. -It is simply expression, as Harry says, that gives reality to things. -I may mention that she was not the woman's only child. There is -a son, a charming fellow, I believe. But he is not on the stage. -He is a sailor, or something. And now, tell me about yourself and what you -are painting." - -"You went to the opera?" said Hallward, speaking very slowly -and with a strained touch of pain in his voice. "You went to -the opera while Sibyl Vane was lying dead in some sordid lodging? -You can talk to me of other women being charming, and of Patti -singing divinely, before the girl you loved has even the quiet -of a grave to sleep in? Why, man, there are horrors in store -for that little white body of hers!" - -"Stop, Basil! I won't hear it!" cried Dorian, leaping to his feet. -"You must not tell me about things. What is done is done. -What is past is past." - -"You call yesterday the past?" - -"What has the actual lapse of time got to do with it? It is -only shallow people who require years to get rid of an emotion. -A man who is master of himself can end a sorrow as easily as he can -invent a pleasure. I don't want to be at the mercy of my emotions. -I want to use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them." - -"Dorian, this is horrible! Something has changed you completely. -You look exactly the same wonderful boy who, day after day, -used to come down to my studio to sit for his picture. -But you were simple, natural, and affectionate then. -You were the most unspoiled creature in the whole world. -Now, I don't know what has come over you. You talk as if you -had no heart, no pity in you. It is all Harry's influence. -I see that." - -The lad flushed up and, going to the window, looked out for -a few moments on the green, flickering, sun-lashed garden. -"I owe a great deal to Harry, Basil," he said at last, -"more than I owe to you. You only taught me to be vain." - -"Well, I am punished for that, Dorian--or shall be some day." - -"I don't know what you mean, Basil," he exclaimed, turning round. -"I don't know what you want. What do you want?" - -"I want the Dorian Gray I used to paint," said the artist sadly. - -"Basil," said the lad, going over to him and putting his hand -on his shoulder, "you have come too late. Yesterday, when I -heard that Sibyl Vane had killed herself--" - -"Killed herself! Good heavens! is there no doubt about that?" -cried Hallward, looking up at him with an expression of horror. - -"My dear Basil! Surely you don't think it was a vulgar accident? -Of course she killed herself." - -The elder man buried his face in his hands. "How fearful," -he muttered, and a shudder ran through him. - -"No," said Dorian Gray, "there is nothing fearful about it. -It is one of the great romantic tragedies of the age. -As a rule, people who act lead the most commonplace lives. -They are good husbands, or faithful wives, or something tedious. -You know what I mean--middle-class virtue and all that kind of thing. -How different Sibyl was! She lived her finest tragedy. -She was always a heroine. The last night she played-- -the night you saw her--she acted badly because she had known -the reality of love. When she knew its unreality, she died, -as Juliet might have died. She passed again into the sphere of art. -There is something of the martyr about her. Her death has all -the pathetic uselessness of martyrdom, all its wasted beauty. -But, as I was saying, you must not think I have not suffered. -If you had come in yesterday at a particular moment-- -about half-past five, perhaps, or a quarter to six-- -you would have found me in tears. Even Harry, who was here, -who brought me the news, in fact, had no idea what I was -going through. I suffered immensely. Then it passed away. -I cannot repeat an emotion. No one can, except sentimentalists. -And you are awfully unjust, Basil. You come down here to console me. -That is charming of you. You find me consoled, and you are furious. -How like a sympathetic person! You remind me of a story -Harry told me about a certain philanthropist who spent twenty -years of his life in trying to get some grievance redressed, -or some unjust law altered--I forget exactly what it was. -Finally he succeeded, and nothing could exceed his disappointment. -He had absolutely nothing to do, almost died of ennui, and became -a confirmed misanthrope. And besides, my dear old Basil, -if you really want to console me, teach me rather to forget what -has happened, or to see it from a proper artistic point of view. -Was it not Gautier who used to write about la consolation des arts? -I remember picking up a little vellum-covered book in your -studio one day and chancing on that delightful phrase. -Well, I am not like that young man you told me of when we -were down at Marlow together, the young man who used to say -that yellow satin could console one for all the miseries of life. -I love beautiful things that one can touch and handle. -Old brocades, green bronzes, lacquer-work, carved ivories, -exquisite surroundings, luxury, pomp--there is much to be got -from all these. But the artistic temperament that they create, -or at any rate reveal, is still more to me. To become -the spectator of one's own life, as Harry says, is to escape -the suffering of life. I know you are surprised at my talking -to you like this. You have not realized how I have developed. -I was a schoolboy when you knew me. I am a man now. -I have new passions, new thoughts, new ideas. I am different, -but you must not like me less. I am changed, but you must -always be my friend. Of course, I am very fond of Harry. -But I know that you are better than he is. You are not stronger-- -you are too much afraid of life--but you are better. And how -happy we used to be together! Don't leave me, Basil, and don't -quarrel with me. I am what I am. There is nothing more to be -said." - -The painter felt strangely moved. The lad was infinitely dear to him, -and his personality had been the great turning point in his art. -He could not bear the idea of reproaching him any more. After all, -his indifference was probably merely a mood that would pass away. -There was so much in him that was good, so much in him that -was noble. - -"Well, Dorian," he said at length, with a sad smile, "I -won't speak to you again about this horrible thing, after to-day. -I only trust your name won't be mentioned in connection with it. -The inquest is to take place this afternoon. Have they summoned you?" - -Dorian shook his head, and a look of annoyance passed over his face -at the mention of the word "inquest." There was something so crude -and vulgar about everything of the kind. "They don't know my name," -he answered. - -"But surely she did?" - -"Only my Christian name, and that I am quite sure she never mentioned -to any one. She told me once that they were all rather curious to learn -who I was, and that she invariably told them my name was Prince Charming. -It was pretty of her. You must do me a drawing of Sibyl, Basil. -I should like to have something more of her than the memory of a few kisses -and some broken pathetic words." - -"I will try and do something, Dorian, if it would please you. -But you must come and sit to me yourself again. I can't get on -without you." - -"I can never sit to you again, Basil. It is impossible!" -he exclaimed, starting back. - -The painter stared at him. "My dear boy, what nonsense!" -he cried. "Do you mean to say you don't like what I did of you? -Where is it? Why have you pulled the screen in front of it? -Let me look at it. It is the best thing I have ever done. -Do take the screen away, Dorian. It is simply disgraceful -of your servant hiding my work like that. I felt the room looked -different as I came in." - -"My servant has nothing to do with it, Basil. You don't imagine I let -him arrange my room for me? He settles my flowers for me sometimes-- -that is all. No; I did it myself. The light was too strong on -the portrait." - -"Too strong! Surely not, my dear fellow? It is an admirable place for it. -Let me see it." And Hallward walked towards the corner of the room. - -A cry of terror broke from Dorian Gray's lips, and he rushed -between the painter and the screen. "Basil," he said, -looking very pale, "you must not look at it. I don't wish -you to." - -"Not look at my own work! You are not serious. Why shouldn't I look at it?" -exclaimed Hallward, laughing. - -"If you try to look at it, Basil, on my word of honour I will -never speak to you again as long as I live. I am quite serious. -I don't offer any explanation, and you are not to ask for any. -But, remember, if you touch this screen, everything is over -between us." - -Hallward was thunderstruck. He looked at Dorian Gray in -absolute amazement. He had never seen him like this before. -The lad was actually pallid with rage. His hands were clenched, -and the pupils of his eyes were like disks of blue fire. -He was trembling all over. - -"Dorian!" - -"Don't speak!" - -"But what is the matter? Of course I won't look at it if you don't want -me to," he said, rather coldly, turning on his heel and going over towards -the window. "But, really, it seems rather absurd that I shouldn't see my -own work, especially as I am going to exhibit it in Paris in the autumn. -I shall probably have to give it another coat of varnish before that, so I -must see it some day, and why not to-day?" - -"To exhibit it! You want to exhibit it?" exclaimed Dorian Gray, -a strange sense of terror creeping over him. Was the world going to be -shown his secret? Were people to gape at the mystery of his life? -That was impossible. Something--he did not know what--had to be done -at once. - -"Yes; I don't suppose you will object to that. Georges Petit -is going to collect all my best pictures for a special exhibition -in the Rue de Seze, which will open the first week in October. -The portrait will only be away a month. I should think you could easily -spare it for that time. In fact, you are sure to be out of town. -And if you keep it always behind a screen, you can't care much -about it." - -Dorian Gray passed his hand over his forehead. There were beads of -perspiration there. He felt that he was on the brink of a horrible danger. -"You told me a month ago that you would never exhibit it," he cried. -"Why have you changed your mind? You people who go in for being consistent -have just as many moods as others have. The only difference is that -your moods are rather meaningless. You can't have forgotten that you -assured me most solemnly that nothing in the world would induce you -to send it to any exhibition. You told Harry exactly the same thing." -He stopped suddenly, and a gleam of light came into his eyes. He remembered -that Lord Henry had said to him once, half seriously and half in jest, -"If you want to have a strange quarter of an hour, get Basil to tell you -why he won't exhibit your picture. He told me why he wouldn't, and it -was a revelation to me." Yes, perhaps Basil, too, had his secret. -He would ask him and try. - -"Basil," he said, coming over quite close and looking him straight -in the face, "we have each of us a secret. Let me know yours, -and I shall tell you mine. What was your reason for refusing -to exhibit my picture?" - -The painter shuddered in spite of himself. "Dorian, if I told you, -you might like me less than you do, and you would certainly laugh -at me. I could not bear your doing either of those two things. -If you wish me never to look at your picture again, I am content. -I have always you to look at. If you wish the best work I have ever done -to be hidden from the world, I am satisfied. Your friendship is dearer -to me than any fame or reputation." - -"No, Basil, you must tell me," insisted Dorian Gray. -"I think I have a right to know." His feeling of terror -had passed away, and curiosity had taken its place. -He was determined to find out Basil Hallward's mystery. - -"Let us sit down, Dorian," said the painter, looking troubled. -"Let us sit down. And just answer me one question. -Have you noticed in the picture something curious?--something that -probably at first did not strike you, but that revealed itself -to you suddenly?" - -"Basil!" cried the lad, clutching the arms of his chair with trembling -hands and gazing at him with wild startled eyes. - -"I see you did. Don't speak. Wait till you hear what I have to say. -Dorian, from the moment I met you, your personality had the most -extraordinary influence over me. I was dominated, soul, brain, and power, -by you. You became to me the visible incarnation of that unseen -ideal whose memory haunts us artists like an exquisite dream. -I worshipped you. I grew jealous of every one to whom you spoke. -I wanted to have you all to myself. I was only happy when I -was with you. When you were away from me, you were still present -in my art.... Of course, I never let you know anything about this. -It would have been impossible. You would not have understood it. -I hardly understood it myself. I only knew that I had seen perfection -face to face, and that the world had become wonderful to my eyes-- -too wonderful, perhaps, for in such mad worships there is peril, -the peril of losing them, no less than the peril of keeping them.... -Weeks and weeks went on, and I grew more and more absorbed in you. -Then came a new development. I had drawn you as Paris in -dainty armour, and as Adonis with huntsman's cloak and polished -boar-spear. Crowned with heavy lotus-blossoms you had sat on -the prow of Adrian's barge, gazing across the green turbid Nile. -You had leaned over the still pool of some Greek woodland and seen -in the water's silent silver the marvel of your own face. -And it had all been what art should be--unconscious, ideal, and remote. -One day, a fatal day I sometimes think, I determined to paint -a wonderful portrait of you as you actually are, not in the costume -of dead ages, but in your own dress and in your own time. -Whether it was the realism of the method, or the mere wonder -of your own personality, thus directly presented to me without -mist or veil, I cannot tell. But I know that as I worked at it, -every flake and film of colour seemed to me to reveal my secret. -I grew afraid that others would know of my idolatry. I felt, Dorian, -that I had told too much, that I had put too much of myself into it. -Then it was that I resolved never to allow the picture to be exhibited. -You were a little annoyed; but then you did not realize all that it -meant to me. Harry, to whom I talked about it, laughed at me. -But I did not mind that. When the picture was finished, and I sat -alone with it, I felt that I was right.... Well, after a few days -the thing left my studio, and as soon as I had got rid of the intolerable -fascination of its presence, it seemed to me that I had been foolish -in imagining that I had seen anything in it, more than that you -were extremely good-looking and that I could paint. Even now I -cannot help feeling that it is a mistake to think that the passion -one feels in creation is ever really shown in the work one creates. -Art is always more abstract than we fancy. Form and colour tell -us of form and colour--that is all. It often seems to me that art -conceals the artist far more completely than it ever reveals him. -And so when I got this offer from Paris, I determined to make your -portrait the principal thing in my exhibition. It never occurred -to me that you would refuse. I see now that you were right. -The picture cannot be shown. You must not be angry with me, Dorian, -for what I have told you. As I said to Harry, once, you are made to be -worshipped." - -Dorian Gray drew a long breath. The colour came back to his cheeks, -and a smile played about his lips. The peril was over. -He was safe for the time. Yet he could not help feeling -infinite pity for the painter who had just made this strange -confession to him, and wondered if he himself would ever -be so dominated by the personality of a friend. Lord Henry -had the charm of being very dangerous. But that was all. -He was too clever and too cynical to be really fond of. -Would there ever be some one who would fill him with a -strange idolatry? Was that one of the things that life had -in store? - -"It is extraordinary to me, Dorian," said Hallward, "that you -should have seen this in the portrait. Did you really see it?" - -"I saw something in it," he answered, "something that seemed -to me very curious." - -"Well, you don't mind my looking at the thing now?" - -Dorian shook his head. "You must not ask me that, Basil. -I could not possibly let you stand in front of that picture." - -"You will some day, surely?" - -"Never." - -"Well, perhaps you are right. And now good-bye, Dorian. -You have been the one person in my life who has really influenced -my art. Whatever I have done that is good, I owe to you. -Ah! you don't know what it cost me to tell you all that I have -told you." - -"My dear Basil," said Dorian, "what have you told me? -Simply that you felt that you admired me too much. -That is not even a compliment." - -"It was not intended as a compliment. It was a confession. -Now that I have made it, something seems to have gone out of me. -Perhaps one should never put one's worship into words." - -"It was a very disappointing confession." - -"Why, what did you expect, Dorian? You didn't see anything else -in the picture, did you? There was nothing else to see?" - -"No; there was nothing else to see. Why do you ask? -But you mustn't talk about worship. It is foolish. You and I -are friends, Basil, and we must always remain so." - -"You have got Harry," said the painter sadly. - -"Oh, Harry!" cried the lad, with a ripple of laughter. "Harry spends -his days in saying what is incredible and his evenings in doing -what is improbable. Just the sort of life I would like to lead. -But still I don't think I would go to Harry if I were in trouble. -I would sooner go to you, Basil." - -"You will sit to me again?" - -"Impossible!" - -"You spoil my life as an artist by refusing, Dorian. No man -comes across two ideal things. Few come across one." - -"I can't explain it to you, Basil, but I must never sit to you again. -There is something fatal about a portrait. It has a life of its own. -I will come and have tea with you. That will be just as pleasant." - -"Pleasanter for you, I am afraid," murmured Hallward regretfully. -"And now good-bye. I am sorry you won't let me look at the picture -once again. But that can't be helped. I quite understand what you feel -about it." - -As he left the room, Dorian Gray smiled to himself. Poor Basil! -How little he knew of the true reason! And how strange it -was that, instead of having been forced to reveal his own secret, -he had succeeded, almost by chance, in wresting a secret from -his friend! How much that strange confession explained to him! -The painter's absurd fits of jealousy, his wild devotion, -his extravagant panegyrics, his curious reticences-- -he understood them all now, and he felt sorry. There seemed -to him to be something tragic in a friendship so coloured -by romance. - -He sighed and touched the bell. The portrait must be hidden away -at all costs. He could not run such a risk of discovery again. -It had been mad of him to have allowed the thing to remain, -even for an hour, in a room to which any of his friends -had access. - - - -CHAPTER 10 - -When his servant entered, he looked at him steadfastly -and wondered if he had thought of peering behind the screen. -The man was quite impassive and waited for his orders. Dorian lit -a cigarette and walked over to the glass and glanced into it. -He could see the reflection of Victor's face perfectly. -It was like a placid mask of servility. There was nothing -to be afraid of, there. Yet he thought it best to be on -his guard. - -Speaking very slowly, he told him to tell the house-keeper that he wanted -to see her, and then to go to the frame-maker and ask him to send two of his -men round at once. It seemed to him that as the man left the room his eyes -wandered in the direction of the screen. Or was that merely his own fancy? - -After a few moments, in her black silk dress, with old-fashioned thread -mittens on her wrinkled hands, Mrs. Leaf bustled into the library. -He asked her for the key of the schoolroom. - -"The old schoolroom, Mr. Dorian?" she exclaimed. "Why, it is full of dust. -I must get it arranged and put straight before you go into it. It is not fit -for you to see, sir. It is not, indeed." - -"I don't want it put straight, Leaf. I only want the key." - -"Well, sir, you'll be covered with cobwebs if you go into it. Why, it hasn't -been opened for nearly five years--not since his lordship died." - -He winced at the mention of his grandfather. He had hateful memories of him. -"That does not matter," he answered. "I simply want to see the place-- -that is all. Give me the key." - -"And here is the key, sir," said the old lady, going over -the contents of her bunch with tremulously uncertain hands. -"Here is the key. I'll have it off the bunch in a moment. -But you don't think of living up there, sir, and you so -comfortable here?" - -"No, no," he cried petulantly. "Thank you, Leaf. That will do." - -She lingered for a few moments, and was garrulous over some detail -of the household. He sighed and told her to manage things as she -thought best. She left the room, wreathed in smiles. - -As the door closed, Dorian put the key in his pocket and looked round -the room. His eye fell on a large, purple satin coverlet heavily -embroidered with gold, a splendid piece of late seventeenth-century -Venetian work that his grandfather had found in a convent near Bologna. -Yes, that would serve to wrap the dreadful thing in. It had perhaps -served often as a pall for the dead. Now it was to hide something that -had a corruption of its own, worse than the corruption of death itself-- -something that would breed horrors and yet would never die. What the worm -was to the corpse, his sins would be to the painted image on the canvas. -They would mar its beauty and eat away its grace. They would defile -it and make it shameful. And yet the thing would still live on. -It would be always alive. - -He shuddered, and for a moment he regretted that he had not told -Basil the true reason why he had wished to hide the picture away. -Basil would have helped him to resist Lord Henry's influence, -and the still more poisonous influences that came from his -own temperament. The love that he bore him--for it was really love-- -had nothing in it that was not noble and intellectual. -It was not that mere physical admiration of beauty that is born -of the senses and that dies when the senses tire. It was such -love as Michelangelo had known, and Montaigne, and Winckelmann, -and Shakespeare himself. Yes, Basil could have saved him. -But it was too late now. The past could always be annihilated. -Regret, denial, or forgetfulness could do that. But the future -was inevitable. There were passions in him that would find -their terrible outlet, dreams that would make the shadow of their -evil real. - -He took up from the couch the great purple-and-gold texture that -covered it, and, holding it in his hands, passed behind the screen. -Was the face on the canvas viler than before? It seemed to him -that it was unchanged, and yet his loathing of it was intensified. -Gold hair, blue eyes, and rose-red lips--they all were there. -It was simply the expression that had altered. That was horrible -in its cruelty. Compared to what he saw in it of censure or rebuke, -how shallow Basil's reproaches about Sibyl Vane had been!-- -how shallow, and of what little account! His own soul was looking -out at him from the canvas and calling him to judgement. A look -of pain came across him, and he flung the rich pall over the picture. -As he did so, a knock came to the door. He passed out as his -servant entered. - -"The persons are here, Monsieur." - -He felt that the man must be got rid of at once. He must -not be allowed to know where the picture was being taken to. -There was something sly about him, and he had thoughtful, -treacherous eyes. Sitting down at the writing-table he scribbled -a note to Lord Henry, asking him to send him round something -to read and reminding him that they were to meet at eight-fifteen -that evening. - -"Wait for an answer," he said, handing it to him, "and show the men in here." - -In two or three minutes there was another knock, and Mr. Hubbard himself, -the celebrated frame-maker of South Audley Street, came in with a -somewhat rough-looking young assistant. Mr. Hubbard was a florid, -red-whiskered little man, whose admiration for art was considerably tempered -by the inveterate impecuniosity of most of the artists who dealt with him. -As a rule, he never left his shop. He waited for people to come to him. -But he always made an exception in favour of Dorian Gray. There was -something about Dorian that charmed everybody. It was a pleasure even to -see him. - -"What can I do for you, Mr. Gray?" he said, rubbing his fat freckled hands. -"I thought I would do myself the honour of coming round in person. I have -just got a beauty of a frame, sir. Picked it up at a sale. Old Florentine. -Came from Fonthill, I believe. Admirably suited for a religious subject, -Mr. Gray." - -"I am so sorry you have given yourself the trouble of coming round, -Mr. Hubbard. I shall certainly drop in and look at the frame-- -though I don't go in much at present for religious art--but to-day -I only want a picture carried to the top of the house for me. -It is rather heavy, so I thought I would ask you to lend me a couple of -your men." - -"No trouble at all, Mr. Gray. I am delighted to be of any service to you. -Which is the work of art, sir?" - -"This," replied Dorian, moving the screen back. "Can you move it, -covering and all, just as it is? I don't want it to get scratched -going upstairs." - -"There will be no difficulty, sir," said the genial frame-maker, beginning, -with the aid of his assistant, to unhook the picture from the long brass -chains by which it was suspended. "And, now, where shall we carry it to, -Mr. Gray?" - -"I will show you the way, Mr. Hubbard, if you will kindly follow me. -Or perhaps you had better go in front. I am afraid it is right at -the top of the house. We will go up by the front staircase, as it -is wider." - -He held the door open for them, and they passed out into the hall and began -the ascent. The elaborate character of the frame had made the picture -extremely bulky, and now and then, in spite of the obsequious protests -of Mr. Hubbard, who had the true tradesman's spirited dislike of seeing a -gentleman doing anything useful, Dorian put his hand to it so as to help them. - -"Something of a load to carry, sir," gasped the little man when they -reached the top landing. And he wiped his shiny forehead. - -"I am afraid it is rather heavy," murmured Dorian as he unlocked the door -that opened into the room that was to keep for him the curious secret of his -life and hide his soul from the eyes of men. - -He had not entered the place for more than four years--not, indeed, -since he had used it first as a play-room when he was a child, -and then as a study when he grew somewhat older. It was a large, -well-proportioned room, which had been specially built by the last -Lord Kelso for the use of the little grandson whom, for his strange -likeness to his mother, and also for other reasons, he had always -hated and desired to keep at a distance. It appeared to Dorian -to have but little changed. There was the huge Italian cassone, -with its fantastically painted panels and its tarnished -gilt mouldings, in which he had so often hidden himself as a boy. -There the satinwood book-case filled with his dog-eared schoolbooks. -On the wall behind it was hanging the same ragged Flemish tapestry -where a faded king and queen were playing chess in a garden, -while a company of hawkers rode by, carrying hooded birds on their -gauntleted wrists. How well he remembered it all! Every moment -of his lonely childhood came back to him as he looked round. -He recalled the stainless purity of his boyish life, and it seemed horrible -to him that it was here the fatal portrait was to be hidden away. -How little he had thought, in those dead days, of all that was in store -for him! - -But there was no other place in the house so secure from prying eyes as this. -He had the key, and no one else could enter it. Beneath its purple pall, -the face painted on the canvas could grow bestial, sodden, and unclean. -What did it matter? No one could see it. He himself would not see it. -Why should he watch the hideous corruption of his soul? He kept his youth-- -that was enough. And, besides, might not his nature grow finer, after all? -There was no reason that the future should be so full of shame. -Some love might come across his life, and purify him, and shield him -from those sins that seemed to be already stirring in spirit and in flesh-- -those curious unpictured sins whose very mystery lent them their subtlety and -their charm. Perhaps, some day, the cruel look would have passed away from -the scarlet sensitive mouth, and he might show to the world Basil Hallward's -masterpiece. - -No; that was impossible. Hour by hour, and week by week, the thing -upon the canvas was growing old. It might escape the hideousness -of sin, but the hideousness of age was in store for it. -The cheeks would become hollow or flaccid. Yellow crow's feet -would creep round the fading eyes and make them horrible. -The hair would lose its brightness, the mouth would gape or droop, -would be foolish or gross, as the mouths of old men are. -There would be the wrinkled throat, the cold, blue-veined hands, -the twisted body, that he remembered in the grandfather who had been -so stern to him in his boyhood. The picture had to be concealed. -There was no help for it. - -"Bring it in, Mr. Hubbard, please," he said, wearily, turning round. -"I am sorry I kept you so long. I was thinking of something else." - -"Always glad to have a rest, Mr. Gray," answered the frame-maker, -who was still gasping for breath. "Where shall we put it, sir?" - -"Oh, anywhere. Here: this will do. I don't want to have it hung up. -Just lean it against the wall. Thanks." - -"Might one look at the work of art, sir?" - -Dorian started. "It would not interest you, Mr. Hubbard," -he said, keeping his eye on the man. He felt ready to leap -upon him and fling him to the ground if he dared to lift -the gorgeous hanging that concealed the secret of his life. -"I shan't trouble you any more now. I am much obliged for your -kindness in coming round." - -"Not at all, not at all, Mr. Gray. Ever ready to do anything for you, sir." -And Mr. Hubbard tramped downstairs, followed by the assistant, who glanced -back at Dorian with a look of shy wonder in his rough uncomely face. -He had never seen any one so marvellous. - -When the sound of their footsteps had died away, Dorian locked -the door and put the key in his pocket. He felt safe now. -No one would ever look upon the horrible thing. No eye but his -would ever see his shame. - -On reaching the library, he found that it was just after -five o'clock and that the tea had been already brought up. -On a little table of dark perfumed wood thickly incrusted with nacre, -a present from Lady Radley, his guardian's wife, a pretty -professional invalid who had spent the preceding winter in Cairo, -was lying a note from Lord Henry, and beside it was a book bound -in yellow paper, the cover slightly torn and the edges soiled. -A copy of the third edition of The St. James's Gazette had been -placed on the tea-tray. It was evident that Victor had returned. -He wondered if he had met the men in the hall as they were leaving -the house and had wormed out of them what they had been doing. -He would be sure to miss the picture--had no doubt missed -it already, while he had been laying the tea-things. The screen -had not been set back, and a blank space was visible on the wall. -Perhaps some night he might find him creeping upstairs and trying -to force the door of the room. It was a horrible thing to have -a spy in one's house. He had heard of rich men who had been -blackmailed all their lives by some servant who had read a letter, -or overheard a conversation, or picked up a card with an address, -or found beneath a pillow a withered flower or a shred of -crumpled lace. - -He sighed, and having poured himself out some tea, opened Lord Henry's note. -It was simply to say that he sent him round the evening paper, and a book -that might interest him, and that he would be at the club at eight-fifteen. He -opened The St. James's languidly, and looked through it. A red pencil-mark on -the fifth page caught his eye. It drew attention to the following paragraph: - - -INQUEST ON AN ACTRESS.--An inquest was held this morning at the Bell Tavern, -Hoxton Road, by Mr. Danby, the District Coroner, on the body of Sibyl Vane, -a young actress recently engaged at the Royal Theatre, Holborn. A verdict -of death by misadventure was returned. Considerable sympathy was expressed -for the mother of the deceased, who was greatly affected during the giving -of her own evidence, and that of Dr. Birrell, who had made the post-mortem -examination of the deceased. - - -He frowned, and tearing the paper in two, went across -the room and flung the pieces away. How ugly it all was! -And how horribly real ugliness made things! He felt a little -annoyed with Lord Henry for having sent him the report. -And it was certainly stupid of him to have marked it with red pencil. -Victor might have read it. The man knew more than enough English -for that. - -Perhaps he had read it and had begun to suspect something. -And, yet, what did it matter? What had Dorian Gray to do -with Sibyl Vane's death? There was nothing to fear. -Dorian Gray had not killed her. - -His eye fell on the yellow book that Lord Henry had sent him. -What was it, he wondered. He went towards the little, -pearl-coloured octagonal stand that had always looked to him -like the work of some strange Egyptian bees that wrought in silver, -and taking up the volume, flung himself into an arm-chair and began -to turn over the leaves. After a few minutes he became absorbed. -It was the strangest book that he had ever read. It seemed to him -that in exquisite raiment, and to the delicate sound of flutes, -the sins of the world were passing in dumb show before him. -Things that he had dimly dreamed of were suddenly made -real to him. Things of which he had never dreamed were -gradually revealed. - -It was a novel without a plot and with only one character, being, indeed, -simply a psychological study of a certain young Parisian who spent his life -trying to realize in the nineteenth century all the passions and modes -of thought that belonged to every century except his own, and to sum up, -as it were, in himself the various moods through which the world-spirit had -ever passed, loving for their mere artificiality those renunciations that men -have unwisely called virtue, as much as those natural rebellions that wise -men still call sin. The style in which it was written was that curious -jewelled style, vivid and obscure at once, full of argot and of archaisms, -of technical expressions and of elaborate paraphrases, that characterizes -the work of some of the finest artists of the French school of Symbolistes. -There were in it metaphors as monstrous as orchids and as subtle in colour. -The life of the senses was described in the terms of mystical philosophy. -One hardly knew at times whether one was reading the spiritual ecstasies -of some mediaeval saint or the morbid confessions of a modern sinner. -It was a poisonous book. The heavy odour of incense seemed to cling about its -pages and to trouble the brain. The mere cadence of the sentences, the subtle -monotony of their music, so full as it was of complex refrains and movements -elaborately repeated, produced in the mind of the lad, as he passed from -chapter to chapter, a form of reverie, a malady of dreaming, that made him -unconscious of the falling day and creeping shadows. - -Cloudless, and pierced by one solitary star, a copper-green -sky gleamed through the windows. He read on by its wan light -till he could read no more. Then, after his valet had reminded -him several times of the lateness of the hour, he got up, -and going into the next room, placed the book on the little -Florentine table that always stood at his bedside and began -to dress for dinner. - -It was almost nine o'clock before he reached the club, where he found -Lord Henry sitting alone, in the morning-room, looking very much bored. - -"I am so sorry, Harry," he cried, "but really it is entirely your fault. -That book you sent me so fascinated me that I forgot how the time -was going." - -"Yes, I thought you would like it," replied his host, rising from his chair. - -"I didn't say I liked it, Harry. I said it fascinated me. -There is a great difference." - -"Ah, you have discovered that?" murmured Lord Henry. -And they passed into the dining-room. - - - -CHAPTER 11 - -For years, Dorian Gray could not free himself from the influence -of this book. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say -that he never sought to free himself from it. He procured from -Paris no less than nine large-paper copies of the first edition, -and had them bound in different colours, so that they might suit -his various moods and the changing fancies of a nature over -which he seemed, at times, to have almost entirely lost control. -The hero, the wonderful young Parisian in whom the romantic -and the scientific temperaments were so strangely blended, -became to him a kind of prefiguring type of himself. -And, indeed, the whole book seemed to him to contain the story -of his own life, written before he had lived it. - -In one point he was more fortunate than the novel's fantastic hero. -He never knew--never, indeed, had any cause to know--that somewhat -grotesque dread of mirrors, and polished metal surfaces, and still -water which came upon the young Parisian so early in his life, -and was occasioned by the sudden decay of a beau that had once, -apparently, been so remarkable. It was with an almost cruel joy-- -and perhaps in nearly every joy, as certainly in every pleasure, -cruelty has its place--that he used to read the latter part of the book, -with its really tragic, if somewhat overemphasized, account of the sorrow -and despair of one who had himself lost what in others, and the world, -he had most dearly valued. - -For the wonderful beauty that had so fascinated Basil Hallward, -and many others besides him, seemed never to leave him. -Even those who had heard the most evil things against him-- -and from time to time strange rumours about his mode of life -crept through London and became the chatter of the clubs-- -could not believe anything to his dishonour when they saw him. -He had always the look of one who had kept himself unspotted -from the world. Men who talked grossly became silent when Dorian -Gray entered the room. There was something in the purity of his -face that rebuked them. His mere presence seemed to recall -to them the memory of the innocence that they had tarnished. -They wondered how one so charming and graceful as he was could -have escaped the stain of an age that was at once sordid -and sensual. - -Often, on returning home from one of those mysterious and -prolonged absences that gave rise to such strange conjecture -among those who were his friends, or thought that they were so, -he himself would creep upstairs to the locked room, open the door -with the key that never left him now, and stand, with a mirror, -in front of the portrait that Basil Hallward had painted of him, -looking now at the evil and aging face on the canvas, and now at -the fair young face that laughed back at him from the polished glass. -The very sharpness of the contrast used to quicken his sense -of pleasure. He grew more and more enamoured of his own beauty, -more and more interested in the corruption of his own soul. -He would examine with minute care, and sometimes with a monstrous -and terrible delight, the hideous lines that seared the wrinkling -forehead or crawled around the heavy sensual mouth, wondering sometimes -which were the more horrible, the signs of sin or the signs of age. -He would place his white hands beside the coarse bloated hands -of the picture, and smile. He mocked the misshapen body and the -failing limbs. - -There were moments, indeed, at night, when, lying sleepless -in his own delicately scented chamber, or in the sordid -room of the little ill-famed tavern near the docks which, -under an assumed name and in disguise, it was his habit -to frequent, he would think of the ruin he had brought upon -his soul with a pity that was all the more poignant because it -was purely selfish. But moments such as these were rare. -That curiosity about life which Lord Henry had first stirred -in him, as they sat together in the garden of their friend, -seemed to increase with gratification. The more he knew, -the more he desired to know. He had mad hungers that grew more -ravenous as he fed them. - -Yet he was not really reckless, at any rate in his relations to society. -Once or twice every month during the winter, and on each Wednesday -evening while the season lasted, he would throw open to the world -his beautiful house and have the most celebrated musicians of the day -to charm his guests with the wonders of their art. His little dinners, -in the settling of which Lord Henry always assisted him, were noted -as much for the careful selection and placing of those invited, -as for the exquisite taste shown in the decoration of the table, -with its subtle symphonic arrangements of exotic flowers, -and embroidered cloths, and antique plate of gold and silver. -Indeed, there were many, especially among the very young men, who saw, -or fancied that they saw, in Dorian Gray the true realization -of a type of which they had often dreamed in Eton or Oxford days, -a type that was to combine something of the real culture of the scholar -with all the grace and distinction and perfect manner of a citizen -of the world. To them he seemed to be of the company of those whom -Dante describes as having sought to "make themselves perfect -by the worship of beauty." Like Gautier, he was one for whom "the -visible world existed." - -And, certainly, to him life itself was the first, the greatest, -of the arts, and for it all the other arts seemed to be but -a preparation. Fashion, by which what is really fantastic -becomes for a moment universal, and dandyism, which, in its -own way, is an attempt to assert the absolute modernity -of beauty, had, of course, their fascination for him. -His mode of dressing, and the particular styles that from time -to time he affected, had their marked influence on the young -exquisites of the Mayfair balls and Pall Mall club windows, -who copied him in everything that he did, and tried to reproduce -the accidental charm of his graceful, though to him only -half-serious, fopperies. - -For, while he was but too ready to accept the position that -was almost immediately offered to him on his coming of age, -and found, indeed, a subtle pleasure in the thought that he might -really become to the London of his own day what to imperial -Neronian Rome the author of the Satyricon once had been, -yet in his inmost heart he desired to be something more than a mere -arbiter elegantiarum, to be consulted on the wearing of a jewel, -or the knotting of a necktie, or the conduct of a cane. -He sought to elaborate some new scheme of life that would have -its reasoned philosophy and its ordered principles, and find -in the spiritualizing of the senses its highest realization. - -The worship of the senses has often, and with much justice, -been decried, men feeling a natural instinct of terror about -passions and sensations that seem stronger than themselves, -and that they are conscious of sharing with the less highly -organized forms of existence. But it appeared to Dorian Gray -that the true nature of the senses had never been understood, -and that they had remained savage and animal merely because -the world had sought to starve them into submission or to kill -them by pain, instead of aiming at making them elements -of a new spirituality, of which a fine instinct for beauty was -to be the dominant characteristic. As he looked back upon man -moving through history, he was haunted by a feeling of loss. -So much had been surrendered! and to such little purpose! -There had been mad wilful rejections, monstrous forms -of self-torture and self-denial, whose origin was fear -and whose result was a degradation infinitely more terrible -than that fancied degradation from which, in their ignorance, -they had sought to escape; Nature, in her wonderful irony, -driving out the anchorite to feed with the wild animals of -the desert and giving to the hermit the beasts of the field as -his companions. - -Yes: there was to be, as Lord Henry had prophesied, a new Hedonism -that was to recreate life and to save it from that harsh uncomely -puritanism that is having, in our own day, its curious revival. -It was to have its service of the intellect, certainly, yet it was -never to accept any theory or system that would involve the sacrifice -of any mode of passionate experience. Its aim, indeed, was to be -experience itself, and not the fruits of experience, sweet or bitter -as they might be. Of the asceticism that deadens the senses, -as of the vulgar profligacy that dulls them, it was to know nothing. -But it was to teach man to concentrate himself upon the moments of a life -that is itself but a moment. - -There are few of us who have not sometimes wakened before dawn, -either after one of those dreamless nights that make us almost -enamoured of death, or one of those nights of horror and misshapen joy, -when through the chambers of the brain sweep phantoms more terrible -than reality itself, and instinct with that vivid life that lurks -in all grotesques, and that lends to Gothic art its enduring vitality, -this art being, one might fancy, especially the art of those whose -minds have been troubled with the malady of reverie. Gradually white -fingers creep through the curtains, and they appear to tremble. -In black fantastic shapes, dumb shadows crawl into the corners -of the room and crouch there. Outside, there is the stirring -of birds among the leaves, or the sound of men going forth -to their work, or the sigh and sob of the wind coming down from -the hills and wandering round the silent house, as though it feared -to wake the sleepers and yet must needs call forth sleep from -her purple cave. Veil after veil of thin dusky gauze is lifted, -and by degrees the forms and colours of things are restored to them, -and we watch the dawn remaking the world in its antique pattern. -The wan mirrors get back their mimic life. The flameless tapers -stand where we had left them, and beside them lies the half-cut book -that we had been studying, or the wired flower that we had worn at -the ball, or the letter that we had been afraid to read, or that we -had read too often. Nothing seems to us changed. Out of the unreal -shadows of the night comes back the real life that we had known. -We have to resume it where we had left off, and there steals over us -a terrible sense of the necessity for the continuance of energy -in the same wearisome round of stereotyped habits, or a wild longing, -it may be, that our eyelids might open some morning upon a world -that had been refashioned anew in the darkness for our pleasure, -a world in which things would have fresh shapes and colours, -and be changed, or have other secrets, a world in which the past -would have little or no place, or survive, at any rate, -in no conscious form of obligation or regret, the remembrance -even of joy having its bitterness and the memories of pleasure -their pain. - -It was the creation of such worlds as these that seemed to Dorian -Gray to be the true object, or amongst the true objects, of life; -and in his search for sensations that would be at once new and delightful, -and possess that element of strangeness that is so essential to romance, -he would often adopt certain modes of thought that he knew to be really -alien to his nature, abandon himself to their subtle influences, -and then, having, as it were, caught their colour and satisfied his -intellectual curiosity, leave them with that curious indifference -that is not incompatible with a real ardour of temperament, and that, -indeed, according to certain modern psychologists, is often a condition -of it. - -It was rumoured of him once that he was about to join the Roman -Catholic communion, and certainly the Roman ritual had always -a great attraction for him. The daily sacrifice, more awful -really than all the sacrifices of the antique world, stirred him -as much by its superb rejection of the evidence of the senses -as by the primitive simplicity of its elements and the eternal -pathos of the human tragedy that it sought to symbolize. He loved -to kneel down on the cold marble pavement and watch the priest, -in his stiff flowered dalmatic, slowly and with white hands moving -aside the veil of the tabernacle, or raising aloft the jewelled, -lantern-shaped monstrance with that pallid wafer that at times, -one would fain think, is indeed the "panis caelestis," the bread -of angels, or, robed in the garments of the Passion of Christ, -breaking the Host into the chalice and smiting his breast for his sins. -The fuming censers that the grave boys, in their lace and scarlet, -tossed into the air like great gilt flowers had their subtle -fascination for him. As he passed out, he used to look with wonder -at the black confessionals and long to sit in the dim shadow of one -of them and listen to men and women whispering through the worn -grating the true story of their lives. - -But he never fell into the error of arresting his intellectual development -by any formal acceptance of creed or system, or of mistaking, for a house -in which to live, an inn that is but suitable for the sojourn of a night, -or for a few hours of a night in which there are no stars and the moon is -in travail. Mysticism, with its marvellous power of making common things -strange to us, and the subtle antinomianism that always seems to accompany it, -moved him for a season; and for a season he inclined to the materialistic -doctrines of the Darwinismus movement in Germany, and found a curious pleasure -in tracing the thoughts and passions of men to some pearly cell in the brain, -or some white nerve in the body, delighting in the conception of the absolute -dependence of the spirit on certain physical conditions, morbid or healthy, -normal or diseased. Yet, as has been said of him before, no theory of life -seemed to him to be of any importance compared with life itself. He felt -keenly conscious of how barren all intellectual speculation is when separated -from action and experiment. He knew that the senses, no less than the soul, -have their spiritual mysteries to reveal. - -And so he would now study perfumes and the secrets of their manufacture, -distilling heavily scented oils and burning odorous gums from the East. -He saw that there was no mood of the mind that had not its counterpart -in the sensuous life, and set himself to discover their true relations, -wondering what there was in frankincense that made one mystical, -and in ambergris that stirred one's passions, and in violets that woke -the memory of dead romances, and in musk that troubled the brain, -and in champak that stained the imagination; and seeking often to elaborate -a real psychology of perfumes, and to estimate the several influences -of sweet-smelling roots and scented, pollen-laden flowers; of aromatic balms -and of dark and fragrant woods; of spikenard, that sickens; of hovenia, -that makes men mad; and of aloes, that are said to be able to expel melancholy -from the soul. - -At another time he devoted himself entirely to music, and in a long -latticed room, with a vermilion-and-gold ceiling and walls of olive-green -lacquer, he used to give curious concerts in which mad gipsies tore wild -music from little zithers, or grave, yellow-shawled Tunisians plucked -at the strained strings of monstrous lutes, while grinning Negroes -beat monotonously upon copper drums and, crouching upon scarlet mats, -slim turbaned Indians blew through long pipes of reed or brass and charmed-- -or feigned to charm--great hooded snakes and horrible horned adders. -The harsh intervals and shrill discords of barbaric music stirred -him at times when Schubert's grace, and Chopin's beautiful sorrows, -and the mighty harmonies of Beethoven himself, fell unheeded on his ear. -He collected together from all parts of the world the strangest instruments -that could be found, either in the tombs of dead nations or among the few -savage tribes that have survived contact with Western civilizations, -and loved to touch and try them. He had the mysterious juruparis of the Rio -Negro Indians, that women are not allowed to look at and that even youths -may not see till they have been subjected to fasting and scourging, -and the earthen jars of the Peruvians that have the shrill cries of birds, -and flutes of human bones such as Alfonso de Ovalle heard in Chile, -and the sonorous green jaspers that are found near Cuzco and give forth -a note of singular sweetness. He had painted gourds filled with pebbles -that rattled when they were shaken; the long clarin of the Mexicans, -into which the performer does not blow, but through which he inhales -the air; the harsh ture of the Amazon tribes, that is sounded by -the sentinels who sit all day long in high trees, and can be heard, -it is said, at a distance of three leagues; the teponaztli, that has -two vibrating tongues of wood and is beaten with sticks that are -smeared with an elastic gum obtained from the milky juice of plants; -the yotl-bells of the Aztecs, that are hung in clusters like grapes; -and a huge cylindrical drum, covered with the skins of great serpents, -like the one that Bernal Diaz saw when he went with Cortes into the Mexican -temple, and of whose doleful sound he has left us so vivid a description. -The fantastic character of these instruments fascinated him, and he felt -a curious delight in the thought that art, like Nature, has her monsters, -things of bestial shape and with hideous voices. Yet, after some time, -he wearied of them, and would sit in his box at the opera, either alone -or with Lord Henry, listening in rapt pleasure to "Tannhauser" and seeing -in the prelude to that great work of art a presentation of the tragedy of -his own soul. - -On one occasion he took up the study of jewels, and appeared -at a costume ball as Anne de Joyeuse, Admiral of France, -in a dress covered with five hundred and sixty pearls. -This taste enthralled him for years, and, indeed, may be said -never to have left him. He would often spend a whole day -settling and resettling in their cases the various stones that he -had collected, such as the olive-green chrysoberyl that turns red -by lamplight, the cymophane with its wirelike line of silver, -the pistachio-coloured peridot, rose-pink and wine-yellow topazes, -carbuncles of fiery scarlet with tremulous, four-rayed stars, -flame-red cinnamon-stones, orange and violet spinels, -and amethysts with their alternate layers of ruby and sapphire. -He loved the red gold of the sunstone, and the moonstone's -pearly whiteness, and the broken rainbow of the milky opal. -He procured from Amsterdam three emeralds of extraordinary size and -richness of colour, and had a turquoise de la vieille roche that was -the envy of all the connoisseurs. - -He discovered wonderful stories, also, about jewels. -In Alphonso's Clericalis Disciplina a serpent was mentioned with -eyes of real jacinth, and in the romantic history of Alexander, -the Conqueror of Emathia was said to have found in the vale of Jordan -snakes "with collars of real emeralds growing on their backs." -There was a gem in the brain of the dragon, Philostratus told us, -and "by the exhibition of golden letters and a scarlet robe" -the monster could be thrown into a magical sleep and slain. -According to the great alchemist, Pierre de Boniface, the diamond -rendered a man invisible, and the agate of India made him eloquent. -The cornelian appeased anger, and the hyacinth provoked sleep, -and the amethyst drove away the fumes of wine. The garnet cast -out demons, and the hydropicus deprived the moon of her colour. -The selenite waxed and waned with the moon, and the meloceus, -that discovers thieves, could be affected only by the blood of kids. -Leonardus Camillus had seen a white stone taken from the brain of a newly -killed toad, that was a certain antidote against poison. The bezoar, -that was found in the heart of the Arabian deer, was a charm that could -cure the plague. In the nests of Arabian birds was the aspilates, -that, according to Democritus, kept the wearer from any danger -by fire. - -The King of Ceilan rode through his city with a large ruby in his hand, -as the ceremony of his coronation. The gates of the palace of John -the Priest were "made of sardius, with the horn of the horned -snake inwrought, so that no man might bring poison within." -Over the gable were "two golden apples, in which were two carbuncles," -so that the gold might shine by day and the carbuncles by night. -In Lodge's strange romance 'A Margarite of America', it was stated -that in the chamber of the queen one could behold "all the chaste -ladies of the world, inchased out of silver, looking through fair -mirrours of chrysolites, carbuncles, sapphires, and greene emeraults." -Marco Polo had seen the inhabitants of Zipangu place rose-coloured -pearls in the mouths of the dead. A sea-monster had been -enamoured of the pearl that the diver brought to King Perozes, -and had slain the thief, and mourned for seven moons over its loss. -When the Huns lured the king into the great pit, he flung it away-- -Procopius tells the story--nor was it ever found again, -though the Emperor Anastasius offered five hundred-weight of gold -pieces for it. The King of Malabar had shown to a certain Venetian -a rosary of three hundred and four pearls, one for every god that -he worshipped. - -When the Duke de Valentinois, son of Alexander VI, visited Louis XII -of France, his horse was loaded with gold leaves, according to Brantome, -and his cap had double rows of rubies that threw out a great light. -Charles of England had ridden in stirrups hung with four hundred and -twenty-one diamonds. Richard II had a coat, valued at thirty thousand marks, -which was covered with balas rubies. Hall described Henry VIII, -on his way to the Tower previous to his coronation, as wearing "a -jacket of raised gold, the placard embroidered with diamonds and other -rich stones, and a great bauderike about his neck of large balasses." -The favourites of James I wore ear-rings of emeralds set in gold filigrane. -Edward II gave to Piers Gaveston a suit of red-gold armour studded -with jacinths, a collar of gold roses set with turquoise-stones, and a -skull-cap parseme with pearls. Henry II wore jewelled gloves reaching -to the elbow, and had a hawk-glove sewn with twelve rubies and fifty-two -great orients. The ducal hat of Charles the Rash, the last Duke -of Burgundy of his race, was hung with pear-shaped pearls and studded -with sapphires. - -How exquisite life had once been! How gorgeous in its pomp and decoration! -Even to read of the luxury of the dead was wonderful. - -Then he turned his attention to embroideries and to the tapestries -that performed the office of frescoes in the chill rooms of -the northern nations of Europe. As he investigated the subject-- -and he always had an extraordinary faculty of becoming absolutely -absorbed for the moment in whatever he took up--he was almost -saddened by the reflection of the ruin that time brought on -beautiful and wonderful things. He, at any rate, had escaped that. -Summer followed summer, and the yellow jonquils bloomed and died -many times, and nights of horror repeated the story of their shame, -but he was unchanged. No winter marred his face or stained his -flowerlike bloom. How different it was with material things! -Where had they passed to? Where was the great crocus-coloured robe, -on which the gods fought against the giants, that had been worked -by brown girls for the pleasure of Athena? Where the huge -velarium that Nero had stretched across the Colosseum at Rome, -that Titan sail of purple on which was represented the starry sky, -and Apollo driving a chariot drawn by white, gilt-reined steeds? -He longed to see the curious table-napkins wrought for the Priest -of the Sun, on which were displayed all the dainties and viands that -could be wanted for a feast; the mortuary cloth of King Chilperic, -with its three hundred golden bees; the fantastic robes that excited -the indignation of the Bishop of Pontus and were figured with -"lions, panthers, bears, dogs, forests, rocks, hunters--all, in fact, -that a painter can copy from nature"; and the coat that Charles -of Orleans once wore, on the sleeves of which were embroidered -the verses of a song beginning "Madame, je suis tout joyeux," -the musical accompaniment of the words being wrought in gold thread, -and each note, of square shape in those days, formed with four pearls. -He read of the room that was prepared at the palace at Rheims for -the use of Queen Joan of Burgundy and was decorated with "thirteen -hundred and twenty-one parrots, made in broidery, and blazoned -with the king's arms, and five hundred and sixty-one butterflies, -whose wings were similarly ornamented with the arms of the queen, -the whole worked in gold." Catherine de Medicis had a mourning-bed -made for her of black velvet powdered with crescents and suns. -Its curtains were of damask, with leafy wreaths and garlands, -figured upon a gold and silver ground, and fringed along the edges -with broideries of pearls, and it stood in a room hung with rows -of the queen's devices in cut black velvet upon cloth of silver. -Louis XIV had gold embroidered caryatides fifteen feet high -in his apartment. The state bed of Sobieski, King of Poland, -was made of Smyrna gold brocade embroidered in turquoises with verses -from the Koran. Its supports were of silver gilt, beautifully chased, -and profusely set with enamelled and jewelled medallions. -It had been taken from the Turkish camp before Vienna, and the -standard of Mohammed had stood beneath the tremulous gilt of its -canopy. - -And so, for a whole year, he sought to accumulate the most exquisite -specimens that he could find of textile and embroidered work, -getting the dainty Delhi muslins, finely wrought with gold-thread palmates -and stitched over with iridescent beetles' wings; the Dacca gauzes, -that from their transparency are known in the East as "woven air," -and "running water," and "evening dew"; strange figured cloths from Java; -elaborate yellow Chinese hangings; books bound in tawny satins or fair blue -silks and wrought with fleurs-de-lis, birds and images; veils of lacis -worked in Hungary point; Sicilian brocades and stiff Spanish velvets; -Georgian work, with its gilt coins, and Japanese Foukousas, with their -green-toned golds and their marvellously plumaged birds. - -He had a special passion, also, for ecclesiastical vestments, -as indeed he had for everything connected with the service -of the Church. In the long cedar chests that lined the west -gallery of his house, he had stored away many rare and beautiful -specimens of what is really the raiment of the Bride of Christ, -who must wear purple and jewels and fine linen that she may -hide the pallid macerated body that is worn by the suffering -that she seeks for and wounded by self-inflicted pain. -He possessed a gorgeous cope of crimson silk and gold-thread damask, -figured with a repeating pattern of golden pomegranates set -in six-petalled formal blossoms, beyond which on either side -was the pine-apple device wrought in seed-pearls. The orphreys -were divided into panels representing scenes from the life -of the Virgin, and the coronation of the Virgin was figured -in coloured silks upon the hood. This was Italian work -of the fifteenth century. Another cope was of green velvet, -embroidered with heart-shaped groups of acanthus-leaves, from -which spread long-stemmed white blossoms, the details of which -were picked out with silver thread and coloured crystals. -The morse bore a seraph's head in gold-thread raised work. -The orphreys were woven in a diaper of red and gold silk, -and were starred with medallions of many saints and martyrs, -among whom was St. Sebastian. He had chasubles, also, -of amber-coloured silk, and blue silk and gold brocade, -and yellow silk damask and cloth of gold, figured with -representations of the Passion and Crucifixion of Christ, -and embroidered with lions and peacocks and other emblems; -dalmatics of white satin and pink silk damask, decorated with -tulips and dolphins and fleurs-de-lis; altar frontals -of crimson velvet and blue linen; and many corporals, -chalice-veils, and sudaria. In the mystic offices to which -such things were put, there was something that quickened -his imagination. - -For these treasures, and everything that he collected in his lovely house, -were to be to him means of forgetfulness, modes by which he could escape, -for a season, from the fear that seemed to him at times to be almost too -great to be borne. Upon the walls of the lonely locked room where he had -spent so much of his boyhood, he had hung with his own hands the terrible -portrait whose changing features showed him the real degradation of his life, -and in front of it had draped the purple-and-gold pall as a curtain. -For weeks he would not go there, would forget the hideous painted thing, -and get back his light heart, his wonderful joyousness, his passionate -absorption in mere existence. Then, suddenly, some night he would creep -out of the house, go down to dreadful places near Blue Gate Fields, -and stay there, day after day, until he was driven away. On his return -he would sit in front of the her times, with that pride of individualism -that is half the fascination of sin, and smiling with secret pleasure -at the misshapen shadow that had to bear the burden that should have been -his own. - -After a few years he could not endure to be long out of England, -and gave up the villa that he had shared at Trouville with Lord Henry, -as well as the little white walled-in house at Algiers where they -had more than once spent the winter. He hated to be separated from -the picture that was such a part of his life, and was also afraid -that during his absence some one might gain access to the room, -in spite of the elaborate bars that he had caused to be placed upon -the door. - -He was quite conscious that this would tell them nothing. -It was true that the portrait still preserved, under all -the foulness and ugliness of the face, its marked likeness -to himself; but what could they learn from that? He would laugh -at any one who tried to taunt him. He had not painted it. -What was it to him how vile and full of shame it looked? -Even if he told them, would they believe it? - -Yet he was afraid. Sometimes when he was down at his great house -in Nottinghamshire, entertaining the fashionable young men of his -own rank who were his chief companions, and astounding the county -by the wanton luxury and gorgeous splendour of his mode of life, -he would suddenly leave his guests and rush back to town to see -that the door had not been tampered with and that the picture was -still there. What if it should be stolen? The mere thought made -him cold with horror. Surely the world would know his secret then. -Perhaps the world already suspected it. - -For, while he fascinated many, there were not a few who distrusted him. -He was very nearly blackballed at a West End club of which his birth -and social position fully entitled him to become a member, and it -was said that on one occasion, when he was brought by a friend into -the smoking-room of the Churchill, the Duke of Berwick and another -gentleman got up in a marked manner and went out. Curious stories -became current about him after he had passed his twenty-fifth year. -It was rumoured that he had been seen brawling with foreign sailors -in a low den in the distant parts of Whitechapel, and that he consorted -with thieves and coiners and knew the mysteries of their trade. -His extraordinary absences became notorious, and, when he used to reappear -again in society, men would whisper to each other in corners, or pass him -with a sneer, or look at him with cold searching eyes, as though they -were determined to discover his secret. - -Of such insolences and attempted slights he, of course, -took no notice, and in the opinion of most people his frank -debonair manner, his charming boyish smile, and the infinite -grace of that wonderful youth that seemed never to leave him, -were in themselves a sufficient answer to the calumnies, -for so they termed them, that were circulated about him. -It was remarked, however, that some of those who had been -most intimate with him appeared, after a time, to shun him. -Women who had wildly adored him, and for his sake had braved -all social censure and set convention at defiance, were seen -to grow pallid with shame or horror if Dorian Gray entered -the room. - -Yet these whispered scandals only increased in the eyes of many -his strange and dangerous charm. His great wealth was a certain -element of security. Society--civilized society, at least-- -is never very ready to believe anything to the detriment of those -who are both rich and fascinating. It feels instinctively that -manners are of more importance than morals, and, in its opinion, -the highest respectability is of much less value than the possession -of a good chef. And, after all, it is a very poor consolation -to be told that the man who has given one a bad dinner, -or poor wine, is irreproachable in his private life. -Even the cardinal virtues cannot atone for half-cold entrees, -as Lord Henry remarked once, in a discussion on the subject, -and there is possibly a good deal to be said for his view. -For the canons of good society are, or should be, the same -as the canons of art. Form is absolutely essential to it. -It should have the dignity of a ceremony, as well as -its unreality, and should combine the insincere character -of a romantic play with the wit and beauty that make such plays -delightful to us. Is insincerity such a terrible thing? -I think not. It is merely a method by which we can multiply -our personalities. - -Such, at any rate, was Dorian Gray's opinion. He used to wonder -at the shallow psychology of those who conceive the ego in man -as a thing simple, permanent, reliable, and of one essence. -To him, man was a being with myriad lives and myriad sensations, -a complex multiform creature that bore within itself strange -legacies of thought and passion, and whose very flesh was tainted -with the monstrous maladies of the dead. He loved to stroll -through the gaunt cold picture-gallery of his country house and look -at the various portraits of those whose blood flowed in his veins. -Here was Philip Herbert, described by Francis Osborne, -in his Memoires on the Reigns of Queen Elizabeth and King James, -as one who was "caressed by the Court for his handsome face, -which kept him not long company." Was it young Herbert's -life that he sometimes led? Had some strange poisonous -germ crept from body to body till it had reached his own? -Was it some dim sense of that ruined grace that had made -him so suddenly, and almost without cause, give utterance, -in Basil Hallward's studio, to the mad prayer that had so changed -his life? Here, in gold-embroidered red doublet, jewelled surcoat, -and gilt-edged ruff and wristbands, stood Sir Anthony Sherard, -with his silver-and-black armour piled at his feet. -What had this man's legacy been? Had the lover of Giovanna -of Naples bequeathed him some inheritance of sin and shame? -Were his own actions merely the dreams that the dead man -had not dared to realize? Here, from the fading canvas, -smiled Lady Elizabeth Devereux, in her gauze hood, pearl stomacher, -and pink slashed sleeves. A flower was in her right hand, -and her left clasped an enamelled collar of white and damask roses. -On a table by her side lay a mandolin and an apple. -There were large green rosettes upon her little pointed shoes. -He knew her life, and the strange stories that were told about -her lovers. Had he something of her temperament in him? These oval, -heavy-lidded eyes seemed to look curiously at him. What of -George Willoughby, with his powdered hair and fantastic patches? -How evil he looked! The face was saturnine and swarthy, -and the sensual lips seemed to be twisted with disdain. -Delicate lace ruffles fell over the lean yellow hands that -were so overladen with rings. He had been a macaroni of the -eighteenth century, and the friend, in his youth, of Lord Ferrars. -What of the second Lord Beckenham, the companion of the Prince -Regent in his wildest days, and one of the witnesses at -the secret marriage with Mrs. Fitzherbert? How proud and -handsome he was, with his chestnut curls and insolent pose! -What passions had he bequeathed? The world had looked upon -him as infamous. He had led the orgies at Carlton House. -The star of the Garter glittered upon his breast. Beside him hung -the portrait of his wife, a pallid, thin-lipped woman in black. -Her blood, also, stirred within him. How curious it all seemed! -And his mother with her Lady Hamilton face and her moist, -wine-dashed lips--he knew what he had got from her. -He had got from her his beauty, and his passion for the beauty -of others. She laughed at him in her loose Bacchante dress. -There were vine leaves in her hair. The purple spilled -from the cup she was holding. The carnations of the painting -had withered, but the eyes were still wonderful in their depth -and brilliancy of colour. They seemed to follow him wherever he -went. - -Yet one had ancestors in literature as well as in one's own race, -nearer perhaps in type and temperament, many of them, and certainly -with an influence of which one was more absolutely conscious. -There were times when it appeared to Dorian Gray that the whole -of history was merely the record of his own life, not as he had lived -it in act and circumstance, but as his imagination had created -it for him, as it had been in his brain and in his passions. -He felt that he had known them all, those strange terrible figures -that had passed across the stage of the world and made sin so marvellous -and evil so full of subtlety. It seemed to him that in some mysterious -way their lives had been his own. - -The hero of the wonderful novel that had so influenced his life had -himself known this curious fancy. In the seventh chapter he tells how, -crowned with laurel, lest lightning might strike him, he had sat, -as Tiberius, in a garden at Capri, reading the shameful books -of Elephantis, while dwarfs and peacocks strutted round him and -the flute-player mocked the swinger of the censer; and, as Caligula, -had caroused with the green-shirted jockeys in their stables and supped -in an ivory manger with a jewel-frontleted horse; and, as Domitian, -had wandered through a corridor lined with marble mirrors, -looking round with haggard eyes for the reflection of the dagger -that was to end his days, and sick with that ennui, that terrible -taedium vitae, that comes on those to whom life denies nothing; -and had peered through a clear emerald at the red shambles of the circus -and then, in a litter of pearl and purple drawn by silver-shod mules, -been carried through the Street of Pomegranates to a House of Gold -and heard men cry on Nero Caesar as he passed by; and, as Elagabalus, -had painted his face with colours, and plied the distaff among the women, -and brought the Moon from Carthage and given her in mystic marriage -to the Sun. - -Over and over again Dorian used to read this fantastic chapter, -and the two chapters immediately following, in which, as in some -curious tapestries or cunningly wrought enamels, were pictured -the awful and beautiful forms of those whom vice and blood -and weariness had made monstrous or mad: Filippo, Duke of Milan, -who slew his wife and painted her lips with a scarlet poison -that her lover might suck death from the dead thing he fondled; -Pietro Barbi, the Venetian, known as Paul the Second, -who sought in his vanity to assume the title of Formosus, -and whose tiara, valued at two hundred thousand florins, -was bought at the price of a terrible sin; Gian Maria Visconti, -who used hounds to chase living men and whose murdered -body was covered with roses by a harlot who had loved him; -the Borgia on his white horse, with Fratricide riding beside -him and his mantle stained with the blood of Perotto; -Pietro Riario, the young Cardinal Archbishop of Florence, -child and minion of Sixtus IV, whose beauty was equalled only by -his debauchery, and who received Leonora of Aragon in a pavilion -of white and crimson silk, filled with nymphs and centaurs, -and gilded a boy that he might serve at the feast as Ganymede -or Hylas; Ezzelin, whose melancholy could be cured only by -the spectacle of death, and who had a passion for red blood, -as other men have for red wine--the son of the Fiend, -as was reported, and one who had cheated his father at dice -when gambling with him for his own soul; Giambattista Cibo, -who in mockery took the name of Innocent and into whose torpid -veins the blood of three lads was infused by a Jewish doctor; -Sigismondo Malatesta, the lover of Isotta and the lord of Rimini, -whose effigy was burned at Rome as the enemy of God and man, -who strangled Polyssena with a napkin, and gave poison -to Ginevra d'Este in a cup of emerald, and in honour of a -shameful passion built a pagan church for Christian worship; -Charles VI, who had so wildly adored his brother's wife that a -leper had warned him of the insanity that was coming on him, -and who, when his brain had sickened and grown strange, -could only be soothed by Saracen cards painted with the images -of love and death and madness; and, in his trimmed jerkin -and jewelled cap and acanthuslike curls, Grifonetto Baglioni, -who slew Astorre with his bride, and Simonetto with his page, -and whose comeliness was such that, as he lay dying -in the yellow piazza of Perugia, those who had hated him -could not choose but weep, and Atalanta, who had cursed him, -blessed him. - -There was a horrible fascination in them all. He saw them -at night, and they troubled his imagination in the day. -The Renaissance knew of strange manners of poisoning-- -poisoning by a helmet and a lighted torch, by an embroidered glove -and a jewelled fan, by a gilded pomander and by an amber chain. -Dorian Gray had been poisoned by a book. There were moments when -he looked on evil simply as a mode through which he could realize -his conception of the beautiful. - - - -CHAPTER 12 - -It was on the ninth of November, the eve of his own thirty-eighth birthday, -as he often remembered afterwards. - -He was walking home about eleven o'clock from Lord Henry's, where he had -been dining, and was wrapped in heavy furs, as the night was cold and foggy. -At the corner of Grosvenor Square and South Audley Street, a man passed him in -the mist, walking very fast and with the collar of his grey ulster turned up. -He had a bag in his hand. Dorian recognized him. It was Basil Hallward. -A strange sense of fear, for which he could not account, came over him. -He made no sign of recognition and went on quickly in the direction of his -own house. - -But Hallward had seen him. Dorian heard him first stopping -on the pavement and then hurrying after him. In a few moments, -his hand was on his arm. - -"Dorian! What an extraordinary piece of luck! I have been -waiting for you in your library ever since nine o'clock. Finally -I took pity on your tired servant and told him to go to bed, -as he let me out. I am off to Paris by the midnight train, -and I particularly wanted to see you before I left. -I thought it was you, or rather your fur coat, as you passed me. -But I wasn't quite sure. Didn't you recognize me?" - -"In this fog, my dear Basil? Why, I can't even recognize Grosvenor Square. -I believe my house is somewhere about here, but I don't feel at all certain -about it. I am sorry you are going away, as I have not seen you for ages. -But I suppose you will be back soon?" - -"No: I am going to be out of England for six months. -I intend to take a studio in Paris and shut myself up till I have -finished a great picture I have in my head. However, it wasn't -about myself I wanted to talk. Here we are at your door. -Let me come in for a moment. I have something to say -to you." - -"I shall be charmed. But won't you miss your train?" said Dorian Gray -languidly as he passed up the steps and opened the door with his latch-key. - -The lamplight struggled out through the fog, and Hallward looked -at his watch. "I have heaps of time," he answered. "The train -doesn't go till twelve-fifteen, and it is only just eleven. -In fact, I was on my way to the club to look for you, when I met you. -You see, I shan't have any delay about luggage, as I have sent on my -heavy things. All I have with me is in this bag, and I can easily -get to Victoria in twenty minutes." - -Dorian looked at him and smiled. "What a way for a fashionable -painter to travel! A Gladstone bag and an ulster! Come in, -or the fog will get into the house. And mind you don't -talk about anything serious. Nothing is serious nowadays. -At least nothing should be." - -Hallward shook his head, as he entered, and followed Dorian into the library. -There was a bright wood fire blazing in the large open hearth. The lamps -were lit, and an open Dutch silver spirit-case stood, with some siphons of -soda-water and large cut-glass tumblers, on a little marqueterie table. - -"You see your servant made me quite at home, Dorian. He gave me -everything I wanted, including your best gold-tipped cigarettes. -He is a most hospitable creature. I like him much better than -the Frenchman you used to have. What has become of the Frenchman, -by the bye?" - -Dorian shrugged his shoulders. "I believe he married Lady Radley's maid, -and has established her in Paris as an English dressmaker. Anglomania is -very fashionable over there now, I hear. It seems silly of the French, -doesn't it? But--do you know?--he was not at all a bad servant. -I never liked him, but I had nothing to complain about. One often -imagines things that are quite absurd. He was really very devoted to me -and seemed quite sorry when he went away. Have another brandy-and-soda? Or -would you like hock-and-seltzer? I always take hock-and-seltzer myself. -There is sure to be some in the next room." - -"Thanks, I won't have anything more," said the painter, -taking his cap and coat off and throwing them on the bag -that he had placed in the corner. "And now, my dear fellow, -I want to speak to you seriously. Don't frown like that. -You make it so much more difficult for me." - -"What is it all about?" cried Dorian in his petulant way, -flinging himself down on the sofa. "I hope it is not about myself. -I am tired of myself to-night. I should like to be somebody else." - -"It is about yourself," answered Hallward in his grave deep voice, -"and I must say it to you. I shall only keep you half an hour." - -Dorian sighed and lit a cigarette. "Half an hour!" he murmured. - -"It is not much to ask of you, Dorian, and it is entirely for your own sake -that I am speaking. I think it right that you should know that the most -dreadful things are being said against you in London." - -"I don't wish to know anything about them. I love scandals -about other people, but scandals about myself don't interest me. -They have not got the charm of novelty." - -"They must interest you, Dorian. Every gentleman is interested -in his good name. You don't want people to talk of you as -something vile and degraded. Of course, you have your position, -and your wealth, and all that kind of thing. But position -and wealth are not everything. Mind you, I don't believe these -rumours at all. At least, I can't believe them when I see you. -Sin is a thing that writes itself across a man's face. -It cannot be concealed. People talk sometimes of secret vices. -There are no such things. If a wretched man has a vice, it shows -itself in the lines of his mouth, the droop of his eyelids, -the moulding of his hands even. Somebody--I won't mention his name, -but you know him--came to me last year to have his portrait done. -I had never seen him before, and had never heard anything -about him at the time, though I have heard a good deal since. -He offered an extravagant price. I refused him. -There was something in the shape of his fingers that I hated. -I know now that I was quite right in what I fancied about him. -His life is dreadful. But you, Dorian, with your pure, -bright, innocent face, and your marvellous untroubled youth-- -I can't believe anything against you. And yet I see you -very seldom, and you never come down to the studio now, -and when I am away from you, and I hear all these hideous things -that people are whispering about you, I don't know what to say. -Why is it, Dorian, that a man like the Duke of Berwick leaves -the room of a club when you enter it? Why is it that so many -gentlemen in London will neither go to your house or invite -you to theirs? You used to be a friend of Lord Staveley. -I met him at dinner last week. Your name happened to come up -in conversation, in connection with the miniatures you have lent -to the exhibition at the Dudley. Staveley curled his lip and said -that you might have the most artistic tastes, but that you -were a man whom no pure-minded girl should be allowed to know, -and whom no chaste woman should sit in the same room with. -I reminded him that I was a friend of yours, and asked him what -he meant. He told me. He told me right out before everybody. -It was horrible! Why is your friendship so fatal to young men? -There was that wretched boy in the Guards who committed suicide. -You were his great friend. There was Sir Henry Ashton, -who had to leave England with a tarnished name. You and -he were inseparable. What about Adrian Singleton and his -dreadful end? What about Lord Kent's only son and his career? -I met his father yesterday in St. James's Street. He seemed broken -with shame and sorrow. What about the young Duke of Perth? -What sort of life has he got now? What gentleman would associate with -him?" - -"Stop, Basil. You are talking about things of which you know nothing," -said Dorian Gray, biting his lip, and with a note of infinite contempt -in his voice. "You ask me why Berwick leaves a room when I enter it. -It is because I know everything about his life, not because he knows -anything about mine. With such blood as he has in his veins, how could -his record be clean? You ask me about Henry Ashton and young Perth. -Did I teach the one his vices, and the other his debauchery? -If Kent's silly son takes his wife from the streets, what is that to me? -If Adrian Singleton writes his friend's name across a bill, am I his keeper? -I know how people chatter in England. The middle classes air their moral -prejudices over their gross dinner-tables, and whisper about what they -call the profligacies of their betters in order to try and pretend -that they are in smart society and on intimate terms with the people -they slander. In this country, it is enough for a man to have -distinction and brains for every common tongue to wag against him. -And what sort of lives do these people, who pose as being moral, -lead themselves? My dear fellow, you forget that we are in the native land -of the hypocrite." - -"Dorian," cried Hallward, "that is not the question. -England is bad enough I know, and English society is all wrong. -That is the reason why I want you to be fine. You have not -been fine. One has a right to judge of a man by the effect -he has over his friends. Yours seem to lose all sense of honour, -of goodness, of purity. You have filled them with a madness -for pleasure. They have gone down into the depths. -You led them there. Yes: you led them there, and yet you -can smile, as you are smiling now. And there is worse behind. -I know you and Harry are inseparable. Surely for that reason, -if for none other, you should not have made his sister's name -a by-word." - -"Take care, Basil. You go too far." - -"I must speak, and you must listen. You shall listen. -When you met Lady Gwendolen, not a breath of scandal had ever -touched her. Is there a single decent woman in London now -who would drive with her in the park? Why, even her children -are not allowed to live with her. Then there are other stories-- -stories that you have been seen creeping at dawn out of dreadful -houses and slinking in disguise into the foulest dens in London. -Are they true? Can they be true? When I first heard them, -I laughed. I hear them now, and they make me shudder. -What about your country-house and the life that is -led there? Dorian, you don't know what is said about you. -I won't tell you that I don't want to preach to you. -I remember Harry saying once that every man who turned himself -into an amateur curate for the moment always began by saying that, -and then proceeded to break his word. I do want to preach to you. -I want you to lead such a life as will make the world respect you. -I want you to have a clean name and a fair record. -I want you to get rid of the dreadful people you associate with. -Don't shrug your shoulders like that. Don't be so indifferent. -You have a wonderful influence. Let it be for good, not for evil. -They say that you corrupt every one with whom you become intimate, -and that it is quite sufficient for you to enter a house -for shame of some kind to follow after. I don't know whether -it is so or not. How should I know? But it is said of you. -I am told things that it seems impossible to doubt. -Lord Gloucester was one of my greatest friends at Oxford. -He showed me a letter that his wife had written to him when she -was dying alone in her villa at Mentone. Your name was implicated -in the most terrible confession I ever read. I told him that it -was absurd--that I knew you thoroughly and that you were incapable -of anything of the kind. Know you? I wonder do I know you? -Before I could answer that, I should have to see your -soul." - -"To see my soul!" muttered Dorian Gray, starting up from the sofa -and turning almost white from fear. - -"Yes," answered Hallward gravely, and with deep-toned sorrow in his voice, -"to see your soul. But only God can do that." - -A bitter laugh of mockery broke from the lips of the younger man. -"You shall see it yourself, to-night!" he cried, seizing a -lamp from the table. "Come: it is your own handiwork. -Why shouldn't you look at it? You can tell the world all about -it afterwards, if you choose. Nobody would believe you. -If they did believe you, they would like me all the better for it. -I know the age better than you do, though you will prate -about it so tediously. Come, I tell you. You have chattered -enough about corruption. Now you shall look on it face -to face." - -There was the madness of pride in every word he uttered. -He stamped his foot upon the ground in his boyish insolent manner. -He felt a terrible joy at the thought that some one else -was to share his secret, and that the man who had painted -the portrait that was the origin of all his shame was to be -burdened for the rest of his life with the hideous memory of what -he had done. - -"Yes," he continued, coming closer to him and looking steadfastly -into his stern eyes, "I shall show you my soul. You shall see -the thing that you fancy only God can see." - -Hallward started back. "This is blasphemy, Dorian!" he cried. -"You must not say things like that. They are horrible, and they -don't mean anything." - -"You think so?" He laughed again. - -"I know so. As for what I said to you to-night, I said it for your good. -You know I have been always a stanch friend to you." - -"Don't touch me. Finish what you have to say." - -A twisted flash of pain shot across the painter's face. -He paused for a moment, and a wild feeling of pity came over him. -After all, what right had he to pry into the life of Dorian Gray? -If he had done a tithe of what was rumoured about him, -how much he must have suffered! Then he straightened himself up, -and walked over to the fire-place, and stood there, looking at -the burning logs with their frostlike ashes and their throbbing cores -of flame. - -"I am waiting, Basil," said the young man in a hard clear voice. - -He turned round. "What I have to say is this," he cried. "You must give -me some answer to these horrible charges that are made against you. -If you tell me that they are absolutely untrue from beginning to end, -I shall believe you. Deny them, Dorian, deny them! Can't you see what I -am going through? My God! don't tell me that you are bad, and corrupt, -and shameful." - -Dorian Gray smiled. There was a curl of contempt in his lips. -"Come upstairs, Basil," he said quietly. "I keep a diary of my life -from day to day, and it never leaves the room in which it is written. -I shall show it to you if you come with me." - -"I shall come with you, Dorian, if you wish it. I see I have missed -my train. That makes no matter. I can go to-morrow. But don't ask me -to read anything to-night. All I want is a plain answer to my question." - -"That shall be given to you upstairs. I could not give it here. -You will not have to read long." - - - -CHAPTER 13 - -He passed out of the room and began the ascent, Basil Hallward following -close behind. They walked softly, as men do instinctively at night. -The lamp cast fantastic shadows on the wall and staircase. A rising wind -made some of the windows rattle. - -When they reached the top landing, Dorian set the lamp down -on the floor, and taking out the key, turned it in the lock. -"You insist on knowing, Basil?" he asked in a low voice. - -"Yes." - -"I am delighted," he answered, smiling. Then he added, -somewhat harshly, "You are the one man in the world who is -entitled to know everything about me. You have had more -to do with my life than you think"; and, taking up the lamp, -he opened the door and went in. A cold current of air passed them, -and the light shot up for a moment in a flame of murky orange. -He shuddered. "Shut the door behind you," he whispered, -as he placed the lamp on the table. - -Hallward glanced round him with a puzzled expression. -The room looked as if it had not been lived in for years. -A faded Flemish tapestry, a curtained picture, an old -Italian cassone, and an almost empty book-case--that was all -that it seemed to contain, besides a chair and a table. -As Dorian Gray was lighting a half-burned candle that was -standing on the mantelshelf, he saw that the whole place -was covered with dust and that the carpet was in holes. -A mouse ran scuffling behind the wainscoting. There was a damp odour -of mildew. - -"So you think that it is only God who sees the soul, Basil? -Draw that curtain back, and you will see mine." - -The voice that spoke was cold and cruel. "You are mad, Dorian, or playing -a part," muttered Hallward, frowning. - -"You won't? Then I must do it myself," said the young man, -and he tore the curtain from its rod and flung it on the ground. - -An exclamation of horror broke from the painter's lips as he saw -in the dim light the hideous face on the canvas grinning at him. -There was something in its expression that filled him with disgust -and loathing. Good heavens! it was Dorian Gray's own face -that he was looking at! The horror, whatever it was, had not yet -entirely spoiled that marvellous beauty. There was still some -gold in the thinning hair and some scarlet on the sensual mouth. -The sodden eyes had kept something of the loveliness of their blue, -the noble curves had not yet completely passed away from chiselled -nostrils and from plastic throat. Yes, it was Dorian himself. -But who had done it? He seemed to recognize his own brushwork, -and the frame was his own design. The idea was monstrous, yet he -felt afraid. He seized the lighted candle, and held it to the picture. -In the left-hand corner was his own name, traced in long letters of -bright vermilion. - -It was some foul parody, some infamous ignoble satire. -He had never done that. Still, it was his own picture. -He knew it, and he felt as if his blood had changed -in a moment from fire to sluggish ice. His own picture! -What did it mean? Why had it altered? He turned and looked -at Dorian Gray with the eyes of a sick man. His mouth twitched, -and his parched tongue seemed unable to articulate. -He passed his hand across his forehead. It was dank with -clammy sweat. - -The young man was leaning against the mantelshelf, watching him -with that strange expression that one sees on the faces of those -who are absorbed in a play when some great artist is acting. -There was neither real sorrow in it nor real joy. There was -simply the passion of the spectator, with perhaps a flicker -of triumph in his eyes. He had taken the flower out of his coat, -and was smelling it, or pretending to do so. - -"What does this mean?" cried Hallward, at last. His own voice sounded -shrill and curious in his ears. - -"Years ago, when I was a boy," said Dorian Gray, crushing the flower -in his hand, "you met me, flattered me, and taught me to be vain -of my good looks. One day you introduced me to a friend of yours, -who explained to me the wonder of youth, and you finished -a portrait of me that revealed to me the wonder of beauty. -In a mad moment that, even now, I don't know whether I regret -or not, I made a wish, perhaps you would call it a prayer. -. . ." - -"I remember it! Oh, how well I remember it! No! the thing is impossible. -The room is damp. Mildew has got into the canvas. The paints I used had some -wretched mineral poison in them. I tell you the thing is impossible." - -"Ah, what is impossible?" murmured the young man, going over to the window -and leaning his forehead against the cold, mist-stained glass. - -"You told me you had destroyed it." - -"I was wrong. It has destroyed me." - -"I don't believe it is my picture." - -"Can't you see your ideal in it?" said Dorian bitterly. - -"My ideal, as you call it. . ." - -"As you called it." - -"There was nothing evil in it, nothing shameful. You were to me such -an ideal as I shall never meet again. This is the face of a satyr." - -"It is the face of my soul." - -"Christ! what a thing I must have worshipped! It has the eyes of a devil." - -"Each of us has heaven and hell in him, Basil," cried Dorian -with a wild gesture of despair. - -Hallward turned again to the portrait and gazed at it. -"My God! If it is true," he exclaimed, "and this is -what you have done with your life, why, you must be worse -even than those who talk against you fancy you to be!" -He held the light up again to the canvas and examined it. -The surface seemed to be quite undisturbed and as he had left it. -It was from within, apparently, that the foulness and horror -had come. Through some strange quickening of inner life -the leprosies of sin were slowly eating the thing away. -The rotting of a corpse in a watery grave was not -so fearful. - -His hand shook, and the candle fell from its socket on the floor -and lay there sputtering. He placed his foot on it and put it out. -Then he flung himself into the rickety chair that was standing by -the table and buried his face in his hands. - -"Good God, Dorian, what a lesson! What an awful lesson!" -There was no answer, but he could hear the young man -sobbing at the window. "Pray, Dorian, pray," he murmured. -"What is it that one was taught to say in one's boyhood? -'Lead us not into temptation. Forgive us our sins. -Wash away our iniquities.' Let us say that together. -The prayer of your pride has been answered. The prayer of your -repentance will be answered also. I worshipped you too much. -I am punished for it. You worshipped yourself too much. We are -both punished." - -Dorian Gray turned slowly around and looked at him with tear-dimmed eyes. -"It is too late, Basil," he faltered. - -"It is never too late, Dorian. Let us kneel down and try if we -cannot remember a prayer. Isn't there a verse somewhere, -'Though your sins be as scarlet, yet I will make them as white -as snow'?" - -"Those words mean nothing to me now." - -"Hush! Don't say that. You have done enough evil in your life. -My God! Don't you see that accursed thing leering at us?" - -Dorian Gray glanced at the picture, and suddenly an uncontrollable -feeling of hatred for Basil Hallward came over him, as though -it had been suggested to him by the image on the canvas, -whispered into his ear by those grinning lips. The mad -passions of a hunted animal stirred within him, and he loathed -the man who was seated at the table, more than in his whole -life he had ever loathed anything. He glanced wildly around. -Something glimmered on the top of the painted chest that -faced him. His eye fell on it. He knew what it was. -It was a knife that he had brought up, some days before, -to cut a piece of cord, and had forgotten to take away with him. -He moved slowly towards it, passing Hallward as he did so. -As soon as he got behind him, he seized it and turned round. -Hallward stirred in his chair as if he was going to rise. -He rushed at him and dug the knife into the great vein that is behind -the ear, crushing the man's head down on the table and stabbing again -and again. - -There was a stifled groan and the horrible sound of some one choking -with blood. Three times the outstretched arms shot up convulsively, -waving grotesque, stiff-fingered hands in the air. He stabbed him twice more, -but the man did not move. Something began to trickle on the floor. -He waited for a moment, still pressing the head down. Then he threw -the knife on the table, and listened. - -He could hear nothing, but the drip, drip on the threadbare carpet. -He opened the door and went out on the landing. The house was -absolutely quiet. No one was about. For a few seconds he stood -bending over the balustrade and peering down into the black seething -well of darkness. Then he took out the key and returned to the room, -locking himself in as he did so. - -The thing was still seated in the chair, straining over the table -with bowed head, and humped back, and long fantastic arms. -Had it not been for the red jagged tear in the neck and the clotted -black pool that was slowly widening on the table, one would have said -that the man was simply asleep. - -How quickly it had all been done! He felt strangely calm, and walking -over to the window, opened it and stepped out on the balcony. -The wind had blown the fog away, and the sky was like a monstrous -peacock's tail, starred with myriads of golden eyes. He looked -down and saw the policeman going his rounds and flashing the long -beam of his lantern on the doors of the silent houses. The crimson -spot of a prowling hansom gleamed at the corner and then vanished. -A woman in a fluttering shawl was creeping slowly by the railings, -staggering as she went. Now and then she stopped and peered back. -Once, she began to sing in a hoarse voice. The policeman strolled -over and said something to her. She stumbled away, laughing. -A bitter blast swept across the square. The gas-lamps flickered -and became blue, and the leafless trees shook their black iron -branches to and fro. He shivered and went back, closing the window -behind him. - -Having reached the door, he turned the key and opened it. -He did not even glance at the murdered man. He felt that -the secret of the whole thing was not to realize the situation. -The friend who had painted the fatal portrait to which -all his misery had been due had gone out of his life. -That was enough. - -Then he remembered the lamp. It was a rather curious one of -Moorish workmanship, made of dull silver inlaid with arabesques -of burnished steel, and studded with coarse turquoises. -Perhaps it might be missed by his servant, and questions would -be asked. He hesitated for a moment, then he turned back and took -it from the table. He could not help seeing the dead thing. -How still it was! How horribly white the long hands looked! -It was like a dreadful wax image. - -Having locked the door behind him, he crept quietly downstairs. -The woodwork creaked and seemed to cry out as if in pain. -He stopped several times and waited. No: everything was still. -It was merely the sound of his own footsteps. - -When he reached the library, he saw the bag and coat in the corner. -They must be hidden away somewhere. He unlocked a secret press that was -in the wainscoting, a press in which he kept his own curious disguises, -and put them into it. He could easily burn them afterwards. Then he pulled -out his watch. It was twenty minutes to two. - -He sat down and began to think. Every year--every month, almost-- -men were strangled in England for what he had done. There had been -a madness of murder in the air. Some red star had come too close -to the earth. . . . And yet, what evidence was there against him? -Basil Hallward had left the house at eleven. No one had seen -him come in again. Most of the servants were at Selby Royal. -His valet had gone to bed.... Paris! Yes. It was to Paris that -Basil had gone, and by the midnight train, as he had intended. -With his curious reserved habits, it would be months before any -suspicions would be roused. Months! Everything could be destroyed long -before then. - -A sudden thought struck him. He put on his fur coat and hat -and went out into the hall. There he paused, hearing the slow -heavy tread of the policeman on the pavement outside and -seeing the flash of the bull's-eye reflected in the window. -He waited and held his breath. - -After a few moments he drew back the latch and slipped out, -shutting the door very gently behind him. Then he began -ringing the bell. In about five minutes his valet appeared, -half-dressed and looking very drowsy. - -"I am sorry to have had to wake you up, Francis," he said, stepping in; -"but I had forgotten my latch-key. What time is it?" - -"Ten minutes past two, sir," answered the man, looking at the clock -and blinking. - -"Ten minutes past two? How horribly late! You must wake me -at nine to-morrow. I have some work to do." - -"All right, sir." - -"Did any one call this evening?" - -"Mr. Hallward, sir. He stayed here till eleven, and then he went -away to catch his train." - -"Oh! I am sorry I didn't see him. Did he leave any message?" - -"No, sir, except that he would write to you from Paris, -if he did not find you at the club." - -"That will do, Francis. Don't forget to call me at nine to-morrow." - -"No, sir." - -The man shambled down the passage in his slippers. - -Dorian Gray threw his hat and coat upon the table and passed -into the library. For a quarter of an hour he walked up and down -the room, biting his lip and thinking. Then he took down the Blue -Book from one of the shelves and began to turn over the leaves. -"Alan Campbell, 152, Hertford Street, Mayfair." Yes; that was the man -he wanted. - - - -CHAPTER 14 - -At nine o'clock the next morning his servant came in with a cup of chocolate -on a tray and opened the shutters. Dorian was sleeping quite peacefully, -lying on his right side, with one hand underneath his cheek. He looked -like a boy who had been tired out with play, or study. - -The man had to touch him twice on the shoulder before he woke, -and as he opened his eyes a faint smile passed across his lips, -as though he had been lost in some delightful dream. Yet he had -not dreamed at all. His night had been untroubled by any images -of pleasure or of pain. But youth smiles without any reason. -It is one of its chiefest charms. - -He turned round, and leaning upon his elbow, began to sip his chocolate. -The mellow November sun came streaming into the room. The sky was bright, -and there was a genial warmth in the air. It was almost like a morning -in May. - -Gradually the events of the preceding night crept with silent, -blood-stained feet into his brain and reconstructed themselves -there with terrible distinctness. He winced at the memory of all -that he had suffered, and for a moment the same curious feeling -of loathing for Basil Hallward that had made him kill him as he sat -in the chair came back to him, and he grew cold with passion. -The dead man was still sitting there, too, and in the sunlight now. -How horrible that was! Such hideous things were for the darkness, -not for the day. - -He felt that if he brooded on what he had gone through he would sicken -or grow mad. There were sins whose fascination was more in the memory -than in the doing of them, strange triumphs that gratified the pride more -than the passions, and gave to the intellect a quickened sense of joy, -greater than any joy they brought, or could ever bring, to the senses. -But this was not one of them. It was a thing to be driven out of the mind, -to be drugged with poppies, to be strangled lest it might strangle -one itself. - -When the half-hour struck, he passed his hand across his forehead, -and then got up hastily and dressed himself with even more than his -usual care, giving a good deal of attention to the choice of his necktie -and scarf-pin and changing his rings more than once. He spent a long -time also over breakfast, tasting the various dishes, talking to his -valet about some new liveries that he was thinking of getting made -for the servants at Selby, and going through his correspondence. -At some of the letters, he smiled. Three of them bored him. -One he read several times over and then tore up with a slight look -of annoyance in his face. "That awful thing, a woman's memory!" -as Lord Henry had once said. - -After he had drunk his cup of black coffee, he wiped his -lips slowly with a napkin, motioned to his servant to wait, -and going over to the table, sat down and wrote two letters. -One he put in his pocket, the other he handed to the valet. - -"Take this round to 152, Hertford Street, Francis, and if Mr. Campbell -is out of town, get his address." - -As soon as he was alone, he lit a cigarette and began sketching upon -a piece of paper, drawing first flowers and bits of architecture, -and then human faces. Suddenly he remarked that every face that -he drew seemed to have a fantastic likeness to Basil Hallward. -He frowned, and getting up, went over to the book-case and took -out a volume at hazard. He was determined that he would not think -about what had happened until it became absolutely necessary that -he should do so. - -When he had stretched himself on the sofa, he looked at -the title-page of the book. It was Gautier's Emaux et Camees, -Charpentier's Japanese-paper edition, with the Jacquemart etching. -The binding was of citron-green leather, with a design of gilt -trellis-work and dotted pomegranates. It had been given -to him by Adrian Singleton. As he turned over the pages, -his eye fell on the poem about the hand of Lacenaire, -the cold yellow hand "du supplice encore mal lavee," -with its downy red hairs and its "doigts de faune." He glanced -at his own white taper fingers, shuddering slightly in spite -of himself, and passed on, till he came to those lovely stanzas -upon Venice: - - Sur une gamme chromatique, - Le sein de peries ruisselant, - La Venus de l'Adriatique - Sort de l'eau son corps rose et blanc. - - Les domes, sur l'azur des ondes - Suivant la phrase au pur contour, - S'enflent comme des gorges rondes - Que souleve un soupir d'amour. - - L'esquif aborde et me depose, - Jetant son amarre au pilier, - Devant une facade rose, - Sur le marbre d'un escalier. - - -How exquisite they were! As one read them, one seemed to be -floating down the green water-ways of the pink and pearl city, -seated in a black gondola with silver prow and trailing curtains. -The mere lines looked to him like those straight lines of -turquoise-blue that follow one as one pushes out to the Lido. -The sudden flashes of colour reminded him of the gleam of -the opal-and-iris-throated birds that flutter round the tall -honeycombed Campanile, or stalk, with such stately grace, -through the dim, dust-stained arcades. Leaning back with -half-closed eyes, he kept saying over and over to himself: - - "Devant une facade rose, - Sur le marbre d'un escalier." - -The whole of Venice was in those two lines. He remembered the autumn -that he had passed there, and a wonderful love that had stirred -him to mad delightful follies. There was romance in every place. -But Venice, like Oxford, had kept the background for romance, and, -to the true romantic, background was everything, or almost everything. -Basil had been with him part of the time, and had gone wild over Tintoret. -Poor Basil! What a horrible way for a man to die! - -He sighed, and took up the volume again, and tried to forget. -He read of the swallows that fly in and out of the little -cafe at Smyrna where the Hadjis sit counting their amber -beads and the turbaned merchants smoke their long tasselled -pipes and talk gravely to each other; he read of the Obelisk -in the Place de la Concorde that weeps tears of granite -in its lonely sunless exile and longs to be back by the hot, -lotus-covered Nile, where there are Sphinxes, and rose-red ibises, -and white vultures with gilded claws, and crocodiles with -small beryl eyes that crawl over the green steaming mud; -he began to brood over those verses which, drawing music -from kiss-stained marble, tell of that curious statue that -Gautier compares to a contralto voice, the "monstre charmant" -that couches in the porphyry-room of the Louvre. But after a time -the book fell from his hand. He grew nervous, and a horrible -fit of terror came over him. What if Alan Campbell should be -out of England? Days would elapse before he could come back. -Perhaps he might refuse to come. What could he do then? -Every moment was of vital importance. - -They had been great friends once, five years before-- -almost inseparable, indeed. Then the intimacy had come suddenly -to an end. When they met in society now, it was only Dorian -Gray who smiled: Alan Campbell never did. - -He was an extremely clever young man, though he had no real -appreciation of the visible arts, and whatever little sense -of the beauty of poetry he possessed he had gained entirely -from Dorian. His dominant intellectual passion was for science. -At Cambridge he had spent a great deal of his time working -in the laboratory, and had taken a good class in the Natural -Science Tripos of his year. Indeed, he was still devoted -to the study of chemistry, and had a laboratory of his -own in which he used to shut himself up all day long, -greatly to the annoyance of his mother, who had set her -heart on his standing for Parliament and had a vague idea -that a chemist was a person who made up prescriptions. -He was an excellent musician, however, as well, and played -both the violin and the piano better than most amateurs. -In fact, it was music that had first brought him and Dorian -Gray together--music and that indefinable attraction that -Dorian seemed to be able to exercise whenever he wished-- -and, indeed, exercised often without being conscious of it. -They had met at Lady Berkshire's the night that Rubinstein -played there, and after that used to be always seen together -at the opera and wherever good music was going on. -For eighteen months their intimacy lasted. Campbell was -always either at Selby Royal or in Grosvenor Square. -To him, as to many others, Dorian Gray was the type -of everything that is wonderful and fascinating in life. -Whether or not a quarrel had taken place between them no one -ever knew. But suddenly people remarked that they scarcely -spoke when they met and that Campbell seemed always to go -away early from any party at which Dorian Gray was present. -He had changed, too--was strangely melancholy at times, appeared -almost to dislike hearing music, and would never himself play, -giving as his excuse, when he was called upon, that he was so -absorbed in science that he had no time left in which to practise. -And this was certainly true. Every day he seemed to become -more interested in biology, and his name appeared once or twice -in some of the scientific reviews in connection with certain -curious experiments. - -This was the man Dorian Gray was waiting for. Every second -he kept glancing at the clock. As the minutes went by he became -horribly agitated. At last he got up and began to pace up -and down the room, looking like a beautiful caged thing. -He took long stealthy strides. His hands were curiously cold. - -The suspense became unbearable. Time seemed to him to be crawling -with feet of lead, while he by monstrous winds was being swept towards -the jagged edge of some black cleft of precipice. He knew what was -waiting for him there; saw it, indeed, and, shuddering, crushed with dank -hands his burning lids as though he would have robbed the very brain -of sight and driven the eyeballs back into their cave. It was useless. -The brain had its own food on which it battened, and the imagination, -made grotesque by terror, twisted and distorted as a living thing by pain, -danced like some foul puppet on a stand and grinned through moving masks. -Then, suddenly, time stopped for him. Yes: that blind, slow-breathing thing -crawled no more, and horrible thoughts, time being dead, raced nimbly on -in front, and dragged a hideous future from its grave, and showed it to him. -He stared at it. Its very horror made him stone. - -At last the door opened and his servant entered. He turned -glazed eyes upon him. - -"Mr. Campbell, sir," said the man. - -A sigh of relief broke from his parched lips, and the colour came -back to his cheeks. - -"Ask him to come in at once, Francis." He felt that he was himself again. -His mood of cowardice had passed away. - -The man bowed and retired. In a few moments, Alan Campbell walked in, -looking very stern and rather pale, his pallor being intensified by his -coal-black hair and dark eyebrows. - -"Alan! This is kind of you. I thank you for coming." - -"I had intended never to enter your house again, Gray. But you said -it was a matter of life and death." His voice was hard and cold. -He spoke with slow deliberation. There was a look of contempt -in the steady searching gaze that he turned on Dorian. -He kept his hands in the pockets of his Astrakhan coat, and seemed -not to have noticed the gesture with which he had been greeted. - -"Yes: it is a matter of life and death, Alan, and to more than one person. -Sit down." - -Campbell took a chair by the table, and Dorian sat opposite to him. -The two men's eyes met. In Dorian's there was infinite pity. -He knew that what he was going to do was dreadful. - -After a strained moment of silence, he leaned across and said, -very quietly, but watching the effect of each word upon the face -of him he had sent for, "Alan, in a locked room at the top -of this house, a room to which nobody but myself has access, -a dead man is seated at a table. He has been dead ten hours now. -Don't stir, and don't look at me like that. Who the man is, -why he died, how he died, are matters that do not concern you. -What you have to do is this--" - -"Stop, Gray. I don't want to know anything further. -Whether what you have told me is true or not true doesn't -concern me. I entirely decline to be mixed up in your life. -Keep your horrible secrets to yourself. They don't interest me -any more." - -"Alan, they will have to interest you. This one will have to interest you. -I am awfully sorry for you, Alan. But I can't help myself. -You are the one man who is able to save me. I am forced to bring -you into the matter. I have no option. Alan, you are scientific. -You know about chemistry and things of that kind. You have made experiments. -What you have got to do is to destroy the thing that is upstairs-- -to destroy it so that not a vestige of it will be left. Nobody saw this -person come into the house. Indeed, at the present moment he is supposed -to be in Paris. He will not be missed for months. When he is missed, -there must be no trace of him found here. You, Alan, you must change him, -and everything that belongs to him, into a handful of ashes that I may -scatter in the air." - -"You are mad, Dorian." - -"Ah! I was waiting for you to call me Dorian." - -"You are mad, I tell you--mad to imagine that I would raise -a finger to help you, mad to make this monstrous confession. -I will have nothing to do with this matter, whatever it is. -Do you think I am going to peril my reputation for you? What is it -to me what devil's work you are up to?" - -"It was suicide, Alan." - -"I am glad of that. But who drove him to it? You, I should fancy." - -"Do you still refuse to do this for me?" - -"Of course I refuse. I will have absolutely nothing to do with it. -I don't care what shame comes on you. You deserve it all. -I should not be sorry to see you disgraced, publicly disgraced. -How dare you ask me, of all men in the world, to mix myself -up in this horror? I should have thought you knew more about -people's characters. Your friend Lord Henry Wotton can't have -taught you much about psychology, whatever else he has taught you. -Nothing will induce me to stir a step to help you. You have -come to the wrong man. Go to some of your friends. Don't come -to me." - -"Alan, it was murder. I killed him. You don't know what he had made -me suffer. Whatever my life is, he had more to do with the making or -the marring of it than poor Harry has had. He may not have intended it, -the result was the same." - -"Murder! Good God, Dorian, is that what you have come to? -I shall not inform upon you. It is not my business. Besides, without -my stirring in the matter, you are certain to be arrested. -Nobody ever commits a crime without doing something stupid. -But I will have nothing to do with it." - -"You must have something to do with it. Wait, wait a moment; -listen to me. Only listen, Alan. All I ask of you is to perform -a certain scientific experiment. You go to hospitals and -dead-houses, and the horrors that you do there don't affect you. -If in some hideous dissecting-room or fetid laboratory you -found this man lying on a leaden table with red gutters scooped -out in it for the blood to flow through, you would simply look -upon him as an admirable subject. You would not turn a hair. -You would not believe that you were doing anything wrong. -On the contrary, you would probably feel that you were benefiting -the human race, or increasing the sum of knowledge in the world, -or gratifying intellectual curiosity, or something of that kind. -What I want you to do is merely what you have often done before. -Indeed, to destroy a body must be far less horrible than -what you are accustomed to work at. And, remember, it is -the only piece of evidence against me. If it is discovered, -I am lost; and it is sure to be discovered unless you -help me." - -"I have no desire to help you. You forget that. I am simply -indifferent to the whole thing. It has nothing to do with me." - -"Alan, I entreat you. Think of the position I am in. -Just before you came I almost fainted with terror. -You may know terror yourself some day. No! don't think of that. -Look at the matter purely from the scientific point of view. -You don't inquire where the dead things on which you -experiment come from. Don't inquire now. I have told you -too much as it is. But I beg of you to do this. We were -friends once, Alan." - -"Don't speak about those days, Dorian--they are dead." - -"The dead linger sometimes. The man upstairs will not go away. -He is sitting at the table with bowed head and outstretched arms. -Alan! Alan! If you don't come to my assistance, I am ruined. -Why, they will hang me, Alan! Don't you understand? They will hang -me for what I have done." - -"There is no good in prolonging this scene. I absolutely refuse -to do anything in the matter. It is insane of you to ask me." - -"You refuse?" - -"Yes." - -"I entreat you, Alan." - -"It is useless." - -The same look of pity came into Dorian Gray's eyes. Then he stretched -out his hand, took a piece of paper, and wrote something on it. -He read it over twice, folded it carefully, and pushed it across the table. -Having done this, he got up and went over to the window. - -Campbell looked at him in surprise, and then took up the paper, -and opened it. As he read it, his face became ghastly pale and he fell -back in his chair. A horrible sense of sickness came over him. -He felt as if his heart was beating itself to death in some -empty hollow. - -After two or three minutes of terrible silence, Dorian turned round and came -and stood behind him, putting his hand upon his shoulder. - -"I am so sorry for you, Alan," he murmured, "but you leave me -no alternative. I have a letter written already. Here it is. -You see the address. If you don't help me, I must send it. -If you don't help me, I will send it. You know what the result will be. -But you are going to help me. It is impossible for you to refuse now. -I tried to spare you. You will do me the justice to admit that. -You were stern, harsh, offensive. You treated me as no man has ever -dared to treat me--no living man, at any rate. I bore it all. -Now it is for me to dictate terms." - -Campbell buried his face in his hands, and a shudder passed through him. - -"Yes, it is my turn to dictate terms, Alan. You know what they are. -The thing is quite simple. Come, don't work yourself into this fever. -The thing has to be done. Face it, and do it." - -A groan broke from Campbell's lips and he shivered all over. -The ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece seemed to him to be -dividing time into separate atoms of agony, each of which was -too terrible to be borne. He felt as if an iron ring was -being slowly tightened round his forehead, as if the disgrace -with which he was threatened had already come upon him. -The hand upon his shoulder weighed like a hand of lead. -It was intolerable. It seemed to crush him. - -"Come, Alan, you must decide at once." - -"I cannot do it," he said, mechanically, as though words could alter things. - -"You must. You have no choice. Don't delay." - -He hesitated a moment. "Is there a fire in the room upstairs?" - -"Yes, there is a gas-fire with asbestos." - -"I shall have to go home and get some things from the laboratory." - -"No, Alan, you must not leave the house. Write out on a sheet -of notepaper what you want and my servant will take a cab -and bring the things back to you." - -Campbell scrawled a few lines, blotted them, and addressed an envelope -to his assistant. Dorian took the note up and read it carefully. -Then he rang the bell and gave it to his valet, with orders to return -as soon as possible and to bring the things with him. - -As the hall door shut, Campbell started nervously, and having got up -from the chair, went over to the chimney-piece. He was shivering with -a kind of ague. For nearly twenty minutes, neither of the men spoke. -A fly buzzed noisily about the room, and the ticking of the clock was -like the beat of a hammer. - -As the chime struck one, Campbell turned round, and looking at Dorian Gray, -saw that his eyes were filled with tears. There was something in the purity -and refinement of that sad face that seemed to enrage him. "You are infamous, -absolutely infamous!" he muttered. - -"Hush, Alan. You have saved my life," said Dorian. - -"Your life? Good heavens! what a life that is! You have gone from -corruption to corruption, and now you have culminated in crime. -In doing what I am going to do--what you force me to do-- -it is not of your life that I am thinking." - -"Ah, Alan," murmured Dorian with a sigh, "I wish you had -a thousandth part of the pity for me that I have for you." -He turned away as he spoke and stood looking out at the garden. -Campbell made no answer. - -After about ten minutes a knock came to the door, and the servant entered, -carrying a large mahogany chest of chemicals, with a long coil of steel and -platinum wire and two rather curiously shaped iron clamps. - -"Shall I leave the things here, sir?" he asked Campbell. - -"Yes," said Dorian. "And I am afraid, Francis, that I have another -errand for you. What is the name of the man at Richmond who supplies -Selby with orchids?" - -"Harden, sir." - -"Yes--Harden. You must go down to Richmond at once, see Harden personally, -and tell him to send twice as many orchids as I ordered, and to have -as few white ones as possible. In fact, I don't want any white ones. -It is a lovely day, Francis, and Richmond is a very pretty place-- -otherwise I wouldn't bother you about it." - -"No trouble, sir. At what time shall I be back?" - -Dorian looked at Campbell. "How long will your experiment take, Alan?" -he said in a calm indifferent voice. The presence of a third person -in the room seemed to give him extraordinary courage. - -Campbell frowned and bit his lip. "It will take about five hours," -he answered. - -"It will be time enough, then, if you are back at half-past seven, Francis. -Or stay: just leave my things out for dressing. You can have the evening -to yourself. I am not dining at home, so I shall not want you." - -"Thank you, sir," said the man, leaving the room. - -"Now, Alan, there is not a moment to be lost. How heavy this chest is! -I'll take it for you. You bring the other things." He spoke rapidly -and in an authoritative manner. Campbell felt dominated by him. -They left the room together. - -When they reached the top landing, Dorian took out the key and turned it -in the lock. Then he stopped, and a troubled look came into his eyes. -He shuddered. "I don't think I can go in, Alan," he murmured. - -"It is nothing to me. I don't require you," said Campbell coldly. - -Dorian half opened the door. As he did so, he saw the face -of his portrait leering in the sunlight. On the floor in front -of it the torn curtain was lying. He remembered that the night -before he had forgotten, for the first time in his life, -to hide the fatal canvas, and was about to rush forward, -when he drew back with a shudder. - -What was that loathsome red dew that gleamed, wet and glistening, -on one of the hands, as though the canvas had sweated blood? -How horrible it was!--more horrible, it seemed to him for the moment, -than the silent thing that he knew was stretched across the table, -the thing whose grotesque misshapen shadow on the spotted carpet -showed him that it had not stirred, but was still there, as he had -left it. - -He heaved a deep breath, opened the door a little wider, -and with half-closed eyes and averted head, walked quickly in, -determined that he would not look even once upon the dead man. -Then, stooping down and taking up the gold-and-purple hanging, -he flung it right over the picture. - -There he stopped, feeling afraid to turn round, and his eyes -fixed themselves on the intricacies of the pattern before him. -He heard Campbell bringing in the heavy chest, and the irons, -and the other things that he had required for his dreadful work. -He began to wonder if he and Basil Hallward had ever met, and, if so, -what they had thought of each other. - -"Leave me now," said a stern voice behind him. - -He turned and hurried out, just conscious that the dead man -had been thrust back into the chair and that Campbell was gazing -into a glistening yellow face. As he was going downstairs, -he heard the key being turned in the lock. - -It was long after seven when Campbell came back into the library. -He was pale, but absolutely calm. "I have done what you asked -me to do," he muttered "And now, good-bye. Let us never see each -other again." - -"You have saved me from ruin, Alan. I cannot forget that," -said Dorian simply. - -As soon as Campbell had left, he went upstairs. There was a horrible -smell of nitric acid in the room. But the thing that had been sitting -at the table was gone. - - - -CHAPTER 15 - -That evening, at eight-thirty, exquisitely dressed and wearing a large -button-hole of Parma violets, Dorian Gray was ushered into Lady -Narborough's drawing-room by bowing servants. His forehead was throbbing -with maddened nerves, and he felt wildly excited, but his manner -as he bent over his hostess's hand was as easy and graceful as ever. -Perhaps one never seems so much at one's ease as when one has to play a part. -Certainly no one looking at Dorian Gray that night could have believed -that he had passed through a tragedy as horrible as any tragedy of our age. -Those finely shaped fingers could never have clutched a knife for sin, -nor those smiling lips have cried out on God and goodness. He himself -could not help wondering at the calm of his demeanour, and for a moment -felt keenly the terrible pleasure of a double life. - -It was a small party, got up rather in a hurry by Lady Narborough, -who was a very clever woman with what Lord Henry used to describe -as the remains of really remarkable ugliness. She had proved -an excellent wife to one of our most tedious ambassadors, and having -buried her husband properly in a marble mausoleum, which she -had herself designed, and married off her daughters to some rich, -rather elderly men, she devoted herself now to the pleasures -of French fiction, French cookery, and French esprit when she could -get it. - -Dorian was one of her especial favourites, and she always told him -that she was extremely glad she had not met him in early life. -"I know, my dear, I should have fallen madly in love with you," -she used to say, "and thrown my bonnet right over the mills for your sake. -It is most fortunate that you were not thought of at the time. -As it was, our bonnets were so unbecoming, and the mills were -so occupied in trying to raise the wind, that I never had even a -flirtation with anybody. However, that was all Narborough's fault. -He was dreadfully short-sighted, and there is no pleasure in taking -in a husband who never sees anything." - -Her guests this evening were rather tedious. The fact was, -as she explained to Dorian, behind a very shabby fan, -one of her married daughters had come up quite suddenly to stay -with her, and, to make matters worse, had actually brought her -husband with her. "I think it is most unkind of her, my dear," -she whispered. "Of course I go and stay with them every summer -after I come from Homburg, but then an old woman like me must -have fresh air sometimes, and besides, I really wake them up. -You don't know what an existence they lead down there. -It is pure unadulterated country life. They get up early, -because they have so much to do, and go to bed early, -because they have so little to think about. There has not been -a scandal in the neighbourhood since the time of Queen Elizabeth, -and consequently they all fall asleep after dinner. -You shan't sit next either of them. You shall sit by me and -amuse me." - -Dorian murmured a graceful compliment and looked round -the room. Yes: it was certainly a tedious party. -Two of the people he had never seen before, and the others -consisted of Ernest Harrowden, one of those middle-aged -mediocrities so common in London clubs who have no enemies, -but are thoroughly disliked by their friends; Lady Ruxton, -an overdressed woman of forty-seven, with a hooked nose, -who was always trying to get herself compromised, but was -so peculiarly plain that to her great disappointment no -one would ever believe anything against her; Mrs. Erlynne, -a pushing nobody, with a delightful lisp and Venetian-red hair; -Lady Alice Chapman, his hostess's daughter, a dowdy dull girl, -with one of those characteristic British faces that, once seen, -are never remembered; and her husband, a red-cheeked, -white-whiskered creature who, like so many of his class, -was under the impression that inordinate joviality can atone for -an entire lack of ideas. - -He was rather sorry he had come, till Lady Narborough, -looking at the great ormolu gilt clock that sprawled in gaudy -curves on the mauve-draped mantelshelf, exclaimed: "How horrid -of Henry Wotton to be so late! I sent round to him this morning -on chance and he promised faithfully not to disappoint me." - -It was some consolation that Harry was to be there, and when the door opened -and he heard his slow musical voice lending charm to some insincere apology, -he ceased to feel bored. - -But at dinner he could not eat anything. Plate after plate went -away untasted. Lady Narborough kept scolding him for what she -called "an insult to poor Adolphe, who invented the menu -specially for you," and now and then Lord Henry looked across -at him, wondering at his silence and abstracted manner. -From time to time the butler filled his glass with champagne. -He drank eagerly, and his thirst seemed to increase. - -"Dorian," said Lord Henry at last, as the chaud-froid was being handed round, -"what is the matter with you to-night? You are quite out of sorts." - -"I believe he is in love," cried Lady Narborough, "and that he is -afraid to tell me for fear I should be jealous. He is quite right. -I certainly should." - -"Dear Lady Narborough," murmured Dorian, smiling, "I have not been in love -for a whole week--not, in fact, since Madame de Ferrol left town." - -"How you men can fall in love with that woman!" exclaimed the old lady. -"I really cannot understand it." - -"It is simply because she remembers you when you were a little girl, -Lady Narborough," said Lord Henry. "She is the one link between us -and your short frocks." - -"She does not remember my short frocks at all, Lord Henry. -But I remember her very well at Vienna thirty years ago, -and how decolletee she was then." - -"She is still decolletee," he answered, taking an olive in his long fingers; -"and when she is in a very smart gown she looks like an edition de luxe -of a bad French novel. She is really wonderful, and full of surprises. -Her capacity for family affection is extraordinary. When her third husband -died, her hair turned quite gold from grief." - -"How can you, Harry!" cried Dorian. - -"It is a most romantic explanation," laughed the hostess. -"But her third husband, Lord Henry! You don't mean to say Ferrol -is the fourth?" - -"Certainly, Lady Narborough." - -"I don't believe a word of it." - -"Well, ask Mr. Gray. He is one of her most intimate friends." - -"Is it true, Mr. Gray?" - -"She assures me so, Lady Narborough," said Dorian. "I asked her whether, -like Marguerite de Navarre, she had their hearts embalmed and hung at -her girdle. She told me she didn't, because none of them had had any -hearts at all." - -"Four husbands! Upon my word that is trop de zele." - -"Trop d'audace, I tell her," said Dorian. - -"Oh! she is audacious enough for anything, my dear. And what is Ferrol like? -I don't know him." - -"The husbands of very beautiful women belong to the criminal classes," -said Lord Henry, sipping his wine. - -Lady Narborough hit him with her fan. "Lord Henry, I am not at all surprised -that the world says that you are extremely wicked." - -"But what world says that?" asked Lord Henry, elevating his eyebrows. -"It can only be the next world. This world and I are on excellent terms." - -"Everybody I know says you are very wicked," cried the old lady, -shaking her head. - -Lord Henry looked serious for some moments. "It is perfectly monstrous," -he said, at last, "the way people go about nowadays saying things against one -behind one's back that are absolutely and entirely true." - -"Isn't he incorrigible?" cried Dorian, leaning forward in his chair. - -"I hope so," said his hostess, laughing. "But really, -if you all worship Madame de Ferrol in this ridiculous way, -I shall have to marry again so as to be in the fashion." - -"You will never marry again, Lady Narborough," broke in Lord Henry. -"You were far too happy. When a woman marries again, it is -because she detested her first husband. When a man marries again, -it is because he adored his first wife. Women try their luck; -men risk theirs." - -"Narborough wasn't perfect," cried the old lady. - -"If he had been, you would not have loved him, my dear lady," -was the rejoinder. "Women love us for our defects. -If we have enough of them, they will forgive us everything, -even our intellects. You will never ask me to dinner again -after saying this, I am afraid, Lady Narborough, but it is -quite true." - -"Of course it is true, Lord Henry. If we women did not love you for -your defects, where would you all be? Not one of you would ever be married. -You would be a set of unfortunate bachelors. Not, however, that that -would alter you much. Nowadays all the married men live like bachelors, -and all the bachelors like married men." - -"Fin de siecle," murmured Lord Henry. - -"Fin du globe," answered his hostess. - -"I wish it were fin du globe," said Dorian with a sigh. -"Life is a great disappointment." - -"Ah, my dear," cried Lady Narborough, putting on her gloves, -"don't tell me that you have exhausted life. When a man says that -one knows that life has exhausted him. Lord Henry is very wicked, -and I sometimes wish that I had been; but you are made to be good-- -you look so good. I must find you a nice wife. Lord Henry, don't you -think that Mr. Gray should get married?" - -"I am always telling him so, Lady Narborough," said Lord Henry with a bow. - -"Well, we must look out for a suitable match for him. -I shall go through Debrett carefully to-night and draw out a list -of all the eligible young ladies." - -"With their ages, Lady Narborough?" asked Dorian. - -"Of course, with their ages, slightly edited. But nothing must be done -in a hurry. I want it to be what The Morning Post calls a suitable alliance, -and I want you both to be happy." - -"What nonsense people talk about happy marriages!" exclaimed Lord Henry. -"A man can be happy with any woman, as long as he does not love her." - -"Ah! what a cynic you are!" cried the old lady, pushing back her chair -and nodding to Lady Ruxton. "You must come and dine with me soon again. -You are really an admirable tonic, much better than what Sir Andrew prescribes -for me. You must tell me what people you would like to meet, though. I want -it to be a delightful gathering." - -"I like men who have a future and women who have a past," he answered. -"Or do you think that would make it a petticoat party?" - -"I fear so," she said, laughing, as she stood up. "A thousand pardons, -my dear Lady Ruxton," she added, "I didn't see you hadn't finished -your cigarette." - -"Never mind, Lady Narborough. I smoke a great deal too much. -I am going to limit myself, for the future." - -"Pray don't, Lady Ruxton," said Lord Henry. "Moderation is a fatal thing. -Enough is as bad as a meal. More than enough is as good as a feast." - -Lady Ruxton glanced at him curiously. "You must come and explain that to me -some afternoon, Lord Henry. It sounds a fascinating theory," she murmured, -as she swept out of the room. - -"Now, mind you don't stay too long over your politics and scandal," -cried Lady Narborough from the door. "If you do, we are sure to -squabble upstairs." - -The men laughed, and Mr. Chapman got up solemnly -from the foot of the table and came up to the top. -Dorian Gray changed his seat and went and sat by Lord Henry. -Mr. Chapman began to talk in a loud voice about the situation -in the House of Commons. He guffawed at his adversaries. -The word doctrinaire--word full of terror to the British mind-- -reappeared from time to time between his explosions. -An alliterative prefix served as an ornament of oratory. -He hoisted the Union Jack on the pinnacles of thought. -The inherited stupidity of the race--sound English common sense -he jovially termed it--was shown to be the proper bulwark -for society. - -A smile curved Lord Henry's lips, and he turned round and looked at Dorian. - -"Are you better, my dear fellow?" he asked. "You seemed rather -out of sorts at dinner." - -"I am quite well, Harry. I am tired. That is all." - -"You were charming last night. The little duchess is quite devoted to you. -She tells me she is going down to Selby." - -"She has promised to come on the twentieth." - -"Is Monmouth to be there, too?" - -"Oh, yes, Harry." - -"He bores me dreadfully, almost as much as he bores her. She is very clever, -too clever for a woman. She lacks the indefinable charm of weakness. -It is the feet of clay that make the gold of the image precious. Her feet -are very pretty, but they are not feet of clay. White porcelain feet, -if you like. They have been through the fire, and what fire does not destroy, -it hardens. She has had experiences." - -"How long has she been married?" asked Dorian. - -"An eternity, she tells me. I believe, according to the peerage, -it is ten years, but ten years with Monmouth must have been like eternity, -with time thrown in. Who else is coming?" - -"Oh, the Willoughbys, Lord Rugby and his wife, our hostess, -Geoffrey Clouston, the usual set. I have asked Lord Grotrian." - -"I like him," said Lord Henry. "A great many people don't, but I find -him charming. He atones for being occasionally somewhat overdressed -by being always absolutely over-educated. He is a very modern type." - -"I don't know if he will be able to come, Harry. He may have to go to Monte -Carlo with his father." - -"Ah! what a nuisance people's people are! Try and make him come. -By the way, Dorian, you ran off very early last night. -You left before eleven. What did you do afterwards? Did you go -straight home?" - -Dorian glanced at him hurriedly and frowned. - -"No, Harry," he said at last, "I did not get home till nearly three." - -"Did you go to the club?" - -"Yes," he answered. Then he bit his lip. "No, I don't mean that. -I didn't go to the club. I walked about. I forget what I did. -. . . How inquisitive you are, Harry! You always want to know what -one has been doing. I always want to forget what I have been doing. -I came in at half-past two, if you wish to know the exact time. -I had left my latch-key at home, and my servant had to let me in. -If you want any corroborative evidence on the subject, you can ask -him." - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "My dear fellow, as if I cared! -Let us go up to the drawing-room. No sherry, thank you, Mr. Chapman. -Something has happened to you, Dorian. Tell me what it is. -You are not yourself to-night." - -"Don't mind me, Harry. I am irritable, and out of temper. -I shall come round and see you to-morrow, or next day. -Make my excuses to Lady Narborough. I shan't go upstairs. -I shall go home. I must go home." - -"All right, Dorian. I dare say I shall see you to-morrow at tea-time. -The duchess is coming." - -"I will try to be there, Harry," he said, leaving the room. -As he drove back to his own house, he was conscious that the sense -of terror he thought he had strangled had come back to him. -Lord Henry's casual questioning had made him lose his -nerves for the moment, and he wanted his nerve still. -Things that were dangerous had to be destroyed. He winced. -He hated the idea of even touching them. - -Yet it had to be done. He realized that, and when he had -locked the door of his library, he opened the secret press -into which he had thrust Basil Hallward's coat and bag. -A huge fire was blazing. He piled another log on it. -The smell of the singeing clothes and burning leather was horrible. -It took him three-quarters of an hour to consume everything. -At the end he felt faint and sick, and having lit some Algerian -pastilles in a pierced copper brazier, he bathed his hands and -forehead with a cool musk-scented vinegar. - -Suddenly he started. His eyes grew strangely bright, and he gnawed -nervously at his underlip. Between two of the windows stood a large -Florentine cabinet, made out of ebony and inlaid with ivory and blue lapis. -He watched it as though it were a thing that could fascinate and make afraid, -as though it held something that he longed for and yet almost loathed. -His breath quickened. A mad craving came over him. He lit a cigarette -and then threw it away. His eyelids drooped till the long fringed -lashes almost touched his cheek. But he still watched the cabinet. -At last he got up from the sofa on which he had been lying, -went over to it, and having unlocked it, touched some hidden spring. -A triangular drawer passed slowly out. His fingers moved instinctively -towards it, dipped in, and closed on something. It was a small -Chinese box of black and gold-dust lacquer, elaborately wrought, -the sides patterned with curved waves, and the silken cords hung with -round crystals and tasselled in plaited metal threads. He opened it. -Inside was a green paste, waxy in lustre, the odour curiously heavy -and persistent. - -He hesitated for some moments, with a strangely immobile smile upon his face. -Then shivering, though the atmosphere of the room was terribly hot, he drew -himself up and glanced at the clock. It was twenty minutes to twelve. -He put the box back, shutting the cabinet doors as he did so, and went into -his bedroom. - -As midnight was striking bronze blows upon the dusky air, Dorian Gray, -dressed commonly, and with a muffler wrapped round his throat, -crept quietly out of his house. In Bond Street he found a hansom -with a good horse. He hailed it and in a low voice gave the driver -an address. - -The man shook his head. "It is too far for me," he muttered. - -"Here is a sovereign for you," said Dorian. "You shall have another if you -drive fast." - -"All right, sir," answered the man, "you will be there in an hour," -and after his fare had got in he turned his horse round and drove -rapidly towards the river. - - - -CHAPTER 16 - -A cold rain began to fall, and the blurred street-lamps looked ghastly -in the dripping mist. The public-houses were just closing, and dim -men and women were clustering in broken groups round their doors. -From some of the bars came the sound of horrible laughter. In others, -drunkards brawled and screamed. - -Lying back in the hansom, with his hat pulled over his forehead, -Dorian Gray watched with listless eyes the sordid shame -of the great city, and now and then he repeated to himself -the words that Lord Henry had said to him on the first day -they had met, "To cure the soul by means of the senses, -and the senses by means of the soul." Yes, that was the secret. -He had often tried it, and would try it again now. -There were opium dens where one could buy oblivion, dens of horror -where the memory of old sins could be destroyed by the madness -of sins that were new. - -The moon hung low in the sky like a yellow skull. From time to time -a huge misshapen cloud stretched a long arm across and hid it. -The gas-lamps grew fewer, and the streets more narrow and gloomy. -Once the man lost his way and had to drive back half a mile. -A steam rose from the horse as it splashed up the puddles. -The sidewindows of the hansom were clogged with a grey-flannel mist. - -"To cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses -by means of the soul!" How the words rang in his ears! -His soul, certainly, was sick to death. Was it true that -the senses could cure it? Innocent blood had been spilled. -What could atone for that? Ah! for that there was no atonement; -but though forgiveness was impossible, forgetfulness was -possible still, and he was determined to forget, to stamp -the thing out, to crush it as one would crush the adder that -had stung one. Indeed, what right had Basil to have spoken -to him as he had done? Who had made him a judge over others? -He had said things that were dreadful, horrible, not to -be endured. - -On and on plodded the hansom, going slower, it seemed to him, -at each step. He thrust up the trap and called to the man -to drive faster. The hideous hunger for opium began to gnaw -at him. His throat burned and his delicate hands twitched -nervously together. He struck at the horse madly with his stick. -The driver laughed and whipped up. He laughed in answer, -and the man was silent. - -The way seemed interminable, and the streets like the black -web of some sprawling spider. The monotony became unbearable, -and as the mist thickened, he felt afraid. - -Then they passed by lonely brickfields. The fog was lighter here, -and he could see the strange, bottle-shaped kilns with their orange, -fanlike tongues of fire. A dog barked as they went by, -and far away in the darkness some wandering sea-gull screamed. -The horse stumbled in a rut, then swerved aside and broke into -a gallop. - -After some time they left the clay road and rattled again -over rough-paven streets. Most of the windows were dark, -but now and then fantastic shadows were silhouetted against -some lamplit blind. He watched them curiously. They moved -like monstrous marionettes and made gestures like live things. -He hated them. A dull rage was in his heart. As they turned -a corner, a woman yelled something at them from an open door, -and two men ran after the hansom for about a hundred yards. -The driver beat at them with his whip. - -It is said that passion makes one think in a circle. -Certainly with hideous iteration the bitten lips of Dorian Gray -shaped and reshaped those subtle words that dealt with soul -and sense, till he had found in them the full expression, -as it were, of his mood, and justified, by intellectual approval, -passions that without such justification would still have -dominated his temper. From cell to cell of his brain crept -the one thought; and the wild desire to live, most terrible -of all man's appetites, quickened into force each trembling -nerve and fibre. Ugliness that had once been hateful -to him because it made things real, became dear to him -now for that very reason. Ugliness was the one reality. -The coarse brawl, the loathsome den, the crude violence -of disordered life, the very vileness of thief and outcast, -were more vivid, in their intense actuality of impression, -than all the gracious shapes of art, the dreamy shadows of song. -They were what he needed for forgetfulness. In three days he would -be free. - -Suddenly the man drew up with a jerk at the top of a dark lane. -Over the low roofs and jagged chimney-stacks of the houses rose -the black masts of ships. Wreaths of white mist clung like ghostly -sails to the yards. - -"Somewhere about here, sir, ain't it?" he asked huskily through the trap. - -Dorian started and peered round. "This will do," he answered, -and having got out hastily and given the driver the extra fare -he had promised him, he walked quickly in the direction of the quay. -Here and there a lantern gleamed at the stern of some huge merchantman. -The light shook and splintered in the puddles. A red glare came from -an outward-bound steamer that was coaling. The slimy pavement looked -like a wet mackintosh. - -He hurried on towards the left, glancing back now and then to see -if he was being followed. In about seven or eight minutes he reached -a small shabby house that was wedged in between two gaunt factories. -In one of the top-windows stood a lamp. He stopped and gave a -peculiar knock. - -After a little time he heard steps in the passage and the chain -being unhooked. The door opened quietly, and he went in without -saying a word to the squat misshapen figure that flattened -itself into the shadow as he passed. At the end of the hall -hung a tattered green curtain that swayed and shook in -the gusty wind which had followed him in from the street. -He dragged it aside and entered a long low room which looked -as if it had once been a third-rate dancing-saloon. Shrill -flaring gas-jets, dulled and distorted in the fly-blown mirrors -that faced them, were ranged round the walls. Greasy reflectors -of ribbed tin backed them, making quivering disks of light. -The floor was covered with ochre-coloured sawdust, trampled here -and there into mud, and stained with dark rings of spilled liquor. -Some Malays were crouching by a little charcoal stove, playing with -bone counters and showing their white teeth as they chattered. -In one corner, with his head buried in his arms, a sailor sprawled -over a table, and by the tawdrily painted bar that ran across one -complete side stood two haggard women, mocking an old man who was -brushing the sleeves of his coat with an expression of disgust. -"He thinks he's got red ants on him," laughed one of them, -as Dorian passed by. The man looked at her in terror and began -to whimper. - -At the end of the room there was a little staircase, -leading to a darkened chamber. As Dorian hurried up its -three rickety steps, the heavy odour of opium met him. -He heaved a deep breath, and his nostrils quivered with pleasure. -When he entered, a young man with smooth yellow hair, who was -bending over a lamp lighting a long thin pipe, looked up at him -and nodded in a hesitating manner. - -"You here, Adrian?" muttered Dorian. - -"Where else should I be?" he answered, listlessly. "None of the chaps -will speak to me now." - -"I thought you had left England." - -"Darlington is not going to do anything. My brother paid the bill at last. -George doesn't speak to me either. . . . I don't care," he added -with a sigh. "As long as one has this stuff, one doesn't want friends. -I think I have had too many friends." - -Dorian winced and looked round at the grotesque things that -lay in such fantastic postures on the ragged mattresses. -The twisted limbs, the gaping mouths, the staring lustreless eyes, -fascinated him. He knew in what strange heavens they were suffering, -and what dull hells were teaching them the secret of some new joy. -They were better off than he was. He was prisoned in thought. -Memory, like a horrible malady, was eating his soul away. From time -to time he seemed to see the eyes of Basil Hallward looking at him. -Yet he felt he could not stay. The presence of Adrian Singleton -troubled him. He wanted to be where no one would know who he was. -He wanted to escape from himself. - -"I am going on to the other place," he said after a pause. - -"On the wharf?" - -"Yes." - -"That mad-cat is sure to be there. They won't have her in this place now." - -Dorian shrugged his shoulders. "I am sick of women who love one. -Women who hate one are much more interesting. Besides, the stuff -is better." - -"Much the same." - -"I like it better. Come and have something to drink. -I must have something." - -"I don't want anything," murmured the young man. - -"Never mind." - -Adrian Singleton rose up wearily and followed Dorian to the bar. -A half-caste, in a ragged turban and a shabby ulster, grinned a -hideous greeting as he thrust a bottle of brandy and two tumblers -in front of them. The women sidled up and began to chatter. -Dorian turned his back on them and said something in a low voice to -Adrian Singleton. - -A crooked smile, like a Malay crease, writhed across the face of one -of the women. "We are very proud to-night," she sneered. - -"For God's sake don't talk to me," cried Dorian, stamping his -foot on the ground. "What do you want? Money? Here it is. -Don't ever talk to me again." - -Two red sparks flashed for a moment in the woman's sodden eyes, -then flickered out and left them dull and glazed. She tossed -her head and raked the coins off the counter with greedy fingers. -Her companion watched her enviously. - -"It's no use," sighed Adrian Singleton. "I don't care to go back. -What does it matter? I am quite happy here." - -"You will write to me if you want anything, won't you?" said Dorian, -after a pause. - -"Perhaps." - -"Good night, then." - -"Good night," answered the young man, passing up the steps and wiping -his parched mouth with a handkerchief. - -Dorian walked to the door with a look of pain in his face. -As he drew the curtain aside, a hideous laugh broke from -the painted lips of the woman who had taken his money. -"There goes the devil's bargain!" she hiccoughed, in a -hoarse voice. - -"Curse you!" he answered, "don't call me that." - -She snapped her fingers. "Prince Charming is what you like to be called, -ain't it?" she yelled after him. - -The drowsy sailor leaped to his feet as she spoke, and looked wildly round. -The sound of the shutting of the hall door fell on his ear. He rushed out as -if in pursuit. - -Dorian Gray hurried along the quay through the drizzling rain. -His meeting with Adrian Singleton had strangely moved him, and he wondered -if the ruin of that young life was really to be laid at his door, -as Basil Hallward had said to him with such infamy of insult. -He bit his lip, and for a few seconds his eyes grew sad. -Yet, after all, what did it matter to him? One's days were too -brief to take the burden of another's errors on one's shoulders. -Each man lived his own life and paid his own price for living it. -The only pity was one had to pay so often for a single fault. -One had to pay over and over again, indeed. In her dealings with man, -destiny never closed her accounts. - -There are moments, psychologists tell us, when the passion for sin, or for -what the world calls sin, so dominates a nature that every fibre of the body, -as every cell of the brain, seems to be instinct with fearful impulses. -Men and women at such moments lose the freedom of their will. They move -to their terrible end as automatons move. Choice is taken from them, -and conscience is either killed, or, if it lives at all, lives but to give -rebellion its fascination and disobedience its charm. For all sins, -as theologians weary not of reminding us, are sins of disobedience. -When that high spirit, that morning star of evil, fell from heaven, it was -as a rebel that he fell. - -Callous, concentrated on evil, with stained mind, and soul -hungry for rebellion, Dorian Gray hastened on, quickening his -step as he went, but as he darted aside into a dim archway, -that had served him often as a short cut to the ill-famed place -where he was going, he felt himself suddenly seized from behind, -and before he had time to defend himself, he was thrust back -against the wall, with a brutal hand round his throat. - -He struggled madly for life, and by a terrible effort wrenched -the tightening fingers away. In a second he heard the click -of a revolver, and saw the gleam of a polished barrel, -pointing straight at his head, and the dusky form of a short, -thick-set man facing him. - -"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 -to-night 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 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. - - - -CHAPTER 17 - -A week later Dorian Gray was sitting in the conservatory at Selby Royal, -talking to the pretty Duchess of Monmouth, who with her husband, -a jaded-looking man of sixty, was amongst his guests. -It was tea-time, and the mellow light of the huge, lace-covered lamp -that stood on the table lit up the delicate china and hammered -silver of the service at which the duchess was presiding. -Her white hands were moving daintily among the cups, and her full red -lips were smiling at something that Dorian had whispered to her. -Lord Henry was lying back in a silk-draped wicker chair, looking at them. -On a peach-coloured divan sat Lady Narborough, pretending to listen -to the duke's description of the last Brazilian beetle that he had -added to his collection. Three young men in elaborate smoking-suits -were handing tea-cakes to some of the women. The house-party -consisted of twelve people, and there were more expected to arrive on -the next day. - -"What are you two talking about?" said Lord Henry, strolling over to -the table and putting his cup down. "I hope Dorian has told you about -my plan for rechristening everything, Gladys. It is a delightful idea." - -"But I don't want to be rechristened, Harry," rejoined the duchess, -looking up at him with her wonderful eyes. "I am quite satisfied -with my own name, and I am sure Mr. Gray should be satisfied -with his." - -"My dear Gladys, I would not alter either name for the world. -They are both perfect. I was thinking chiefly of flowers. -Yesterday I cut an orchid, for my button-hole. It was a marvellous -spotted thing, as effective as the seven deadly sins. -In a thoughtless moment I asked one of the gardeners what it -was called. He told me it was a fine specimen of Robinsoniana, -or something dreadful of that kind. It is a sad truth, -but we have lost the faculty of giving lovely names to things. -Names are everything. I never quarrel with actions. -My one quarrel is with words. That is the reason I hate vulgar -realism in literature. The man who could call a spade a spade -should be compelled to use one. It is the only thing he is fit -for." - -"Then what should we call you, Harry?" she asked. - -"His name is Prince Paradox," said Dorian. - -"I recognize him in a flash," exclaimed the duchess. - -"I won't hear of it," laughed Lord Henry, sinking into a chair. -"From a label there is no escape! I refuse the title." - -"Royalties may not abdicate," fell as a warning from pretty lips. - -"You wish me to defend my throne, then?" - -"Yes." - -"I give the truths of to-morrow." - -"I prefer the mistakes of to-day," she answered. - -"You disarm me, Gladys," he cried, catching the wilfulness of her mood. - -"Of your shield, Harry, not of your spear." - -"I never tilt against beauty," he said, with a wave of his hand. - -"That is your error, Harry, believe me. You value beauty far too much." - -"How can you say that? I admit that I think that it is better -to be beautiful than to be good. But on the other hand, -no one is more ready than I am to acknowledge that it is better -to be good than to be ugly." - -"Ugliness is one of the seven deadly sins, then?" cried the duchess. -"What becomes of your simile about the orchid?" - -"Ugliness is one of the seven deadly virtues, Gladys. You, as a good Tory, -must not underrate them. Beer, the Bible, and the seven deadly virtues have -made our England what she is." - -"You don't like your country, then?" she asked. - -"I live in it." - -"That you may censure it the better." - -"Would you have me take the verdict of Europe on it?" he inquired. - -"What do they say of us?" - -"That Tartuffe has emigrated to England and opened a shop." - -"Is that yours, Harry?" - -"I give it to you." - -"I could not use it. It is too true." - -"You need not be afraid. Our countrymen never recognize a description." - -"They are practical." - -"They are more cunning than practical. When they make up their ledger, -they balance stupidity by wealth, and vice by hypocrisy." - -"Still, we have done great things." - -"Great things have been thrust on us, Gladys." - -"We have carried their burden." - -"Only as far as the Stock Exchange." - -She shook her head. "I believe in the race," she cried. - -"It represents the survival of the pushing." - -"It has development." - -"Decay fascinates me more." - -"What of art?" she asked. - -"It is a malady." - -"Love?" - -"An illusion." - -"Religion?" - -"The fashionable substitute for belief." - -"You are a sceptic." - -"Never! Scepticism is the beginning of faith." - -"What are you?" - -"To define is to limit." - -"Give me a clue." - -"Threads snap. You would lose your way in the labyrinth." - -"You bewilder me. Let us talk of some one else." - -"Our host is a delightful topic. Years ago he was christened -Prince Charming." - -"Ah! don't remind me of that," cried Dorian Gray. - -"Our host is rather horrid this evening," answered the duchess, colouring. -"I believe he thinks that Monmouth married me on purely scientific principles -as the best specimen he could find of a modern butterfly." - -"Well, I hope he won't stick pins into you, Duchess," laughed Dorian. - -"Oh! my maid does that already, Mr. Gray, when she is annoyed with me." - -"And what does she get annoyed with you about, Duchess?" - -"For the most trivial things, Mr. Gray, I assure you. -Usually because I come in at ten minutes to nine and tell her -that I must be dressed by half-past eight." - -"How unreasonable of her! You should give her warning." - -"I daren't, Mr. Gray. Why, she invents hats for me. -You remember the one I wore at Lady Hilstone's garden-party? -You don't, but it is nice of you to pretend that you do. -Well, she made if out of nothing. All good hats are made out -of nothing." - -"Like all good reputations, Gladys," interrupted Lord Henry. -"Every effect that one produces gives one an enemy. -To be popular one must be a mediocrity." - -"Not with women," said the duchess, shaking her head; "and women -rule the world. I assure you we can't bear mediocrities. -We women, as some one says, love with our ears, just as you men -love with your eyes, if you ever love at all." - -"It seems to me that we never do anything else," murmured Dorian. - -"Ah! then, you never really love, Mr. Gray," answered the duchess -with mock sadness. - -"My dear Gladys!" cried Lord Henry. "How can you say that? -Romance lives by repetition, and repetition converts an -appetite into an art. Besides, each time that one loves is -the only time one has ever loved. Difference of object does -not alter singleness of passion. It merely intensifies it. -We can have in life but one great experience at best, -and the secret of life is to reproduce that experience as often -as possible." - -"Even when one has been wounded by it, Harry?" asked the duchess -after a pause. - -"Especially when one has been wounded by it," answered Lord Henry. - -The duchess turned and looked at Dorian Gray with a curious -expression in her eyes. "What do you say to that, Mr. Gray?" -she inquired. - -Dorian hesitated for a moment. Then he threw his head back and laughed. -"I always agree with Harry, Duchess." - -"Even when he is wrong?" - -"Harry is never wrong, Duchess." - -"And does his philosophy make you happy?" - -"I have never searched for happiness. Who wants happiness? -I have searched for pleasure." - -"And found it, Mr. Gray?" - -"Often. Too often." - -The duchess sighed. "I am searching for peace," she said, -"and if I don't go and dress, I shall have none this evening." - -"Let me get you some orchids, Duchess," cried Dorian, starting to his feet -and walking down the conservatory. - -"You are flirting disgracefully with him," said Lord Henry to his cousin. -"You had better take care. He is very fascinating." - -"If he were not, there would be no battle." - -"Greek meets Greek, then?" - -"I am on the side of the Trojans. They fought for a woman." - -"They were defeated." - -"There are worse things than capture," she answered. - -"You gallop with a loose rein." - -"Pace gives life," was the riposte. - -"I shall write it in my diary to-night." - -"What?" - -"That a burnt child loves the fire." - -"I am not even singed. My wings are untouched." - -"You use them for everything, except flight." - -"Courage has passed from men to women. It is a new experience for us." - -"You have a rival." - -"Who?" - -He laughed. "Lady Narborough," he whispered. "She perfectly adores him." - -"You fill me with apprehension. The appeal to antiquity is fatal -to us who are romanticists." - -"Romanticists! You have all the methods of science." - -"Men have educated us." - -"But not explained you." - -"Describe us as a sex," was her challenge. - -"Sphinxes without secrets." - -She looked at him, smiling. "How long Mr. Gray is!" she said. -"Let us go and help him. I have not yet told him the colour of -my frock." - -"Ah! you must suit your frock to his flowers, Gladys." - -"That would be a premature surrender." - -"Romantic art begins with its climax." - -"I must keep an opportunity for retreat." - -"In the Parthian manner?" - -"They found safety in the desert. I could not do that." - -"Women are not always allowed a choice," he answered, but hardly had -he finished the sentence before from the far end of the conservatory -came a stifled groan, followed by the dull sound of a heavy fall. -Everybody started up. The duchess stood motionless in horror. -And with fear in his eyes, Lord Henry rushed through the flapping -palms to find Dorian Gray lying face downwards on the tiled floor in a -deathlike swoon. - -He was carried at once into the blue drawing-room and laid -upon one of the sofas. After a short time, he came to himself -and looked round with a dazed expression. - -"What has happened?" he asked. "Oh! I remember. Am I safe here, Harry?" -He began to tremble. - -"My dear Dorian," answered Lord Henry, "you merely fainted. That was all. -You must have overtired yourself. You had better not come down to dinner. -I will take your place." - -"No, I will come down," he said, struggling to his feet. -"I would rather come down. I must not be alone." - -He went to his room and dressed. There was a wild recklessness -of gaiety in his manner as he sat at table, but now and then -a thrill of terror ran through him when he remembered that, -pressed against the window of the conservatory, like a -white handkerchief, he had seen the face of James Vane watching him. - - - -CHAPTER 18 - -The next day he did not leave the house, and, indeed, spent most -of the time in his own room, sick with a wild terror of dying, -and yet indifferent to life itself. The consciousness of -being hunted, snared, tracked down, had begun to dominate him. -If the tapestry did but tremble in the wind, he shook. -The dead leaves that were blown against the leaded panes seemed -to him like his own wasted resolutions and wild regrets. -When he closed his eyes, he saw again the sailor's face peering -through the mist-stained glass, and horror seemed once more to lay its -hand upon his heart. - -But perhaps it had been only his fancy that had called vengeance out -of the night and set the hideous shapes of punishment before him. -Actual life was chaos, but there was something terribly logical -in the imagination. It was the imagination that set remorse -to dog the feet of sin. It was the imagination that made -each crime bear its misshapen brood. In the common world -of fact the wicked were not punished, nor the good rewarded. -Success was given to the strong, failure thrust upon the weak. -That was all. Besides, had any stranger been prowling round -the house, he would have been seen by the servants or the keepers. -Had any foot-marks been found on the flower-beds, the gardeners -would have reported it. Yes, it had been merely fancy. -Sibyl Vane's brother had not come back to kill him. -He had sailed away in his ship to founder in some winter sea. -From him, at any rate, he was safe. Why, the man did not know -who he was, could not know who he was. The mask of youth had -saved him. - -And yet if it had been merely an illusion, how terrible it -was to think that conscience could raise such fearful phantoms, -and give them visible form, and make them move before one! -What sort of life would his be if, day and night, -shadows of his crime were to peer at him from silent corners, -to mock him from secret places, to whisper in his ear as he sat -at the feast, to wake him with icy fingers as he lay asleep! -As the thought crept through his brain, he grew pale with terror, -and the air seemed to him to have become suddenly colder. -Oh! in what a wild hour of madness he had killed his friend! -How ghastly the mere memory of the scene! He saw it all again. -Each hideous detail came back to him with added horror. -Out of the black cave of time, terrible and swathed in scarlet, -rose the image of his sin. When Lord Henry came in at -six o'clock, he found him crying as one whose heart will -break. - -It was not till the third day that he ventured to go out. -There was something in the clear, pine-scented air of that -winter morning that seemed to bring him back his joyousness -and his ardour for life. But it was not merely the physical -conditions of environment that had caused the change. -His own nature had revolted against the excess of anguish -that had sought to maim and mar the perfection of its calm. -With subtle and finely wrought temperaments it is always so. -Their strong passions must either bruise or bend. They either -slay the man, or themselves die. Shallow sorrows and shallow -loves live on. The loves and sorrows that are great are destroyed -by their own plenitude. Besides, he had convinced himself that -he had been the victim of a terror-stricken imagination, and looked -back now on his fears with something of pity and not a little -of contempt. - -After breakfast, he walked with the duchess for an hour in the garden -and then drove across the park to join the shooting-party. The crisp frost -lay like salt upon the grass. The sky was an inverted cup of blue metal. -A thin film of ice bordered the flat, reed-grown lake. - -At the corner of the pine-wood he caught sight of Sir Geoffrey Clouston, -the duchess's brother, jerking two spent cartridges out of his gun. -He jumped from the cart, and having told the groom to take the mare home, -made his way towards his guest through the withered bracken and -rough undergrowth. - -"Have you had good sport, Geoffrey?" he asked. - -"Not very good, Dorian. I think most of the birds have gone to the open. -I dare say it will be better after lunch, when we get to new ground." - -Dorian strolled along by his side. The keen aromatic air, -the brown and red lights that glimmered in the wood, -the hoarse cries of the beaters ringing out from time to time, -and the sharp snaps of the guns that followed, fascinated him -and filled him with a sense of delightful freedom. -He was dominated by the carelessness of happiness, by the high -indifference of joy. - -Suddenly from a lumpy tussock of old grass some twenty yards in front -of them, with black-tipped ears erect and long hinder limbs throwing -it forward, started a hare. It bolted for a thicket of alders. -Sir Geoffrey put his gun to his shoulder, but there was something -in the animal's grace of movement that strangely charmed Dorian Gray, -and he cried out at once, "Don't shoot it, Geoffrey. Let it live." - -"What nonsense, Dorian!" laughed his companion, and as the hare -bounded into the thicket, he fired. There were two cries heard, -the cry of a hare in pain, which is dreadful, the cry of a man in agony, -which is worse. - -"Good heavens! I have hit a beater!" exclaimed Sir Geoffrey. -"What an ass the man was to get in front of the guns! -Stop shooting there!" he called out at the top of his voice. -"A man is hurt." - -The head-keeper came running up with a stick in his hand. - -"Where, sir? Where is he?" he shouted. At the same time, -the firing ceased along the line. - -"Here," answered Sir Geoffrey angrily, hurrying towards the thicket. -"Why on earth don't you keep your men back? Spoiled my shooting for -the day." - -Dorian watched them as they plunged into the alder-clump, -brushing the lithe swinging branches aside. In a few moments -they emerged, dragging a body after them into the sunlight. -He turned away in horror. It seemed to him that misfortune -followed wherever he went. He heard Sir Geoffrey ask if the man -was really dead, and the affirmative answer of the keeper. -The wood seemed to him to have become suddenly alive with faces. -There was the trampling of myriad feet and the low buzz of voices. -A great copper-breasted pheasant came beating through the -boughs overhead. - -After a few moments--that were to him, in his perturbed state, -like endless hours of pain--he felt a hand laid on his shoulder. -He started and looked round. - -"Dorian," said Lord Henry, "I had better tell them that the shooting -is stopped for to-day. It would not look well to go on." - -"I wish it were stopped for ever, Harry," he answered bitterly. -"The whole thing is hideous and cruel. Is the man ... ?" - -He could not finish the sentence. - -"I am afraid so," rejoined Lord Henry. "He got the whole charge of shot -in his chest. He must have died almost instantaneously. Come; let us -go home." - -They walked side by side in the direction of the avenue for nearly fifty -yards without speaking. Then Dorian looked at Lord Henry and said, -with a heavy sigh, "It is a bad omen, Harry, a very bad omen." - -"What is?" asked Lord Henry. "Oh! this accident, I suppose. -My dear fellow, it can't be helped. It was the man's own fault. -Why did he get in front of the guns? Besides, it is nothing to us. -It is rather awkward for Geoffrey, of course. It does not do to -pepper beaters. It makes people think that one is a wild shot. -And Geoffrey is not; he shoots very straight. But there is no use talking -about the matter." - -Dorian shook his head. "It is a bad omen, Harry. I feel -as if something horrible were going to happen to some of us. -To myself, perhaps," he added, passing his hand over his eyes, -with a gesture of pain. - -The elder man laughed. "The only horrible thing in the world -is ennui, Dorian. That is the one sin for which there is -no forgiveness. But we are not likely to suffer from it unless -these fellows keep chattering about this thing at dinner. -I must tell them that the subject is to be tabooed. -As for omens, there is no such thing as an omen. -Destiny does not send us heralds. She is too wise or too cruel -for that. Besides, what on earth could happen to you, Dorian? -You have everything in the world that a man can want. -There is no one who would not be delighted to change places -with you." - -"There is no one with whom I would not change places, Harry. -Don't laugh like that. I am telling you the truth. The wretched -peasant who has just died is better off than I am. I have no -terror of death. It is the coming of death that terrifies me. -Its monstrous wings seem to wheel in the leaden air around me. -Good heavens! don't you see a man moving behind the trees there, -watching me, waiting for me?" - -Lord Henry looked in the direction in which the trembling gloved hand -was pointing. "Yes," he said, smiling, "I see the gardener waiting for you. -I suppose he wants to ask you what flowers you wish to have on the table -to-night. How absurdly nervous you are, my dear fellow! You must come -and see my doctor, when we get back to town." - -Dorian heaved a sigh of relief as he saw the gardener approaching. -The man touched his hat, glanced for a moment at Lord Henry in a -hesitating manner, and then produced a letter, which he handed -to his master. "Her Grace told me to wait for an answer," -he murmured. - -Dorian put the letter into his pocket. "Tell her Grace that I am coming in," -he said, coldly. The man turned round and went rapidly in the direction of -the house. - -"How fond women are of doing dangerous things!" laughed Lord Henry. -"It is one of the qualities in them that I admire most. A woman -will flirt with anybody in the world as long as other people are -looking on." - -"How fond you are of saying dangerous things, Harry! In the present instance, -you are quite astray. I like the duchess very much, but I don't love her." - -"And the duchess loves you very much, but she likes you less, -so you are excellently matched." - -"You are talking scandal, Harry, and there is never any basis for scandal." - -"The basis of every scandal is an immoral certainty," said Lord Henry, -lighting a cigarette. - -"You would sacrifice anybody, Harry, for the sake of an epigram." - -"The world goes to the altar of its own accord," was the answer. - -"I wish I could love," cried Dorian Gray with a deep note -of pathos in his voice. "But I seem to have lost the passion -and forgotten the desire. I am too much concentrated on myself. -My own personality has become a burden to me. I want to escape, -to go away, to forget. It was silly of me to come down here at all. -I think I shall send a wire to Harvey to have the yacht got ready. -On a yacht one is safe." - -"Safe from what, Dorian? You are in some trouble. Why not tell -me what it is? You know I would help you." - -"I can't tell you, Harry," he answered sadly. "And I dare say it -is only a fancy of mine. This unfortunate accident has upset me. -I have a horrible presentiment that something of the kind may happen -to me." - -"What nonsense!" - -"I hope it is, but I can't help feeling it. Ah! here is -the duchess, looking like Artemis in a tailor-made gown. -You see we have come back, Duchess." - -"I have heard all about it, Mr. Gray," she answered. "Poor Geoffrey is -terribly upset. And it seems that you asked him not to shoot the hare. -How curious!" - -"Yes, it was very curious. I don't know what made me say it. -Some whim, I suppose. It looked the loveliest of little -live things. But I am sorry they told you about the man. -It is a hideous subject." - -"It is an annoying subject," broke in Lord Henry. "It has no psychological -value at all. Now if Geoffrey had done the thing on purpose, how interesting -he would be! I should like to know some one who had committed a real murder." - -"How horrid of you, Harry!" cried the duchess. "Isn't it, -Mr. Gray? Harry, Mr. Gray is ill again. He is going to faint." - -Dorian drew himself up with an effort and smiled. "It is nothing, Duchess," -he murmured; "my nerves are dreadfully out of order. That is all. -I am afraid I walked too far this morning. I didn't hear what Harry said. -Was it very bad? You must tell me some other time. I think I must go and -lie down. You will excuse me, won't you?" - -They had reached the great flight of steps that led from the conservatory -on to the terrace. As the glass door closed behind Dorian, Lord Henry turned -and looked at the duchess with his slumberous eyes. "Are you very much -in love with him?" he asked. - -She did not answer for some time, but stood gazing at the landscape. -"I wish I knew," she said at last. - -He shook his head. "Knowledge would be fatal. It is the uncertainty -that charms one. A mist makes things wonderful." - -"One may lose one's way." - -"All ways end at the same point, my dear Gladys." - -"What is that?" - -"Disillusion." - -"It was my debut in life," she sighed. - -"It came to you crowned." - -"I am tired of strawberry leaves." - -"They become you." - -"Only in public." - -"You would miss them," said Lord Henry. - -"I will not part with a petal." - -"Monmouth has ears." - -"Old age is dull of hearing." - -"Has he never been jealous?" - -"I wish he had been." - -He glanced about as if in search of something. "What are you looking for?" -she inquired. - -"The button from your foil," he answered. "You have dropped it." - -She laughed. "I have still the mask." - -"It makes your eyes lovelier," was his reply. - -She laughed again. Her teeth showed like white seeds in a scarlet fruit. - -Upstairs, in his own room, Dorian Gray was lying on a sofa, -with terror in every tingling fibre of his body. Life had suddenly -become too hideous a burden for him to bear. The dreadful death -of the unlucky beater, shot in the thicket like a wild animal, -had seemed to him to pre-figure death for himself also. -He had nearly swooned at what Lord Henry had said in a chance mood -of cynical jesting. - -At five o'clock he rang his bell for his servant and gave -him orders to pack his things for the night-express to town, -and to have the brougham at the door by eight-thirty. He -was determined not to sleep another night at Selby Royal. -It was an ill-omened place. Death walked there in the sunlight. -The grass of the forest had been spotted with blood. - -Then he wrote a note to Lord Henry, telling him that he was going up to town -to consult his doctor and asking him to entertain his guests in his absence. -As he was putting it into the envelope, a knock came to the door, and his -valet informed him that the head-keeper wished to see him. He frowned and bit -his lip. "Send him in," he muttered, after some moments' hesitation. - -As soon as the man entered, Dorian pulled his chequebook out of a drawer -and spread it out before him. - -"I suppose you have come about the unfortunate accident -of this morning, Thornton?" he said, taking up a pen. - -"Yes, sir," answered the gamekeeper. - -"Was the poor fellow married? Had he any people dependent on him?" -asked Dorian, looking bored. "If so, I should not like them to be left -in want, and will send them any sum of money you may think necessary." - -"We don't know who he is, sir. That is what I took the liberty -of coming to you about." - -"Don't know who he is?" said Dorian, listlessly. "What do you mean? -Wasn't he one of your men?" - -"No, sir. Never saw him before. Seems like a sailor, sir." - -The pen dropped from Dorian Gray's hand, and he felt as if his -heart had suddenly stopped beating. "A sailor?" he cried out. -"Did you say a sailor?" - -"Yes, sir. He looks as if he had been a sort of sailor; -tattooed on both arms, and that kind of thing." - -"Was there anything found on him?" said Dorian, leaning forward and looking -at the man with startled eyes. "Anything that would tell his name?" - -"Some money, sir--not much, and a six-shooter. There was no name of any kind. -A decent-looking man, sir, but rough-like. A sort of sailor we think." - -Dorian started to his feet. A terrible hope fluttered past him. -He clutched at it madly. "Where is the body?" he exclaimed. -"Quick! I must see it at once." - -"It is in an empty stable in the Home Farm, sir. The folk -don't like to have that sort of thing in their houses. -They say a corpse brings bad luck." - -"The Home Farm! Go there at once and meet me. Tell one of the grooms -to bring my horse round. No. Never mind. I'll go to the stables myself. -It will save time." - -In less than a quarter of an hour, Dorian Gray was galloping down the long -avenue as hard as he could go. The trees seemed to sweep past him in -spectral procession, and wild shadows to fling themselves across his path. -Once the mare swerved at a white gate-post and nearly threw him. He lashed -her across the neck with his crop. She cleft the dusky air like an arrow. -The stones flew from her hoofs. - -At last he reached the Home Farm. Two men were loitering in the yard. -He leaped from the saddle and threw the reins to one of them. -In the farthest stable a light was glimmering. Something seemed -to tell him that the body was there, and he hurried to the door -and put his hand upon the latch. - -There he paused for a moment, feeling that he was on the brink -of a discovery that would either make or mar his life. -Then he thrust the door open and entered. - -On a heap of sacking in the far corner was lying the dead body -of a man dressed in a coarse shirt and a pair of blue trousers. -A spotted handkerchief had been placed over the face. -A coarse candle, stuck in a bottle, sputtered beside it. - -Dorian Gray shuddered. He felt that his could not be the hand to take -the handkerchief away, and called out to one of the farm-servants to come -to him. - -"Take that thing off the face. I wish to see it," he said, -clutching at the door-post for support. - -When the farm-servant had done so, he stepped forward. -A cry of joy broke from his lips. The man who had been shot in -the thicket was James Vane. - -He stood there for some minutes looking at the dead body. -As he rode home, his eyes were full of tears, for he knew -he was safe. - - -CHAPTER 19 - -"There is no use your telling me that you are going to be good," -cried Lord Henry, dipping his white fingers into a red copper bowl -filled with rose-water. "You are quite perfect. Pray, don't change." - -Dorian Gray shook his head. "No, Harry, I have done too many -dreadful things in my life. I am not going to do any more. -I began my good actions yesterday." - -"Where were you yesterday?" - -"In the country, Harry. I was staying at a little inn by myself." - -"My dear boy," said Lord Henry, smiling, "anybody can be good in the country. -There are no temptations there. That is the reason why people who live out -of town are so absolutely uncivilized. Civilization is not by any means an -easy thing to attain to. There are only two ways by which man can reach it. -One is by being cultured, the other by being corrupt. Country people have no -opportunity of being either, so they stagnate." - -"Culture and corruption," echoed Dorian. "I have known something of both. -It seems terrible to me now that they should ever be found together. -For I have a new ideal, Harry. I am going to alter. I think I -have altered." - -"You have not yet told me what your good action was. -Or did you say you had done more than one?" asked his companion -as he spilled into his plate a little crimson pyramid of seeded -strawberries and, through a perforated, shell-shaped spoon, -snowed white sugar upon them. - -"I can tell you, Harry. It is not a story I could tell to any one else. -I spared somebody. It sounds vain, but you understand what I mean. -She was quite beautiful and wonderfully like Sibyl Vane. I think it was -that which first attracted me to her. You remember Sibyl, don't you? -How long ago that seems! Well, Hetty was not one of our own class, -of course. She was simply a girl in a village. But I really loved her. -I am quite sure that I loved her. All during this wonderful May that we -have been having, I used to run down and see her two or three times a week. -Yesterday she met me in a little orchard. The apple-blossoms kept tumbling -down on her hair, and she was laughing. We were to have gone away together -this morning at dawn. Suddenly I determined to leave her as flowerlike as I -had found her." - -"I should think the novelty of the emotion must have given you -a thrill of real pleasure, Dorian," interrupted Lord Henry. -"But I can finish your idyll for you. You gave her good advice -and broke her heart. That was the beginning of your reformation." - -"Harry, you are horrible! You mustn't say these dreadful things. -Hetty's heart is not broken. Of course, she cried and all that. -But there is no disgrace upon her. She can live, like Perdita, in her -garden of mint and marigold." - -"And weep over a faithless Florizel," said Lord Henry, -laughing, as he leaned back in his chair. "My dear Dorian, -you have the most curiously boyish moods. Do you think this girl -will ever be really content now with any one of her own rank? -I suppose she will be married some day to a rough carter -or a grinning ploughman. Well, the fact of having met you, -and loved you, will teach her to despise her husband, -and she will be wretched. From a moral point of view, -I cannot say that I think much of your great renunciation. -Even as a beginning, it is poor. Besides, how do you know -that Hetty isn't floating at the present moment in some -starlit mill-pond, with lovely water-lilies round her, -like Ophelia?" - -"I can't bear this, Harry! You mock at everything, and then -suggest the most serious tragedies. I am sorry I told you now. -I don't care what you say to me. I know I was right in acting -as I did. Poor Hetty! As I rode past the farm this morning, -I saw her white face at the window, like a spray of jasmine. -Don't let us talk about it any more, and don't try to persuade -me that the first good action I have done for years, -the first little bit of self-sacrifice I have ever known, -is really a sort of sin. I want to be better. -I am going to be better. Tell me something about yourself. -What is going on in town? I have not been to the club -for days." - -"The people are still discussing poor Basil's disappearance." - -"I should have thought they had got tired of that by this time," -said Dorian, pouring himself out some wine and frowning slightly. - -"My dear boy, they have only been talking about it for six weeks, -and the British public are really not equal to the mental -strain of having more than one topic every three months. -They have been very fortunate lately, however. They have -had my own divorce-case and Alan Campbell's suicide. -Now they have got the mysterious disappearance of an artist. -Scotland Yard still insists that the man in the grey ulster -who left for Paris by the midnight train on the ninth of November -was poor Basil, and the French police declare that Basil never -arrived in Paris at all. I suppose in about a fortnight we shall -be told that he has been seen in San Francisco. It is an odd thing, -but every one who disappears is said to be seen at San Francisco. -It must be a delightful city, and possess all the attractions -of the next world." - -"What do you think has happened to Basil?" asked Dorian, -holding up his Burgundy against the light and wondering how it -was that he could discuss the matter so calmly. - -"I have not the slightest idea. If Basil chooses to hide himself, -it is no business of mine. If he is dead, I don't want to think -about him. Death is the only thing that ever terrifies me. -I hate it." - -"Why?" said the younger man wearily. - -"Because," said Lord Henry, passing beneath his nostrils the gilt trellis -of an open vinaigrette box, "one can survive everything nowadays except that. -Death and vulgarity are the only two facts in the nineteenth century that one -cannot explain away. Let us have our coffee in the music-room, Dorian. -You must play Chopin to me. The man with whom my wife ran away played -Chopin exquisitely. Poor Victoria! I was very fond of her. The house -is rather lonely without her. Of course, married life is merely a habit, -a bad habit. But then one regrets the loss even of one's worst habits. -Perhaps one regrets them the most. They are such an essential part of -one's personality." - -Dorian said nothing, but rose from the table, and passing into the next room, -sat down to the piano and let his fingers stray across the white and black -ivory of the keys. After the coffee had been brought in, he stopped, -and looking over at Lord Henry, said, "Harry, did it ever occur to you that -Basil was murdered?" - -Lord Henry yawned. "Basil was very popular, and always -wore a Waterbury watch. Why should he have been murdered? -He was not clever enough to have enemies. Of course, -he had a wonderful genius for painting. But a man can -paint like Velasquez and yet be as dull as possible. -Basil was really rather dull. He only interested me once, -and that was when he told me, years ago, that he had a wild -adoration for you and that you were the dominant motive of -his art." - -"I was very fond of Basil," said Dorian with a note of sadness in his voice. -"But don't people say that he was murdered?" - -"Oh, some of the papers do. It does not seem to me to be at all probable. -I know there are dreadful places in Paris, but Basil was not the sort of man -to have gone to them. He had no curiosity. It was his chief defect." - -"What would you say, Harry, if I told you that I had murdered Basil?" -said the younger man. He watched him intently after he had spoken. - -"I would say, my dear fellow, that you were posing for a character -that doesn't suit you. All crime is vulgar, just as all vulgarity -is crime. It is not in you, Dorian, to commit a murder. -I am sorry if I hurt your vanity by saying so, but I assure you -it is true. Crime belongs exclusively to the lower orders. -I don't blame them in the smallest degree. I should fancy that -crime was to them what art is to us, simply a method of procuring -extraordinary sensations." - -"A method of procuring sensations? Do you think, then, that a man -who has once committed a murder could possibly do the same crime again? -Don't tell me that." - -"Oh! anything becomes a pleasure if one does it too often," -cried Lord Henry, laughing. "That is one of the most important secrets -of life. I should fancy, however, that murder is always a mistake. -One should never do anything that one cannot talk about after dinner. -But let us pass from poor Basil. I wish I could believe that he had -come to such a really romantic end as you suggest, but I can't. I -dare say he fell into the Seine off an omnibus and that the conductor -hushed up the scandal. Yes: I should fancy that was his end. -I see him lying now on his back under those dull-green waters, -with the heavy barges floating over him and long weeds catching -in his hair. Do you know, I don't think he would have done much -more good work. During the last ten years his painting had gone off -very much." - -Dorian heaved a sigh, and Lord Henry strolled across the room -and began to stroke the head of a curious Java parrot, a large, -grey-plumaged bird with pink crest and tail, that was balancing -itself upon a bamboo perch. As his pointed fingers touched it, -it dropped the white scurf of crinkled lids over black, -glasslike eyes and began to sway backwards and forwards. - -"Yes," he continued, turning round and taking his handkerchief -out of his pocket; "his painting had quite gone off. -It seemed to me to have lost something. It had lost an ideal. -When you and he ceased to be great friends, he ceased to be a -great artist. What was it separated you? I suppose he bored you. -If so, he never forgave you. It's a habit bores have. -By the way, what has become of that wonderful portrait -he did of you? I don't think I have ever seen it since -he finished it. Oh! I remember your telling me years ago -that you had sent it down to Selby, and that it had got mislaid -or stolen on the way. You never got it back? What a pity! -it was really a masterpiece. I remember I wanted to buy it. -I wish I had now. It belonged to Basil's best period. -Since then, his work was that curious mixture of bad painting -and good intentions that always entitles a man to be called -a representative British artist. Did you advertise for it? -You should." - -"I forget," said Dorian. "I suppose I did. But I never really liked it. -I am sorry I sat for it. The memory of the thing is hateful to me. -Why do you talk of it? It used to remind me of those curious lines -in some play--Hamlet, I think--how do they run?-- - - "Like the painting of a sorrow, - A face without a heart." - -Yes: that is what it was like." - -Lord Henry laughed. "If a man treats life artistically, -his brain is his heart," he answered, sinking into an arm-chair. - -Dorian Gray shook his head and struck some soft chords on the piano. -"'Like the painting of a sorrow,'" he repeated, "'a face without -a heart.'" - -The elder man lay back and looked at him with half-closed eyes. -"By the way, Dorian," he said after a pause, "'what does it profit -a man if he gain the whole world and lose--how does the quotation run?-- -his own soul'?" - -The music jarred, and Dorian Gray started and stared at his friend. -"Why do you ask me that, Harry?" - -"My dear fellow," said Lord Henry, elevating his eyebrows in surprise, -"I asked you because I thought you might be able to give me an answer. -That is all. I was going through the park last Sunday, and close by the -Marble Arch there stood a little crowd of shabby-looking people listening -to some vulgar street-preacher. As I passed by, I heard the man yelling -out that question to his audience. It struck me as being rather dramatic. -London is very rich in curious effects of that kind. A wet Sunday, -an uncouth Christian in a mackintosh, a ring of sickly white faces under -a broken roof of dripping umbrellas, and a wonderful phrase flung into -the air by shrill hysterical lips--it was really very good in its way, -quite a suggestion. I thought of telling the prophet that art had -a soul, but that man had not. I am afraid, however, he would not have -understood me." - -"Don't, Harry. The soul is a terrible reality. It can be bought, -and sold, and bartered away. It can be poisoned, or made perfect. -There is a soul in each one of us. I know it." - -"Do you feel quite sure of that, Dorian?" - -"Quite sure." - -"Ah! then it must be an illusion. The things one feels -absolutely certain about are never true. That is the fatality -of faith, and the lesson of romance. How grave you are! -Don't be so serious. What have you or I to do with the superstitions -of our age? No: we have given up our belief in the soul. -Play me something. Play me a nocturne, Dorian, and, as you play, -tell me, in a low voice, how you have kept your youth. -You must have some secret. I am only ten years older than -you are, and I am wrinkled, and worn, and yellow. You are -really wonderful, Dorian. You have never looked more charming -than you do to-night. You remind me of the day I saw you first. -You were rather cheeky, very shy, and absolutely extraordinary. -You have changed, of course, but not in appearance. -I wish you would tell me your secret. To get back my youth -I would do anything in the world, except take exercise, -get up early, or be respectable. Youth! There is nothing -like it. It's absurd to talk of the ignorance of youth. -The only people to whose opinions I listen now with any respect -are people much younger than myself. They seem in front of me. -Life has revealed to them her latest wonder. As for the aged, -I always contradict the aged. I do it on principle. -If you ask them their opinion on something that happened yesterday, -they solemnly give you the opinions current in 1820, -when people wore high stocks, believed in everything, and knew -absolutely nothing. How lovely that thing you are playing is! -I wonder, did Chopin write it at Majorca, with the sea weeping -round the villa and the salt spray dashing against the panes? -It is marvellously romantic. What a blessing it is -that there is one art left to us that is not imitative! -Don't stop. I want music to-night. It seems to me that you -are the young Apollo and that I am Marsyas listening to you. -I have sorrows, Dorian, of my own, that even you know nothing of. -The tragedy of old age is not that one is old, but that one -is young. I am amazed sometimes at my own sincerity. -Ah, Dorian, how happy you are! What an exquisite life -you have had! You have drunk deeply of everything. -You have crushed the grapes against your palate. Nothing has -been hidden from you. And it has all been to you no more than -the sound of music. It has not marred you. You are still the -same." - -"I am not the same, Harry." - -"Yes, you are the same. I wonder what the rest of your life will be. -Don't spoil it by renunciations. At present you are a perfect type. -Don't make yourself incomplete. You are quite flawless now. -You need not shake your head: you know you are. Besides, Dorian, -don't deceive yourself. Life is not governed by will or intention. -Life is a question of nerves, and fibres, and slowly built-up -cells in which thought hides itself and passion has its dreams. -You may fancy yourself safe and think yourself strong. But a chance -tone of colour in a room or a morning sky, a particular perfume -that you had once loved and that brings subtle memories with it, -a line from a forgotten poem that you had come across again, -a cadence from a piece of music that you had ceased to play-- -I tell you, Dorian, that it is on things like these that our lives depend. -Browning writes about that somewhere; but our own senses will imagine -them for us. There are moments when the odour of lilas blanc passes -suddenly across me, and I have to live the strangest month of my life -over again. I wish I could change places with you, Dorian. The world -has cried out against us both, but it has always worshipped you. -It always will worship you. You are the type of what the age -is searching for, and what it is afraid it has found. I am -so glad that you have never done anything, never carved a statue, -or painted a picture, or produced anything outside of yourself! -Life has been your art. You have set yourself to music. Your days are -your sonnets." - -Dorian rose up from the piano and passed his hand through his hair. -"Yes, life has been exquisite," he murmured, "but I am not going -to have the same life, Harry. And you must not say these -extravagant things to me. You don't know everything about me. -I think that if you did, even you would turn from me. You laugh. -Don't laugh." - -"Why have you stopped playing, Dorian? Go back and give me -the nocturne over again. Look at that great, honey-coloured moon -that hangs in the dusky air. She is waiting for you to charm her, -and if you play she will come closer to the earth. You won't? -Let us go to the club, then. It has been a charming evening, -and we must end it charmingly. There is some one at White's who wants -immensely to know you--young Lord Poole, Bournemouth's eldest son. -He has already copied your neckties, and has begged me to introduce -him to you. He is quite delightful and rather reminds me of you." - -"I hope not," said Dorian with a sad look in his eyes. -"But I am tired to-night, Harry. I shan't go to the club. -It is nearly eleven, and I want to go to bed early." - -"Do stay. You have never played so well as to-night. There was something -in your touch that was wonderful. It had more expression than I had ever -heard from it before." - -"It is because I am going to be good," he answered, smiling. -"I am a little changed already." - -"You cannot change to me, Dorian," said Lord Henry. "You and I will always -be friends." - -"Yet you poisoned me with a book once. I should not forgive that. -Harry, promise me that you will never lend that book to any one. -It does harm." - -"My dear boy, you are really beginning to moralize. You will -soon be going about like the converted, and the revivalist, -warning people against all the sins of which you have grown tired. -You are much too delightful to do that. Besides, it is no use. -You and I are what we are, and will be what we will be. -As for being poisoned by a book, there is no such thing as that. -Art has no influence upon action. It annihilates the desire -to act. It is superbly sterile. The books that the world -calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame. -That is all. But we won't discuss literature. Come round -to-morrow. I am going to ride at eleven. We might go together, -and I will take you to lunch afterwards with Lady Branksome. -She is a charming woman, and wants to consult you about some -tapestries she is thinking of buying. Mind you come. Or shall we -lunch with our little duchess? She says she never sees you now. -Perhaps you are tired of Gladys? I thought you would be. -Her clever tongue gets on one's nerves. Well, in any case, be here at -eleven." - -"Must I really come, Harry?" - -"Certainly. The park is quite lovely now. I don't think there -have been such lilacs since the year I met you." - -"Very well. I shall be here at eleven," said Dorian. -"Good night, Harry." As he reached the door, he hesitated -for a moment, as if he had something more to say. Then he sighed -and went out. - - - -CHAPTER 20 - -It was a lovely night, so warm that he threw his coat over his arm and did -not even put his silk scarf round his throat. As he strolled home, -smoking his cigarette, two young men in evening dress passed him. -He heard one of them whisper to the other, "That is Dorian Gray." -He remembered how pleased he used to be when he was pointed out, -or stared at, or talked about. He was tired of hearing his own name now. -Half the charm of the little village where he had been so often lately -was that no one knew who he was. He had often told the girl whom -he had lured to love him that he was poor, and she had believed him. -He had told her once that he was wicked, and she had laughed at him -and answered that wicked people were always very old and very ugly. -What a laugh she had!--just like a thrush singing. And how pretty she had -been in her cotton dresses and her large hats! She knew nothing, but she had -everything that he had lost. - -When he reached home, he found his servant waiting up for him. -He sent him to bed, and threw himself down on the sofa in the library, -and began to think over some of the things that Lord Henry had said -to him. - -Was it really true that one could never change? He felt -a wild longing for the unstained purity of his boyhood-- -his rose-white boyhood, as Lord Henry had once called it. -He knew that he had tarnished himself, filled his mind with -corruption and given horror to his fancy; that he had been -an evil influence to others, and had experienced a terrible joy -in being so; and that of the lives that had crossed his own, -it had been the fairest and the most full of promise that -he had brought to shame. But was it all irretrievable? -Was there no hope for him? - -Ah! in what a monstrous moment of pride and passion he had -prayed that the portrait should bear the burden of his days, -and he keep the unsullied splendour of eternal youth! -All his failure had been due to that. Better for him that each sin -of his life had brought its sure swift penalty along with it. -There was purification in punishment. Not "Forgive us our sins" -but "Smite us for our iniquities" should be the prayer of man to a -most just God. - -The curiously carved mirror that Lord Henry had given -to him, so many years ago now, was standing on the table, -and the white-limbed Cupids laughed round it as of old. -He took it up, as he had done on that night of horror -when he had first noted the change in the fatal picture, -and with wild, tear-dimmed eyes looked into its polished shield. -Once, some one who had terribly loved him had written -to him a mad letter, ending with these idolatrous words: -"The world is changed because you are made of ivory and gold. -The curves of your lips rewrite history." The phrases came back -to his memory, and he repeated them over and over to himself. -Then he loathed his own beauty, and flinging the mirror on -the floor, crushed it into silver splinters beneath his heel. -It was his beauty that had ruined him, his beauty and the youth -that he had prayed for. But for those two things, his life -might have been free from stain. His beauty had been to him -but a mask, his youth but a mockery. What was youth at best? -A green, an unripe time, a time of shallow moods, -and sickly thoughts. Why had he worn its livery? Youth had -spoiled him. - -It was better not to think of the past. Nothing could alter that. -It was of himself, and of his own future, that he had to think. -James Vane was hidden in a nameless grave in Selby churchyard. -Alan Campbell had shot himself one night in his laboratory, -but had not revealed the secret that he had been forced to know. -The excitement, such as it was, over Basil Hallward's -disappearance would soon pass away. It was already waning. -He was perfectly safe there. Nor, indeed, was it the death -of Basil Hallward that weighed most upon his mind. -It was the living death of his own soul that troubled him. -Basil had painted the portrait that had marred his life. -He could not forgive him that. It was the portrait that had -done everything. Basil had said things to him that were unbearable, -and that he had yet borne with patience. The murder had -been simply the madness of a moment. As for Alan Campbell, -his suicide had been his own act. He had chosen to do it. -It was nothing to him. - -A new life! That was what he wanted. That was what he was waiting for. -Surely he had begun it already. He had spared one innocent thing, -at any rate. He would never again tempt innocence. He would be good. - -As he thought of Hetty Merton, he began to wonder if the portrait in the -locked room had changed. Surely it was not still so horrible as it had been? -Perhaps if his life became pure, he would be able to expel every sign of evil -passion from the face. Perhaps the signs of evil had already gone away. -He would go and look. - -He took the lamp from the table and crept upstairs. As he unbarred the door, -a smile of joy flitted across his strangely young-looking face and lingered -for a moment about his lips. Yes, he would be good, and the hideous thing -that he had hidden away would no longer be a terror to him. He felt as if -the load had been lifted from him already. - -He went in quietly, locking the door behind him, as was -his custom, and dragged the purple hanging from the portrait. -A cry of pain and indignation broke from him. He could see -no change, save that in the eyes there was a look of cunning -and in the mouth the curved wrinkle of the hypocrite. -The thing was still loathsome--more loathsome, if possible, -than before--and the scarlet dew that spotted the hand -seemed brighter, and more like blood newly spilled. -Then he trembled. Had it been merely vanity that had made -him do his one good deed? Or the desire for a new sensation, -as Lord Henry had hinted, with his mocking laugh? -Or that passion to act a part that sometimes makes us do -things finer than we are ourselves? Or, perhaps, all these? -And why was the red stain larger than it had been? It seemed -to have crept like a horrible disease over the wrinkled fingers. -There was blood on the painted feet, as though the thing -had dripped--blood even on the hand that had not held -the knife. Confess? Did it mean that he was to confess? -To give himself up and be put to death? He laughed. -He felt that the idea was monstrous. Besides, even if -he did confess, who would believe him? There was no trace -of the murdered man anywhere. Everything belonging to him -had been destroyed. He himself had burned what had been -below-stairs. The world would simply say that he was mad. -They would shut him up if he persisted in his story. -. . . Yet it was his duty to confess, to suffer public shame, -and to make public atonement. There was a God who called -upon men to tell their sins to earth as well as to heaven. -Nothing that he could do would cleanse him till he had -told his own sin. His sin? He shrugged his shoulders. -The death of Basil Hallward seemed very little to him. -He was thinking of Hetty Merton. For it was an unjust mirror, -this mirror of his soul that he was looking at. -Vanity? Curiosity? Hypocrisy? Had there been nothing more -in his renunciation than that? There had been something more. -At least he thought so. But who could tell? . . . No. There -had been nothing more. Through vanity he had spared her. -In hypocrisy he had worn the mask of goodness. For curiosity's -sake he had tried the denial of self. He recognized that -now. - -But this murder--was it to dog him all his life? Was he always to be -burdened by his past? Was he really to confess? Never. There was -only one bit of evidence left against him. The picture itself-- -that was evidence. He would destroy it. Why had he kept it so long? -Once it had given him pleasure to watch it changing and growing old. -Of late he had felt no such pleasure. It had kept him awake at night. -When he had been away, he had been filled with terror lest other eyes -should look upon it. It had brought melancholy across his passions. -Its mere memory had marred many moments of joy. It had been -like conscience to him. Yes, it had been conscience. He would -destroy it. - -He looked round and saw the knife that had stabbed Basil Hallward. -He had cleaned it many times, till there was no stain left upon it. -It was bright, and glistened. As it had killed the painter, -so it would kill the painter's work, and all that that meant. -It would kill the past, and when that was dead, he would be free. -It would kill this monstrous soul-life, and without its hideous warnings, -he would be at peace. He seized the thing, and stabbed the picture -with it. - -There was a cry heard, and a crash. The cry was so horrible -in its agony that the frightened servants woke and crept -out of their rooms. Two gentlemen, who were passing in -the square below, stopped and looked up at the great house. -They walked on till they met a policeman and brought him back. -The man rang the bell several times, but there was no answer. -Except for a light in one of the top windows, the house was all dark. -After a time, he went away and stood in an adjoining portico -and watched. - -"Whose house is that, Constable?" asked the elder of the two gentlemen. - -"Mr. Dorian Gray's, sir," answered the policeman. - -They looked at each other, as they walked away, and sneered. -One of them was Sir Henry Ashton's uncle. - -Inside, in the servants' part of the house, the half-clad -domestics were talking in low whispers to each other. -Old Mrs. Leaf was crying and wringing her hands. Francis was -as pale as death. - -After about a quarter of an hour, he got the coachman and one of the footmen -and crept upstairs. They knocked, but there was no reply. They called out. -Everything was still. Finally, after vainly trying to force the door, -they got on the roof and dropped down on to the balcony. The windows -yielded easily--their bolts were old. - -When they entered, they found hanging upon the wall a splendid -portrait of their master as they had last seen him, in all -the wonder of his exquisite youth and beauty. Lying on the floor -was a dead man, in evening dress, with a knife in his heart. -He was withered, wrinkled, and loathsome of visage. -It was not till they had examined the rings that they -recognized who it was. - - -End of the Project Gutenberg Etext of Dorian Gray - - diff --git a/old/dgray10.zip b/old/dgray10.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index fd45609..0000000 --- a/old/dgray10.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/dgray10h.htm b/old/dgray10h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index e8ed6ce..0000000 --- a/old/dgray10h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,7843 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> -<html> -<head> -<title>The Picture of Dorian Gray</title> -<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> -</head> - -<body bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000"> -<h1 align="center">The Picture of Dorian Gray<br> -by Oscar Wilde</h1> - -<pre> -*Project Gutenberg's The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde* - -*** Etexts From The Original Internet Information Providers *** - -Please take a look at the important information in this header. -We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an -electronic path open for the next readers. Do not remove this. - - -**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** - -**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** - -*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations* - -Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and -further information is included below. We need your donations. - - -The Picture of Dorian Gray -by Oscar Wilde - -October, 1994 Etext #174 -[Date last updated: April 11, 2006] - - -*Project Gutenberg's The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde* -This etext was created by Judith Boss, Omaha, Nebraska. The -equipment: an IBM-compatible 486/33, a Hewlett-Packard ScanJet -IIc flatbed scanner, and Calera Recognition Systems' M/Series -Professional OCR software and RISC Accelerator Board. - -</pre> -<p> - THE PREFACE</p> -<p>The artist is the creator of beautiful things. To reveal art and conceal the - artist is art's aim. The critic is he who can translate into another manner - or a new material his impression of beautiful things. </p> -<p>The highest as the lowest form of criticism is a mode of autobiography. - Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without - being charming. This is a fault.</p> -<p>Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. - For these there is hope. They are the elect to whom beautiful things - mean only beauty.</p> -<p>There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. - Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.</p> -<p>The nineteenth century dislike of realism is the rage of Caliban - seeing his own face in a glass.</p> -<p>The nineteenth century dislike of romanticism is the rage of - Caliban not seeing his own face in a glass. The moral life of man - forms part of the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality - of art consists in the perfect use of an imperfect medium. - No artist desires to prove anything. Even things that are true - can be proved. No artist has ethical sympathies. An ethical - sympathy in an artist is an unpardonable mannerism of style. - No artist is ever morbid. The artist can express everything. - Thought and language are to the artist instruments of an art. - Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for an art. - From the point of view of form, the type of all the arts is the art - of the musician. From the point of view of feeling, the actor's - craft is the type. All art is at once surface and symbol. - Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. - Those who read the symbol do so at their peril. - It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors. - Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work - is new, complex, and vital. When critics disagree, - the artist is in accord with himself. We can forgive a man - for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. - The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one - admires it intensely.</p> -<blockquote> - <p> All art is quite useless.</p> - <p> OSCAR WILDE</p> - <p> </p> -</blockquote> -<p> - CHAPTER 1</p> -<p>The studio was filled with the rich odour of roses, and when the light summer - wind stirred amidst the trees of the garden, there came through the open door - the heavy scent of the lilac, or the more delicate perfume of the pink-flowering - thorn. </p> -<p>From the corner of the divan of Persian saddle-bags on which - he was lying, smoking, as was his custom, innumerable cigarettes, - Lord Henry Wotton could just catch the gleam of the honey-sweet and - honey-coloured blossoms of a laburnum, whose tremulous branches seemed - hardly able to bear the burden of a beauty so flamelike as theirs; - and now and then the fantastic shadows of birds in flight flitted - across the long tussore-silk curtains that were stretched in front - of the huge window, producing a kind of momentary Japanese effect, - and making him think of those pallid, jade-faced painters of Tokyo who, - through the medium of an art that is necessarily immobile, - seek to convey the sense of swiftness and motion. The sullen murmur - of the bees shouldering their way through the long unmown grass, - or circling with monotonous insistence round the dusty gilt horns of - the straggling woodbine, seemed to make the stillness more oppressive. - The dim roar of London was like the bourdon note of a distant organ.</p> -<p>In the centre of the room, clamped to an upright easel, stood the full-length - portrait of a young man of extraordinary personal beauty, and in front of it, - some little distance away, was sitting the artist himself, Basil Hallward, - whose sudden disappearance some years ago caused, at the time, such public - excitement and gave rise to so many strange conjectures.</p> -<p>As the painter looked at the gracious and comely form he had so skilfully - mirrored in his art, a smile of pleasure passed across his face, and seemed - about to linger there. But he suddenly started up, and closing his eyes, - placed his fingers upon the lids, as though he sought to imprison within his - brain some curious dream from which he feared he might awake.</p> -<p>"It is your best work, Basil, the best thing you have ever done," - said Lord Henry languidly. "You must certainly send it next year - to the Grosvenor. The Academy is too large and too vulgar. - Whenever I have gone there, there have been either so many people that I - have not been able to see the pictures, which was dreadful, or so many - pictures that I have not been able to see the people, which was worse. - The Grosvenor is really the only place."</p> -<p>"I don't think I shall send it anywhere," he answered, tossing his - head - back in that odd way that used to make his friends laugh at him at Oxford. - "No, I won't send it anywhere."</p> -<p>Lord Henry elevated his eyebrows and looked at him in amazement through - the thin blue wreaths of smoke that curled up in such fanciful whorls - from his heavy, opium-tainted cigarette. "Not send it anywhere? - My dear fellow, why? Have you any reason? What odd chaps you - painters are! You do anything in the world to gain a reputation. - As soon as you have one, you seem to want to throw it away. - It is silly of you, for there is only one thing in the world worse - than being talked about, and that is not being talked about. - A portrait like this would set you far above all the young men in England, - and make the old men quite jealous, if old men are ever capable of - any emotion."</p> -<p>"I know you will laugh at me," he replied, "but I really can't - exhibit it. - I have put too much of myself into it."</p> -<p>Lord Henry stretched himself out on the divan and laughed.</p> -<p>"Yes, I knew you would; but it is quite true, all the - same."</p> -<p>"Too much of yourself in it! Upon my word, Basil, - I didn't know you were so vain; and I really can't see any resemblance - between you, with your rugged strong face and your coal-black hair, - and this young Adonis, who looks as if he was made out of ivory - and rose-leaves. Why, my dear Basil, he is a Narcissus, and you-- - well, of course you have an intellectual expression and all that. - But beauty, real beauty, ends where an intellectual expression begins. - Intellect is in itself a mode of exaggeration, and destroys - the harmony of any face. The moment one sits down to think, - one becomes all nose, or all forehead, or something horrid. - Look at the successful men in any of the learned professions. - How perfectly hideous they are! Except, of course, in the Church. - But then in the Church they don't think. A bishop keeps on saying at - the age of eighty what he was told to say when he was a boy of eighteen, - and as a natural consequence he always looks absolutely delightful. - Your mysterious young friend, whose name you have never told me, - but whose picture really fascinates me, never thinks. I feel quite - sure of that. He is some brainless beautiful creature who should be - always here in winter when we have no flowers to look at, and always - here in summer when we want something to chill our intelligence. - Don't flatter yourself, Basil: you are not in the least like - him."</p> -<p>"You don't understand me, Harry," answered the artist. "Of course - I am - not like him. I know that perfectly well. Indeed, I should be sorry - to look like him. You shrug your shoulders? I am telling you the truth. - There is a fatality about all physical and intellectual distinction, - the sort of fatality that seems to dog through history the faltering - steps of kings. It is better not to be different from one's fellows. - The ugly and the stupid have the best of it in this world. They can sit - at their ease and gape at the play. If they know nothing of victory, - they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat. They live as we - all should live--undisturbed, indifferent, and without disquiet. - They neither bring ruin upon others, nor ever receive it from alien hands. - Your rank and wealth, Harry; my brains, such as they are--my art, whatever it - may be worth; Dorian Gray's good looks--we shall all suffer for what the gods - have given us, suffer terribly."</p> -<p>"Dorian Gray? Is that his name?" asked Lord Henry, walking across - the studio towards Basil Hallward.</p> -<p>"Yes, that is his name. I didn't intend to tell it to you."</p> -<p>"But why not?"</p> -<p>"Oh, I can't explain. When I like people immensely, I never tell - their names to any one. It is like surrendering a part of them. - I have grown to love secrecy. It seems to be the one thing - that can make modern life mysterious or marvellous to us. - The commonest thing is delightful if one only hides it. - When I leave town now I never tell my people where I am going. - If I did, I would lose all my pleasure. It is a silly habit, - I dare say, but somehow it seems to bring a great deal of romance - into one's life. I suppose you think me awfully foolish - about it?"</p> -<p>"Not at all," answered Lord Henry, "not at all, my dear Basil. - You seem to forget that I am married, and the one charm of marriage is - that it makes a life of deception absolutely necessary for both parties. - I never know where my wife is, and my wife never knows what I am doing. - When we meet--we do meet occasionally, when we dine out together, or go - down to the Duke's--we tell each other the most absurd stories with the most - serious faces. My wife is very good at it--much better, in fact, than I am. - She never gets confused over her dates, and I always do. But when she - does find me out, she makes no row at all. I sometimes wish she would; - but she merely laughs at me."</p> -<p>"I hate the way you talk about your married life, Harry," - said Basil Hallward, strolling towards the door that led into - the garden. "I believe that you are really a very good husband, - but that you are thoroughly ashamed of your own virtues. - You are an extraordinary fellow. You never say a moral thing, - and you never do a wrong thing. Your cynicism is simply - a pose."</p> -<p>"Being natural is simply a pose, and the most irritating pose I know," - cried Lord Henry, laughing; and the two young men went out into the garden - together and ensconced themselves on a long bamboo seat that stood in the - shade of a tall laurel bush. The sunlight slipped over the polished leaves. - In the grass, white daisies were tremulous.</p> -<p>After a pause, Lord Henry pulled out his watch. "I am afraid I - must be going, Basil," he murmured, "and before I go, I insist - on your answering a question I put to you some time ago."</p> -<p>"What is that?" said the painter, keeping his eyes fixed on the ground.</p> -<p>"You know quite well."</p> -<p>"I do not, Harry."</p> -<p>"Well, I will tell you what it is. I want you to explain to me why you - won't exhibit Dorian Gray's picture. I want the real reason."</p> -<p>"I told you the real reason."</p> -<p>"No, you did not. You said it was because there was too much - of yourself in it. Now, that is childish."</p> -<p>"Harry," said Basil Hallward, looking him straight in the face, - "every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, - not of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. - It is not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, - on the coloured canvas, reveals himself. The reason I will not exhibit - this picture is that I am afraid that I have shown in it the secret of my - own soul."</p> -<p>Lord Henry laughed. "And what is that?" he asked.</p> -<p>"I will tell you," said Hallward; but an expression of perplexity - came over his face.</p> -<p>"I am all expectation, Basil," continued his companion, - glancing at him.</p> -<p>"Oh, there is really very little to tell, Harry," answered the painter; - "and I am afraid you will hardly understand it. Perhaps you will hardly - believe it."</p> -<p>Lord Henry smiled, and leaning down, plucked a pink-petalled daisy from - the grass and examined it. "I am quite sure I shall understand it," - he replied, gazing intently at the little golden, white-feathered disk, - "and as for believing things, I can believe anything, provided that it - is - quite incredible."</p> -<p>The wind shook some blossoms from the trees, and the heavy lilac-blooms, - with their clustering stars, moved to and fro in the languid air. - A grasshopper began to chirrup by the wall, and like a blue thread - a long thin dragon-fly floated past on its brown gauze wings. - Lord Henry felt as if he could hear Basil Hallward's heart beating, - and wondered what was coming.</p> -<p>"The story is simply this," said the painter after some time. "Two - months ago I went to a crush at Lady Brandon's. You know we poor artists have - to show ourselves in society from time to time, just to remind the public that - we are not savages. With an evening coat and a white tie, as you told me once, - anybody, even a stock-broker, can gain a reputation for being civilized. Well, - after I had been in the room about ten minutes, talking to huge overdressed - dowagers and tedious academicians, I suddenly became conscious that some one - was looking at me. I turned half-way round and saw Dorian Gray for the first - time. When our eyes met, I felt that I was growing pale. A curious sensation - of terror came over me. I knew that I had come face to face with some one whose - mere personality was so fascinating that, if I allowed it to do so, it would - absorb my whole nature, my whole soul, my very art itself. I did not want any - external influence in my life. You know yourself, Harry, how independent I am - by nature. I have always been my own master; had at least always been so, till - I met Dorian Gray. Then--but I don't know how to explain it to you. Something - seemed to tell me that I was on the verge of a terrible crisis in my life. I - had a strange feeling that fate had in store for me exquisite joys and exquisite - sorrows. I grew afraid and turned to quit the room. It was not conscience that - made me do so: it was a sort of cowardice. I take no credit to myself for trying - to escape."</p> -<p>"Conscience and cowardice are really the same things, Basil. - Conscience is the trade-name of the firm. That is all."</p> -<p>"I don't believe that, Harry, and I don't believe you do either. - However, whatever was my motive--and it may have been pride, - for I used to be very proud--I certainly struggled to the door. - There, of course, I stumbled against Lady Brandon. 'You are not - going to run away so soon, Mr. Hallward?' she screamed out. - You know her curiously shrill voice?"</p> -<p>"Yes; she is a peacock in everything but beauty," said Lord Henry, - pulling the daisy to bits with his long nervous fingers.</p> -<p>"I could not get rid of her. She brought me up to royalties, - and people with stars and garters, and elderly ladies with gigantic - tiaras and parrot noses. She spoke of me as her dearest friend. - I had only met her once before, but she took it into her head to lionize me. - I believe some picture of mine had made a great success at the time, - at least had been chattered about in the penny newspapers, which is - the nineteenth-century standard of immortality. Suddenly I found myself - face to face with the young man whose personality had so strangely - stirred me. We were quite close, almost touching. Our eyes met again. - It was reckless of me, but I asked Lady Brandon to introduce me to him. - Perhaps it was not so reckless, after all. It was simply inevitable. - We would have spoken to each other without any introduction. - I am sure of that. Dorian told me so afterwards. He, too, felt that we - were destined to know each other."</p> -<p>"And how did Lady Brandon describe this wonderful young man?" - asked his companion. "I know she goes in for giving - a rapid precis of all her guests. I remember her bringing - me up to a truculent and red-faced old gentleman covered - all over with orders and ribbons, and hissing into my ear, - in a tragic whisper which must have been perfectly audible - to everybody in the room, the most astounding details. - I simply fled. I like to find out people for myself. - But Lady Brandon treats her guests exactly as an auctioneer - treats his goods. She either explains them entirely away, - or tells one everything about them except what one wants - to know."</p> -<p>"Poor Lady Brandon! You are hard on her, Harry!" said Hallward listlessly.</p> -<p>"My dear fellow, she tried to found a salon, and only succeeded - in opening a restaurant. How could I admire her? But tell me, - what did she say about Mr. Dorian Gray?"</p> -<p>"Oh, something like, 'Charming boy--poor dear mother and I - absolutely inseparable. Quite forget what he does--afraid he-- - doesn't do anything--oh, yes, plays the piano--or is it - the violin, dear Mr. Gray?' Neither of us could help laughing, - and we became friends at once."</p> -<p>"Laughter is not at all a bad beginning for a friendship, - and it is far the best ending for one," said the young lord, - plucking another daisy.</p> -<p>Hallward shook his head. "You don't understand what friendship is, Harry," - he murmured--"or what enmity is, for that matter. You like every one; - that is to say, you are indifferent to every one."</p> -<p>"How horribly unjust of you!" cried Lord Henry, tilting his hat back - and looking up at the little clouds that, like ravelled skeins of glossy - white silk, were drifting across the hollowed turquoise of the summer sky. - "Yes; horribly unjust of you. I make a great difference between people. - I choose my friends for their good looks, my acquaintances for - their good characters, and my enemies for their good intellects. - A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies. I have not - got one who is a fool. They are all men of some intellectual power, - and consequently they all appreciate me. Is that very vain of me? - I think it is rather vain."</p> -<p>"I should think it was, Harry. But according to your category I - must be merely an acquaintance."</p> -<p>"My dear old Basil, you are much more than an acquaintance."</p> -<p>"And much less than a friend. A sort of brother, I suppose?"</p> -<p>"Oh, brothers! I don't care for brothers. My elder brother won't die, - and my younger brothers seem never to do anything else."</p> -<p>"Harry!" exclaimed Hallward, frowning.</p> -<p>"My dear fellow, I am not quite serious. But I can't help detesting - my relations. I suppose it comes from the fact that none of us - can stand other people having the same faults as ourselves. - I quite sympathize with the rage of the English democracy against - what they call the vices of the upper orders. The masses feel - that drunkenness, stupidity, and immorality should be their own - special property, and that if any one of us makes an ass of himself, - he is poaching on their preserves. When poor Southwark got - into the divorce court, their indignation was quite magnificent. - And yet I don't suppose that ten per cent of the proletariat - live correctly."</p> -<p>"I don't agree with a single word that you have said, and, what is more, - Harry, I feel sure you don't either."</p> -<p>Lord Henry stroked his pointed brown beard and tapped the toe - of his patent-leather boot with a tasselled ebony cane. - "How English you are Basil! That is the second time you - have made that observation. If one puts forward an idea - to a true Englishman--always a rash thing to do--he never - dreams of considering whether the idea is right or wrong. - The only thing he considers of any importance is whether one - believes it oneself. Now, the value of an idea has nothing - whatsoever to do with the sincerity of the man who expresses it. - Indeed, the probabilities are that the more insincere - the man is, the more purely intellectual will the idea be, - as in that case it will not be coloured by either his wants, - his desires, or his prejudices. However, I don't propose - to discuss politics, sociology, or metaphysics with you. - I like persons better than principles, and I like persons - with no principles better than anything else in the world. - Tell me more about Mr. Dorian Gray. How often do you - see him?"</p> -<p>"Every day. I couldn't be happy if I didn't see him every day. - He is absolutely necessary to me."</p> -<p>"How extraordinary! I thought you would never care for anything - but your art."</p> -<p>"He is all my art to me now," said the painter gravely. - "I sometimes think, Harry, that there are only two eras of any - importance in the world's history. The first is the appearance - of a new medium for art, and the second is the appearance - of a new personality for art also. What the invention - of oil-painting was to the Venetians, the face of Antinous - was to late Greek sculpture, and the face of Dorian Gray will - some day be to me. It is not merely that I paint from him, - draw from him, sketch from him. Of course, I have done all that. - But he is much more to me than a model or a sitter. - I won't tell you that I am dissatisfied with what I have done - of him, or that his beauty is such that art cannot express it. - There is nothing that art cannot express, and I know that - the work I have done, since I met Dorian Gray, is good work, - is the best work of my life. But in some curious way--I wonder - will you understand me?--his personality has suggested to me - an entirely new manner in art, an entirely new mode of style. - I see things differently, I think of them differently. - I can now recreate life in a way that was hidden from me before. - 'A dream of form in days of thought'--who is it who says that? - I forget; but it is what Dorian Gray has been to me. - The merely visible presence of this lad--for he seems to me - little more than a lad, though he is really over twenty-- - his merely visible presence--ah! I wonder can you realize - all that that means? Unconsciously he defines for me - the lines of a fresh school, a school that is to have in it - all the passion of the romantic spirit, all the perfection - of the spirit that is Greek. The harmony of soul and body-- - how much that is! We in our madness have separated the two, - and have invented a realism that is vulgar, an ideality that - is void. Harry! if you only knew what Dorian Gray is to me! - You remember that landscape of mine, for which Agnew offered - me such a huge price but which I would not part with? - It is one of the best things I have ever done. And why - is it so? Because, while I was painting it, Dorian Gray sat - beside me. Some subtle influence passed from him to me, - and for the first time in my life I saw in the plain - woodland the wonder I had always looked for and always - missed."</p> -<p>"Basil, this is extraordinary! I must see Dorian Gray."</p> -<p>Hallward got up from the seat and walked up and down the garden. - After some time he came back. "Harry," he said, "Dorian Gray - is to me simply a motive in art. You might see nothing in him. - I see everything in him. He is never more present in my work than - when no image of him is there. He is a suggestion, as I have said, - of a new manner. I find him in the curves of certain lines, - in the loveliness and subtleties of certain colours. - That is all."</p> -<p>"Then why won't you exhibit his portrait?" asked Lord Henry.</p> -<p>"Because, without intending it, I have put into it some expression - of all this curious artistic idolatry, of which, of course, - I have never cared to speak to him. He knows nothing about it. - He shall never know anything about it. But the world might guess it, - and I will not bare my soul to their shallow prying eyes. - My heart shall never be put under their microscope. There is too much - of myself in the thing, Harry--too much of myself!"</p> -<p>"Poets are not so scrupulous as you are. They know how useful passion - is for publication. Nowadays a broken heart will run to many editions."</p> -<p>"I hate them for it," cried Hallward. "An artist should create - beautiful things, but should put nothing of his own life into them. - We live in an age when men treat art as if it were meant to be a form - of autobiography. We have lost the abstract sense of beauty. - Some day I will show the world what it is; and for that reason the world - shall never see my portrait of Dorian Gray."</p> -<p>"I think you are wrong, Basil, but I won't argue with you. - It is only the intellectually lost who ever argue. Tell me, - is Dorian Gray very fond of you?"</p> -<p>The painter considered for a few moments. "He likes me," - he answered after a pause; "I know he likes me. Of course I - flatter him dreadfully. I find a strange pleasure in saying - things to him that I know I shall be sorry for having said. - As a rule, he is charming to me, and we sit in the studio and talk - of a thousand things. Now and then, however, he is horribly - thoughtless, and seems to take a real delight in giving me pain. - Then I feel, Harry, that I have given away my whole soul to some - one who treats it as if it were a flower to put in his coat, - a bit of decoration to charm his vanity, an ornament for a - summer's day."</p> -<p>"Days in summer, Basil, are apt to linger," murmured Lord Henry. - "Perhaps you will tire sooner than he will. It is a sad thing to think - of, - but there is no doubt that genius lasts longer than beauty. That accounts - for the fact that we all take such pains to over-educate ourselves. - In the wild struggle for existence, we want to have something that endures, - and so we fill our minds with rubbish and facts, in the silly hope of keeping - our place. The thoroughly well-informed man--that is the modern ideal. - And the mind of the thoroughly well-informed man is a dreadful thing. - It is like a bric-a-brac shop, all monsters and dust, with everything - priced above its proper value. I think you will tire first, all the same. - Some day you will look at your friend, and he will seem to you to be a little - out of drawing, or you won't like his tone of colour, or something. You will - bitterly reproach him in your own heart, and seriously think that he has - behaved very badly to you. The next time he calls, you will be perfectly - cold and indifferent. It will be a great pity, for it will alter you. - What you have told me is quite a romance, a romance of art one might call it, - and the worst of having a romance of any kind is that it leaves one - so unromantic."</p> -<p>"Harry, don't talk like that. As long as I live, the personality - of Dorian Gray will dominate me. You can't feel what I feel. - You change too often."</p> -<p>"Ah, my dear Basil, that is exactly why I can feel it. Those who are faithful - know only the trivial side of love: it is the faithless who know love's tragedies." - And Lord Henry struck a light on a dainty silver case and began to smoke a cigarette - with a self-conscious and satisfied air, as if he had summed up the world in - a phrase. There was a rustle of chirruping sparrows in the green lacquer leaves - of the ivy, and the blue cloud-shadows chased themselves across the grass like - swallows. How pleasant it was in the garden! And how delightful other people's - emotions were!-- much more delightful than their ideas, it seemed to him. One's - own soul, and the passions of one's friends--those were the fascinating things - in life. He pictured to himself with silent amusement the tedious luncheon that - he had missed by staying so long with Basil Hallward. Had he gone to his aunt's, - he would have been sure to have met Lord Goodbody there, and the whole conversation - would have been about the feeding of the poor and the necessity for model lodging-houses. - Each class would have preached the importance of those virtues, for whose exercise - there was no necessity in their own lives. The rich would have spoken on the - value of thrift, and the idle grown eloquent over the dignity of labour. It - was charming to have escaped all that! As he thought of his aunt, an idea seemed - to strike him. He turned to Hallward and said, "My dear fellow, I have - just remembered."</p> -<p>"Remembered what, Harry?"</p> -<p>"Where I heard the name of Dorian Gray."</p> -<p>"Where was it?" asked Hallward, with a slight frown.</p> -<p>"Don't look so angry, Basil. It was at my aunt, Lady Agatha's. - She told me she had discovered a wonderful young man who was going - to help her in the East End, and that his name was Dorian Gray. - I am bound to state that she never told me he was good-looking. Women - have no appreciation of good looks; at least, good women have not. - She said that he was very earnest and had a beautiful nature. - I at once pictured to myself a creature with spectacles and lank hair, - horribly freckled, and tramping about on huge feet. I wish I had known it - was your friend."</p> -<p>"I am very glad you didn't, Harry."</p> -<p>"Why?"</p> -<p>"I don't want you to meet him."</p> -<p>"You don't want me to meet him?"</p> -<p>"No."</p> -<p>"Mr. Dorian Gray is in the studio, sir," said the butler, - coming into the garden.</p> -<p>"You must introduce me now," cried Lord Henry, laughing.</p> -<p>The painter turned to his servant, who stood blinking in the sunlight. - "Ask Mr. Gray to wait, Parker: I shall be in in a few moments." - The man bowed and went up the walk.</p> -<p>Then he looked at Lord Henry. "Dorian Gray is my dearest friend," - he said. "He has a simple and a beautiful nature. Your aunt - was quite right in what she said of him. Don't spoil him. - Don't try to influence him. Your influence would be bad. - The world is wide, and has many marvellous people in it. - Don't take away from me the one person who gives to my art - whatever charm it possesses: my life as an artist depends - on him. Mind, Harry, I trust you." He spoke very slowly, - and the words seemed wrung out of him almost against - his will.</p> -<p>"What nonsense you talk!" said Lord Henry, smiling, and taking Hallward - by the arm, he almost led him into the house.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 2</p> -<p>As they entered they saw Dorian Gray. He was seated at the piano, - with his back to them, turning over the pages of a volume of Schumann's - "Forest Scenes." "You must lend me these, Basil," he cried. - "I want to learn them. They are perfectly charming."</p> -<p>"That entirely depends on how you sit to-day, Dorian."</p> -<p>"Oh, I am tired of sitting, and I don't want a life-sized portrait - of myself," answered the lad, swinging round on the music-stool - in a wilful, petulant manner. When he caught sight of Lord Henry, - a faint blush coloured his cheeks for a moment, and he started up. - "I beg your pardon, Basil, but I didn't know you had any one - with you."</p> -<p>"This is Lord Henry Wotton, Dorian, an old Oxford friend of mine. - I have just been telling him what a capital sitter you were, - and now you have spoiled everything."</p> -<p>"You have not spoiled my pleasure in meeting you, Mr. Gray," - said Lord Henry, stepping forward and extending his hand. - "My aunt has often spoken to me about you. You are one of - her favourites, and, I am afraid, one of her victims also."</p> -<p>"I am in Lady Agatha's black books at present," answered Dorian - with a funny look of penitence. "I promised to go to a club in - Whitechapel with her last Tuesday, and I really forgot all about it. - We were to have played a duet together--three duets, I believe. - I don't know what she will say to me. I am far too frightened - to call."</p> -<p>"Oh, I will make your peace with my aunt. She is quite devoted to you. - And I don't think it really matters about your not being there. The audience - probably thought it was a duet. When Aunt Agatha sits down to the piano, - she makes quite enough noise for two people."</p> -<p>"That is very horrid to her, and not very nice to me," - answered Dorian, laughing.</p> -<p>Lord Henry looked at him. Yes, he was certainly wonderfully handsome, - with his finely curved scarlet lips, his frank blue eyes, his crisp - gold hair. There was something in his face that made one trust him at once. - All the candour of youth was there, as well as all youth's passionate purity. - One felt that he had kept himself unspotted from the world. No wonder Basil - Hallward worshipped him.</p> -<p>"You are too charming to go in for philanthropy, Mr. Gray--far too charming." - And Lord Henry flung himself down on the divan and opened his cigarette-case.</p> -<p>The painter had been busy mixing his colours and getting his brushes ready. - He was looking worried, and when he heard Lord Henry's last remark, he glanced - at him, hesitated for a moment, and then said, "Harry, I want to finish - this - picture to-day. Would you think it awfully rude of me if I asked you to - go away?"</p> -<p>Lord Henry smiled and looked at Dorian Gray. "Am I to go, Mr. Gray?" - he asked.</p> -<p>"Oh, please don't, Lord Henry. I see that Basil is in one of his sulky - moods, - and I can't bear him when he sulks. Besides, I want you to tell me why I - should not go in for philanthropy."</p> -<p>"I don't know that I shall tell you that, Mr. Gray. It is so - tedious a subject that one would have to talk seriously about it. - But I certainly shall not run away, now that you have asked me to stop. - You don't really mind, Basil, do you? You have often told me that you - liked your sitters to have some one to chat to."</p> -<p>Hallward bit his lip. "If Dorian wishes it, of course you must stay. - Dorian's whims are laws to everybody, except himself."</p> -<p>Lord Henry took up his hat and gloves. "You are very pressing, Basil, - but I - am afraid I must go. I have promised to meet a man at the Orleans. - Good-bye, Mr. Gray. Come and see me some afternoon in Curzon Street. - I am nearly always at home at five o'clock. Write to me when you are coming. - I should be sorry to miss you."</p> -<p>"Basil," cried Dorian Gray, "if Lord Henry Wotton goes, I shall - go, too. - You never open your lips while you are painting, and it is horribly dull - standing on a platform and trying to look pleasant. Ask him to stay. - I insist upon it."</p> -<p>"Stay, Harry, to oblige Dorian, and to oblige me," said Hallward, - gazing intently at his picture. "It is quite true, I never talk - when I am working, and never listen either, and it must be dreadfully - tedious for my unfortunate sitters. I beg you to stay."</p> -<p>"But what about my man at the Orleans?"</p> -<p>The painter laughed. "I don't think there will be any difficulty about - that. - Sit down again, Harry. And now, Dorian, get up on the platform, and don't - move about too much, or pay any attention to what Lord Henry says. - He has a very bad influence over all his friends, with the single exception - of myself."</p> -<p>Dorian Gray stepped up on the dais with the air of a young Greek martyr, - and made a little moue of discontent to Lord Henry, to whom he had rather - taken a fancy. He was so unlike Basil. They made a delightful contrast. - And he had such a beautiful voice. After a few moments he said to him, - "Have you really a very bad influence, Lord Henry? As bad as Basil says?"</p> -<p>"There is no such thing as a good influence, Mr. Gray. - All influence is immoral--immoral from the scientific point - of view."</p> -<p>"Why?"</p> -<p>"Because to influence a person is to give him one's own soul. - He does not think his natural thoughts, or burn with his natural passions. - His virtues are not real to him. His sins, if there are such things - as sins, are borrowed. He becomes an echo of some one else's music, - an actor of a part that has not been written for him. The aim of life - is self-development. To realize one's nature perfectly--that is what - each of us is here for. People are afraid of themselves, nowadays. - They have forgotten the highest of all duties, the duty that one owes - to one's self. Of course, they are charitable. They feed the hungry - and clothe the beggar. But their own souls starve, and are naked. - Courage has gone out of our race. Perhaps we never really had it. - The terror of society, which is the basis of morals, the terror of God, - which is the secret of religion--these are the two things that govern us. - And yet--"</p> -<p>"Just turn your head a little more to the right, Dorian, like a good boy," - said the painter, deep in his work and conscious only that a look had come - into the lad's face that he had never seen there before.</p> -<p>"And yet," continued Lord Henry, in his low, musical voice, - and with that graceful wave of the hand that was always so - characteristic of him, and that he had even in his Eton days, - "I believe that if one man were to live out his life fully - and completely, were to give form to every feeling, expression to - every thought, reality to every dream--I believe that the world - would gain such a fresh impulse of joy that we would forget all - the maladies of mediaevalism, and return to the Hellenic ideal-- - to something finer, richer than the Hellenic ideal, it may be. - But the bravest man amongst us is afraid of himself. - The mutilation of the savage has its tragic survival in the - self-denial that mars our lives. We are punished for our refusals. - Every impulse that we strive to strangle broods in the mind - and poisons us. The body sins once, and has done with its sin, - for action is a mode of purification. Nothing remains then - but the recollection of a pleasure, or the luxury of a regret. - The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. - Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things - it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its monstrous - laws have made monstrous and unlawful. It has been said - that the great events of the world take place in the brain. - It is in the brain, and the brain only, that the great sins - of the world take place also. You, Mr. Gray, you yourself, - with your rose-red youth and your rose-white boyhood, you have had - passions that have made you afraid, thoughts that have filled you - with terror, day-dreams and sleeping dreams whose mere memory might - stain your cheek with shame--"</p> -<p>"Stop!" faltered Dorian Gray, "stop! you bewilder me. - I don't know what to say. There is some answer to you, but I - cannot find it. Don't speak. Let me think. Or, rather, let me - try not to think."</p> -<p>For nearly ten minutes he stood there, motionless, with parted - lips and eyes strangely bright. He was dimly conscious - that entirely fresh influences were at work within him. - Yet they seemed to him to have come really from himself. - The few words that Basil's friend had said to him--words spoken - by chance, no doubt, and with wilful paradox in them-- - had touched some secret chord that had never been touched before, - but that he felt was now vibrating and throbbing to - curious pulses.</p> -<p>Music had stirred him like that. Music had troubled him many times. - But music was not articulate. It was not a new world, but rather - another chaos, that it created in us. Words! Mere words! - How terrible they were! How clear, and vivid, and cruel! One could - not escape from them. And yet what a subtle magic there was in them! - They seemed to be able to give a plastic form to formless things, - and to have a music of their own as sweet as that of viol or of lute. - Mere words! Was there anything so real as words?</p> -<p>Yes; there had been things in his boyhood that he had not understood. - He understood them now. Life suddenly became fiery-coloured to him. - It seemed to him that he had been walking in fire. Why had he not - known it?</p> -<p>With his subtle smile, Lord Henry watched him. He knew the precise - psychological moment when to say nothing. He felt intensely interested. - He was amazed at the sudden impression that his words had produced, - and, remembering a book that he had read when he was sixteen, - a book which had revealed to him much that he had not known before, - he wondered whether Dorian Gray was passing through a similar experience. - He had merely shot an arrow into the air. Had it hit the mark? - How fascinating the lad was!</p> -<p>Hallward painted away with that marvellous bold touch of his, - that had the true refinement and perfect delicacy that in art, - at any rate comes only from strength. He was unconscious of - the silence.</p> -<p>"Basil, I am tired of standing," cried Dorian Gray suddenly. - "I must go out and sit in the garden. The air is stifling here."</p> -<p>"My dear fellow, I am so sorry. When I am painting, - I can't think of anything else. But you never sat better. - You were perfectly still. And I have caught the effect I wanted-- - the half-parted lips and the bright look in the eyes. - I don't know what Harry has been saying to you, but he has - certainly made you have the most wonderful expression. - I suppose he has been paying you compliments. You mustn't believe - a word that he says."</p> -<p>"He has certainly not been paying me compliments. Perhaps that is the - reason - that I don't believe anything he has told me."</p> -<p>"You know you believe it all," said Lord Henry, looking at him with - his dreamy languorous eyes. "I will go out to the garden with you. - It is horribly hot in the studio. Basil, let us have something iced - to drink, something with strawberries in it."</p> -<p>"Certainly, Harry. Just touch the bell, and when Parker comes I - will tell him what you want. I have got to work up this background, - so I will join you later on. Don't keep Dorian too long. - I have never been in better form for painting than I am to-day. This - is going to be my masterpiece. It is my masterpiece as it stands."</p> -<p>Lord Henry went out to the garden and found Dorian Gray burying his face in - the great cool lilac-blossoms, feverishly drinking in their perfume as if it - had been wine. He came close to him and put his hand upon his shoulder. - "You are quite right to do that," he murmured. "Nothing can cure - the soul - but the senses, just as nothing can cure the senses but the soul."</p> -<p>The lad started and drew back. He was bareheaded, and the leaves - had tossed his rebellious curls and tangled all their gilded threads. - There was a look of fear in his eyes, such as people have when they - are suddenly awakened. His finely chiselled nostrils quivered, - and some hidden nerve shook the scarlet of his lips and left - them trembling.</p> -<p>"Yes," continued Lord Henry, "that is one of the great secrets - of life-- - to cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses by means of the soul. - You are a wonderful creation. You know more than you think you know, just as - you know less than you want to know."</p> -<p>Dorian Gray frowned and turned his head away. He could not help - liking the tall, graceful young man who was standing by him. - His romantic, olive-coloured face and worn expression interested him. - There was something in his low languid voice that was absolutely fascinating. - His cool, white, flowerlike hands, even, had a curious charm. - They moved, as he spoke, like music, and seemed to have a language - of their own. But he felt afraid of him, and ashamed of being afraid. - Why had it been left for a stranger to reveal him to himself? - He had known Basil Hallward for months, but the friendship between them - had never altered him. Suddenly there had come some one across his life - who seemed to have disclosed to him life's mystery. And, yet, what was - there to be afraid of? He was not a schoolboy or a girl. It was absurd to - be frightened.</p> -<p>"Let us go and sit in the shade," said Lord Henry. "Parker has - brought out the drinks, and if you stay any longer in this glare, - you will be quite spoiled, and Basil will never paint you again. - You really must not allow yourself to become sunburnt. It would - be unbecoming."</p> -<p>"What can it matter?" cried Dorian Gray, laughing, as he sat - down on the seat at the end of the garden.</p> -<p>"It should matter everything to you, Mr. Gray."</p> -<p>"Why?"</p> -<p>"Because you have the most marvellous youth, and youth is the one thing - worth having."</p> -<p>"I don't feel that, Lord Henry."</p> -<p>"No, you don't feel it now. Some day, when you are old - and wrinkled and ugly, when thought has seared your forehead - with its lines, and passion branded your lips with its - hideous fires, you will feel it, you will feel it terribly. - Now, wherever you go, you charm the world. Will it always - be so? . . . You have a wonderfully beautiful face, Mr. Gray. - Don't frown. You have. And beauty is a form of genius-- - is higher, indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. - It is of the great facts of the world, like sunlight, - or spring-time, or the reflection in dark waters of that silver - shell we call the moon. It cannot be questioned. It has its divine - right of sovereignty. It makes princes of those who have it. - You smile? Ah! when you have lost it you won't smile. - . . . People say sometimes that beauty is only superficial. - That may be so, but at least it is not so superficial - as thought is. To me, beauty is the wonder of wonders. - It is only shallow people who do not judge by appearances. - The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible. - . . . Yes, Mr. Gray, the gods have been good to you. - But what the gods give they quickly take away. You have only - a few years in which to live really, perfectly, and fully. - When your youth goes, your beauty will go with it, and then you - will suddenly discover that there are no triumphs left for you, - or have to content yourself with those mean triumphs that - the memory of your past will make more bitter than defeats. - Every month as it wanes brings you nearer to something dreadful. - Time is jealous of you, and wars against your lilies and your roses. - You will become sallow, and hollow-cheeked, and dull-eyed. - You will suffer horribly.... Ah! realize your youth - while you have it. Don't squander the gold of your days, - listening to the tedious, trying to improve the hopeless failure, - or giving away your life to the ignorant, the common, - and the vulgar. These are the sickly aims, the false ideals, - of our age. Live! Live the wonderful life that is in you! - Let nothing be lost upon you. Be always searching for - new sensations. Be afraid of nothing. . . . A new Hedonism-- - that is what our century wants. You might be its visible symbol. - With your personality there is nothing you could not do. - The world belongs to you for a season. . . . The moment I met - you I saw that you were quite unconscious of what you really are, - of what you really might be. There was so much in you that - charmed me that I felt I must tell you something about yourself. - I thought how tragic it would be if you were wasted. For there is - such a little time that your youth will last--such a little time. - The common hill-flowers wither, but they blossom again. - The laburnum will be as yellow next June as it is now. - In a month there will be purple stars on the clematis, and year - after year the green night of its leaves will hold its purple stars. - But we never get back our youth. The pulse of joy that beats in us - at twenty becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail, our senses rot. - We degenerate into hideous puppets, haunted by the memory - of the passions of which we were too much afraid, and the - exquisite temptations that we had not the courage to yield to. - Youth! Youth! There is absolutely nothing in the world but - youth!"</p> -<p>Dorian Gray listened, open-eyed and wondering. The spray - of lilac fell from his hand upon the gravel. A furry bee came - and buzzed round it for a moment. Then it began to scramble - all over the oval stellated globe of the tiny blossoms. - He watched it with that strange interest in trivial things - that we try to develop when things of high import make us afraid, - or when we are stirred by some new emotion for which we - cannot find expression, or when some thought that terrifies - us lays sudden siege to the brain and calls on us to yield. - After a time the bee flew away. He saw it creeping into the stained - trumpet of a Tyrian convolvulus. The flower seemed to quiver, - and then swayed gently to and fro.</p> -<p>Suddenly the painter appeared at the door of the studio and made staccato - signs for them to come in. They turned to each other and smiled.</p> -<p>"I am waiting," he cried. "Do come in. The light is quite perfect, - and you can bring your drinks."</p> -<p>They rose up and sauntered down the walk together. Two green-and-white - butterflies fluttered past them, and in the pear-tree at the corner - of the garden a thrush began to sing.</p> -<p>"You are glad you have met me, Mr. Gray," said Lord Henry, - looking at him.</p> -<p>"Yes, I am glad now. I wonder shall I always be glad?"</p> -<p>"Always! That is a dreadful word. It makes me shudder when I hear it. - Women are so fond of using it. They spoil every romance by trying to make - it last for ever. It is a meaningless word, too. The only difference - between a caprice and a lifelong passion is that the caprice lasts a - little longer."</p> -<p>As they entered the studio, Dorian Gray put his hand upon Lord Henry's arm. - "In that case, let our friendship be a caprice," he murmured, flushing - at his - own boldness, then stepped up on the platform and resumed his pose.</p> -<p>Lord Henry flung himself into a large wicker arm-chair and watched him. The - sweep and dash of the brush on the canvas made the only sound that broke the - stillness, except when, now and then, Hallward stepped back to look at his work - from a distance. In the slanting beams that streamed through the open doorway - the dust danced and was golden. The heavy scent of the roses seemed to brood - over everything. </p> -<p>After about a quarter of an hour Hallward stopped painting, - looked for a long time at Dorian Gray, and then for a long - time at the picture, biting the end of one of his huge brushes - and frowning. "It is quite finished," he cried at last, - and stooping down he wrote his name in long vermilion letters on - the left-hand corner of the canvas.</p> -<p>Lord Henry came over and examined the picture. It was certainly - a wonderful work of art, and a wonderful likeness as well.</p> -<p>"My dear fellow, I congratulate you most warmly," he said. - "It is the finest portrait of modern times. Mr. Gray, come over - and look at yourself."</p> -<p>The lad started, as if awakened from some dream.</p> -<p>"Is it really finished?" he murmured, stepping down from the platform.</p> -<p>"Quite finished," said the painter. "And you have sat splendidly - to-day. I am awfully obliged to you."</p> -<p>"That is entirely due to me," broke in Lord Henry. "Isn't it, - Mr. Gray?"</p> -<p>Dorian made no answer, but passed listlessly in front of his - picture and turned towards it. When he saw it he drew back, - and his cheeks flushed for a moment with pleasure. A look of joy came - into his eyes, as if he had recognized himself for the first time. - He stood there motionless and in wonder, dimly conscious that Hallward - was speaking to him, but not catching the meaning of his words. - The sense of his own beauty came on him like a revelation. - He had never felt it before. Basil Hallward's compliments had seemed - to him to be merely the charming exaggeration of friendship. - He had listened to them, laughed at them, forgotten them. - They had not influenced his nature. Then had come Lord Henry - Wotton with his strange panegyric on youth, his terrible warning - of its brevity. That had stirred him at the time, and now, - as he stood gazing at the shadow of his own loveliness, the full - reality of the description flashed across him. Yes, there would - be a day when his face would be wrinkled and wizen, his eyes dim - and colourless, the grace of his figure broken and deformed. - The scarlet would pass away from his lips and the gold steal from - his hair. The life that was to make his soul would mar his body. - He would become dreadful, hideous, and uncouth.</p> -<p>As he thought of it, a sharp pang of pain struck through him - like a knife and made each delicate fibre of his nature quiver. - His eyes deepened into amethyst, and across them came a mist - of tears. He felt as if a hand of ice had been laid upon - his heart.</p> -<p>"Don't you like it?" cried Hallward at last, stung a little - by the lad's silence, not understanding what it meant.</p> -<p>"Of course he likes it," said Lord Henry. "Who wouldn't like - it? - It is one of the greatest things in modern art. I will give you - anything you like to ask for it. I must have it."</p> -<p>"It is not my property, Harry."</p> -<p>"Whose property is it?"</p> -<p>"Dorian's, of course," answered the painter.</p> -<p>"He is a very lucky fellow."</p> -<p>"How sad it is!" murmured Dorian Gray with his eyes still fixed upon - his own portrait. "How sad it is! I shall grow old, and horrible, - and dreadful. But this picture will remain always young. - It will never be older than this particular day of June. - . . . If it were only the other way! If it were I who was - to be always young, and the picture that was to grow old! - For that--for that--I would give everything! Yes, there is - nothing in the whole world I would not give! I would give my soul - for that!"</p> -<p>"You would hardly care for such an arrangement, Basil," cried Lord - Henry, laughing. "It would be rather hard lines on your work."</p> -<p>"I should object very strongly, Harry," said Hallward.</p> -<p>Dorian Gray turned and looked at him. "I believe you would, Basil. - You like your art better than your friends. I am no more to you - than a green bronze figure. Hardly as much, I dare say."</p> -<p>The painter stared in amazement. It was so unlike Dorian to speak like that. - What had happened? He seemed quite angry. His face was flushed and his - cheeks burning.</p> -<p>"Yes," he continued, "I am less to you than your ivory Hermes - or your - silver Faun. You will like them always. How long will you like me? - Till I have my first wrinkle, I suppose. I know, now, that when one - loses one's good looks, whatever they may be, one loses everything. - Your picture has taught me that. Lord Henry Wotton is perfectly right. - Youth is the only thing worth having. When I find that I am growing old, I - shall kill myself."</p> -<p>Hallward turned pale and caught his hand. "Dorian! Dorian!" he cried, - "don't talk like that. I have never had such a friend as you, and I shall - never have such another. You are not jealous of material things, are you?-- - you who are finer than any of them!"</p> -<p>"I am jealous of everything whose beauty does not die. - I am jealous of the portrait you have painted of me. - Why should it keep what I must lose? Every moment that passes - takes something from me and gives something to it. Oh, if it - were only the other way! If the picture could change, - and I could be always what I am now! Why did you paint it? - It will mock me some day--mock me horribly!" The hot tears - welled into his eyes; he tore his hand away and, flinging himself - on the divan, he buried his face in the cushions, as though he - was praying.</p> -<p>"This is your doing, Harry," said the painter bitterly.</p> -<p>Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "It is the real Dorian Gray-- - that is all."</p> -<p>"It is not."</p> -<p>"If it is not, what have I to do with it?"</p> -<p>"You should have gone away when I asked you," he muttered.</p> -<p>"I stayed when you asked me," was Lord Henry's answer.</p> -<p>"Harry, I can't quarrel with my two best friends at once, - but between you both you have made me hate the finest - piece of work I have ever done, and I will destroy it. - What is it but canvas and colour? I will not let it come across - our three lives and mar them."</p> -<p>Dorian Gray lifted his golden head from the pillow, and with pallid face and - tear-stained eyes, looked at him as he walked over to the deal painting-table - that was set beneath the high curtained window. What was he doing there? - His fingers were straying about among the litter of tin tubes and dry brushes, - seeking for something. Yes, it was for the long palette-knife, with its thin - blade of lithe steel. He had found it at last. He was going to rip up - the canvas.</p> -<p>With a stifled sob the lad leaped from the couch, and, rushing over - to Hallward, tore the knife out of his hand, and flung it to the end - of the studio. "Don't, Basil, don't!" he cried. "It would be - murder!"</p> -<p>"I am glad you appreciate my work at last, Dorian," said the painter - coldly - when he had recovered from his surprise. "I never thought you would."</p> -<p>"Appreciate it? I am in love with it, Basil. It is part of myself. - I feel that."</p> -<p>"Well, as soon as you are dry, you shall be varnished, and framed, - and sent home. Then you can do what you like with yourself." - And he walked across the room and rang the bell for tea. - "You will have tea, of course, Dorian? And so will you, Harry? - Or do you object to such simple pleasures?"</p> -<p>"I adore simple pleasures," said Lord Henry. "They are - the last refuge of the complex. But I don't like scenes, - except on the stage. What absurd fellows you are, both of you! - I wonder who it was defined man as a rational animal. - It was the most premature definition ever given. Man is many things, - but he is not rational. I am glad he is not, after all-- - though I wish you chaps would not squabble over the picture. - You had much better let me have it, Basil. This silly boy doesn't - really want it, and I really do."</p> -<p>"If you let any one have it but me, Basil, I shall never forgive you!" - cried Dorian Gray; "and I don't allow people to call me a silly boy."</p> -<p>"You know the picture is yours, Dorian. I gave it to you before it existed."</p> -<p>"And you know you have been a little silly, Mr. Gray, and that you - don't really object to being reminded that you are extremely young."</p> -<p>"I should have objected very strongly this morning, Lord Henry."</p> -<p>"Ah! this morning! You have lived since then."</p> -<p>There came a knock at the door, and the butler entered with a - laden tea-tray and set it down upon a small Japanese table. - There was a rattle of cups and saucers and the hissing of a fluted - Georgian urn. Two globe-shaped china dishes were brought - in by a page. Dorian Gray went over and poured out the tea. - The two men sauntered languidly to the table and examined what was - under the covers.</p> -<p>"Let us go to the theatre to-night," said Lord Henry. - "There is sure to be something on, somewhere. I have promised - to dine at White's, but it is only with an old friend, - so I can send him a wire to say that I am ill, or that I am - prevented from coming in consequence of a subsequent engagement. - I think that would be a rather nice excuse: it would have all - the surprise of candour."</p> -<p>"It is such a bore putting on one's dress-clothes," muttered Hallward. - "And, when one has them on, they are so horrid."</p> -<p>"Yes," answered Lord Henry dreamily, "the costume of the nineteenth - century is detestable. It is so sombre, so depressing. Sin is the only - real colour-element left in modern life."</p> -<p>"You really must not say things like that before Dorian, Harry."</p> -<p>"Before which Dorian? The one who is pouring out tea for us, - or the one in the picture?"</p> -<p>"Before either."</p> -<p>"I should like to come to the theatre with you, Lord Henry," - said the lad.</p> -<p>"Then you shall come; and you will come, too, Basil, won't you?"</p> -<p>"I can't, really. I would sooner not. I have a lot of work to do."</p> -<p>"Well, then, you and I will go alone, Mr. Gray."</p> -<p>"I should like that awfully."</p> -<p>The painter bit his lip and walked over, cup in hand, to the picture. - "I shall stay with the real Dorian," he said, sadly.</p> -<p>"Is it the real Dorian?" cried the original of the portrait, - strolling across to him. "Am I really like that?"</p> -<p>"Yes; you are just like that."</p> -<p>"How wonderful, Basil!"</p> -<p>"At least you are like it in appearance. But it will never alter," - sighed Hallward. "That is something."</p> -<p>"What a fuss people make about fidelity!" exclaimed Lord Henry. - "Why, even in love it is purely a question for physiology. - It has nothing to do with our own will. Young men want to - be faithful, and are not; old men want to be faithless, and cannot: - that is all one can say."</p> -<p>"Don't go to the theatre to-night, Dorian," said Hallward. - "Stop and dine with me."</p> -<p>"I can't, Basil."</p> -<p>"Why?"</p> -<p>"Because I have promised Lord Henry Wotton to go with him."</p> -<p>"He won't like you the better for keeping your promises. - He always breaks his own. I beg you not to go."</p> -<p>Dorian Gray laughed and shook his head.</p> -<p>"I entreat you."</p> -<p>The lad hesitated, and looked over at Lord Henry, who was watching - them from the tea-table with an amused smile.</p> -<p>"I must go, Basil," he answered.</p> -<p>"Very well," said Hallward, and he went over and laid down his - cup on the tray. "It is rather late, and, as you have to dress, - you had better lose no time. Good-bye, Harry. Good-bye, Dorian. - Come and see me soon. Come to-morrow."</p> -<p>"Certainly."</p> -<p>"You won't forget?"</p> -<p>"No, of course not," cried Dorian.</p> -<p>"And ... Harry!"</p> -<p>"Yes, Basil?"</p> -<p>"Remember what I asked you, when we were in the garden this morning."</p> -<p>"I have forgotten it."</p> -<p>"I trust you."</p> -<p>"I wish I could trust myself," said Lord Henry, laughing. "Come, - Mr. Gray, - my hansom is outside, and I can drop you at your own place. Good-bye, Basil. - It has been a most interesting afternoon."</p> -<p>As the door closed behind them, the painter flung himself down on a sofa, - and a look of pain came into his face.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 3</p> -<p>At half-past twelve next day Lord Henry Wotton strolled from Curzon - Street over to the Albany to call on his uncle, Lord Fermor, - a genial if somewhat rough-mannered old bachelor, whom the outside - world called selfish because it derived no particular benefit - from him, but who was considered generous by Society as he fed - the people who amused him. His father had been our ambassador - at Madrid when Isabella was young and Prim unthought of, - but had retired from the diplomatic service in a capricious - moment of annoyance on not being offered the Embassy at Paris, - a post to which he considered that he was fully entitled - by reason of his birth, his indolence, the good English - of his dispatches, and his inordinate passion for pleasure. - The son, who had been his father's secretary, had resigned along - with his chief, somewhat foolishly as was thought at the time, - and on succeeding some months later to the title, had set - himself to the serious study of the great aristocratic art - of doing absolutely nothing. He had two large town houses, - but preferred to live in chambers as it was less trouble, - and took most of his meals at his club. He paid some attention - to the management of his collieries in the Midland counties, - excusing himself for this taint of industry on the ground that - the one advantage of having coal was that it enabled a gentleman - to afford the decency of burning wood on his own hearth. - In politics he was a Tory, except when the Tories were in office, - during which period he roundly abused them for being a pack - of Radicals. He was a hero to his valet, who bullied him, - and a terror to most of his relations, whom he bullied in turn. - Only England could have produced him, and he always said - that the country was going to the dogs. His principles - were out of date, but there was a good deal to be said for - his prejudices.</p> -<p>When Lord Henry entered the room, he found his uncle sitting in a rough - shooting-coat, smoking a cheroot and grumbling over The Times. - "Well, Harry," said the old gentleman, "what brings you out so - early? - I thought you dandies never got up till two, and were not visible - till five."</p> -<p>"Pure family affection, I assure you, Uncle George. I want to get - something out of you."</p> -<p>"Money, I suppose," said Lord Fermor, making a wry face. - "Well, sit down and tell me all about it. Young people, - nowadays, imagine that money is everything."</p> -<p>"Yes," murmured Lord Henry, settling his button-hole in his coat; - "and when they grow older they know it. But I don't want money. - It is only people who pay their bills who want that, Uncle George, - and I never pay mine. Credit is the capital of a younger son, - and one lives charmingly upon it. Besides, I always deal with - Dartmoor's tradesmen, and consequently they never bother me. - What I want is information: not useful information, of course; - useless information."</p> -<p>"Well, I can tell you anything that is in an English Blue Book, - Harry, although those fellows nowadays write a lot of nonsense. - When I was in the Diplomatic, things were much better. - But I hear they let them in now by examination. What can - you expect? Examinations, sir, are pure humbug from beginning - to end. If a man is a gentleman, he knows quite enough, - and if he is not a gentleman, whatever he knows is bad - for him."</p> -<p>"Mr. Dorian Gray does not belong to Blue Books, Uncle George," - said Lord Henry languidly.</p> -<p>"Mr. Dorian Gray? Who is he?" asked Lord Fermor, knitting his bushy - white eyebrows.</p> -<p>"That is what I have come to learn, Uncle George. Or rather, - I know who he is. He is the last Lord Kelso's grandson. - His mother was a Devereux, Lady Margaret Devereaux. - I want you to tell me about his mother. What was she like? - Whom did she marry? You have known nearly everybody - in your time, so you might have known her. I am very much - interested in Mr. Gray at present. I have only just - met him."</p> -<p>"Kelso's grandson!" echoed the old gentleman. "Kelso's grandson! - ... Of - course.... I knew his mother intimately. I believe I was at her christening. - She was an extraordinarily beautiful girl, Margaret Devereux, and made - all the men frantic by running away with a penniless young fellow-- - a mere nobody, sir, a subaltern in a foot regiment, or something - of that kind. Certainly. I remember the whole thing as if it - happened yesterday. The poor chap was killed in a duel at Spa a few - months after the marriage. There was an ugly story about it. - They said Kelso got some rascally adventurer, some Belgian brute, - to insult his son-in-law in public--paid him, sir, to do it, paid him-- - and that the fellow spitted his man as if he had been a pigeon. - The thing was hushed up, but, egad, Kelso ate his chop alone at the club - for some time afterwards. He brought his daughter back with him, I was told, - and she never spoke to him again. Oh, yes; it was a bad business. - The girl died, too, died within a year. So she left a son, did she? - I had forgotten that. What sort of boy is he? If he is like his mother, - he must be a good-looking chap."</p> -<p>"He is very good-looking," assented Lord Henry.</p> -<p>"I hope he will fall into proper hands," continued the old man. - "He should have a pot of money waiting for him if Kelso - did the right thing by him. His mother had money, too. - All the Selby property came to her, through her grandfather. - Her grandfather hated Kelso, thought him a mean dog. - He was, too. Came to Madrid once when I was there. Egad, I was - ashamed of him. The Queen used to ask me about the English noble - who was always quarrelling with the cabmen about their fares. - They made quite a story of it. I didn't dare show my face at Court - for a month. I hope he treated his grandson better than he did - the jarvies."</p> -<p>"I don't know," answered Lord Henry. "I fancy that the boy will - be well off. - He is not of age yet. He has Selby, I know. He told me so. And . . . his - mother was very beautiful?"</p> -<p>"Margaret Devereux was one of the loveliest creatures I ever saw, Harry. - What on earth induced her to behave as she did, I never could understand. - She could have married anybody she chose. Carlington was mad after her. - She was romantic, though. All the women of that family were. - The men were a poor lot, but, egad! the women were wonderful. - Carlington went on his knees to her. Told me so himself. She laughed at him, - and there wasn't a girl in London at the time who wasn't after him. - And by the way, Harry, talking about silly marriages, what is this humbug your - father tells me about Dartmoor wanting to marry an American? Ain't English - girls good enough for him?"</p> -<p>"It is rather fashionable to marry Americans just now, Uncle George."</p> -<p>"I'll back English women against the world, Harry," said Lord Fermor, - striking the table with his fist.</p> -<p>"The betting is on the Americans."</p> -<p>"They don't last, I am told," muttered his uncle.</p> -<p>"A long engagement exhausts them, but they are capital at a steeplechase. - They take things flying. I don't think Dartmoor has a chance."</p> -<p>"Who are her people?" grumbled the old gentleman. "Has she got - any?"</p> -<p>Lord Henry shook his head. "American girls are as clever at concealing - their parents, as English women are at concealing their past," he said, - rising to go.</p> -<p>"They are pork-packers, I suppose?"</p> -<p>"I hope so, Uncle George, for Dartmoor's sake. I am told - that pork-packing is the most lucrative profession in America, - after politics."</p> -<p>"Is she pretty?"</p> -<p>"She behaves as if she was beautiful. Most American women do. - It is the secret of their charm."</p> -<p>"Why can't these American women stay in their own country? - They are always telling us that it is the paradise for women."</p> -<p>"It is. That is the reason why, like Eve, they are so excessively - anxious to get out of it," said Lord Henry. "Good-bye, Uncle George. - I shall be late for lunch, if I stop any longer. Thanks for giving me - the information I wanted. I always like to know everything about my - new friends, and nothing about my old ones."</p> -<p>"Where are you lunching, Harry?"</p> -<p>"At Aunt Agatha's. I have asked myself and Mr. Gray. - He is her latest protege."</p> -<p>"Humph! tell your Aunt Agatha, Harry, not to bother me any more with - her charity appeals. I am sick of them. Why, the good woman thinks - that I have nothing to do but to write cheques for her silly fads."</p> -<p>"All right, Uncle George, I'll tell her, but it won't have any effect. - Philanthropic people lose all sense of humanity. It is their - distinguishing characteristic."</p> -<p>The old gentleman growled approvingly and rang the bell for his servant. - Lord Henry passed up the low arcade into Burlington Street and turned his - steps in the direction of Berkeley Square.</p> -<p>So that was the story of Dorian Gray's parentage. - Crudely as it had been told to him, it had yet stirred him - by its suggestion of a strange, almost modern romance. - A beautiful woman risking everything for a mad passion. - A few wild weeks of happiness cut short by a hideous, - treacherous crime. Months of voiceless agony, and then - a child born in pain. The mother snatched away by death, - the boy left to solitude and the tyranny of an old and - loveless man. Yes; it was an interesting background. - It posed the lad, made him more perfect, as it were. Behind every - exquisite thing that existed, there was something tragic. - Worlds had to be in travail, that the meanest flower might blow. - . . . And how charming he had been at dinner the night before, - as with startled eyes and lips parted in frightened pleasure - he had sat opposite to him at the club, the red candleshades - staining to a richer rose the wakening wonder of his face. - Talking to him was like playing upon an exquisite violin. - He answered to every touch and thrill of the bow. . . . There - was something terribly enthralling in the exercise of influence. - No other activity was like it. To project one's soul into some - gracious form, and let it tarry there for a moment; to hear one's - own intellectual views echoed back to one with all the added - music of passion and youth; to convey one's temperament into - another as though it were a subtle fluid or a strange perfume: - there was a real joy in that--perhaps the most satisfying - joy left to us in an age so limited and vulgar as our own, - an age grossly carnal in its pleasures, and grossly common - in its aims.... He was a marvellous type, too, this lad, - whom by so curious a chance he had met in Basil's studio, - or could be fashioned into a marvellous type, at any rate. - Grace was his, and the white purity of boyhood, and beauty such - as old Greek marbles kept for us. There was nothing that one - could not do with him. He could be made a Titan or a toy. - What a pity it was that such beauty was destined to fade! - . . . And Basil? From a psychological point of view, - how interesting he was! The new manner in art, the fresh - mode of looking at life, suggested so strangely by the merely - visible presence of one who was unconscious of it all; - the silent spirit that dwelt in dim woodland, and walked unseen - in open field, suddenly showing herself, Dryadlike and not afraid, - because in his soul who sought for her there had been wakened - that wonderful vision to which alone are wonderful things revealed; - the mere shapes and patterns of things becoming, as it were, - refined, and gaining a kind of symbolical value, as though - they were themselves patterns of some other and more perfect - form whose shadow they made real: how strange it all was! - He remembered something like it in history. Was it not Plato, - that artist in thought, who had first analyzed it? - Was it not Buonarotti who had carved it in the coloured marbles - of a sonnet-sequence? But in our own century it was strange. - . . . Yes; he would try to be to Dorian Gray what, without knowing it, - the lad was to the painter who had fashioned the wonderful portrait. - He would seek to dominate him--had already, indeed, - half done so. He would make that wonderful spirit his own. - There was something fascinating in this son of love and - death.</p> -<p>Suddenly he stopped and glanced up at the houses. He found that he had - passed his aunt's some distance, and, smiling to himself, turned back. - When he entered the somewhat sombre hall, the butler told him that they - had gone in to lunch. He gave one of the footmen his hat and stick - and passed into the dining-room.</p> -<p>"Late as usual, Harry," cried his aunt, shaking her head at him.</p> -<p>He invented a facile excuse, and having taken the vacant seat - next to her, looked round to see who was there. Dorian bowed - to him shyly from the end of the table, a flush of pleasure - stealing into his cheek. Opposite was the Duchess of Harley, - a lady of admirable good-nature and good temper, much liked - by every one who knew her, and of those ample architectural - proportions that in women who are not duchesses are described - by contemporary historians as stoutness. Next to her sat, - on her right, Sir Thomas Burdon, a Radical member of Parliament, - who followed his leader in public life and in private life - followed the best cooks, dining with the Tories and thinking - with the Liberals, in accordance with a wise and well-known rule. - The post on her left was occupied by Mr. Erskine of Treadley, - an old gentleman of considerable charm and culture, who had fallen, - however, into bad habits of silence, having, as he explained - once to Lady Agatha, said everything that he had to say - before he was thirty. His own neighbour was Mrs. Vandeleur, - one of his aunt's oldest friends, a perfect saint amongst women, - but so dreadfully dowdy that she reminded one of a badly - bound hymn-book. Fortunately for him she had on the other - side Lord Faudel, a most intelligent middle-aged mediocrity, - as bald as a ministerial statement in the House of Commons, - with whom she was conversing in that intensely earnest manner - which is the one unpardonable error, as he remarked once himself, - that all really good people fall into, and from which none of them - ever quite escape.</p> -<p>"We are talking about poor Dartmoor, Lord Henry," cried the duchess, - nodding pleasantly to him across the table. "Do you think he will really - marry this fascinating young person?"</p> -<p>"I believe she has made up her mind to propose to him, Duchess."</p> -<p>"How dreadful!" exclaimed Lady Agatha. "Really, some one should - interfere."</p> -<p>"I am told, on excellent authority, that her father keeps an American - dry-goods store," said Sir Thomas Burdon, looking supercilious.</p> -<p>"My uncle has already suggested pork-packing Sir Thomas."</p> -<p>"Dry-goods! What are American dry-goods?" asked the duchess, - raising her large hands in wonder and accentuating the verb.</p> -<p>"American novels," answered Lord Henry, helping himself to some quail.</p> -<p>The duchess looked puzzled.</p> -<p>"Don't mind him, my dear," whispered Lady Agatha. "He never - means anything - that he says."</p> -<p>"When America was discovered," said the Radical member-- - and he began to give some wearisome facts. Like all people - who try to exhaust a subject, he exhausted his listeners. - The duchess sighed and exercised her privilege of interruption. - "I wish to goodness it never had been discovered at all!" - she exclaimed. "Really, our girls have no chance nowadays. It is - most unfair."</p> -<p>"Perhaps, after all, America never has been discovered," - said Mr. Erskine; "I myself would say that it had merely - been detected."</p> -<p>"Oh! but I have seen specimens of the inhabitants," answered the - duchess vaguely. "I must confess that most of them are extremely pretty. - And they dress well, too. They get all their dresses in Paris. - I wish I could afford to do the same."</p> -<p>"They say that when good Americans die they go to Paris," - chuckled Sir Thomas, who had a large wardrobe of Humour's - cast-off clothes.</p> -<p>"Really! And where do bad Americans go to when they die?" - inquired the duchess.</p> -<p>"They go to America," murmured Lord Henry.</p> -<p>Sir Thomas frowned. "I am afraid that your nephew is prejudiced against - that great country," he said to Lady Agatha. "I have travelled all - over it - in cars provided by the directors, who, in such matters, are extremely civil. - I assure you that it is an education to visit it."</p> -<p>"But must we really see Chicago in order to be educated?" - asked Mr. Erskine plaintively. "I don't feel up to the journey."</p> -<p>Sir Thomas waved his hand. "Mr. Erskine of Treadley has the world on his - shelves. We practical men like to see things, not to read about them. The Americans - are an extremely interesting people. They are absolutely reasonable. I think - that is their distinguishing characteristic. Yes, Mr. Erskine, an absolutely - reasonable people. I assure you there is no nonsense about the Americans." -</p> -<p>How dreadful!" cried Lord Henry. "I can stand brute force, but brute - reason is quite unbearable. There is something unfair about its use. - It is hitting below the intellect."</p> -<p>"I do not understand you," said Sir Thomas, growing rather red.</p> -<p>"I do, Lord Henry," murmured Mr. Erskine, with a smile.</p> -<p>"Paradoxes are all very well in their way... ." rejoined the baronet.</p> -<p>"Was that a paradox?" asked Mr. Erskine. "I did not think so. - Perhaps it was. Well, the way of paradoxes is the way of truth. - To test reality we must see it on the tight rope. When the verities - become acrobats, we can judge them."</p> -<p>"Dear me!" said Lady Agatha, "how you men argue! I am sure I - never can make - out what you are talking about. Oh! Harry, I am quite vexed with you. - Why do you try to persuade our nice Mr. Dorian Gray to give up the East End? - I assure you he would be quite invaluable. They would love his playing."</p> -<p>"I want him to play to me," cried Lord Henry, smiling, and he looked - down the table and caught a bright answering glance.</p> -<p>"But they are so unhappy in Whitechapel," continued Lady Agatha.</p> -<p>"I can sympathize with everything except suffering," - said Lord Henry, shrugging his shoulders. "I cannot sympathize - with that. It is too ugly, too horrible, too distressing. - There is something terribly morbid in the modern sympathy - with pain. One should sympathize with the colour, the beauty, - the joy of life. The less said about life's sores, - the better."</p> -<p>"Still, the East End is a very important problem," remarked Sir Thomas - with a grave shake of the head.</p> -<p>"Quite so," answered the young lord. "It is the problem of slavery, - and we try to solve it by amusing the slaves."</p> -<p>The politician looked at him keenly. "What change do you propose, then?" - he asked.</p> -<p>Lord Henry laughed. "I don't desire to change anything in England - except the weather," he answered. "I am quite content with - philosophic contemplation. But, as the nineteenth century has - gone bankrupt through an over-expenditure of sympathy, I would - suggest that we should appeal to science to put us straight. - The advantage of the emotions is that they lead us astray, - and the advantage of science is that it is not emotional."</p> -<p>"But we have such grave responsibilities," ventured Mrs. Vandeleur - timidly.</p> -<p>"Terribly grave," echoed Lady Agatha.</p> -<p>Lord Henry looked over at Mr. Erskine. "Humanity takes itself too seriously. - It is the world's original sin. If the caveman had known how to laugh, - history would have been different."</p> -<p>"You are really very comforting," warbled the duchess. - "I have always felt rather guilty when I came to see your - dear aunt, for I take no interest at all in the East End. - For the future I shall be able to look her in the face without - a blush."</p> -<p>"A blush is very becoming, Duchess," remarked Lord Henry.</p> -<p>"Only when one is young," she answered. "When an old woman - like myself blushes, it is a very bad sign. Ah! Lord Henry, - I wish you would tell me how to become young again."</p> -<p>He thought for a moment. "Can you remember any great error - that you committed in your early days, Duchess?" he asked, - looking at her across the table.</p> -<p>"A great many, I fear," she cried.</p> -<p>"Then commit them over again," he said gravely. "To get back - one's youth, - one has merely to repeat one's follies."</p> -<p>"A delightful theory!" she exclaimed. "I must put it into practice."</p> -<p>"A dangerous theory!" came from Sir Thomas's tight lips. - Lady Agatha shook her head, but could not help being amused. - Mr. Erskine listened.</p> -<p>"Yes," he continued, "that is one of the great secrets of life. - Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, - and discover when it is too late that the only things one never - regrets are one's mistakes."</p> -<p>A laugh ran round the table.</p> -<p>He played with the idea and grew wilful; tossed it into - the air and transformed it; let it escape and recaptured it; - made it iridescent with fancy and winged it with paradox. - The praise of folly, as he went on, soared into a philosophy, - and philosophy herself became young, and catching the mad - music of pleasure, wearing, one might fancy, her wine-stained - robe and wreath of ivy, danced like a Bacchante over the hills - of life, and mocked the slow Silenus for being sober. - Facts fled before her like frightened forest things. - Her white feet trod the huge press at which wise Omar sits, - till the seething grape-juice rose round her bare limbs in waves - of purple bubbles, or crawled in red foam over the vat's black, - dripping, sloping sides. It was an extraordinary improvisation. - He felt that the eyes of Dorian Gray were fixed on him, - and the consciousness that amongst his audience there was - one whose temperament he wished to fascinate seemed to give - his wit keenness and to lend colour to his imagination. - He was brilliant, fantastic, irresponsible. He charmed - his listeners out of themselves, and they followed - his pipe, laughing. Dorian Gray never took his gaze - off him, but sat like one under a spell, smiles chasing - each other over his lips and wonder growing grave in his - darkening eyes.</p> -<p>At last, liveried in the costume of the age, reality entered the room in - the shape of a servant to tell the duchess that her carriage was waiting. - She wrung her hands in mock despair. "How annoying!" she cried. "I - must go. - I have to call for my husband at the club, to take him to some absurd meeting - at Willis's Rooms, where he is going to be in the chair. If I am late he is - sure to be furious, and I couldn't have a scene in this bonnet. It is far - too fragile. A harsh word would ruin it. No, I must go, dear Agatha. - Good-bye, Lord Henry, you are quite delightful and dreadfully demoralizing. - I am sure I don't know what to say about your views. You must come and dine - with us some night. Tuesday? Are you disengaged Tuesday?"</p> -<p>"For you I would throw over anybody, Duchess," said Lord Henry with - a bow.</p> -<p>"Ah! that is very nice, and very wrong of you," she cried; "so - mind you come"; - and she swept out of the room, followed by Lady Agatha and the other ladies.</p> -<p>When Lord Henry had sat down again, Mr. Erskine moved round, - and taking a chair close to him, placed his hand upon his arm.</p> -<p>"You talk books away," he said; "why don't you write one?"</p> -<p>"I am too fond of reading books to care to write them, Mr. Erskine. - I should like to write a novel certainly, a novel that would be as lovely - as a Persian carpet and as unreal. But there is no literary public - in England for anything except newspapers, primers, and encyclopaedias. - Of all people in the world the English have the least sense of the beauty - of literature."</p> -<p>"I fear you are right," answered Mr. Erskine. "I myself used - to have literary ambitions, but I gave them up long ago. - And now, my dear young friend, if you will allow me to call - you so, may I ask if you really meant all that you said to us - at lunch?"</p> -<p>"I quite forget what I said," smiled Lord Henry. "Was it all - very bad?"</p> -<p>"Very bad indeed. In fact I consider you extremely dangerous, - and if anything happens to our good duchess, we shall all look on you - as being primarily responsible. But I should like to talk to you - about life. The generation into which I was born was tedious. - Some day, when you are tired of London, come down to Treadley and expound - to me your philosophy of pleasure over some admirable Burgundy I am - fortunate enough to possess."</p> -<p>"I shall be charmed. A visit to Treadley would be a great privilege. - It has a perfect host, and a perfect library."</p> -<p>"You will complete it," answered the old gentleman with a courteous - bow. - "And now I must bid good-bye to your excellent aunt. I am due at - the Athenaeum. It is the hour when we sleep there."</p> -<p>"All of you, Mr. Erskine?"</p> -<p>"Forty of us, in forty arm-chairs. We are practising for an English Academy - of Letters."</p> -<p>Lord Henry laughed and rose. "I am going to the park," - he cried.</p> -<p>As he was passing out of the door, Dorian Gray touched him on the arm. - "Let me come with you," he murmured.</p> -<p>"But I thought you had promised Basil Hallward to go and see him," - answered Lord Henry.</p> -<p>"I would sooner come with you; yes, I feel I must come with you. - Do let me. And you will promise to talk to me all the time? - No one talks so wonderfully as you do."</p> -<p>"Ah! I have talked quite enough for to-day," said Lord Henry, smiling. - "All I want now is to look at life. You may come and look at it with me, - if you care to."</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 4</p> -<p>One afternoon, a month later, Dorian Gray was reclining in a luxurious - arm-chair, in the little library of Lord Henry's house in Mayfair. - It was, in its way, a very charming room, with its high panelled - wainscoting of olive-stained oak, its cream-coloured frieze and ceiling - of raised plasterwork, and its brickdust felt carpet strewn with silk, - long-fringed Persian rugs. On a tiny satinwood table stood a statuette - by Clodion, and beside it lay a copy of Les Cent Nouvelles, bound for - Margaret of Valois by Clovis Eve and powdered with the gilt daisies - that Queen had selected for her device. Some large blue china jars - and parrot-tulips were ranged on the mantelshelf, and through the small - leaded panes of the window streamed the apricot-coloured light of a summer - day in London.</p> -<p>Lord Henry had not yet come in. He was always late on principle, - his principle being that punctuality is the thief of time. - So the lad was looking rather sulky, as with listless fingers - he turned over the pages of an elaborately illustrated edition - of Manon Lescaut that he had found in one of the book-cases. The - formal monotonous ticking of the Louis Quatorze clock annoyed him. - Once or twice he thought of going away.</p> -<p>At last he heard a step outside, and the door opened. - "How late you are, Harry!" he murmured.</p> -<p>"I am afraid it is not Harry, Mr. Gray," answered a shrill voice.</p> -<p>He glanced quickly round and rose to his feet. "I beg your pardon. - I thought--"</p> -<p>"You thought it was my husband. It is only his wife. - You must let me introduce myself. I know you quite well - by your photographs. I think my husband has got seventeen - of them."</p> -<p>"Not seventeen, Lady Henry?"</p> -<p>"Well, eighteen, then. And I saw you with him the other - night at the opera." She laughed nervously as she spoke, - and watched him with her vague forget-me-not eyes. - She was a curious woman, whose dresses always looked as if - they had been designed in a rage and put on in a tempest. - She was usually in love with somebody, and, as her passion - was never returned, she had kept all her illusions. - She tried to look picturesque, but only succeeded in being untidy. - Her name was Victoria, and she had a perfect mania for going - to church.</p> -<p>"That was at Lohengrin, Lady Henry, I think?"</p> -<p>"Yes; it was at dear Lohengrin. I like Wagner's music better than - anybody's. It is so loud that one can talk the whole time without - other people hearing what one says. That is a great advantage, - don't you think so, Mr. Gray?"</p> -<p>The same nervous staccato laugh broke from her thin lips, - and her fingers began to play with a long tortoise-shell - paper-knife.</p> -<p>Dorian smiled and shook his head: "I am afraid I don't think so, - Lady Henry. I never talk during music--at least, during good music. - If one hears bad music, it is one's duty to drown it in conversation."</p> -<p>"Ah! that is one of Harry's views, isn't it, Mr. Gray? - I always hear Harry's views from his friends. It is the only - way I get to know of them. But you must not think I don't - like good music. I adore it, but I am afraid of it. - It makes me too romantic. I have simply worshipped pianists-- - two at a time, sometimes, Harry tells me. I don't know what it - is about them. Perhaps it is that they are foreigners. - They all are, ain't they? Even those that are born - in England become foreigners after a time, don't they? - It is so clever of them, and such a compliment to art. - Makes it quite cosmopolitan, doesn't it? You have never been - to any of my parties, have you, Mr. Gray? You must come. - I can't afford orchids, but I share no expense in foreigners. - They make one's rooms look so picturesque. But here is Harry! - Harry, I came in to look for you, to ask you something-- - I forget what it was--and I found Mr. Gray here. - We have had such a pleasant chat about music. We have quite - the same ideas. No; I think our ideas are quite different. - But he has been most pleasant. I am so glad I've seen - him."</p> -<p>"I am charmed, my love, quite charmed," said Lord Henry, elevating - his dark, - crescent-shaped eyebrows and looking at them both with an amused smile. - "So sorry I am late, Dorian. I went to look after a piece of old brocade - in Wardour Street and had to bargain for hours for it. Nowadays people know - the price of everything and the value of nothing."</p> -<p>"I am afraid I must be going," exclaimed Lady Henry, - breaking an awkward silence with her silly sudden laugh. - "I have promised to drive with the duchess. Good-bye, Mr. Gray. - Good-bye, Harry. You are dining out, I suppose? So am I. Perhaps I - shall see you at Lady Thornbury's."</p> -<p>"I dare say, my dear," said Lord Henry, shutting the door behind - her as, - looking like a bird of paradise that had been out all night in the rain, - she flitted out of the room, leaving a faint odour of frangipanni. - Then he lit a cigarette and flung himself down on the sofa.</p> -<p>"Never marry a woman with straw-coloured hair, Dorian," he said - after a few puffs.</p> -<p>"Why, Harry?"</p> -<p>"Because they are so sentimental."</p> -<p>"But I like sentimental people."</p> -<p>"Never marry at all, Dorian. Men marry because they are tired; - women, because they are curious: both are disappointed."</p> -<p>"I don't think I am likely to marry, Harry. I am too much in love. - That is one of your aphorisms. I am putting it into practice, - as I do everything that you say."</p> -<p>"Who are you in love with?" asked Lord Henry after a pause.</p> -<p>"With an actress," said Dorian Gray, blushing.</p> -<p>Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "That is a rather commonplace debut."</p> -<p>"You would not say so if you saw her, Harry."</p> -<p>"Who is she?"</p> -<p>"Her name is Sibyl Vane."</p> -<p>"Never heard of her."</p> -<p>"No one has. People will some day, however. She is a genius."</p> -<p>"My dear boy, no woman is a genius. Women are a decorative sex. - They never have anything to say, but they say it charmingly. - Women represent the triumph of matter over mind, just as men - represent the triumph of mind over morals."</p> -<p>"Harry, how can you?"</p> -<p>"My dear Dorian, it is quite true. I am analysing women at present, - so I ought to know. The subject is not so abstruse as I thought it was. - I find that, ultimately, there are only two kinds of women, - the plain and the coloured. The plain women are very useful. - If you want to gain a reputation for respectability, you have merely - to take them down to supper. The other women are very charming. - They commit one mistake, however. They paint in order to try and look young. - Our grandmothers painted in order to try and talk brilliantly. - Rouge and esprit used to go together. That is all over now. - As long as a woman can look ten years younger than her own daughter, - she is perfectly satisfied. As for conversation, there are only five - women in London worth talking to, and two of these can't be admitted into - decent society. However, tell me about your genius. How long have you - known her?"</p> -<p>"Ah! Harry, your views terrify me."</p> -<p>"Never mind that. How long have you known her?"</p> -<p>"About three weeks."</p> -<p>"And where did you come across her?"</p> -<p>"I will tell you, Harry, but you mustn't be unsympathetic about it. - After all, it never would have happened if I had not met you. - You filled me with a wild desire to know everything about life. - For days after I met you, something seemed to throb in my veins. - As I lounged in the park, or strolled down Piccadilly, I used - to look at every one who passed me and wonder, with a mad curiosity, - what sort of lives they led. Some of them fascinated me. - Others filled me with terror. There was an exquisite poison in the air. - I had a passion for sensations. . . . Well, one evening about seven - o'clock, I determined to go out in search of some adventure. - I felt that this grey monstrous London of ours, with its myriads of people, - its sordid sinners, and its splendid sins, as you once phrased it, - must have something in store for me. I fancied a thousand things. - The mere danger gave me a sense of delight. I remembered what you - had said to me on that wonderful evening when we first dined together, - about the search for beauty being the real secret of life. - I don't know what I expected, but I went out and wandered eastward, - soon losing my way in a labyrinth of grimy streets and black - grassless squares. About half-past eight I passed by an absurd - little theatre, with great flaring gas-jets and gaudy play-bills. - A hideous Jew, in the most amazing waistcoat I ever beheld - in my life, was standing at the entrance, smoking a vile cigar. - He had greasy ringlets, and an enormous diamond blazed in the centre - of a soiled shirt. 'Have a box, my Lord?' he said, when he saw me, - and he took off his hat with an air of gorgeous servility. - There was something about him, Harry, that amused me. - He was such a monster. You will laugh at me, I know, but I - really went in and paid a whole guinea for the stage-box. To - the present day I can't make out why I did so; and yet if I hadn't-- - my dear Harry, if I hadn't--I should have missed the greatest - romance of my life. I see you are laughing. It is horrid of - you!"</p> -<p>"I am not laughing, Dorian; at least I am not laughing at you. - But you should not say the greatest romance of your life. - You should say the first romance of your life. You will - always be loved, and you will always be in love with love. - A grande passion is the privilege of people who have nothing to do. - That is the one use of the idle classes of a country. - Don't be afraid. There are exquisite things in store for you. - This is merely the beginning."</p> -<p>"Do you think my nature so shallow?" cried Dorian Gray angrily.</p> -<p>"No; I think your nature so deep."</p> -<p>"How do you mean?"</p> -<p>"My dear boy, the people who love only once in their lives are really - the shallow people. What they call their loyalty, and their fidelity, - I call either the lethargy of custom or their lack of imagination. - Faithfulness is to the emotional life what consistency is to the life - of the intellect--simply a confession of failure. Faithfulness! - I must analyse it some day. The passion for property is in it. - There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid - that others might pick them up. But I don't want to interrupt you. - Go on with your story."</p> -<p>"Well, I found myself seated in a horrid little private box, - with a vulgar drop-scene staring me in the face. - I looked out from behind the curtain and surveyed the house. - It was a tawdry affair, all Cupids and cornucopias, like a - third-rate wedding-cake. The gallery and pit were fairly full, - but the two rows of dingy stalls were quite empty, and there was - hardly a person in what I suppose they called the dress-circle. - Women went about with oranges and ginger-beer, and there was a - terrible consumption of nuts going on."</p> -<p>"It must have been just like the palmy days of the British drama."</p> -<p>"Just like, I should fancy, and very depressing. I began to wonder - what on earth I should do when I caught sight of the play-bill. - What do you think the play was, Harry?"</p> -<p>"I should think 'The Idiot Boy', or 'Dumb but Innocent'. - Our fathers used to like that sort of piece, I believe. - The longer I live, Dorian, the more keenly I feel that whatever - was good enough for our fathers is not good enough for us. In art, - as in politics, les grandperes ont toujours tort."</p> -<p>"This play was good enough for us, Harry. It was Romeo and Juliet. I must - admit that I was rather annoyed at the idea of seeing Shakespeare done in such - a wretched hole of a place. Still, I felt interested, in a sort of way. At any - rate, I determined to wait for the first act. There was a dreadful orchestra, - presided over by a young Hebrew who sat at a cracked piano, that nearly drove - me away, but at last the drop-scene was drawn up and the play began. Romeo was - a stout elderly gentleman, with corked eyebrows, a husky tragedy voice, and - a figure like a beer-barrel. Mercutio was almost as bad. He was played by the - low-comedian, who had introduced gags of his own and was on most friendly terms - with the pit. They were both as grotesque as the scenery, and that looked as - if it had come out of a country-booth. But Juliet! Harry, imagine a girl, hardly - seventeen years of age, with a little, flowerlike face, a small Greek head with - plaited coils of dark-brown hair, eyes that were violet wells of passion, lips - that were like the petals of a rose. She was the loveliest thing I had ever - seen in my life. You said to me once that pathos left you unmoved, but that - beauty, mere beauty, could fill your eyes with tears. I tell you, Harry, I could - hardly see this girl for the mist of tears that came across me. And her voice--I - never heard such a voice. It was very low at first, with deep mellow notes that - seemed to fall singly upon one's ear. Then it became a little louder, and sounded - like a flute or a distant hautboy. In the garden-scene it had all the tremulous - ecstasy that one hears just before dawn when nightingales are singing. There - were moments, later on, when it had the wild passion of violins. You know how - a voice can stir one. Your voice and the voice of Sibyl Vane are two things - that I shall never forget. When I close my eyes, I hear them, and each of them - says something different. I don't know which to follow. Why should I not love - her? Harry, I do love her. She is everything to me in life. Night after night - I go to see her play. One evening she is Rosalind, and the next evening she - is Imogen. I have seen her die in the gloom of an Italian tomb, sucking the - poison from her lover's lips. I have watched her wandering through the forest - of Arden, disguised as a pretty boy in hose and doublet and dainty cap. She - has been mad, and has come into the presence of a guilty king, and given him - rue to wear and bitter herbs to taste of. She has been innocent, and the black - hands of jealousy have crushed her reedlike throat. I have seen her in every - age and in every costume. Ordinary women never appeal to one's imagination. - They are limited to their century. No glamour ever transfigures them. One knows - their minds as easily as one knows their bonnets. One can always find them. - There is no mystery in any of them. They ride in the park in the morning and - chatter at tea-parties in the afternoon. They have their stereotyped smile and - their fashionable manner. They are quite obvious. But an actress! How different - an actress is! Harry! why didn't you tell me that the only thing worth loving - is an actress?"</p> -<p>Because I have loved so many of them, Dorian."</p> -<p>"Oh, yes, horrid people with dyed hair and painted faces."</p> -<p>"Don't run down dyed hair and painted faces. There is an extraordinary - charm in them, sometimes," said Lord Henry.</p> -<p>"I wish now I had not told you about Sibyl Vane."</p> -<p>"You could not have helped telling me, Dorian. All through your life - you will tell me everything you do."</p> -<p>"Yes, Harry, I believe that is true. I cannot help telling you things. - You have a curious influence over me. If I ever did a crime, I would come - and confess it to you. You would understand me."</p> -<p>"People like you--the wilful sunbeams of life--don't commit crimes, Dorian. - But I am much obliged for the compliment, all the same. And now tell me-- - reach me the matches, like a good boy--thanks--what are your actual relations - with Sibyl Vane?"</p> -<p>Dorian Gray leaped to his feet, with flushed cheeks and burning eyes. - "Harry! Sibyl Vane is sacred!"</p> -<p>"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?"</p> -<p>"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."</p> -<p>"I am not surprised."</p> -<p>"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."</p> -<p>"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."</p> -<p>"Well, he seemed to think they were beyond his means," - laughed Dorian. "By this time, however, the lights were being - put out in the theatre, and I had to go. He wanted me to try - some cigars that he strongly recommended. I declined. - The next night, of course, I arrived at the place again. - When he saw me, he made me a low bow and assured me that I - was a munificent patron of art. He was a most offensive brute, - though he had an extraordinary passion for Shakespeare. - He told me once, with an air of pride, that his five bankruptcies - were entirely due to 'The Bard,' as he insisted on calling him. - He seemed to think it a distinction."</p> -<p>"It was a distinction, my dear Dorian--a great distinction. - Most people become bankrupt through having invested too - heavily in the prose of life. To have ruined one's self over - poetry is an honour. But when did you first speak to Miss - Sibyl Vane?"</p> -<p>"The third night. She had been playing Rosalind. - I could not help going round. I had thrown her some flowers, - and she had looked at me--at least I fancied that she had. - The old Jew was persistent. He seemed determined to take me behind, - so I consented. It was curious my not wanting to know her, - wasn't it?"</p> -<p>"No; I don't think so."</p> -<p>"My dear Harry, why?"</p> -<p>"I will tell you some other time. Now I want to know about the girl."</p> -<p>"Sibyl? Oh, she was so shy and so gentle. There is something of a - child about her. Her eyes opened wide in exquisite wonder when I - told her what I thought of her performance, and she seemed quite - unconscious of her power. I think we were both rather nervous. - The old Jew stood grinning at the doorway of the dusty greenroom, - making elaborate speeches about us both, while we stood looking at - each other like children. He would insist on calling me 'My Lord,' - so I had to assure Sibyl that I was not anything of the kind. - She said quite simply to me, 'You look more like a prince. - I must call you Prince Charming.'"</p> -<p>"Upon my word, Dorian, Miss Sibyl knows how to pay compliments."</p> -<p>"You don't understand her, Harry. She regarded me merely as a person - in a play. She knows nothing of life. She lives with her mother, - a faded tired woman who played Lady Capulet in a sort of magenta - dressing-wrapper on the first night, and looks as if she had seen - better days."</p> -<p>"I know that look. It depresses me," murmured Lord Henry, - examining his rings.</p> -<p>"The Jew wanted to tell me her history, but I said it did not interest - me."</p> -<p>"You were quite right. There is always something infinitely mean - about other people's tragedies."</p> -<p>"Sibyl is the only thing I care about. What is it to me - where she came from? From her little head to her little feet, - she is absolutely and entirely divine. Every night of my life I - go to see her act, and every night she is more marvellous."</p> -<p>"That is the reason, I suppose, that you never dine with me now. - I thought you must have some curious romance on hand. You have; - but it is not quite what I expected."</p> -<p>"My dear Harry, we either lunch or sup together every day, - and I have been to the opera with you several times," said Dorian, - opening his blue eyes in wonder.</p> -<p>"You always come dreadfully late."</p> -<p>"Well, I can't help going to see Sibyl play," he cried, "even - if it is - only for a single act. I get hungry for her presence; and when I think - of the wonderful soul that is hidden away in that little ivory body, - I am filled with awe."</p> -<p>"You can dine with me to-night, Dorian, can't you?"</p> -<p>He shook his head. "To-night she is Imogen," he answered, - "and to-morrow night she will be Juliet."</p> -<p>"When is she Sibyl Vane?"</p> -<p>"Never."</p> -<p>"I congratulate you."</p> -<p>"How horrid you are! She is all the great heroines of the world in one. - She is more than an individual. You laugh, but I tell you she - has genius. I love her, and I must make her love me. You, who know - all the secrets of life, tell me how to charm Sibyl Vane to love me! - I want to make Romeo jealous. I want the dead lovers of the world - to hear our laughter and grow sad. I want a breath of our passion - to stir their dust into consciousness, to wake their ashes into pain. - My God, Harry, how I worship her!" He was walking up and down the room - as he spoke. Hectic spots of red burned on his cheeks. He was - terribly excited.</p> -<p>Lord Henry watched him with a subtle sense of pleasure. How different - he was now from the shy frightened boy he had met in Basil Hallward's studio! - His nature had developed like a flower, had borne blossoms of scarlet flame. - Out of its secret hiding-place had crept his soul, and desire had come to meet - it on the way.</p> -<p>"And what do you propose to do?" said Lord Henry at last.</p> -<p>"I want you and Basil to come with me some night and see her act. - I have not the slightest fear of the result. You are certain to - acknowledge her genius. Then we must get her out of the Jew's hands. - She is bound to him for three years--at least for two years and eight months-- - from the present time. I shall have to pay him something, of course. - When all that is settled, I shall take a West End theatre and bring - her out properly. She will make the world as mad as she has - made me."</p> -<p>"That would be impossible, my dear boy."</p> -<p>"Yes, she will. She has not merely art, consummate art-instinct, - in her, but she has personality also; and you have often told me - that it is personalities, not principles, that move the age."</p> -<p>"Well, what night shall we go?"</p> -<p>"Let me see. To-day is Tuesday. Let us fix to-morrow. She plays - Juliet to-morrow."</p> -<p>"All right. The Bristol at eight o'clock; and I will get Basil."</p> -<p>"Not eight, Harry, please. Half-past six. We must be there - before the curtain rises. You must see her in the first act, - where she meets Romeo."</p> -<p>"Half-past six! What an hour! It will be like having a meat-tea, or reading - an English novel. It must be seven. No gentleman dines before seven. - Shall you see Basil between this and then? Or shall I write to him?"</p> -<p>"Dear Basil! I have not laid eyes on him for a week. - It is rather horrid of me, as he has sent me my portrait in - the most wonderful frame, specially designed by himself, and, - though I am a little jealous of the picture for being a whole - month younger than I am, I must admit that I delight in it. - Perhaps you had better write to him. I don't want to see him alone. - He says things that annoy me. He gives me good advice."</p> -<p>Lord Henry smiled. "People are very fond of giving away what they - need most themselves. It is what I call the depth of generosity."</p> -<p>"Oh, Basil is the best of fellows, but he seems to me to be just a bit - of a Philistine. Since I have known you, Harry, I have discovered that."</p> -<p>"Basil, my dear boy, puts everything that is charming in him - into his work. The consequence is that he has nothing left for - life but his prejudices, his principles, and his common sense. - The only artists I have ever known who are personally delightful - are bad artists. Good artists exist simply in what they make, - and consequently are perfectly uninteresting in what they are. - A great poet, a really great poet, is the most unpoetical of - all creatures. But inferior poets are absolutely fascinating. - The worse their rhymes are, the more picturesque they look. - The mere fact of having published a book of second-rate sonnets - makes a man quite irresistible. He lives the poetry that - he cannot write. The others write the poetry that they dare - not realize."</p> -<p>"I wonder is that really so, Harry?" said Dorian Gray, - putting some perfume on his handkerchief out of a large, - gold-topped bottle that stood on the table. "It must be, - if you say it. And now I am off. Imogen is waiting for me. - Don't forget about to-morrow. Good-bye."</p> -<p>As he left the room, Lord Henry's heavy eyelids drooped, and he began - to think. Certainly few people had ever interested him so much - as Dorian Gray, and yet the lad's mad adoration of some one else - caused him not the slightest pang of annoyance or jealousy. - He was pleased by it. It made him a more interesting study. - He had been always enthralled by the methods of natural science, - but the ordinary subject-matter of that science had seemed to him - trivial and of no import. And so he had begun by vivisecting himself, - as he had ended by vivisecting others. Human life--that appeared - to him the one thing worth investigating. Compared to it there - was nothing else of any value. It was true that as one watched - life in its curious crucible of pain and pleasure, one could - not wear over one's face a mask of glass, nor keep the sulphurous - fumes from troubling the brain and making the imagination turbid - with monstrous fancies and misshapen dreams. There were poisons - so subtle that to know their properties one had to sicken of them. - There were maladies so strange that one had to pass through them - if one sought to understand their nature. And, yet, what a great - reward one received! How wonderful the whole world became to one! - To note the curious hard logic of passion, and the emotional - coloured life of the intellect--to observe where they met, - and where they separated, at what point they were in unison, - and at what point they were at discord--there was a delight in that! - What matter what the cost was? One could never pay too high a price for - any sensation.</p> -<p>He was conscious--and the thought brought a gleam of pleasure into - his brown agate eyes--that it was through certain words of his, - musical words said with musical utterance, that Dorian Gray's soul - had turned to this white girl and bowed in worship before her. - To a large extent the lad was his own creation. He had made - him premature. That was something. Ordinary people waited till - life disclosed to them its secrets, but to the few, to the elect, - the mysteries of life were revealed before the veil was drawn away. - Sometimes this was the effect of art, and chiefly of the art of literature, - which dealt immediately with the passions and the intellect. - But now and then a complex personality took the place and assumed - the office of art, was indeed, in its way, a real work of art, - life having its elaborate masterpieces, just as poetry has, or sculpture, - or painting.</p> -<p>Yes, the lad was premature. He was gathering his harvest while it - was yet spring. The pulse and passion of youth were in him, - but he was becoming self-conscious. It was delightful to watch him. - With his beautiful face, and his beautiful soul, he was a thing to - wonder at. It was no matter how it all ended, or was destined to end. - He was like one of those gracious figures in a pageant or a play, - whose joys seem to be remote from one, but whose sorrows stir one's sense - of beauty, and whose wounds are like red roses.</p> -<p>Soul and body, body and soul--how mysterious they were! There was - animalism in the soul, and the body had its moments of spirituality. - The senses could refine, and the intellect could degrade. Who could - say where the fleshly impulse ceased, or the psychical impulse began? - How shallow were the arbitrary definitions of ordinary psychologists! - And yet how difficult to decide between the claims of the various schools! - Was the soul a shadow seated in the house of sin? Or was the body - really in the soul, as Giordano Bruno thought? The separation of spirit - from matter was a mystery, and the union of spirit with matter was a - mystery also.</p> -<p>He began to wonder whether we could ever make psychology so absolute - a science that each little spring of life would be revealed to us. - As it was, we always misunderstood ourselves and rarely understood others. - Experience was of no ethical value. It was merely the name men gave to - their mistakes. Moralists had, as a rule, regarded it as a mode of warning, - had claimed for it a certain ethical efficacy in the formation of character, - had praised it as something that taught us what to follow and showed - us what to avoid. But there was no motive power in experience. - It was as little of an active cause as conscience itself. All that it - really demonstrated was that our future would be the same as our past, - and that the sin we had done once, and with loathing, we would do many times, - and with joy.</p> -<p>It was clear to him that the experimental method was the only - method by which one could arrive at any scientific analysis - of the passions; and certainly Dorian Gray was a subject made - to his hand, and seemed to promise rich and fruitful results. - His sudden mad love for Sibyl Vane was a psychological phenomenon - of no small interest. There was no doubt that curiosity had much - to do with it, curiosity and the desire for new experiences, - yet it was not a simple, but rather a very complex passion. - What there was in it of the purely sensuous instinct of boyhood - had been transformed by the workings of the imagination, - changed into something that seemed to the lad himself to be remote - from sense, and was for that very reason all the more dangerous. - It was the passions about whose origin we deceived ourselves - that tyrannized most strongly over us. Our weakest motives - were those of whose nature we were conscious. It often happened - that when we thought we were experimenting on others we were - really experimenting on ourselves.</p> -<p>While Lord Henry sat dreaming on these things, a knock came to the door, - and his valet entered and reminded him it was time to dress for dinner. - He got up and looked out into the street. The sunset had smitten into - scarlet gold the upper windows of the houses opposite. The panes glowed - like plates of heated metal. The sky above was like a faded rose. - He thought of his friend's young fiery-coloured life and wondered how it was - all going to end.</p> -<p>When he arrived home, about half-past twelve o'clock, he saw a telegram - lying on the hall table. He opened it and found it was from Dorian Gray. - It was to tell him that he was engaged to be married to Sibyl Vane.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 5</p> -<p>"Mother, Mother, I am so happy!" whispered the girl, burying her - face in the lap of the faded, tired-looking woman who, - with back turned to the shrill intrusive light, was sitting - in the one arm-chair that their dingy sitting-room contained. - "I am so happy!" she repeated, "and you must be happy, too!"</p> -<p>Mrs. Vane winced and put her thin, bismuth-whitened hands on her - daughter's head. "Happy!" she echoed, "I am only happy, Sibyl, - when I - see you act. You must not think of anything but your acting. - Mr. Isaacs has been very good to us, and we owe him money."</p> -<p>The girl looked up and pouted. "Money, Mother?" she cried, - "what does money matter? Love is more than money."</p> -<p>"Mr. Isaacs has advanced us fifty pounds to pay off our debts and to get - a proper outfit for James. You must not forget that, Sibyl. Fifty pounds - is a very large sum. Mr. Isaacs has been most considerate."</p> -<p>"He is not a gentleman, Mother, and I hate the way he talks to me," - said the girl, rising to her feet and going over to the window.</p> -<p>"I don't know how we could manage without him," answered the elder - woman querulously.</p> -<p>Sibyl Vane tossed her head and laughed. "We don't want him - any more, Mother. Prince Charming rules life for us now." - Then she paused. A rose shook in her blood and shadowed - her cheeks. Quick breath parted the petals of her lips. - They trembled. Some southern wind of passion swept over her - and stirred the dainty folds of her dress. "I love him," - she said simply.</p> -<p>"Foolish child! foolish child!" was the parrot-phrase flung in answer. - The waving of crooked, false-jewelled fingers gave grotesqueness to - the words.</p> -<p>The girl laughed again. The joy of a caged bird was in her voice. - Her eyes caught the melody and echoed it in radiance, then closed - for a moment, as though to hide their secret. When they opened, - the mist of a dream had passed across them.</p> -<p>Thin-lipped wisdom spoke at her from the worn chair, - hinted at prudence, quoted from that book of cowardice whose - author apes the name of common sense. She did not listen. - She was free in her prison of passion. Her prince, Prince Charming, - was with her. She had called on memory to remake him. - She had sent her soul to search for him, and it had brought him back. - His kiss burned again upon her mouth. Her eyelids were warm with - his breath.</p> -<p>Then wisdom altered its method and spoke of espial and discovery. - This young man might be rich. If so, marriage should be thought of. - Against the shell of her ear broke the waves of worldly cunning. - The arrows of craft shot by her. She saw the thin lips moving, - and smiled.</p> -<p>Suddenly she felt the need to speak. The wordy silence troubled her. - "Mother, Mother," she cried, "why does he love me so much? I - know why I - love him. I love him because he is like what love himself should be. - But what does he see in me? I am not worthy of him. And yet--why, I - cannot tell--though I feel so much beneath him, I don't feel humble. - I feel proud, terribly proud. Mother, did you love my father as I love - Prince Charming?"</p> -<p>The elder woman grew pale beneath the coarse powder that daubed - her cheeks, and her dry lips twitched with a spasm of pain. - Sybil rushed to her, flung her arms round her neck, and kissed her. - "Forgive me, Mother. I know it pains you to talk about our father. - But it only pains you because you loved him so much. Don't look so sad. - I am as happy to-day as you were twenty years ago. Ah! let me be happy - for ever!"</p> -<p>"My child, you are far too young to think of falling in love. - Besides, what do you know of this young man? You don't - even know his name. The whole thing is most inconvenient, - and really, when James is going away to Australia, and I have - so much to think of, I must say that you should have shown - more consideration. However, as I said before, if he is rich - . . ."</p> -<p>"Ah! Mother, Mother, let me be happy!"</p> -<p>Mrs. Vane glanced at her, and with one of those false - theatrical gestures that so often become a mode of second - nature to a stage-player, clasped her in her arms. - At this moment, the door opened and a young lad with rough - brown hair came into the room. He was thick-set of figure, - and his hands and feet were large and somewhat clumsy in movement. - He was not so finely bred as his sister. One would hardly - have guessed the close relationship that existed between them. - Mrs. Vane fixed her eyes on him and intensified her smile. - She mentally elevated her son to the dignity of an audience. - She felt sure that the tableau was interesting.</p> -<p>"You might keep some of your kisses for me, Sibyl, I think," - said the lad with a good-natured grumble.</p> -<p>"Ah! but you don't like being kissed, Jim," she cried. - "You are a dreadful old bear." And she ran across the room and - hugged him.</p> -<p>James Vane looked into his sister's face with tenderness. - "I want you to come out with me for a walk, Sibyl. - I don't suppose I shall ever see this horrid London again. - I am sure I don't want to."</p> -<p>"My son, don't say such dreadful things," murmured Mrs. Vane, taking - up - a tawdry theatrical dress, with a sigh, and beginning to patch it. - She felt a little disappointed that he had not joined the group. - It would have increased the theatrical picturesqueness of the situation.</p> -<p>"Why not, Mother? I mean it."</p> -<p>"You pain me, my son. I trust you will return from Australia in a position - of affluence. I believe there is no society of any kind in the Colonies-- - nothing that I would call society--so when you have made your fortune, - you must come back and assert yourself in London."</p> -<p>"Society!" muttered the lad. "I don't want to know anything - about that. - I should like to make some money to take you and Sibyl off the stage. - I hate it."</p> -<p>"Oh, Jim!" said Sibyl, laughing, "how unkind of you! - But are you really going for a walk with me? That will be nice! - I was afraid you were going to say good-bye to some of your friends-- - to Tom Hardy, who gave you that hideous pipe, or Ned Langton, - who makes fun of you for smoking it. It is very sweet of you - to let me have your last afternoon. Where shall we go? - Let us go to the park."</p> -<p>"I am too shabby," he answered, frowning. "Only swell people - go to the park."</p> -<p>"Nonsense, Jim," she whispered, stroking the sleeve of his coat.</p> -<p>He hesitated for a moment. "Very well," he said at last, - "but don't be too long dressing." She danced out of the door. - One could hear her singing as she ran upstairs. Her little feet - pattered overhead.</p> -<p>He walked up and down the room two or three times. Then he turned - to the still figure in the chair. "Mother, are my things ready?" - he asked.</p> -<p>"Quite ready, James," she answered, keeping her eyes on - her work. For some months past she had felt ill at ease - when she was alone with this rough stern son of hers. - Her shallow secret nature was troubled when their eyes met. - She used to wonder if he suspected anything. The silence, - for he made no other observation, became intolerable to her. - She began to complain. Women defend themselves by attacking, - just as they attack by sudden and strange surrenders. - "I hope you will be contented, James, with your sea-faring life," - she said. "You must remember that it is your own choice. - You might have entered a solicitor's office. Solicitors are - a very respectable class, and in the country often dine with - the best families."</p> -<p>"I hate offices, and I hate clerks," he replied. "But you are - quite right. - I have chosen my own life. All I say is, watch over Sibyl. Don't let her - come to any harm. Mother, you must watch over her."</p> -<p>"James, you really talk very strangely. Of course I watch over Sibyl."</p> -<p>"I hear a gentleman comes every night to the theatre and goes behind - to talk to her. Is that right? What about that?"</p> -<p>"You are speaking about things you don't understand, James. In the profession - we are accustomed to receive a great deal of most gratifying attention. - I myself used to receive many bouquets at one time. That was when acting - was really understood. As for Sibyl, I do not know at present whether - her attachment is serious or not. But there is no doubt that the young - man in question is a perfect gentleman. He is always most polite to me. - Besides, he has the appearance of being rich, and the flowers he sends - are lovely."</p> -<p>"You don't know his name, though," said the lad harshly.</p> -<p>"No," answered his mother with a placid expression in her face. - "He has not yet revealed his real name. I think it is quite romantic - of him. He is probably a member of the aristocracy."</p> -<p>James Vane bit his lip. "Watch over Sibyl, Mother," he cried, - "watch over her."</p> -<p>"My son, you distress me very much. Sibyl is always under my special care. - Of course, if this gentleman is wealthy, there is no reason why she should - not contract an alliance with him. I trust he is one of the aristocracy. - He has all the appearance of it, I must say. It might be a most brilliant - marriage for Sibyl. They would make a charming couple. His good looks are - really quite remarkable; everybody notices them."</p> -<p>The lad muttered something to himself and drummed on the window-pane - with his coarse fingers. He had just turned round to say something - when the door opened and Sibyl ran in.</p> -<p>"How serious you both are!" she cried. "What is the matter?"</p> -<p>"Nothing," he answered. "I suppose one must be serious sometimes. - Good-bye, Mother; I will have my dinner at five o'clock. Everything - is packed, except my shirts, so you need not trouble."</p> -<p>"Good-bye, my son," she answered with a bow of strained stateliness.</p> -<p>She was extremely annoyed at the tone he had adopted with her, - and there was something in his look that had made her feel afraid.</p> -<p>"Kiss me, Mother," said the girl. Her flowerlike lips touched the - withered - cheek and warmed its frost.</p> -<p>"My child! my child!" cried Mrs. Vane, looking up to the ceiling - in search of an imaginary gallery.</p> -<p>"Come, Sibyl," said her brother impatiently. He hated - his mother's affectations.</p> -<p>They went out into the flickering, wind-blown sunlight and strolled - down the dreary Euston Road. The passersby glanced in wonder - at the sullen heavy youth who, in coarse, ill-fitting clothes, - was in the company of such a graceful, refined-looking girl. - He was like a common gardener walking with a rose.</p> -<p>Jim frowned from time to time when he caught the inquisitive - glance of some stranger. He had that dislike of being stared at, - which comes on geniuses late in life and never leaves the commonplace. - Sibyl, however, was quite unconscious of the effect she was producing. - Her love was trembling in laughter on her lips. She was thinking - of Prince Charming, and, that she might think of him all the more, - she did not talk of him, but prattled on about the ship in which - Jim was going to sail, about the gold he was certain to find, - about the wonderful heiress whose life he was to save from the wicked, - red-shirted bushrangers. For he was not to remain a sailor, - or a supercargo, or whatever he was going to be. Oh, no! A sailor's - existence was dreadful. Fancy being cooped up in a horrid ship, - with the hoarse, hump-backed waves trying to get in, and a black wind - blowing the masts down and tearing the sails into long screaming ribands! - He was to leave the vessel at Melbourne, bid a polite good-bye - to the captain, and go off at once to the gold-fields. Before - a week was over he was to come across a large nugget of pure gold, - the largest nugget that had ever been discovered, and bring it - down to the coast in a waggon guarded by six mounted policemen. - The bushrangers were to attack them three times, and be defeated - with immense slaughter. Or, no. He was not to go to the gold-fields - at all. They were horrid places, where men got intoxicated, - and shot each other in bar-rooms, and used bad language. He was - to be a nice sheep-farmer, and one evening, as he was riding home, - he was to see the beautiful heiress being carried off by a robber - on a black horse, and give chase, and rescue her. Of course, - she would fall in love with him, and he with her, and they would - get married, and come home, and live in an immense house in London. - Yes, there were delightful things in store for him. But he must - be very good, and not lose his temper, or spend his money foolishly. - She was only a year older than he was, but she knew so much more - of life. He must be sure, also, to write to her by every mail, - and to say his prayers each night before he went to sleep. - God was very good, and would watch over him. She would pray - for him, too, and in a few years he would come back quite rich and - happy.</p> -<p>The lad listened sulkily to her and made no answer. He was heart-sick - at leaving home.</p> -<p>Yet it was not this alone that made him gloomy and morose. - Inexperienced though he was, he had still a strong sense - of the danger of Sibyl's position. This young dandy who was - making love to her could mean her no good. He was a gentleman, - and he hated him for that, hated him through some curious - race-instinct for which he could not account, and which for that - reason was all the more dominant within him. He was conscious - also of the shallowness and vanity of his mother's nature, - and in that saw infinite peril for Sibyl and Sibyl's happiness. - Children begin by loving their parents; as they grow older they - judge them; sometimes they forgive them.</p> -<p>His mother! He had something on his mind to ask of her, - something that he had brooded on for many months of silence. - A chance phrase that he had heard at the theatre, a whispered - sneer that had reached his ears one night as he waited at - the stage-door, had set loose a train of horrible thoughts. - He remembered it as if it had been the lash of a hunting-crop - across his face. His brows knit together into a wedgelike furrow, - and with a twitch of pain he bit his underlip.</p> -<p>"You are not listening to a word I am saying, Jim," cried Sibyl, - "and I am making the most delightful plans for your future. - Do say something."</p> -<p>"What do you want me to say?"</p> -<p>"Oh! that you will be a good boy and not forget us," she answered, - smiling at him.</p> -<p>He shrugged his shoulders. "You are more likely to forget me than I am - to forget you, Sibyl."</p> -<p>She flushed. "What do you mean, Jim?" she asked.</p> -<p>"You have a new friend, I hear. Who is he? Why have you not told me - about him? He means you no good."</p> -<p>"Stop, Jim!" she exclaimed. "You must not say anything against - him. - I love him."</p> -<p>"Why, you don't even know his name," answered the lad. "Who - is he? - I have a right to know."</p> -<p>"He is called Prince Charming. Don't you like the name. Oh! you silly - boy! you should never forget it. If you only saw him, you would think him the - most wonderful person in the world. Some day you will meet him--when you come - back from Australia. You will like him so much. Everybody likes him, and I ... - love him. I wish you could come to the theatre to-night. He is going to be there, - and I am to play Juliet. Oh! how I shall play it! Fancy, Jim, to be in love - and play Juliet! To have him sitting there! To play for his delight! I am afraid - I may frighten the company, frighten or enthrall them. To be in love is to surpass - one's self. Poor dreadful Mr. Isaacs will be shouting 'genius' to his loafers - at the bar. He has preached me as a dogma; to-night he will announce me as a - revelation. I feel it. And it is all his, his only, Prince Charming, my wonderful - lover, my god of graces. But I am poor beside him. Poor? What does that matter? - When poverty creeps in at the door, love flies in through the window. Our proverbs - want rewriting. They were made in winter, and it is summer now; spring-time - for me, I think, a very dance of blossoms in blue skies."</p> -<p>He is a gentleman," said the lad sullenly.</p> -<p>"A prince!" she cried musically. "What more do you want?"</p> -<p>"He wants to enslave you."</p> -<p>"I shudder at the thought of being free."</p> -<p>"I want you to beware of him."</p> -<p>"To see him is to worship him; to know him is to trust him."</p> -<p>"Sibyl, you are mad about him."</p> -<p>She laughed and took his arm. "You dear old Jim, you talk as - if you were a hundred. Some day you will be in love yourself. - Then you will know what it is. Don't look so sulky. - Surely you should be glad to think that, though you are - going away, you leave me happier than I have ever been before. - Life has been hard for us both, terribly hard and difficult. - But it will be different now. You are going to a new world, - and I have found one. Here are two chairs; let us sit down and see - the smart people go by."</p> -<p>They took their seats amidst a crowd of watchers. The tulip-beds - across the road flamed like throbbing rings of fire. A white dust-- - tremulous cloud of orris-root it seemed--hung in the panting air. - The brightly coloured parasols danced and dipped like monstrous butterflies.</p> -<p>She made her brother talk of himself, his hopes, his prospects. - He spoke slowly and with effort. They passed words to each other - as players at a game pass counters. Sibyl felt oppressed. She could - not communicate her joy. A faint smile curving that sullen mouth - was all the echo she could win. After some time she became silent. - Suddenly she caught a glimpse of golden hair and laughing lips, - and in an open carriage with two ladies Dorian Gray drove past.</p> -<p>She started to her feet. "There he is!" she cried.</p> -<p>"Who?" said Jim Vane.</p> -<p>"Prince Charming," she answered, looking after the victoria.</p> -<p>He jumped up and seized her roughly by the arm. "Show him to me. - Which is he? Point him out. I must see him!" he exclaimed; - but at that moment the Duke of Berwick's four-in-hand came between, - and when it had left the space clear, the carriage had swept out of - the park.</p> -<p>"He is gone," murmured Sibyl sadly. "I wish you had seen him."</p> -<p>"I wish I had, for as sure as there is a God in heaven, - if he ever does you any wrong, I shall kill him."</p> -<p>She looked at him in horror. He repeated his words. - They cut the air like a dagger. The people round began to gape. - A lady standing close to her tittered.</p> -<p>"Come away, Jim; come away," she whispered. He followed her doggedly - as she passed through the crowd. He felt glad at what he had said.</p> -<p>When they reached the Achilles Statue, she turned round. - There was pity in her eyes that became laughter on her lips. - She shook her head at him. "You are foolish, Jim, utterly foolish; - a bad-tempered boy, that is all. How can you say such - horrible things? You don't know what you are talking about. - You are simply jealous and unkind. Ah! I wish you would - fall in love. Love makes people good, and what you said - was wicked."</p> -<p>"I am sixteen," he answered, "and I know what I am about. - Mother is no help to you. She doesn't understand how to look - after you. I wish now that I was not going to Australia at all. - I have a great mind to chuck the whole thing up. I would, if my - articles hadn't been signed."</p> -<p>"Oh, don't be so serious, Jim. You are like one of the heroes - of those silly melodramas Mother used to be so fond of acting in. - I am not going to quarrel with you. I have seen him, and oh! to see - him is perfect happiness. We won't quarrel. I know you would never - harm any one I love, would you?"</p> -<p>"Not as long as you love him, I suppose," was the sullen answer.</p> -<p>"I shall love him for ever!" she cried.</p> -<p>"And he?"</p> -<p>"For ever, too!"</p> -<p>"He had better."</p> -<p>She shrank from him. Then she laughed and put her hand on his arm. - He was merely a boy.</p> -<p>At the Marble Arch they hailed an omnibus, which left them close - to their shabby home in the Euston Road. It was after five o'clock, - and Sibyl had to lie down for a couple of hours before acting. - Jim insisted that she should do so. He said that he would sooner - part with her when their mother was not present. She would be sure - to make a scene, and he detested scenes of every kind.</p> -<p>In Sybil's own room they parted. There was jealousy in the lad's heart, - and a fierce murderous hatred of the stranger who, as it seemed to him, - had come between them. Yet, when her arms were flung round his neck, - and her fingers strayed through his hair, he softened and kissed her with - real affection. There were tears in his eyes as he went downstairs.</p> -<p>His mother was waiting for him below. She grumbled at his unpunctuality, - as he entered. He made no answer, but sat down to his meagre meal. - The flies buzzed round the table and crawled over the stained cloth. - Through the rumble of omnibuses, and the clatter of street-cabs, - he could hear the droning voice devouring each minute that was left - to him.</p> -<p>After some time, he thrust away his plate and put his head in his hands. - He felt that he had a right to know. It should have been told to him before, - if it was as he suspected. Leaden with fear, his mother watched him. - Words dropped mechanically from her lips. A tattered lace handkerchief - twitched in her fingers. When the clock struck six, he got up and went - to the door. Then he turned back and looked at her. Their eyes met. - In hers he saw a wild appeal for mercy. It enraged him.</p> -<p>"Mother, I have something to ask you," he said. Her eyes wandered - vaguely about the room. She made no answer. "Tell me the truth. - I have a right to know. Were you married to my father?"</p> -<p>She heaved a deep sigh. It was a sigh of relief. The terrible moment, - the moment that night and day, for weeks and months, she had dreaded, - had come at last, and yet she felt no terror. Indeed, in some measure it - was a disappointment to her. The vulgar directness of the question called - for a direct answer. The situation had not been gradually led up to. - It was crude. It reminded her of a bad rehearsal.</p> -<p>"No," she answered, wondering at the harsh simplicity of life.</p> -<p>"My father was a scoundrel then!" cried the lad, clenching his fists.</p> -<p>She shook her head. "I knew he was not free. We loved each other - very much. If he had lived, he would have made provision for us. - Don't speak against him, my son. He was your father, and a gentleman. - Indeed, he was highly connected."</p> -<p>An oath broke from his lips. "I don't care for myself," - he exclaimed, "but don't let Sibyl. . . . It is a gentleman, - isn't it, who is in love with her, or says he is? - Highly connected, too, I suppose."</p> -<p>For a moment a hideous sense of humiliation came over the woman. - Her head drooped. She wiped her eyes with shaking hands. - "Sibyl has a mother," she murmured; "I had none."</p> -<p>The lad was touched. He went towards her, and stooping down, - he kissed her. "I am sorry if I have pained you by asking about - my father," he said, "but I could not help it. I must go now. - Good-bye. Don't forget that you will have only one child now - to look after, and believe me that if this man wrongs my sister, - I will find out who he is, track him down, and kill him like a dog. - I swear it."</p> -<p>The exaggerated folly of the threat, the passionate gesture - that accompanied it, the mad melodramatic words, made life seem - more vivid to her. She was familiar with the atmosphere. - She breathed more freely, and for the first time for many months - she really admired her son. She would have liked to have continued - the scene on the same emotional scale, but he cut her short. - Trunks had to be carried down and mufflers looked for. - The lodging-house drudge bustled in and out. There was the bargaining - with the cabman. The moment was lost in vulgar details. - It was with a renewed feeling of disappointment that she waved the - tattered lace handkerchief from the window, as her son drove away. - She was conscious that a great opportunity had been wasted. - She consoled herself by telling Sibyl how desolate she felt her - life would be, now that she had only one child to look after. - She remembered the phrase. It had pleased her. Of the threat - she said nothing. It was vividly and dramatically expressed. - She felt that they would all laugh at it some day.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 6</p> -<p>"I suppose you have heard the news, Basil?" said Lord Henry - that evening as Hallward was shown into a little private room - at the Bristol where dinner had been laid for three.</p> -<p>"No, Harry," answered the artist, giving his hat and coat to - the bowing waiter. "What is it? Nothing about politics, I hope! - They don't interest me. There is hardly a single person in the House - of Commons worth painting, though many of them would be the better - for a little whitewashing."</p> -<p>"Dorian Gray is engaged to be married," said Lord Henry, - watching him as he spoke.</p> -<p>Hallward started and then frowned. "Dorian engaged to be married!" - he cried. "Impossible!"</p> -<p>"It is perfectly true."</p> -<p>"To whom?"</p> -<p>"To some little actress or other."</p> -<p>"I can't believe it. Dorian is far too sensible."</p> -<p>"Dorian is far too wise not to do foolish things now and then, - my dear Basil."</p> -<p>"Marriage is hardly a thing that one can do now and then, Harry."</p> -<p>"Except in America," rejoined Lord Henry languidly. "But I - didn't say he was married. I said he was engaged to be married. - There is a great difference. I have a distinct remembrance of - being married, but I have no recollection at all of being engaged. - I am inclined to think that I never was engaged."</p> -<p>"But think of Dorian's birth, and position, and wealth. - It would be absurd for him to marry so much beneath him."</p> -<p>"If you want to make him marry this girl, tell him that, Basil. He is - sure to do it, then. Whenever a man does a thoroughly stupid thing, - it is always from the noblest motives."</p> -<p>"I hope the girl is good, Harry. I don't want to see Dorian tied to some - vile creature, who might degrade his nature and ruin his intellect."</p> -<p>"Oh, she is better than good--she is beautiful," murmured Lord Henry, - sipping a glass of vermouth and orange-bitters. "Dorian says she - is beautiful, and he is not often wrong about things of that kind. - Your portrait of him has quickened his appreciation of the personal - appearance of other people. It has had that excellent effect, - amongst others. We are to see her to-night, if that boy doesn't forget - his appointment."</p> -<p>"Are you serious?"</p> -<p>"Quite serious, Basil. I should be miserable if I thought I - should ever be more serious than I am at the present moment."</p> -<p>"But do you approve of it, Harry?" asked the painter, - walking up and down the room and biting his lip. "You can't - approve of it, possibly. It is some silly infatuation."</p> -<p>"I never approve, or disapprove, of anything now. It is an absurd - attitude to take towards life. We are not sent into the world - to air our moral prejudices. I never take any notice of what common - people say, and I never interfere with what charming people do. - If a personality fascinates me, whatever mode of expression that - personality selects is absolutely delightful to me. Dorian Gray - falls in love with a beautiful girl who acts Juliet, and proposes - to marry her. Why not? If he wedded Messalina, he would be none - the less interesting. You know I am not a champion of marriage. - The real drawback to marriage is that it makes one unselfish. - And unselfish people are colourless. They lack individuality. - Still, there are certain temperaments that marriage makes more complex. - They retain their egotism, and add to it many other egos. - They are forced to have more than one life. They become more - highly organized, and to be highly organized is, I should fancy, - the object of man's existence. Besides, every experience - is of value, and whatever one may say against marriage, - it is certainly an experience. I hope that Dorian Gray will - make this girl his wife, passionately adore her for six months, - and then suddenly become fascinated by some one else. He would be a - wonderful study."</p> -<p>"You don't mean a single word of all that, Harry; you know you don't. - If - Dorian Gray's life were spoiled, no one would be sorrier than yourself. - You are much better than you pretend to be."</p> -<p>Lord Henry laughed. "The reason we all like to think - so well of others is that we are all afraid for ourselves. - The basis of optimism is sheer terror. We think that we are - generous because we credit our neighbour with the possession - of those virtues that are likely to be a benefit to us. - We praise the banker that we may overdraw our account, - and find good qualities in the highwayman in the hope that - he may spare our pockets. I mean everything that I have said. - I have the greatest contempt for optimism. As for a spoiled life, - no life is spoiled but one whose growth is arrested. - If you want to mar a nature, you have merely to reform it. - As for marriage, of course that would be silly, but there are other - and more interesting bonds between men and women. I will certainly - encourage them. They have the charm of being fashionable. - But here is Dorian himself. He will tell you more than - I can."</p> -<p>"My dear Harry, my dear Basil, you must both congratulate me!" - said the lad, throwing off his evening cape with its satin-lined - wings and shaking each of his friends by the hand in turn. - "I have never been so happy. Of course, it is sudden-- - all really delightful things are. And yet it seems to me - to be the one thing I have been looking for all my life." - He was flushed with excitement and pleasure, and looked - extraordinarily handsome.</p> -<p>"I hope you will always be very happy, Dorian," said Hallward, "but - I - don't quite forgive you for not having let me know of your engagement. - You let Harry know."</p> -<p>"And I don't forgive you for being late for dinner," broke in Lord - Henry, - putting his hand on the lad's shoulder and smiling as he spoke. - "Come, let us sit down and try what the new chef here is like, and then - you - will tell us how it all came about."</p> -<p>"There is really not much to tell," cried Dorian as they took their - seats at the small round table. "What happened was simply this. - After I left you yesterday evening, Harry, I dressed, had some - dinner at that little Italian restaurant in Rupert Street you - introduced me to, and went down at eight o'clock to the theatre. - Sibyl was playing Rosalind. Of course, the scenery was dreadful - and the Orlando absurd. But Sibyl! You should have seen her! - When she came on in her boy's clothes, she was perfectly wonderful. - She wore a moss-coloured velvet jerkin with cinnamon sleeves, - slim, brown, cross-gartered hose, a dainty little green cap with a hawk's - feather caught in a jewel, and a hooded cloak lined with dull red. - She had never seemed to me more exquisite. She had all the delicate - grace of that Tanagra figurine that you have in your studio, Basil. - Her hair clustered round her face like dark leaves round a pale rose. - As for her acting--well, you shall see her to-night. She is simply - a born artist. I sat in the dingy box absolutely enthralled. - I forgot that I was in London and in the nineteenth century. - I was away with my love in a forest that no man had ever seen. - After the performance was over, I went behind and spoke to her. - As we were sitting together, suddenly there came into her eyes a look - that I had never seen there before. My lips moved towards hers. - We kissed each other. I can't describe to you what I felt at that moment. - It seemed to me that all my life had been narrowed to one perfect - point of rose-coloured joy. She trembled all over and shook - like a white narcissus. Then she flung herself on her knees - and kissed my hands. I feel that I should not tell you all this, - but I can't help it. Of course, our engagement is a dead secret. - She has not even told her own mother. I don't know what my guardians - will say. Lord Radley is sure to be furious. I don't care. - I shall be of age in less than a year, and then I can do what I like. - I have been right, Basil, haven't I, to take my love out of poetry - and to find my wife in Shakespeare's plays? Lips that Shakespeare - taught to speak have whispered their secret in my ear. - I have had the arms of Rosalind around me, and kissed Juliet on the - mouth."</p> -<p>"Yes, Dorian, I suppose you were right," said Hallward slowly.</p> -<p>"Have you seen her to-day?" asked Lord Henry.</p> -<p>Dorian Gray shook his head. "I left her in the forest of Arden; - I shall find her in an orchard in Verona."</p> -<p>Lord Henry sipped his champagne in a meditative manner. - "At what particular point did you mention the word marriage, Dorian? - And what did she say in answer? Perhaps you forgot all about it."</p> -<p>"My dear Harry, I did not treat it as a business transaction, - and I did not make any formal proposal. I told her that I - loved her, and she said she was not worthy to be my wife. - Not worthy! Why, the whole world is nothing to me compared - with her."</p> -<p>"Women are wonderfully practical," murmured Lord Henry, - "much more practical than we are. In situations of that kind - we often forget to say anything about marriage, and they always - remind us."</p> -<p>Hallward laid his hand upon his arm. "Don't, Harry. - You have annoyed Dorian. He is not like other men. - He would never bring misery upon any one. His nature is too fine - for that."</p> -<p>Lord Henry looked across the table. "Dorian is never annoyed with me," - he answered. "I asked the question for the best reason possible, - for the only reason, indeed, that excuses one for asking any question-- - simple curiosity. I have a theory that it is always the women who - propose to us, and not we who propose to the women. Except, of course, - in middle-class life. But then the middle classes are not modern."</p> -<p>Dorian Gray laughed, and tossed his head. "You are quite - incorrigible, Harry; but I don't mind. It is impossible to be angry - with you. When you see Sibyl Vane, you will feel that the man - who could wrong her would be a beast, a beast without a heart. - I cannot understand how any one can wish to shame the thing - he loves. I love Sibyl Vane. I want to place her on a pedestal - of gold and to see the world worship the woman who is mine. - What is marriage? An irrevocable vow. You mock at it for that. - Ah! don't mock. It is an irrevocable vow that I want to take. - Her trust makes me faithful, her belief makes me good. - When I am with her, I regret all that you have taught me. - I become different from what you have known me to be. - I am changed, and the mere touch of Sibyl Vane's hand makes - me forget you and all your wrong, fascinating, poisonous, - delightful theories."</p> -<p>"And those are ... ?" asked Lord Henry, helping himself to some salad.</p> -<p>"Oh, your theories about life, your theories about love, - your theories about pleasure. All your theories, in fact, Harry."</p> -<p>"Pleasure is the only thing worth having a theory about," - he answered in his slow melodious voice. "But I am afraid - I cannot claim my theory as my own. It belongs to Nature, - not to me. Pleasure is Nature's test, her sign of approval. - When we are happy, we are always good, but when we are good, - we are not always happy."</p> -<p>"Ah! but what do you mean by good?" cried Basil Hallward.</p> -<p>"Yes," echoed Dorian, leaning back in his chair and looking at Lord - Henry over the heavy clusters of purple-lipped irises that stood - in the centre of the table, "what do you mean by good, Harry?"</p> -<p>"To be good is to be in harmony with one's self," he replied, - touching the thin stem of his glass with his pale, fine-pointed fingers. - "Discord is to be forced to be in harmony with others. - One's own life--that is the important thing. As for the lives - of one's neighbours, if one wishes to be a prig or a Puritan, - one can flaunt one's moral views about them, but they are not - one's concern. Besides, individualism has really the higher aim. - Modern morality consists in accepting the standard of one's age. - I consider that for any man of culture to accept the standard of his age is - a form of the grossest immorality."</p> -<p>"But, surely, if one lives merely for one's self, Harry, one pays - a terrible price for doing so?" suggested the painter.</p> -<p>"Yes, we are overcharged for everything nowadays. I should - fancy that the real tragedy of the poor is that they can afford - nothing but self-denial. Beautiful sins, like beautiful things, - are the privilege of the rich."</p> -<p>"One has to pay in other ways but money."</p> -<p>"What sort of ways, Basil?"</p> -<p>"Oh! I should fancy in remorse, in suffering, in . . . well, - in the consciousness of degradation."</p> -<p>Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "My dear fellow, mediaeval art - is charming, but mediaeval emotions are out of date. One can use - them in fiction, of course. But then the only things that one can - use in fiction are the things that one has ceased to use in fact. - Believe me, no civilized man ever regrets a pleasure, and no uncivilized - man ever knows what a pleasure is."</p> -<p>"I know what pleasure is," cried Dorian Gray. "It is to adore - some one."</p> -<p>"That is certainly better than being adored," he answered, - toying with some fruits. "Being adored is a nuisance. - Women treat us just as humanity treats its gods. - They worship us, and are always bothering us to do something - for them."</p> -<p>"I should have said that whatever they ask for they had first given to - us," - murmured the lad gravely. "They create love in our natures. They have a - right to demand it back."</p> -<p>"That is quite true, Dorian," cried Hallward.</p> -<p>"Nothing is ever quite true," said Lord Henry.</p> -<p>"This is," interrupted Dorian. "You must admit, Harry, that - women - give to men the very gold of their lives."</p> -<p>"Possibly," he sighed, "but they invariably want it back in - such - very small change. That is the worry. Women, as some witty - Frenchman once put it, inspire us with the desire to do masterpieces - and always prevent us from carrying them out."</p> -<p>"Harry, you are dreadful! I don't know why I like you so much."</p> -<p>"You will always like me, Dorian," he replied. "Will you have - some coffee, - you fellows? Waiter, bring coffee, and fine-champagne, and some cigarettes. - No, don't mind the cigarettes--I have some. Basil, I can't allow you to - smoke cigars. You must have a cigarette. A cigarette is the perfect type - of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. - What more can one want? Yes, Dorian, you will always be fond of me. - I represent to you all the sins you have never had the courage to commit."</p> -<p>"What nonsense you talk, Harry!" cried the lad, taking a light from - a fire-breathing silver dragon that the waiter had placed on the table. - "Let us go down to the theatre. When Sibyl comes on the stage you will - have a new ideal of life. She will represent something to you that you - have never known."</p> -<p>"I have known everything," said Lord Henry, with a tired - look in his eyes, "but I am always ready for a new emotion. - I am afraid, however, that, for me at any rate, there is - no such thing. Still, your wonderful girl may thrill me. - I love acting. It is so much more real than life. Let us go. - Dorian, you will come with me. I am so sorry, Basil, but there - is only room for two in the brougham. You must follow us in - a hansom."</p> -<p>They got up and put on their coats, sipping their coffee standing. - The painter was silent and preoccupied. There was a gloom over him. - He could not bear this marriage, and yet it seemed to him - to be better than many other things that might have happened. - After a few minutes, they all passed downstairs. He drove off by himself, - as had been arranged, and watched the flashing lights of the little - brougham in front of him. A strange sense of loss came over him. - He felt that Dorian Gray would never again be to him all that he had - been in the past. Life had come between them.... His eyes darkened, - and the crowded flaring streets became blurred to his eyes. - When the cab drew up at the theatre, it seemed to him that he had grown - years older.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 7</p> -<p>For some reason or other, the house was crowded that night, - and the fat Jew manager who met them at the door was - beaming from ear to ear with an oily tremulous smile. - He escorted them to their box with a sort of pompous humility, - waving his fat jewelled hands and talking at the top of his voice. - Dorian Gray loathed him more than ever. He felt as if he had - come to look for Miranda and had been met by Caliban. - Lord Henry, upon the other hand, rather liked him. - At least he declared he did, and insisted on shaking him - by the hand and assuring him that he was proud to meet a man - who had discovered a real genius and gone bankrupt over a poet. - Hallward amused himself with watching the faces in the pit. - The heat was terribly oppressive, and the huge sunlight - flamed like a monstrous dahlia with petals of yellow fire. - The youths in the gallery had taken off their coats - and waistcoats and hung them over the side. They talked - to each other across the theatre and shared their oranges - with the tawdry girls who sat beside them. Some women - were laughing in the pit. Their voices were horribly shrill - and discordant. The sound of the popping of corks came from - the bar.</p> -<p>"What a place to find one's divinity in!" said Lord Henry.</p> -<p>"Yes!" answered Dorian Gray. "It was here I found her, and she - is divine - beyond all living things. When she acts, you will forget everything. - These common rough people, with their coarse faces and brutal gestures, - become quite different when she is on the stage. They sit silently - and watch her. They weep and laugh as she wills them to do. - She makes them as responsive as a violin. She spiritualizes them, - and one feels that they are of the same flesh and blood as one's self."</p> -<p>"The same flesh and blood as one's self! Oh, I hope not!" - exclaimed Lord Henry, who was scanning the occupants of the gallery - through his opera-glass.</p> -<p>"Don't pay any attention to him, Dorian," said the painter. - "I understand what you mean, and I believe in this girl. - Any one you love must be marvellous, and any girl - who has the effect you describe must be fine and noble. - To spiritualize one's age--that is something worth doing. - If this girl can give a soul to those who have lived without one, - if she can create the sense of beauty in people whose lives - have been sordid and ugly, if she can strip them of their - selfishness and lend them tears for sorrows that are not - their own, she is worthy of all your adoration, worthy of - the adoration of the world. This marriage is quite right. - I did not think so at first, but I admit it now. - The gods made Sibyl Vane for you. Without her you would have - been incomplete."</p> -<p>"Thanks, Basil," answered Dorian Gray, pressing his hand. - "I knew that you would understand me. Harry is so cynical, - he terrifies me. But here is the orchestra. It is - quite dreadful, but it only lasts for about five minutes. - Then the curtain rises, and you will see the girl to whom I - am going to give all my life, to whom I have given everything - that is good in me."</p> -<p>A quarter of an hour afterwards, amidst an extraordinary turmoil of applause, - Sibyl Vane stepped on to the stage. Yes, she was certainly lovely to look at-- - one of the loveliest creatures, Lord Henry thought, that he had ever seen. - There was something of the fawn in her shy grace and startled eyes. - A faint blush, like the shadow of a rose in a mirror of silver, came to her - cheeks as she glanced at the crowded enthusiastic house. She stepped back - a few paces and her lips seemed to tremble. Basil Hallward leaped to his feet - and began to applaud. Motionless, and as one in a dream, sat Dorian Gray, - gazing at her. Lord Henry peered through his glasses, murmuring, - "Charming! charming!"</p> -<p>The scene was the hall of Capulet's house, and Romeo in his pilgrim's dress - had entered with Mercutio and his other friends. The band, such as it was, struck - up a few bars of music, and the dance began. Through the crowd of ungainly, - shabbily dressed actors, Sibyl Vane moved like a creature from a finer world. - Her body swayed, while she danced, as a plant sways in the water. The curves - of her throat were the curves of a white lily. Her hands seemed to be made of - cool ivory.</p> -<p>Yet she was curiously listless. She showed no sign of joy - when her eyes rested on Romeo. The few words she had to speak--</p> -<blockquote> - Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, <br> - Which mannerly devotion shows in this; <br> - For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch, <br> - And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss-- <br> -</blockquote> -<p>with the brief dialogue that follows, were spoken in a thoroughly artificial - manner. The voice was exquisite, but from the point of view of tone it was absolutely - false. It was wrong in colour. It took away all the life from the verse. It - made the passion unreal.</p> -<p>Dorian Gray grew pale as he watched her. He was puzzled and anxious. - Neither of his friends dared to say anything to him. She seemed to them - to be absolutely incompetent. They were horribly disappointed.</p> -<p>Yet they felt that the true test of any Juliet is the balcony scene - of the second act. They waited for that. If she failed there, - there was nothing in her.</p> -<p>She looked charming as she came out in the moonlight. That could not be denied. - But the staginess of her acting was unbearable, and grew worse as she went on. - Her gestures became absurdly artificial. She overemphasized everything that - she had to say. The beautiful passage--</p> -<blockquote> - Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face, <br> - Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek<br> - For that which thou hast heard me speak to-night--<br> -</blockquote> -<p>was declaimed with the painful precision of a schoolgirl who has been taught - to recite by some second-rate professor of elocution. When she leaned over the - balcony and came to those wonderful lines--</p> -<blockquote> - Although I joy in thee, <br> - I have no joy of this contract to-night: <br> - It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden; <br> - Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be <br> - Ere one can say, "It lightens." Sweet, good-night! <br> - This bud of love by summer's ripening breath <br> - May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet-- <br> -</blockquote> -<p>she spoke the words as though they conveyed no meaning to her. It was - not nervousness. Indeed, so far from being nervous, she was absolutely - self-contained. It was simply bad art. She was a complete failure.</p> -<p>Even the common uneducated audience of the pit and gallery lost their - interest in the play. They got restless, and began to talk loudly and to - whistle. The Jew manager, who was standing at the back of the - dress-circle, stamped and swore with rage. The only person unmoved was - the girl herself.</p> -<p>When the second act was over, there came a storm of hisses, - and Lord Henry got up from his chair and put on his coat. - "She is quite beautiful, Dorian," he said, "but she can't act. - Let us go."</p> -<p>"I am going to see the play through," answered the lad, - in a hard bitter voice. "I am awfully sorry that I have made - you waste an evening, Harry. I apologize to you both."</p> -<p>"My dear Dorian, I should think Miss Vane was ill," interrupted Hallward. - "We will come some other night."</p> -<p>"I wish she were ill," he rejoined. "But she seems to me - to be simply callous and cold. She has entirely altered. - Last night she was a great artist. This evening she is merely a - commonplace mediocre actress."</p> -<p>"Don't talk like that about any one you love, Dorian. Love is a more - wonderful thing than art."</p> -<p>"They are both simply forms of imitation," remarked Lord Henry. - "But do let us go. Dorian, you must not stay here any longer. - It is not good for one's morals to see bad acting. - Besides, I don't suppose you will want your wife to act, - so what does it matter if she plays Juliet like a wooden doll? - She is very lovely, and if she knows as little about life - as she does about acting, she will be a delightful experience. - There are only two kinds of people who are really fascinating-- - people who know absolutely everything, and people who know - absolutely nothing. Good heavens, my dear boy, don't look so tragic! - The secret of remaining young is never to have an emotion - that is unbecoming. Come to the club with Basil and myself. - We will smoke cigarettes and drink to the beauty of Sibyl Vane. - She is beautiful. What more can you want?"</p> -<p>"Go away, Harry," cried the lad. "I want to be alone. Basil, - you must go. - Ah! can't you see that my heart is breaking?" The hot tears came - to his eyes. His lips trembled, and rushing to the back of the box, - he leaned up against the wall, hiding his face in his hands.</p> -<p>"Let us go, Basil," said Lord Henry with a strange tenderness in - his voice, - and the two young men passed out together.</p> -<p>A few moments afterwards the footlights flared up and the curtain rose - on the third act. Dorian Gray went back to his seat. He looked pale, - and proud, and indifferent. The play dragged on, and seemed interminable. - Half of the audience went out, tramping in heavy boots and laughing. - The whole thing was a fiasco. The last act was played to almost - empty benches. The curtain went down on a titter and some groans.</p> -<p>As soon as it was over, Dorian Gray rushed behind the scenes into - the greenroom. The girl was standing there alone, with a look - of triumph on her face. Her eyes were lit with an exquisite fire. - There was a radiance about her. Her parted lips were smiling over - some secret of their own.</p> -<p>When he entered, she looked at him, and an expression of infinite joy - came over her. "How badly I acted to-night, Dorian!" she cried.</p> -<p>"Horribly!" he answered, gazing at her in amazement. "Horribly! - It was dreadful. Are you ill? You have no idea what it was. - You have no idea what I suffered."</p> -<p>The girl smiled. "Dorian," she answered, lingering over - his name with long-drawn music in her voice, as though it - were sweeter than honey to the red petals of her mouth. - "Dorian, you should have understood. But you understand now, - don't you?"</p> -<p>"Understand what?" he asked, angrily.</p> -<p>"Why I was so bad to-night. Why I shall always be bad. - Why I shall never act well again."</p> -<p>He shrugged his shoulders. "You are ill, I suppose. - When you are ill you shouldn't act. You make yourself ridiculous. - My friends were bored. I was bored."</p> -<p>She seemed not to listen to him. She was transfigured with joy. - An ecstasy of happiness dominated her.</p> -<p>"Dorian, Dorian," she cried, "before I knew you, acting was - the one - reality of my life. It was only in the theatre that I lived. I thought - that it was all true. I was Rosalind one night and Portia the other. - The joy of Beatrice was my joy, and the sorrows of Cordelia were mine also. - I believed in everything. The common people who acted with me seemed - to me to be godlike. The painted scenes were my world. I knew nothing - but shadows, and I thought them real. You came--oh, my beautiful love!-- - and you freed my soul from prison. You taught me what reality really is. - To-night, for the first time in my life, I saw through the hollowness, - the sham, the silliness of the empty pageant in which I had always played. - To-night, for the first time, I became conscious that the Romeo was hideous, - and old, and painted, that the moonlight in the orchard was false, - that the scenery was vulgar, and that the words I had to speak were unreal, - were not my words, were not what I wanted to say. You had brought me - something higher, something of which all art is but a reflection. - You had made me understand what love really is. My love! My love! - Prince Charming! Prince of life! I have grown sick of shadows. - You are more to me than all art can ever be. What have I to do with - the puppets of a play? When I came on to-night, I could not understand - how it was that everything had gone from me. I thought that I was going - to be wonderful. I found that I could do nothing. Suddenly it dawned - on my soul what it all meant. The knowledge was exquisite to me. I heard - them hissing, and I smiled. What could they know of love such as ours? - Take me away, Dorian--take me away with you, where we can be quite alone. - I hate the stage. I might mimic a passion that I do not feel, - but I cannot mimic one that burns me like fire. Oh, Dorian, Dorian, - you understand now what it signifies? Even if I could do it, it would - be profanation for me to play at being in love. You have made me see - that."</p> -<p>He flung himself down on the sofa and turned away his face. - "You have killed my love," he muttered.</p> -<p>She looked at him in wonder and laughed. He made no answer. - She came across to him, and with her little fingers stroked - his hair. She knelt down and pressed his hands to her lips. - He drew them away, and a shudder ran through him.</p> -<p>Then he leaped up and went to the door. "Yes," he cried, - "you have killed my love. You used to stir my imagination. - Now you don't even stir my curiosity. You simply produce no effect. - I loved you because you were marvellous, because you had genius - and intellect, because you realized the dreams of great - poets and gave shape and substance to the shadows of art. - You have thrown it all away. You are shallow and stupid. - My God! how mad I was to love you! What a fool I have been! - You are nothing to me now. I will never see you again. - I will never think of you. I will never mention your name. - You don't know what you were to me, once. Why, once . . . Oh, - I can't bear to think of it! I wish I had never laid - eyes upon you! You have spoiled the romance of my life. - How little you can know of love, if you say it mars your art! - Without your art, you are nothing. I would have made - you famous, splendid, magnificent. The world would - have worshipped you, and you would have borne my name. - What are you now? A third-rate actress with a pretty - face."</p> -<p>The girl grew white, and trembled. She clenched her hands together, - and her voice seemed to catch in her throat. "You are not serious, Dorian?" - she murmured. "You are acting."</p> -<p>"Acting! I leave that to you. You do it so well," he answered bitterly.</p> -<p>She rose from her knees and, with a piteous expression of pain - in her face, came across the room to him. She put her hand - upon his arm and looked into his eyes. He thrust her back. - "Don't touch me!" he cried.</p> -<p>A low moan broke from her, and she flung herself at his feet - and lay there like a trampled flower. "Dorian, Dorian, - don't leave me!" she whispered. "I am so sorry I didn't act well. - I was thinking of you all the time. But I will try--indeed, I - will try. It came so suddenly across me, my love for you. - I think I should never have known it if you had not kissed me-- - if we had not kissed each other. Kiss me again, my love. - Don't go away from me. I couldn't bear it. Oh! don't go away - from me. My brother . . . No; never mind. He didn't mean it. - He was in jest. . . . But you, oh! can't you forgive me for - to-night? I will work so hard and try to improve. Don't be cruel - to me, because I love you better than anything in the world. - After all, it is only once that I have not pleased you. - But you are quite right, Dorian. I should have shown - myself more of an artist. It was foolish of me, and yet I - couldn't help it. Oh, don't leave me, don't leave me." - A fit of passionate sobbing choked her. She crouched on - the floor like a wounded thing, and Dorian Gray, with his - beautiful eyes, looked down at her, and his chiselled lips curled - in exquisite disdain. There is always something ridiculous - about the emotions of people whom one has ceased to love. - Sibyl Vane seemed to him to be absurdly melodramatic. - Her tears and sobs annoyed him.</p> -<p>"I am going," he said at last in his calm clear voice. - "I don't wish to be unkind, but I can't see you again. - You have disappointed me."</p> -<p>She wept silently, and made no answer, but crept nearer. - Her little hands stretched blindly out, and appeared to be - seeking for him. He turned on his heel and left the room. - In a few moments he was out of the theatre.</p> -<p>Where he went to he hardly knew. He remembered wandering through dimly - lit streets, past gaunt, black-shadowed archways and evil-looking houses. - Women with hoarse voices and harsh laughter had called after him. - Drunkards had reeled by, cursing and chattering to themselves like - monstrous apes. He had seen grotesque children huddled upon door-steps, and - heard shrieks and oaths from gloomy courts.</p> -<p>As the dawn was just breaking, he found himself close to Covent Garden. - The darkness lifted, and, flushed with faint fires, the sky hollowed itself - into a perfect pearl. Huge carts filled with nodding lilies rumbled slowly - down the polished empty street. The air was heavy with the perfume of - the flowers, and their beauty seemed to bring him an anodyne for his pain. - He followed into the market and watched the men unloading their waggons. - A white-smocked carter offered him some cherries. He thanked him, - wondered why he refused to accept any money for them, and began to eat - them listlessly. They had been plucked at midnight, and the coldness - of the moon had entered into them. A long line of boys carrying crates - of striped tulips, and of yellow and red roses, defiled in front of him, - threading their way through the huge, jade-green piles of vegetables. - Under the portico, with its grey, sun-bleached pillars, loitered a troop - of draggled bareheaded girls, waiting for the auction to be over. - Others crowded round the swinging doors of the coffee-house in the piazza. - The heavy cart-horses slipped and stamped upon the rough stones, - shaking their bells and trappings. Some of the drivers were lying asleep - on a pile of sacks. Iris-necked and pink-footed, the pigeons ran about - picking up seeds.</p> -<p>After a little while, he hailed a hansom and drove home. - For a few moments he loitered upon the doorstep, looking round - at the silent square, with its blank, close-shuttered windows - and its staring blinds. The sky was pure opal now, - and the roofs of the houses glistened like silver against it. - From some chimney opposite a thin wreath of smoke was rising. - It curled, a violet riband, through the nacre-coloured air.</p> -<p>In the huge gilt Venetian lantern, spoil of some Doge's barge, - that hung from the ceiling of the great, oak-panelled hall - of entrance, lights were still burning from three flickering jets: - thin blue petals of flame they seemed, rimmed with white fire. - He turned them out and, having thrown his hat and cape on the table, - passed through the library towards the door of his bedroom, - a large octagonal chamber on the ground floor that, in his new-born - feeling for luxury, he had just had decorated for himself and hung - with some curious Renaissance tapestries that had been discovered - stored in a disused attic at Selby Royal. As he was turning - the handle of the door, his eye fell upon the portrait Basil - Hallward had painted of him. He started back as if in surprise. - Then he went on into his own room, looking somewhat puzzled. - After he had taken the button-hole out of his coat, he seemed - to hesitate. Finally, he came back, went over to the picture, - and examined it. In the dim arrested light that struggled - through the cream-coloured silk blinds, the face appeared to him - to be a little changed. The expression looked different. - One would have said that there was a touch of cruelty in the mouth. - It was certainly strange.</p> -<p>He turned round and, walking to the window, drew up the blind. - The bright dawn flooded the room and swept the fantastic - shadows into dusky corners, where they lay shuddering. - But the strange expression that he had noticed in the face of - the portrait seemed to linger there, to be more intensified even. - The quivering ardent sunlight showed him the lines of cruelty round - the mouth as clearly as if he had been looking into a mirror after - he had done some dreadful thing.</p> -<p>He winced and, taking up from the table an oval glass framed - in ivory Cupids, one of Lord Henry's many presents to him, - glanced hurriedly into its polished depths. No line like that - warped his red lips. What did it mean?</p> -<p>He rubbed his eyes, and came close to the picture, and examined it again. - There were no signs of any change when he looked into the actual painting, - and yet there was no doubt that the whole expression had altered. It was not - a mere fancy of his own. The thing was horribly apparent.</p> -<p>He threw himself into a chair and began to think. Suddenly there flashed - across his mind what he had said in Basil Hallward's studio the day - the picture had been finished. Yes, he remembered it perfectly. - He had uttered a mad wish that he himself might remain young, - and the portrait grow old; that his own beauty might be untarnished, - and the face on the canvas bear the burden of his passions and his sins; - that the painted image might be seared with the lines of suffering - and thought, and that he might keep all the delicate bloom and loveliness - of his then just conscious boyhood. Surely his wish had not been fulfilled? - Such things were impossible. It seemed monstrous even to think of them. - And, yet, there was the picture before him, with the touch of cruelty in - the mouth.</p> -<p>Cruelty! Had he been cruel? It was the girl's fault, not his. - He had dreamed of her as a great artist, had given his love to her - because he had thought her great. Then she had disappointed him. - She had been shallow and unworthy. And, yet, a feeling - of infinite regret came over him, as he thought of her lying - at his feet sobbing like a little child. He remembered with what - callousness he had watched her. Why had he been made like that? - Why had such a soul been given to him? But he had suffered also. - During the three terrible hours that the play had lasted, - he had lived centuries of pain, aeon upon aeon of torture. - His life was well worth hers. She had marred him for a moment, - if he had wounded her for an age. Besides, women were better - suited to bear sorrow than men. They lived on their emotions. - They only thought of their emotions. When they took lovers, - it was merely to have some one with whom they could have scenes. - Lord Henry had told him that, and Lord Henry knew what women were. - Why should he trouble about Sibyl Vane? She was nothing to him - now.</p> -<p>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?</p> -<p>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.</p> -<p>Yet it was watching him, with its beautiful marred face and its cruel smile. - Its bright hair gleamed in the early sunlight. Its blue eyes met his own. - A sense of infinite pity, not for himself, but for the painted image - of himself, came over him. It had altered already, and would alter more. - Its gold would wither into grey. Its red and white roses would die. - For every sin that he committed, a stain would fleck and wreck its fairness. - But he would not sin. The picture, changed or unchanged, would be - to him the visible emblem of conscience. He would resist temptation. - He would not see Lord Henry any more--would not, at any rate, - listen to those subtle poisonous theories that in Basil Hallward's - garden had first stirred within him the passion for impossible things. - He would go back to Sibyl Vane, make her amends, marry her, try to love - her again. Yes, it was his duty to do so. She must have suffered - more than he had. Poor child! He had been selfish and cruel to her. - The fascination that she had exercised over him would return. - They would be happy together. His life with her would be beautiful and - pure.</p> -<p>He got up from his chair and drew a large screen right in front - of the portrait, shuddering as he glanced at it. "How horrible!" - he murmured to himself, and he walked across to the window and opened it. - When he stepped out on to the grass, he drew a deep breath. - The fresh morning air seemed to drive away all his sombre passions. - He thought only of Sibyl. A faint echo of his love came back to him. - He repeated her name over and over again. The birds that were - singing in the dew-drenched garden seemed to be telling the flowers - about her.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 8</p> -<p>It was long past noon when he awoke. His valet had crept - several times on tiptoe into the room to see if he was stirring, - and had wondered what made his young master sleep so late. - Finally his bell sounded, and Victor came in softly with a cup - of tea, and a pile of letters, on a small tray of old Sevres china, - and drew back the olive-satin curtains, with their shimmering - blue lining, that hung in front of the three tall windows.</p> -<p>"Monsieur has well slept this morning," he said, smiling.</p> -<p>"What o'clock is it, Victor?" asked Dorian Gray drowsily.</p> -<p>"One hour and a quarter, Monsieur."</p> -<p>How late it was! He sat up, and having sipped some tea, - turned over his letters. One of them was from Lord Henry, and had - been brought by hand that morning. He hesitated for a moment, - and then put it aside. The others he opened listlessly. - They contained the usual collection of cards, invitations to dinner, - tickets for private views, programmes of charity concerts, - and the like that are showered on fashionable young men every - morning during the season. There was a rather heavy bill - for a chased silver Louis-Quinze toilet-set that he had not - yet had the courage to send on to his guardians, who were - extremely old-fashioned people and did not realize that we live - in an age when unnecessary things are our only necessities; - and there were several very courteously worded communications - from Jermyn Street money-lenders offering to advance any sum - of money at a moment's notice and at the most reasonable rates - of interest.</p> -<p>After about ten minutes he got up, and throwing on an elaborate dressing-gown - of silk-embroidered cashmere wool, passed into the onyx-paved bathroom. - The cool water refreshed him after his long sleep. He seemed to have - forgotten all that he had gone through. A dim sense of having taken part - in some strange tragedy came to him once or twice, but there was the unreality - of a dream about it.</p> -<p>As soon as he was dressed, he went into the library and sat - down to a light French breakfast that had been laid out - for him on a small round table close to the open window. - It was an exquisite day. The warm air seemed laden with spices. - A bee flew in and buzzed round the blue-dragon bowl that, - filled with sulphur-yellow roses, stood before him. He felt - perfectly happy.</p> -<p>Suddenly his eye fell on the screen that he had placed in front - of the portrait, and he started.</p> -<p>"Too cold for Monsieur?" asked his valet, putting an omelette on - the table. - "I shut the window?"</p> -<p>Dorian shook his head. "I am not cold," he murmured.</p> -<p>Was it all true? Had the portrait really changed? - Or had it been simply his own imagination that had made him - see a look of evil where there had been a look of joy? - Surely a painted canvas could not alter? The thing was absurd. - It would serve as a tale to tell Basil some day. It would make - him smile.</p> -<p>And, yet, how vivid was his recollection of the whole thing! - First in the dim twilight, and then in the bright dawn, - he had seen the touch of cruelty round the warped lips. - He almost dreaded his valet leaving the room. He knew that - when he was alone he would have to examine the portrait. - He was afraid of certainty. When the coffee and cigarettes - had been brought and the man turned to go, he felt a wild desire - to tell him to remain. As the door was closing behind him, - he called him back. The man stood waiting for his orders. - Dorian looked at him for a moment. "I am not at home - to any one, Victor," he said with a sigh. The man bowed - and retired.</p> -<p>Then he rose from the table, lit a cigarette, and flung - himself down on a luxuriously cushioned couch that stood facing - the screen. The screen was an old one, of gilt Spanish leather, - stamped and wrought with a rather florid Louis-Quatorze pattern. - He scanned it curiously, wondering if ever before it had concealed - the secret of a man's life.</p> -<p>Should he move it aside, after all? Why not let it stay there? - What was the use of knowing? If the thing was true, - it was terrible. If it was not true, why trouble about it? - But what if, by some fate or deadlier chance, eyes other than - his spied behind and saw the horrible change? What should he do - if Basil Hallward came and asked to look at his own picture? - Basil would be sure to do that. No; the thing had to be examined, - and at once. Anything would be better than this dreadful state - of doubt.</p> -<p>He got up and locked both doors. At least he would be alone when he looked - upon the mask of his shame. Then he drew the screen aside and saw himself - face to face. It was perfectly true. The portrait had altered.</p> -<p>As he often remembered afterwards, and always with no small wonder, - he found himself at first gazing at the portrait with a feeling - of almost scientific interest. That such a change should have - taken place was incredible to him. And yet it was a fact. - Was there some subtle affinity between the chemical atoms that - shaped themselves into form and colour on the canvas and the soul - that was within him? Could it be that what that soul thought, - they realized?--that what it dreamed, they made true? - Or was there some other, more terrible reason? He shuddered, - and felt afraid, and, going back to the couch, lay there, - gazing at the picture in sickened horror.</p> -<p>One thing, however, he felt that it had done for him. - It had made him conscious how unjust, how cruel, he had been - to Sibyl Vane. It was not too late to make reparation for that. - She could still be his wife. His unreal and selfish love - would yield to some higher influence, would be transformed - into some nobler passion, and the portrait that Basil Hallward - had painted of him would be a guide to him through life, - would be to him what holiness is to some, and conscience - to others, and the fear of God to us all. There were opiates - for remorse, drugs that could lull the moral sense to sleep. - But here was a visible symbol of the degradation of sin. - Here was an ever-present sign of the ruin men brought upon - their souls.</p> -<p>Three o'clock struck, and four, and the half-hour rang its double chime, but - Dorian Gray did not stir. He was trying to gather up the scarlet threads of - life and to weave them into a pattern; to find his way through the sanguine - labyrinth of passion through which he was wandering. He did not know what to - do, or what to think. Finally, he went over to the table and wrote a passionate - letter to the girl he had loved, imploring her forgiveness and accusing himself - of madness. He covered page after page with wild words of sorrow and wilder - words of pain. There is a luxury in self-reproach. When we blame ourselves, - we feel that no one else has a right to blame us. It is the confession, not - the priest, that gives us absolution. When Dorian had finished the letter, he - felt that he had been forgiven. </p> -<p>Suddenly there came a knock to the door, and he heard Lord Henry's - voice outside. "My dear boy, I must see you. Let me in at once. - I can't bear your shutting yourself up like this."</p> -<p>He made no answer at first, but remained quite still. - The knocking still continued and grew louder. Yes, it was - better to let Lord Henry in, and to explain to him the new - life he was going to lead, to quarrel with him if it became - necessary to quarrel, to part if parting was inevitable. - He jumped up, drew the screen hastily across the picture, - and unlocked the door.</p> -<p>"I am so sorry for it all, Dorian," said Lord Henry as he entered. - "But you must not think too much about it."</p> -<p>"Do you mean about Sibyl Vane?" asked the lad.</p> -<p>"Yes, of course," answered Lord Henry, sinking into a chair - and slowly pulling off his yellow gloves. "It is dreadful, - from one point of view, but it was not your fault. Tell me, - did you go behind and see her, after the play was over?"</p> -<p>"Yes."</p> -<p>"I felt sure you had. Did you make a scene with her?"</p> -<p>"I was brutal, Harry--perfectly brutal. But it is all right now. - I am not sorry for anything that has happened. It has taught me to know - myself better."</p> -<p>"Ah, Dorian, I am so glad you take it in that way! I was afraid I - would find you plunged in remorse and tearing that nice curly hair - of yours."</p> -<p>"I have got through all that," said Dorian, shaking his head and - smiling. - "I am perfectly happy now. I know what conscience is, to begin with. - It is not what you told me it was. It is the divinest thing in us. - Don't sneer at it, Harry, any more--at least not before me. I want to - be good. I can't bear the idea of my soul being hideous."</p> -<p>"A very charming artistic basis for ethics, Dorian! I congratulate you - on it. But how are you going to begin?"</p> -<p>"By marrying Sibyl Vane."</p> -<p>"Marrying Sibyl Vane!" cried Lord Henry, standing up and looking - at him in perplexed amazement. "But, my dear Dorian--"</p> -<p>"Yes, Harry, I know what you are going to say. Something dreadful - about marriage. Don't say it. Don't ever say things of that - kind to me again. Two days ago I asked Sibyl to marry me. - I am not going to break my word to her. She is to be my wife."</p> -<p>"Your wife! Dorian! . . . Didn't you get my letter? - I wrote to you this morning, and sent the note down by my - own man."</p> -<p>"Your letter? Oh, yes, I remember. I have not read it yet, Harry. - I was afraid there might be something in it that I wouldn't like. - You cut life to pieces with your epigrams."</p> -<p>"You know nothing then?"</p> -<p>"What do you mean?"</p> -<p>Lord Henry walked across the room, and sitting down by Dorian Gray, - took both his hands in his own and held them tightly. "Dorian," he - said, - "my letter--don't be frightened--was to tell you that Sibyl Vane - is dead."</p> -<p>A cry of pain broke from the lad's lips, and he leaped to his feet, - tearing his hands away from Lord Henry's grasp. "Dead! Sibyl dead! - It is not true! It is a horrible lie! How dare you say it?"</p> -<p>"It is quite true, Dorian," said Lord Henry, gravely. "It is - in - all the morning papers. I wrote down to you to ask you not to see - any one till I came. There will have to be an inquest, of course, - and you must not be mixed up in it. Things like that make a man - fashionable in Paris. But in London people are so prejudiced. - Here, one should never make one's debut with a scandal. - One should reserve that to give an interest to one's old age. - I suppose they don't know your name at the theatre? If they don't, - it is all right. Did any one see you going round to her room? - That is an important point."</p> -<p>Dorian did not answer for a few moments. He was dazed with horror. - Finally he stammered, in a stifled voice, "Harry, did you say an inquest? - What did you mean by that? Did Sibyl--? Oh, Harry, I can't bear it! - But be quick. Tell me everything at once."</p> -<p>"I have no doubt it was not an accident, Dorian, though it - must be put in that way to the public. It seems that as she - was leaving the theatre with her mother, about half-past - twelve or so, she said she had forgotten something upstairs. - They waited some time for her, but she did not come down again. - They ultimately found her lying dead on the floor of her - dressing-room. She had swallowed something by mistake, - some dreadful thing they use at theatres. I don't know what - it was, but it had either prussic acid or white lead in it. - I should fancy it was prussic acid, as she seems to have - died instantaneously."</p> -<p>"Harry, Harry, it is terrible!" cried the lad.</p> -<p>"Yes; it is very tragic, of course, but you must not get yourself - mixed up in it. I see by The Standard that she was seventeen. - I should have thought she was almost younger than that. - She looked such a child, and seemed to know so little about acting. - Dorian, you mustn't let this thing get on your nerves. - You must come and dine with me, and afterwards we will look in at - the opera. It is a Patti night, and everybody will be there. - You can come to my sister's box. She has got some smart women - with her."</p> -<p>"So I have murdered Sibyl Vane," said Dorian Gray, half to himself, - "murdered her as surely as if I had cut her little throat - with a knife. Yet the roses are not less lovely for all that. - The birds sing just as happily in my garden. And to-night I am - to dine with you, and then go on to the opera, and sup somewhere, - I suppose, afterwards. How extraordinarily dramatic life is! - If I had read all this in a book, Harry, I think I would have - wept over it. Somehow, now that it has happened actually, - and to me, it seems far too wonderful for tears. - Here is the first passionate love-letter I have ever written - in my life. Strange, that my first passionate love-letter should - have been addressed to a dead girl. Can they feel, I wonder, - those white silent people we call the dead? Sibyl! Can she feel, - or know, or listen? Oh, Harry, how I loved her once! - It seems years ago to me now. She was everything to me. - Then came that dreadful night--was it really only last night?-- - when she played so badly, and my heart almost broke. - She explained it all to me. It was terribly pathetic. - But I was not moved a bit. I thought her shallow. - Suddenly something happened that made me afraid. - I can't tell you what it was, but it was terrible. - I said I would go back to her. I felt I had done wrong. - And now she is dead. My God! My God! Harry, what shall I do? - You don't know the danger I am in, and there is nothing - to keep me straight. She would have done that for me. - She had no right to kill herself. It was selfish of - her."</p> -<p>"My dear Dorian," answered Lord Henry, taking a cigarette - from his case and producing a gold-latten matchbox, - "the only way a woman can ever reform a man is by boring him - so completely that he loses all possible interest in life. - If you had married this girl, you would have been wretched. - Of course, you would have treated her kindly. One can always - be kind to people about whom one cares nothing. But she would - have soon found out that you were absolutely indifferent - to her. And when a woman finds that out about her husband, - she either becomes dreadfully dowdy, or wears very smart - bonnets that some other woman's husband has to pay for. - I say nothing about the social mistake, which would have - been abject--which, of course, I would not have allowed-- - but I assure you that in any case the whole thing would have been an - absolute failure."</p> -<p>"I suppose it would," muttered the lad, walking up and down the room - and looking horribly pale. "But I thought it was my duty. - It is not my fault that this terrible tragedy has prevented my doing - what was right. I remember your saying once that there is a fatality - about good resolutions--that they are always made too late. - Mine certainly were."</p> -<p>"Good resolutions are useless attempts to interfere - with scientific laws. Their origin is pure vanity. - Their result is absolutely nil. They give us, now and then, - some of those luxurious sterile emotions that have a certain - charm for the weak. That is all that can be said for them. - They are simply cheques that men draw on a bank where they have - no account."</p> -<p>"Harry," cried Dorian Gray, coming over and sitting down beside him, - "why is it that I cannot feel this tragedy as much as I want to? - I don't think I am heartless. Do you?"</p> -<p>"You have done too many foolish things during the last fortnight - to be entitled to give yourself that name, Dorian," answered Lord - Henry with his sweet melancholy smile.</p> -<p>The lad frowned. "I don't like that explanation, Harry," he rejoined, - "but I am glad you don't think I am heartless. I am nothing of the kind. - I know I am not. And yet I must admit that this thing that has happened - does not affect me as it should. It seems to me to be simply like a - wonderful ending to a wonderful play. It has all the terrible beauty - of a Greek tragedy, a tragedy in which I took a great part, but by which I - have not been wounded."</p> -<p>"It is an interesting question," said Lord Henry, who found - an exquisite pleasure in playing on the lad's unconscious egotism, - "an extremely interesting question. I fancy that the true - explanation is this: It often happens that the real tragedies - of life occur in such an inartistic manner that they hurt - us by their crude violence, their absolute incoherence, - their absurd want of meaning, their entire lack of style. - They affect us just as vulgarity affects us. They give us - an impression of sheer brute force, and we revolt against that. - Sometimes, however, a tragedy that possesses artistic elements - of beauty crosses our lives. If these elements of beauty are real, - the whole thing simply appeals to our sense of dramatic effect. - Suddenly we find that we are no longer the actors, - but the spectators of the play. Or rather we are both. - We watch ourselves, and the mere wonder of the spectacle - enthralls us. In the present case, what is it that has - really happened? Some one has killed herself for love of you. - I wish that I had ever had such an experience. It would - have made me in love with love for the rest of my life. - The people who have adored me--there have not been very many, - but there have been some--have always insisted on living on, - long after I had ceased to care for them, or they to care for me. - They have become stout and tedious, and when I meet them, - they go in at once for reminiscences. That awful memory of woman! - What a fearful thing it is! And what an utter intellectual - stagnation it reveals! One should absorb the colour of life, - but one should never remember its details. Details are always - vulgar."</p> -<p>"I must sow poppies in my garden," sighed Dorian.</p> -<p>"There is no necessity," rejoined his companion. "Life has always - poppies in her hands. Of course, now and then things linger. - I once wore nothing but violets all through one season, - as a form of artistic mourning for a romance that would not die. - Ultimately, however, it did die. I forget what killed it. - I think it was her proposing to sacrifice the whole world for me. - That is always a dreadful moment. It fills one with the terror - of eternity. Well--would you believe it?--a week ago, - at Lady Hampshire's, I found myself seated at dinner next - the lady in question, and she insisted on going over the whole - thing again, and digging up the past, and raking up the future. - I had buried my romance in a bed of asphodel. She dragged - it out again and assured me that I had spoiled her life. - I am bound to state that she ate an enormous dinner, so I did - not feel any anxiety. But what a lack of taste she showed! - The one charm of the past is that it is the past. - But women never know when the curtain has fallen. - They always want a sixth act, and as soon as the interest - of the play is entirely over, they propose to continue it. - If they were allowed their own way, every comedy would have - a tragic ending, and every tragedy would culminate in a farce. - They are charmingly artificial, but they have no sense of art. - You are more fortunate than I am. I assure you, Dorian, that not - one of the women I have known would have done for me what Sibyl - Vane did for you. Ordinary women always console themselves. - Some of them do it by going in for sentimental colours. - Never trust a woman who wears mauve, whatever her age may be, - or a woman over thirty-five who is fond of pink ribbons. - It always means that they have a history. Others find - a great consolation in suddenly discovering the good qualities - of their husbands. They flaunt their conjugal felicity - in one's face, as if it were the most fascinating of sins. - Religion consoles some. Its mysteries have all the charm - of a flirtation, a woman once told me, and I can quite - understand it. Besides, nothing makes one so vain as being told - that one is a sinner. Conscience makes egotists of us all. - Yes; there is really no end to the consolations that women find - in modern life. Indeed, I have not mentioned the most important - one."</p> -<p>"What is that, Harry?" said the lad listlessly.</p> -<p>"Oh, the obvious consolation. Taking some one else's admirer when one - loses one's own. In good society that always whitewashes a woman. - But really, Dorian, how different Sibyl Vane must have been from all the women - one meets! There is something to me quite beautiful about her death. - I am glad I am living in a century when such wonders happen. - They make one believe in the reality of the things we all play with, - such as romance, passion, and love."</p> -<p>"I was terribly cruel to her. You forget that."</p> -<p>"I am afraid that women appreciate cruelty, downright cruelty, - more than anything else. They have wonderfully primitive instincts. - We have emancipated them, but they remain slaves looking for their masters, - all the same. They love being dominated. I am sure you were splendid. - I have never seen you really and absolutely angry, but I can fancy how - delightful you looked. And, after all, you said something to me the day - before yesterday that seemed to me at the time to be merely fanciful, - but that I see now was absolutely true, and it holds the key - to everything."</p> -<p>"What was that, Harry?"</p> -<p>"You said to me that Sibyl Vane represented to you all the heroines - of romance--that she was Desdemona one night, and Ophelia the other; - that if she died as Juliet, she came to life as Imogen."</p> -<p>"She will never come to life again now," muttered the lad, - burying his face in his hands.</p> -<p>"No, she will never come to life. She has played her last part. - But you must think of that lonely death in the tawdry dressing-room - simply as a strange lurid fragment from some Jacobean tragedy, - as a wonderful scene from Webster, or Ford, or Cyril Tourneur. - The girl never really lived, and so she has never really died. - To you at least she was always a dream, a phantom that flitted - through Shakespeare's plays and left them lovelier for its presence, - a reed through which Shakespeare's music sounded richer and more - full of joy. The moment she touched actual life, she marred it, - and it marred her, and so she passed away. Mourn for Ophelia, - if you like. Put ashes on your head because Cordelia was strangled. - Cry out against Heaven because the daughter of Brabantio died. - But don't waste your tears over Sibyl Vane. She was less real than they - are."</p> -<p>There was a silence. The evening darkened in the room. - Noiselessly, and with silver feet, the shadows crept in from - the garden. The colours faded wearily out of things.</p> -<p>After some time Dorian Gray looked up. "You have explained me - to myself, Harry," he murmured with something of a sigh of relief. - "I felt all that you have said, but somehow I was afraid of it, - and I could not express it to myself. How well you know me! - But we will not talk again of what has happened. It has been - a marvellous experience. That is all. I wonder if life has still - in store for me anything as marvellous."</p> -<p>"Life has everything in store for you, Dorian. There is nothing that you, - with your extraordinary good looks, will not be able to do."</p> -<p>"But suppose, Harry, I became haggard, and old, and wrinkled? - What then?"</p> -<p>"Ah, then," said Lord Henry, rising to go, "then, my dear Dorian, - you would have to fight for your victories. As it is, - they are brought to you. No, you must keep your good looks. - We live in an age that reads too much to be wise, and that - thinks too much to be beautiful. We cannot spare you. - And now you had better dress and drive down to the club. - We are rather late, as it is."</p> -<p>"I think I shall join you at the opera, Harry. I feel too tired - to eat anything. What is the number of your sister's box?"</p> -<p>"Twenty-seven, I believe. It is on the grand tier. - You will see her name on the door. But I am sorry you won't - come and dine."</p> -<p>"I don't feel up to it," said Dorian listlessly. "But I am - awfully obliged to you for all that you have said to me. - You are certainly my best friend. No one has ever understood me - as you have."</p> -<p>"We are only at the beginning of our friendship, Dorian," answered - Lord Henry, shaking him by the hand. "Good-bye. I shall see you before - nine-thirty, I hope. Remember, Patti is singing."</p> -<p>As he closed the door behind him, Dorian Gray touched the bell, - and in a few minutes Victor appeared with the lamps and drew - the blinds down. He waited impatiently for him to go. - The man seemed to take an interminable time over everything.</p> -<p>As soon as he had left, he rushed to the screen and drew it back. - No; there was no further change in the picture. It had received - the news of Sibyl Vane's death before he had known of it himself. - It was conscious of the events of life as they occurred. - The vicious cruelty that marred the fine lines of the mouth had, - no doubt, appeared at the very moment that the girl had drunk - the poison, whatever it was. Or was it indifferent to results? - Did it merely take cognizance of what passed within the soul? - He wondered, and hoped that some day he would see the change taking place - before his very eyes, shuddering as he hoped it.</p> -<p>Poor Sibyl! What a romance it had all been! She had often mimicked - death on the stage. Then Death himself had touched her and taken - her with him. How had she played that dreadful last scene? - Had she cursed him, as she died? No; she had died for love of him, - and love would always be a sacrament to him now. She had atoned - for everything by the sacrifice she had made of her life. - He would not think any more of what she had made him go through, - on that horrible night at the theatre. When he thought of her, - it would be as a wonderful tragic figure sent on to the world's stage - to show the supreme reality of love. A wonderful tragic figure? - Tears came to his eyes as he remembered her childlike look, and winsome - fanciful ways, and shy tremulous grace. He brushed them away hastily and - looked again at the picture.</p> -<p>He felt that the time had really come for making his choice. - Or had his choice already been made? Yes, life had decided - that for him--life, and his own infinite curiosity about life. - Eternal youth, infinite passion, pleasures subtle and secret, - wild joys and wilder sins--he was to have all these things. - The portrait was to bear the burden of his shame: - that was all. - ??? - A feeling of pain crept over him as he thought of the desecration - that was in store for the fair face on the canvas. Once, in boyish - mockery of Narcissus, he had kissed, or feigned to kiss, - those painted lips that now smiled so cruelly at him. - Morning after morning he had sat before the portrait wondering at - its beauty, almost enamoured of it, as it seemed to him at times. - Was it to alter now with every mood to which he yielded? - Was it to become a monstrous and loathsome thing, to be hidden - away in a locked room, to be shut out from the sunlight that had - so often touched to brighter gold the waving wonder of its hair? - The pity of it! the pity of it!</p> -<p>For a moment, he thought of praying that the horrible sympathy - that existed between him and the picture might cease. - It had changed in answer to a prayer; perhaps in answer to a prayer - it might remain unchanged. And yet, who, that knew anything - about life, would surrender the chance of remaining always young, - however fantastic that chance might be, or with what fateful consequences - it might be fraught? Besides, was it really under his control? - Had it indeed been prayer that had produced the substitution? - Might there not be some curious scientific reason for it all? - If thought could exercise its influence upon a living organism, - might not thought exercise an influence upon dead and inorganic things? - Nay, without thought or conscious desire, might not things external - to ourselves vibrate in unison with our moods and passions, - atom calling to atom in secret love or strange affinity? - But the reason was of no importance. He would never again tempt - by a prayer any terrible power. If the picture was to alter, - it was to alter. That was all. Why inquire too closely - into it?</p> -<p>For there would be a real pleasure in watching it. - He would be able to follow his mind into its secret places. - This portrait would be to him the most magical of mirrors. - As it had revealed to him his own body, so it would reveal - to him his own soul. And when winter came upon it, he would - still be standing where spring trembles on the verge of summer. - When the blood crept from its face, and left behind a pallid mask - of chalk with leaden eyes, he would keep the glamour of boyhood. - Not one blossom of his loveliness would ever fade. Not one pulse - of his life would ever weaken. Like the gods of the Greeks, - he would be strong, and fleet, and joyous. What did it matter what - happened to the coloured image on the canvas? He would be safe. - That was everything.</p> -<p>He drew the screen back into its former place in front of the picture, - smiling as he did so, and passed into his bedroom, where his valet was - already waiting for him. An hour later he was at the opera, and Lord - Henry was leaning over his chair.</p> -<p> - CHAPTER 9</p> -<p>As he was sitting at breakfast next morning, Basil Hallward was shown - into the room.</p> -<p>"I am so glad I have found you, Dorian," he said gravely. - "I called last night, and they told me you were at the opera. - Of course, I knew that was impossible. But I wish you had left - word where you had really gone to. I passed a dreadful evening, - half afraid that one tragedy might be followed by another. - I think you might have telegraphed for me when you heard of it first. - I read of it quite by chance in a late edition of The Globe - that I picked up at the club. I came here at once and was - miserable at not finding you. I can't tell you how heart-broken - I am about the whole thing. I know what you must suffer. - But where were you? Did you go down and see the girl's mother? - For a moment I thought of following you there. They gave - the address in the paper. Somewhere in the Euston Road, isn't it? - But I was afraid of intruding upon a sorrow that I could - not lighten. Poor woman! What a state she must be in! - And her only child, too! What did she say about it - all?"</p> -<p>"My dear Basil, how do I know?" murmured Dorian Gray, sipping some - pale-yellow wine from a delicate, gold-beaded bubble of Venetian - glass and looking dreadfully bored. "I was at the opera. - You should have come on there. I met Lady Gwendolen, Harry's sister, - for the first time. We were in her box. She is perfectly charming; - and Patti sang divinely. Don't talk about horrid subjects. - If one doesn't talk about a thing, it has never happened. - It is simply expression, as Harry says, that gives reality to things. - I may mention that she was not the woman's only child. There is - a son, a charming fellow, I believe. But he is not on the stage. - He is a sailor, or something. And now, tell me about yourself and what you - are painting."</p> -<p>"You went to the opera?" said Hallward, speaking very slowly - and with a strained touch of pain in his voice. "You went to - the opera while Sibyl Vane was lying dead in some sordid lodging? - You can talk to me of other women being charming, and of Patti - singing divinely, before the girl you loved has even the quiet - of a grave to sleep in? Why, man, there are horrors in store - for that little white body of hers!"</p> -<p>"Stop, Basil! I won't hear it!" cried Dorian, leaping to his feet. - "You must not tell me about things. What is done is done. - What is past is past."</p> -<p>"You call yesterday the past?"</p> -<p>"What has the actual lapse of time got to do with it? It is - only shallow people who require years to get rid of an emotion. - A man who is master of himself can end a sorrow as easily as he can - invent a pleasure. I don't want to be at the mercy of my emotions. - I want to use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them."</p> -<p>"Dorian, this is horrible! Something has changed you completely. - You look exactly the same wonderful boy who, day after day, - used to come down to my studio to sit for his picture. - But you were simple, natural, and affectionate then. - You were the most unspoiled creature in the whole world. - Now, I don't know what has come over you. You talk as if you - had no heart, no pity in you. It is all Harry's influence. - I see that."</p> -<p>The lad flushed up and, going to the window, looked out for - a few moments on the green, flickering, sun-lashed garden. - "I owe a great deal to Harry, Basil," he said at last, - "more than I owe to you. You only taught me to be vain."</p> -<p>"Well, I am punished for that, Dorian--or shall be some day."</p> -<p>"I don't know what you mean, Basil," he exclaimed, turning round. - "I don't know what you want. What do you want?"</p> -<p>"I want the Dorian Gray I used to paint," said the artist sadly.</p> -<p>"Basil," said the lad, going over to him and putting his hand - on his shoulder, "you have come too late. Yesterday, when I - heard that Sibyl Vane had killed herself--"</p> -<p>"Killed herself! Good heavens! is there no doubt about that?" - cried Hallward, looking up at him with an expression of horror.</p> -<p>"My dear Basil! Surely you don't think it was a vulgar accident? - Of course she killed herself."</p> -<p>The elder man buried his face in his hands. "How fearful," - he muttered, and a shudder ran through him.</p> -<p>"No," said Dorian Gray, "there is nothing fearful about it. - It is one of the great romantic tragedies of the age. - As a rule, people who act lead the most commonplace lives. - They are good husbands, or faithful wives, or something tedious. - You know what I mean--middle-class virtue and all that kind of thing. - How different Sibyl was! She lived her finest tragedy. - She was always a heroine. The last night she played-- - the night you saw her--she acted badly because she had known - the reality of love. When she knew its unreality, she died, - as Juliet might have died. She passed again into the sphere of art. - There is something of the martyr about her. Her death has all - the pathetic uselessness of martyrdom, all its wasted beauty. - But, as I was saying, you must not think I have not suffered. - If you had come in yesterday at a particular moment-- - about half-past five, perhaps, or a quarter to six-- - you would have found me in tears. Even Harry, who was here, - who brought me the news, in fact, had no idea what I was - going through. I suffered immensely. Then it passed away. - I cannot repeat an emotion. No one can, except sentimentalists. - And you are awfully unjust, Basil. You come down here to console me. - That is charming of you. You find me consoled, and you are furious. - How like a sympathetic person! You remind me of a story - Harry told me about a certain philanthropist who spent twenty - years of his life in trying to get some grievance redressed, - or some unjust law altered--I forget exactly what it was. - Finally he succeeded, and nothing could exceed his disappointment. - He had absolutely nothing to do, almost died of ennui, and became - a confirmed misanthrope. And besides, my dear old Basil, - if you really want to console me, teach me rather to forget what - has happened, or to see it from a proper artistic point of view. - Was it not Gautier who used to write about la consolation des arts? - I remember picking up a little vellum-covered book in your - studio one day and chancing on that delightful phrase. - Well, I am not like that young man you told me of when we - were down at Marlow together, the young man who used to say - that yellow satin could console one for all the miseries of life. - I love beautiful things that one can touch and handle. - Old brocades, green bronzes, lacquer-work, carved ivories, - exquisite surroundings, luxury, pomp--there is much to be got - from all these. But the artistic temperament that they create, - or at any rate reveal, is still more to me. To become - the spectator of one's own life, as Harry says, is to escape - the suffering of life. I know you are surprised at my talking - to you like this. You have not realized how I have developed. - I was a schoolboy when you knew me. I am a man now. - I have new passions, new thoughts, new ideas. I am different, - but you must not like me less. I am changed, but you must - always be my friend. Of course, I am very fond of Harry. - But I know that you are better than he is. You are not stronger-- - you are too much afraid of life--but you are better. And how - happy we used to be together! Don't leave me, Basil, and don't - quarrel with me. I am what I am. There is nothing more to be - said."</p> -<p>The painter felt strangely moved. The lad was infinitely dear to him, - and his personality had been the great turning point in his art. - He could not bear the idea of reproaching him any more. After all, - his indifference was probably merely a mood that would pass away. - There was so much in him that was good, so much in him that - was noble.</p> -<p>"Well, Dorian," he said at length, with a sad smile, "I - won't speak to you again about this horrible thing, after to-day. - I only trust your name won't be mentioned in connection with it. - The inquest is to take place this afternoon. Have they summoned you?"</p> -<p>Dorian shook his head, and a look of annoyance passed over his face - at the mention of the word "inquest." There was something so crude - and vulgar about everything of the kind. "They don't know my name," - he answered.</p> -<p>"But surely she did?"</p> -<p>"Only my Christian name, and that I am quite sure she never mentioned - to any one. She told me once that they were all rather curious to learn - who I was, and that she invariably told them my name was Prince Charming. - It was pretty of her. You must do me a drawing of Sibyl, Basil. - I should like to have something more of her than the memory of a few kisses - and some broken pathetic words."</p> -<p>"I will try and do something, Dorian, if it would please you. - But you must come and sit to me yourself again. I can't get on - without you."</p> -<p>"I can never sit to you again, Basil. It is impossible!" - he exclaimed, starting back.</p> -<p>The painter stared at him. "My dear boy, what nonsense!" - he cried. "Do you mean to say you don't like what I did of you? - Where is it? Why have you pulled the screen in front of it? - Let me look at it. It is the best thing I have ever done. - Do take the screen away, Dorian. It is simply disgraceful - of your servant hiding my work like that. I felt the room looked - different as I came in."</p> -<p>"My servant has nothing to do with it, Basil. You don't imagine I let - him arrange my room for me? He settles my flowers for me sometimes-- - that is all. No; I did it myself. The light was too strong on - the portrait."</p> -<p>"Too strong! Surely not, my dear fellow? It is an admirable place for - it. - Let me see it." And Hallward walked towards the corner of the room.</p> -<p>A cry of terror broke from Dorian Gray's lips, and he rushed - between the painter and the screen. "Basil," he said, - looking very pale, "you must not look at it. I don't wish - you to."</p> -<p>"Not look at my own work! You are not serious. Why shouldn't I look at - it?" - exclaimed Hallward, laughing.</p> -<p>"If you try to look at it, Basil, on my word of honour I will - never speak to you again as long as I live. I am quite serious. - I don't offer any explanation, and you are not to ask for any. - But, remember, if you touch this screen, everything is over - between us."</p> -<p>Hallward was thunderstruck. He looked at Dorian Gray in - absolute amazement. He had never seen him like this before. - The lad was actually pallid with rage. His hands were clenched, - and the pupils of his eyes were like disks of blue fire. - He was trembling all over.</p> -<p>"Dorian!"</p> -<p>"Don't speak!"</p> -<p>"But what is the matter? Of course I won't look at it if you don't want - me to," he said, rather coldly, turning on his heel and going over towards - the window. "But, really, it seems rather absurd that I shouldn't see my - own work, especially as I am going to exhibit it in Paris in the autumn. - I shall probably have to give it another coat of varnish before that, so I - must see it some day, and why not to-day?"</p> -<p>"To exhibit it! You want to exhibit it?" exclaimed Dorian Gray, - a strange sense of terror creeping over him. Was the world going to be - shown his secret? Were people to gape at the mystery of his life? - That was impossible. Something--he did not know what--had to be done - at once.</p> -<p>"Yes; I don't suppose you will object to that. Georges Petit - is going to collect all my best pictures for a special exhibition - in the Rue de Seze, which will open the first week in October. - The portrait will only be away a month. I should think you could easily - spare it for that time. In fact, you are sure to be out of town. - And if you keep it always behind a screen, you can't care much - about it."</p> -<p>Dorian Gray passed his hand over his forehead. There were beads of - perspiration there. He felt that he was on the brink of a horrible danger. - "You told me a month ago that you would never exhibit it," he cried. - "Why have you changed your mind? You people who go in for being consistent - have just as many moods as others have. The only difference is that - your moods are rather meaningless. You can't have forgotten that you - assured me most solemnly that nothing in the world would induce you - to send it to any exhibition. You told Harry exactly the same thing." - He stopped suddenly, and a gleam of light came into his eyes. He remembered - that Lord Henry had said to him once, half seriously and half in jest, - "If you want to have a strange quarter of an hour, get Basil to tell you - why he won't exhibit your picture. He told me why he wouldn't, and it - was a revelation to me." Yes, perhaps Basil, too, had his secret. - He would ask him and try.</p> -<p>"Basil," he said, coming over quite close and looking him straight - in the face, "we have each of us a secret. Let me know yours, - and I shall tell you mine. What was your reason for refusing - to exhibit my picture?"</p> -<p>The painter shuddered in spite of himself. "Dorian, if I told you, - you might like me less than you do, and you would certainly laugh - at me. I could not bear your doing either of those two things. - If you wish me never to look at your picture again, I am content. - I have always you to look at. If you wish the best work I have ever done - to be hidden from the world, I am satisfied. Your friendship is dearer - to me than any fame or reputation."</p> -<p>"No, Basil, you must tell me," insisted Dorian Gray. - "I think I have a right to know." His feeling of terror - had passed away, and curiosity had taken its place. - He was determined to find out Basil Hallward's mystery.</p> -<p>"Let us sit down, Dorian," said the painter, looking troubled. - "Let us sit down. And just answer me one question. - Have you noticed in the picture something curious?--something that - probably at first did not strike you, but that revealed itself - to you suddenly?"</p> -<p>"Basil!" cried the lad, clutching the arms of his chair with trembling - hands and gazing at him with wild startled eyes.</p> -<p>"I see you did. Don't speak. Wait till you hear what I have to say. - Dorian, from the moment I met you, your personality had the most - extraordinary influence over me. I was dominated, soul, brain, and power, - by you. You became to me the visible incarnation of that unseen - ideal whose memory haunts us artists like an exquisite dream. - I worshipped you. I grew jealous of every one to whom you spoke. - I wanted to have you all to myself. I was only happy when I - was with you. When you were away from me, you were still present - in my art.... Of course, I never let you know anything about this. - It would have been impossible. You would not have understood it. - I hardly understood it myself. I only knew that I had seen perfection - face to face, and that the world had become wonderful to my eyes-- - too wonderful, perhaps, for in such mad worships there is peril, - the peril of losing them, no less than the peril of keeping them.... - Weeks and weeks went on, and I grew more and more absorbed in you. - Then came a new development. I had drawn you as Paris in - dainty armour, and as Adonis with huntsman's cloak and polished - boar-spear. Crowned with heavy lotus-blossoms you had sat on - the prow of Adrian's barge, gazing across the green turbid Nile. - You had leaned over the still pool of some Greek woodland and seen - in the water's silent silver the marvel of your own face. - And it had all been what art should be--unconscious, ideal, and remote. - One day, a fatal day I sometimes think, I determined to paint - a wonderful portrait of you as you actually are, not in the costume - of dead ages, but in your own dress and in your own time. - Whether it was the realism of the method, or the mere wonder - of your own personality, thus directly presented to me without - mist or veil, I cannot tell. But I know that as I worked at it, - every flake and film of colour seemed to me to reveal my secret. - I grew afraid that others would know of my idolatry. I felt, Dorian, - that I had told too much, that I had put too much of myself into it. - Then it was that I resolved never to allow the picture to be exhibited. - You were a little annoyed; but then you did not realize all that it - meant to me. Harry, to whom I talked about it, laughed at me. - But I did not mind that. When the picture was finished, and I sat - alone with it, I felt that I was right.... Well, after a few days - the thing left my studio, and as soon as I had got rid of the intolerable - fascination of its presence, it seemed to me that I had been foolish - in imagining that I had seen anything in it, more than that you - were extremely good-looking and that I could paint. Even now I - cannot help feeling that it is a mistake to think that the passion - one feels in creation is ever really shown in the work one creates. - Art is always more abstract than we fancy. Form and colour tell - us of form and colour--that is all. It often seems to me that art - conceals the artist far more completely than it ever reveals him. - And so when I got this offer from Paris, I determined to make your - portrait the principal thing in my exhibition. It never occurred - to me that you would refuse. I see now that you were right. - The picture cannot be shown. You must not be angry with me, Dorian, - for what I have told you. As I said to Harry, once, you are made to be - worshipped."</p> -<p>Dorian Gray drew a long breath. The colour came back to his cheeks, - and a smile played about his lips. The peril was over. - He was safe for the time. Yet he could not help feeling - infinite pity for the painter who had just made this strange - confession to him, and wondered if he himself would ever - be so dominated by the personality of a friend. Lord Henry - had the charm of being very dangerous. But that was all. - He was too clever and too cynical to be really fond of. - Would there ever be some one who would fill him with a - strange idolatry? Was that one of the things that life had - in store?</p> -<p>"It is extraordinary to me, Dorian," said Hallward, "that you - should have seen this in the portrait. Did you really see it?"</p> -<p>"I saw something in it," he answered, "something that seemed - to me very curious."</p> -<p>"Well, you don't mind my looking at the thing now?"</p> -<p>Dorian shook his head. "You must not ask me that, Basil. - I could not possibly let you stand in front of that picture."</p> -<p>"You will some day, surely?"</p> -<p>"Never."</p> -<p>"Well, perhaps you are right. And now good-bye, Dorian. - You have been the one person in my life who has really influenced - my art. Whatever I have done that is good, I owe to you. - Ah! you don't know what it cost me to tell you all that I have - told you."</p> -<p>"My dear Basil," said Dorian, "what have you told me? - Simply that you felt that you admired me too much. - That is not even a compliment."</p> -<p>"It was not intended as a compliment. It was a confession. - Now that I have made it, something seems to have gone out of me. - Perhaps one should never put one's worship into words."</p> -<p>"It was a very disappointing confession."</p> -<p>"Why, what did you expect, Dorian? You didn't see anything else - in the picture, did you? There was nothing else to see?"</p> -<p>"No; there was nothing else to see. Why do you ask? - But you mustn't talk about worship. It is foolish. You and I - are friends, Basil, and we must always remain so."</p> -<p>"You have got Harry," said the painter sadly.</p> -<p>"Oh, Harry!" cried the lad, with a ripple of laughter. "Harry - spends - his days in saying what is incredible and his evenings in doing - what is improbable. Just the sort of life I would like to lead. - But still I don't think I would go to Harry if I were in trouble. - I would sooner go to you, Basil."</p> -<p>"You will sit to me again?"</p> -<p>"Impossible!"</p> -<p>"You spoil my life as an artist by refusing, Dorian. No man - comes across two ideal things. Few come across one."</p> -<p>"I can't explain it to you, Basil, but I must never sit to you again. - There is something fatal about a portrait. It has a life of its own. - I will come and have tea with you. That will be just as pleasant."</p> -<p>"Pleasanter for you, I am afraid," murmured Hallward regretfully. - "And now good-bye. I am sorry you won't let me look at the picture - once again. But that can't be helped. I quite understand what you feel - about it."</p> -<p>As he left the room, Dorian Gray smiled to himself. Poor Basil! - How little he knew of the true reason! And how strange it - was that, instead of having been forced to reveal his own secret, - he had succeeded, almost by chance, in wresting a secret from - his friend! How much that strange confession explained to him! - The painter's absurd fits of jealousy, his wild devotion, - his extravagant panegyrics, his curious reticences-- - he understood them all now, and he felt sorry. There seemed - to him to be something tragic in a friendship so coloured - by romance.</p> -<p>He sighed and touched the bell. The portrait must be hidden away - at all costs. He could not run such a risk of discovery again. - It had been mad of him to have allowed the thing to remain, - even for an hour, in a room to which any of his friends - had access.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 10</p> -<p>When his servant entered, he looked at him steadfastly and wondered if he had - thought of peering behind the screen. The man was quite impassive and waited - for his orders. Dorian lit a cigarette and walked over to the glass and glanced - into it. He could see the reflection of Victor's face perfectly. It was like - a placid mask of servility. There was nothing to be afraid of, there. Yet he - thought it best to be on his guard.</p> -<p>Speaking very slowly, he told him to tell the house-keeper that he wanted - to see her, and then to go to the frame-maker and ask him to send two of his - men round at once. It seemed to him that as the man left the room his eyes - wandered in the direction of the screen. Or was that merely his own fancy?</p> -<p>After a few moments, in her black silk dress, with old-fashioned thread - mittens on her wrinkled hands, Mrs. Leaf bustled into the library. - He asked her for the key of the schoolroom.</p> -<p>"The old schoolroom, Mr. Dorian?" she exclaimed. "Why, it is - full of dust. - I must get it arranged and put straight before you go into it. It is not fit - for you to see, sir. It is not, indeed."</p> -<p>"I don't want it put straight, Leaf. I only want the key."</p> -<p>"Well, sir, you'll be covered with cobwebs if you go into it. Why, it - hasn't - been opened for nearly five years--not since his lordship died."</p> -<p>He winced at the mention of his grandfather. He had hateful memories of him. - "That does not matter," he answered. "I simply want to see the - place-- - that is all. Give me the key."</p> -<p>"And here is the key, sir," said the old lady, going over - the contents of her bunch with tremulously uncertain hands. - "Here is the key. I'll have it off the bunch in a moment. - But you don't think of living up there, sir, and you so - comfortable here?"</p> -<p>"No, no," he cried petulantly. "Thank you, Leaf. That will do."</p> -<p>She lingered for a few moments, and was garrulous over some detail - of the household. He sighed and told her to manage things as she - thought best. She left the room, wreathed in smiles.</p> -<p>As the door closed, Dorian put the key in his pocket and looked round - the room. His eye fell on a large, purple satin coverlet heavily - embroidered with gold, a splendid piece of late seventeenth-century - Venetian work that his grandfather had found in a convent near Bologna. - Yes, that would serve to wrap the dreadful thing in. It had perhaps - served often as a pall for the dead. Now it was to hide something that - had a corruption of its own, worse than the corruption of death itself-- - something that would breed horrors and yet would never die. What the worm - was to the corpse, his sins would be to the painted image on the canvas. - They would mar its beauty and eat away its grace. They would defile - it and make it shameful. And yet the thing would still live on. - It would be always alive.</p> -<p>He shuddered, and for a moment he regretted that he had not told - Basil the true reason why he had wished to hide the picture away. - Basil would have helped him to resist Lord Henry's influence, - and the still more poisonous influences that came from his - own temperament. The love that he bore him--for it was really love-- - had nothing in it that was not noble and intellectual. - It was not that mere physical admiration of beauty that is born - of the senses and that dies when the senses tire. It was such - love as Michelangelo had known, and Montaigne, and Winckelmann, - and Shakespeare himself. Yes, Basil could have saved him. - But it was too late now. The past could always be annihilated. - Regret, denial, or forgetfulness could do that. But the future - was inevitable. There were passions in him that would find - their terrible outlet, dreams that would make the shadow of their - evil real.</p> -<p>He took up from the couch the great purple-and-gold texture that - covered it, and, holding it in his hands, passed behind the screen. - Was the face on the canvas viler than before? It seemed to him - that it was unchanged, and yet his loathing of it was intensified. - Gold hair, blue eyes, and rose-red lips--they all were there. - It was simply the expression that had altered. That was horrible - in its cruelty. Compared to what he saw in it of censure or rebuke, - how shallow Basil's reproaches about Sibyl Vane had been!-- - how shallow, and of what little account! His own soul was looking - out at him from the canvas and calling him to judgement. A look - of pain came across him, and he flung the rich pall over the picture. - As he did so, a knock came to the door. He passed out as his - servant entered.</p> -<p>"The persons are here, Monsieur."</p> -<p>He felt that the man must be got rid of at once. He must - not be allowed to know where the picture was being taken to. - There was something sly about him, and he had thoughtful, - treacherous eyes. Sitting down at the writing-table he scribbled - a note to Lord Henry, asking him to send him round something - to read and reminding him that they were to meet at eight-fifteen - that evening.</p> -<p>"Wait for an answer," he said, handing it to him, "and show - the men in here."</p> -<p>In two or three minutes there was another knock, and Mr. Hubbard himself, - the celebrated frame-maker of South Audley Street, came in with a - somewhat rough-looking young assistant. Mr. Hubbard was a florid, - red-whiskered little man, whose admiration for art was considerably tempered - by the inveterate impecuniosity of most of the artists who dealt with him. - As a rule, he never left his shop. He waited for people to come to him. - But he always made an exception in favour of Dorian Gray. There was - something about Dorian that charmed everybody. It was a pleasure even to - see him.</p> -<p>"What can I do for you, Mr. Gray?" he said, rubbing his fat freckled - hands. - "I thought I would do myself the honour of coming round in person. I have - just got a beauty of a frame, sir. Picked it up at a sale. Old Florentine. - Came from Fonthill, I believe. Admirably suited for a religious subject, - Mr. Gray."</p> -<p>"I am so sorry you have given yourself the trouble of coming round, - Mr. Hubbard. I shall certainly drop in and look at the frame-- - though I don't go in much at present for religious art--but to-day - I only want a picture carried to the top of the house for me. - It is rather heavy, so I thought I would ask you to lend me a couple of - your men."</p> -<p>"No trouble at all, Mr. Gray. I am delighted to be of any service to you. - Which is the work of art, sir?"</p> -<p>"This," replied Dorian, moving the screen back. "Can you move - it, - covering and all, just as it is? I don't want it to get scratched - going upstairs."</p> -<p>"There will be no difficulty, sir," said the genial frame-maker, - beginning, - with the aid of his assistant, to unhook the picture from the long brass - chains by which it was suspended. "And, now, where shall we carry it to, - Mr. Gray?"</p> -<p>"I will show you the way, Mr. Hubbard, if you will kindly follow me. - Or perhaps you had better go in front. I am afraid it is right at - the top of the house. We will go up by the front staircase, as it - is wider."</p> -<p>He held the door open for them, and they passed out into the hall and began - the ascent. The elaborate character of the frame had made the picture - extremely bulky, and now and then, in spite of the obsequious protests - of Mr. Hubbard, who had the true tradesman's spirited dislike of seeing a - gentleman doing anything useful, Dorian put his hand to it so as to help them.</p> -<p>"Something of a load to carry, sir," gasped the little man when they - reached the top landing. And he wiped his shiny forehead.</p> -<p>"I am afraid it is rather heavy," murmured Dorian as he unlocked - the door - that opened into the room that was to keep for him the curious secret of his - life and hide his soul from the eyes of men.</p> -<p>He had not entered the place for more than four years--not, indeed, - since he had used it first as a play-room when he was a child, - and then as a study when he grew somewhat older. It was a large, - well-proportioned room, which had been specially built by the last - Lord Kelso for the use of the little grandson whom, for his strange - likeness to his mother, and also for other reasons, he had always - hated and desired to keep at a distance. It appeared to Dorian - to have but little changed. There was the huge Italian cassone, - with its fantastically painted panels and its tarnished - gilt mouldings, in which he had so often hidden himself as a boy. - There the satinwood book-case filled with his dog-eared schoolbooks. - On the wall behind it was hanging the same ragged Flemish tapestry - where a faded king and queen were playing chess in a garden, - while a company of hawkers rode by, carrying hooded birds on their - gauntleted wrists. How well he remembered it all! Every moment - of his lonely childhood came back to him as he looked round. - He recalled the stainless purity of his boyish life, and it seemed horrible - to him that it was here the fatal portrait was to be hidden away. - How little he had thought, in those dead days, of all that was in store - for him!</p> -<p>But there was no other place in the house so secure from prying eyes as this. - He had the key, and no one else could enter it. Beneath its purple pall, - the face painted on the canvas could grow bestial, sodden, and unclean. - What did it matter? No one could see it. He himself would not see it. - Why should he watch the hideous corruption of his soul? He kept his youth-- - that was enough. And, besides, might not his nature grow finer, after all? - There was no reason that the future should be so full of shame. - Some love might come across his life, and purify him, and shield him - from those sins that seemed to be already stirring in spirit and in flesh-- - those curious unpictured sins whose very mystery lent them their subtlety and - their charm. Perhaps, some day, the cruel look would have passed away from - the scarlet sensitive mouth, and he might show to the world Basil Hallward's - masterpiece.</p> -<p>No; that was impossible. Hour by hour, and week by week, the thing - upon the canvas was growing old. It might escape the hideousness - of sin, but the hideousness of age was in store for it. - The cheeks would become hollow or flaccid. Yellow crow's feet - would creep round the fading eyes and make them horrible. - The hair would lose its brightness, the mouth would gape or droop, - would be foolish or gross, as the mouths of old men are. - There would be the wrinkled throat, the cold, blue-veined hands, - the twisted body, that he remembered in the grandfather who had been - so stern to him in his boyhood. The picture had to be concealed. - There was no help for it.</p> -<p>"Bring it in, Mr. Hubbard, please," he said, wearily, turning round. - "I am sorry I kept you so long. I was thinking of something else."</p> -<p>"Always glad to have a rest, Mr. Gray," answered the frame-maker, - who was still gasping for breath. "Where shall we put it, sir?"</p> -<p>"Oh, anywhere. Here: this will do. I don't want to have it hung up. - Just lean it against the wall. Thanks."</p> -<p>"Might one look at the work of art, sir?"</p> -<p>Dorian started. "It would not interest you, Mr. Hubbard," he said, - keeping his eye on the man. He felt ready to leap upon him and fling him to - the ground if he dared to lift the gorgeous hanging that concealed the secret - of his life. "I shan't trouble you any more now. I am much obliged for - your kindness in coming round."</p> -<p>Not at all, not at all, Mr. Gray. Ever ready to do anything for you, sir." - And Mr. Hubbard tramped downstairs, followed by the assistant, who glanced - back at Dorian with a look of shy wonder in his rough uncomely face. - He had never seen any one so marvellous.</p> -<p>When the sound of their footsteps had died away, Dorian locked - the door and put the key in his pocket. He felt safe now. - No one would ever look upon the horrible thing. No eye but his - would ever see his shame.</p> -<p>On reaching the library, he found that it was just after - five o'clock and that the tea had been already brought up. - On a little table of dark perfumed wood thickly incrusted with nacre, - a present from Lady Radley, his guardian's wife, a pretty - professional invalid who had spent the preceding winter in Cairo, - was lying a note from Lord Henry, and beside it was a book bound - in yellow paper, the cover slightly torn and the edges soiled. - A copy of the third edition of The St. James's Gazette had been - placed on the tea-tray. It was evident that Victor had returned. - He wondered if he had met the men in the hall as they were leaving - the house and had wormed out of them what they had been doing. - He would be sure to miss the picture--had no doubt missed - it already, while he had been laying the tea-things. The screen - had not been set back, and a blank space was visible on the wall. - Perhaps some night he might find him creeping upstairs and trying - to force the door of the room. It was a horrible thing to have - a spy in one's house. He had heard of rich men who had been - blackmailed all their lives by some servant who had read a letter, - or overheard a conversation, or picked up a card with an address, - or found beneath a pillow a withered flower or a shred of - crumpled lace.</p> -<p>He sighed, and having poured himself out some tea, opened Lord Henry's note. - It was simply to say that he sent him round the evening paper, and a book - that might interest him, and that he would be at the club at eight-fifteen. - He - opened The St. James's languidly, and looked through it. A red pencil-mark on - the fifth page caught his eye. It drew attention to the following paragraph:</p> -<p> - INQUEST ON AN ACTRESS.--An inquest was held this morning at the Bell Tavern, - Hoxton Road, by Mr. Danby, the District Coroner, on the body of Sibyl Vane, - a young actress recently engaged at the Royal Theatre, Holborn. A verdict - of death by misadventure was returned. Considerable sympathy was expressed - for the mother of the deceased, who was greatly affected during the giving - of her own evidence, and that of Dr. Birrell, who had made the post-mortem - examination of the deceased.</p> -<p> - He frowned, and tearing the paper in two, went across - the room and flung the pieces away. How ugly it all was! - And how horribly real ugliness made things! He felt a little - annoyed with Lord Henry for having sent him the report. - And it was certainly stupid of him to have marked it with red pencil. - Victor might have read it. The man knew more than enough English - for that.</p> -<p>Perhaps he had read it and had begun to suspect something. - And, yet, what did it matter? What had Dorian Gray to do - with Sibyl Vane's death? There was nothing to fear. - Dorian Gray had not killed her.</p> -<p>His eye fell on the yellow book that Lord Henry had sent him. - What was it, he wondered. He went towards the little, - pearl-coloured octagonal stand that had always looked to him - like the work of some strange Egyptian bees that wrought in silver, - and taking up the volume, flung himself into an arm-chair and began - to turn over the leaves. After a few minutes he became absorbed. - It was the strangest book that he had ever read. It seemed to him - that in exquisite raiment, and to the delicate sound of flutes, - the sins of the world were passing in dumb show before him. - Things that he had dimly dreamed of were suddenly made - real to him. Things of which he had never dreamed were - gradually revealed.</p> -<p>It was a novel without a plot and with only one character, being, indeed, - simply a psychological study of a certain young Parisian who spent his life - trying to realize in the nineteenth century all the passions and modes - of thought that belonged to every century except his own, and to sum up, - as it were, in himself the various moods through which the world-spirit had - ever passed, loving for their mere artificiality those renunciations that men - have unwisely called virtue, as much as those natural rebellions that wise - men still call sin. The style in which it was written was that curious - jewelled style, vivid and obscure at once, full of argot and of archaisms, - of technical expressions and of elaborate paraphrases, that characterizes - the work of some of the finest artists of the French school of Symbolistes. - There were in it metaphors as monstrous as orchids and as subtle in colour. - The life of the senses was described in the terms of mystical philosophy. - One hardly knew at times whether one was reading the spiritual ecstasies - of some mediaeval saint or the morbid confessions of a modern sinner. - It was a poisonous book. The heavy odour of incense seemed to cling about its - pages and to trouble the brain. The mere cadence of the sentences, the subtle - monotony of their music, so full as it was of complex refrains and movements - elaborately repeated, produced in the mind of the lad, as he passed from - chapter to chapter, a form of reverie, a malady of dreaming, that made him - unconscious of the falling day and creeping shadows.</p> -<p>Cloudless, and pierced by one solitary star, a copper-green - sky gleamed through the windows. He read on by its wan light - till he could read no more. Then, after his valet had reminded - him several times of the lateness of the hour, he got up, - and going into the next room, placed the book on the little - Florentine table that always stood at his bedside and began - to dress for dinner.</p> -<p>It was almost nine o'clock before he reached the club, where he found - Lord Henry sitting alone, in the morning-room, looking very much bored.</p> -<p>"I am so sorry, Harry," he cried, "but really it is entirely - your fault. - That book you sent me so fascinated me that I forgot how the time - was going."</p> -<p>"Yes, I thought you would like it," replied his host, rising from - his chair.</p> -<p>"I didn't say I liked it, Harry. I said it fascinated me. - There is a great difference."</p> -<p>"Ah, you have discovered that?" murmured Lord Henry. - And they passed into the dining-room.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 11</p> -<p>For years, Dorian Gray could not free himself from the influence of this book. - Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that he never sought to free himself - from it. He procured from Paris no less than nine large-paper copies of the - first edition, and had them bound in different colours, so that they might suit - his various moods and the changing fancies of a nature over which he seemed, - at times, to have almost entirely lost control. The hero, the wonderful young - Parisian in whom the romantic and the scientific temperaments were so strangely - blended, became to him a kind of prefiguring type of himself. And, indeed, the - whole book seemed to him to contain the story of his own life, written before - he had lived it.</p> -<p>In one point he was more fortunate than the novel's fantastic hero. - He never knew--never, indeed, had any cause to know--that somewhat - grotesque dread of mirrors, and polished metal surfaces, and still - water which came upon the young Parisian so early in his life, - and was occasioned by the sudden decay of a beau that had once, - apparently, been so remarkable. It was with an almost cruel joy-- - and perhaps in nearly every joy, as certainly in every pleasure, - cruelty has its place--that he used to read the latter part of the book, - with its really tragic, if somewhat overemphasized, account of the sorrow - and despair of one who had himself lost what in others, and the world, - he had most dearly valued.</p> -<p>For the wonderful beauty that had so fascinated Basil Hallward, - and many others besides him, seemed never to leave him. - Even those who had heard the most evil things against him-- - and from time to time strange rumours about his mode of life - crept through London and became the chatter of the clubs-- - could not believe anything to his dishonour when they saw him. - He had always the look of one who had kept himself unspotted - from the world. Men who talked grossly became silent when Dorian - Gray entered the room. There was something in the purity of his - face that rebuked them. His mere presence seemed to recall - to them the memory of the innocence that they had tarnished. - They wondered how one so charming and graceful as he was could - have escaped the stain of an age that was at once sordid - and sensual.</p> -<p>Often, on returning home from one of those mysterious and - prolonged absences that gave rise to such strange conjecture - among those who were his friends, or thought that they were so, - he himself would creep upstairs to the locked room, open the door - with the key that never left him now, and stand, with a mirror, - in front of the portrait that Basil Hallward had painted of him, - looking now at the evil and aging face on the canvas, and now at - the fair young face that laughed back at him from the polished glass. - The very sharpness of the contrast used to quicken his sense - of pleasure. He grew more and more enamoured of his own beauty, - more and more interested in the corruption of his own soul. - He would examine with minute care, and sometimes with a monstrous - and terrible delight, the hideous lines that seared the wrinkling - forehead or crawled around the heavy sensual mouth, wondering sometimes - which were the more horrible, the signs of sin or the signs of age. - He would place his white hands beside the coarse bloated hands - of the picture, and smile. He mocked the misshapen body and the - failing limbs.</p> -<p>There were moments, indeed, at night, when, lying sleepless - in his own delicately scented chamber, or in the sordid - room of the little ill-famed tavern near the docks which, - under an assumed name and in disguise, it was his habit - to frequent, he would think of the ruin he had brought upon - his soul with a pity that was all the more poignant because it - was purely selfish. But moments such as these were rare. - That curiosity about life which Lord Henry had first stirred - in him, as they sat together in the garden of their friend, - seemed to increase with gratification. The more he knew, - the more he desired to know. He had mad hungers that grew more - ravenous as he fed them.</p> -<p>Yet he was not really reckless, at any rate in his relations to society. - Once or twice every month during the winter, and on each Wednesday - evening while the season lasted, he would throw open to the world - his beautiful house and have the most celebrated musicians of the day - to charm his guests with the wonders of their art. His little dinners, - in the settling of which Lord Henry always assisted him, were noted - as much for the careful selection and placing of those invited, - as for the exquisite taste shown in the decoration of the table, - with its subtle symphonic arrangements of exotic flowers, - and embroidered cloths, and antique plate of gold and silver. - Indeed, there were many, especially among the very young men, who saw, - or fancied that they saw, in Dorian Gray the true realization - of a type of which they had often dreamed in Eton or Oxford days, - a type that was to combine something of the real culture of the scholar - with all the grace and distinction and perfect manner of a citizen - of the world. To them he seemed to be of the company of those whom - Dante describes as having sought to "make themselves perfect - by the worship of beauty." Like Gautier, he was one for whom "the - visible world existed."</p> -<p>And, certainly, to him life itself was the first, the greatest, - of the arts, and for it all the other arts seemed to be but - a preparation. Fashion, by which what is really fantastic - becomes for a moment universal, and dandyism, which, in its - own way, is an attempt to assert the absolute modernity - of beauty, had, of course, their fascination for him. - His mode of dressing, and the particular styles that from time - to time he affected, had their marked influence on the young - exquisites of the Mayfair balls and Pall Mall club windows, - who copied him in everything that he did, and tried to reproduce - the accidental charm of his graceful, though to him only - half-serious, fopperies.</p> -<p>For, while he was but too ready to accept the position that - was almost immediately offered to him on his coming of age, - and found, indeed, a subtle pleasure in the thought that he might - really become to the London of his own day what to imperial - Neronian Rome the author of the Satyricon once had been, - yet in his inmost heart he desired to be something more than a mere - arbiter elegantiarum, to be consulted on the wearing of a jewel, - or the knotting of a necktie, or the conduct of a cane. - He sought to elaborate some new scheme of life that would have - its reasoned philosophy and its ordered principles, and find - in the spiritualizing of the senses its highest realization.</p> -<p>The worship of the senses has often, and with much justice, - been decried, men feeling a natural instinct of terror about - passions and sensations that seem stronger than themselves, - and that they are conscious of sharing with the less highly - organized forms of existence. But it appeared to Dorian Gray - that the true nature of the senses had never been understood, - and that they had remained savage and animal merely because - the world had sought to starve them into submission or to kill - them by pain, instead of aiming at making them elements - of a new spirituality, of which a fine instinct for beauty was - to be the dominant characteristic. As he looked back upon man - moving through history, he was haunted by a feeling of loss. - So much had been surrendered! and to such little purpose! - There had been mad wilful rejections, monstrous forms - of self-torture and self-denial, whose origin was fear - and whose result was a degradation infinitely more terrible - than that fancied degradation from which, in their ignorance, - they had sought to escape; Nature, in her wonderful irony, - driving out the anchorite to feed with the wild animals of - the desert and giving to the hermit the beasts of the field as - his companions.</p> -<p>Yes: there was to be, as Lord Henry had prophesied, a new Hedonism - that was to recreate life and to save it from that harsh uncomely - puritanism that is having, in our own day, its curious revival. - It was to have its service of the intellect, certainly, yet it was - never to accept any theory or system that would involve the sacrifice - of any mode of passionate experience. Its aim, indeed, was to be - experience itself, and not the fruits of experience, sweet or bitter - as they might be. Of the asceticism that deadens the senses, - as of the vulgar profligacy that dulls them, it was to know nothing. - But it was to teach man to concentrate himself upon the moments of a life - that is itself but a moment.</p> -<p>There are few of us who have not sometimes wakened before dawn, - either after one of those dreamless nights that make us almost - enamoured of death, or one of those nights of horror and misshapen joy, - when through the chambers of the brain sweep phantoms more terrible - than reality itself, and instinct with that vivid life that lurks - in all grotesques, and that lends to Gothic art its enduring vitality, - this art being, one might fancy, especially the art of those whose - minds have been troubled with the malady of reverie. Gradually white - fingers creep through the curtains, and they appear to tremble. - In black fantastic shapes, dumb shadows crawl into the corners - of the room and crouch there. Outside, there is the stirring - of birds among the leaves, or the sound of men going forth - to their work, or the sigh and sob of the wind coming down from - the hills and wandering round the silent house, as though it feared - to wake the sleepers and yet must needs call forth sleep from - her purple cave. Veil after veil of thin dusky gauze is lifted, - and by degrees the forms and colours of things are restored to them, - and we watch the dawn remaking the world in its antique pattern. - The wan mirrors get back their mimic life. The flameless tapers - stand where we had left them, and beside them lies the half-cut book - that we had been studying, or the wired flower that we had worn at - the ball, or the letter that we had been afraid to read, or that we - had read too often. Nothing seems to us changed. Out of the unreal - shadows of the night comes back the real life that we had known. - We have to resume it where we had left off, and there steals over us - a terrible sense of the necessity for the continuance of energy - in the same wearisome round of stereotyped habits, or a wild longing, - it may be, that our eyelids might open some morning upon a world - that had been refashioned anew in the darkness for our pleasure, - a world in which things would have fresh shapes and colours, - and be changed, or have other secrets, a world in which the past - would have little or no place, or survive, at any rate, - in no conscious form of obligation or regret, the remembrance - even of joy having its bitterness and the memories of pleasure - their pain.</p> -<p>It was the creation of such worlds as these that seemed to Dorian - Gray to be the true object, or amongst the true objects, of life; - and in his search for sensations that would be at once new and delightful, - and possess that element of strangeness that is so essential to romance, - he would often adopt certain modes of thought that he knew to be really - alien to his nature, abandon himself to their subtle influences, - and then, having, as it were, caught their colour and satisfied his - intellectual curiosity, leave them with that curious indifference - that is not incompatible with a real ardour of temperament, and that, - indeed, according to certain modern psychologists, is often a condition - of it.</p> -<p>It was rumoured of him once that he was about to join the Roman - Catholic communion, and certainly the Roman ritual had always - a great attraction for him. The daily sacrifice, more awful - really than all the sacrifices of the antique world, stirred him - as much by its superb rejection of the evidence of the senses - as by the primitive simplicity of its elements and the eternal - pathos of the human tragedy that it sought to symbolize. He loved - to kneel down on the cold marble pavement and watch the priest, - in his stiff flowered dalmatic, slowly and with white hands moving - aside the veil of the tabernacle, or raising aloft the jewelled, - lantern-shaped monstrance with that pallid wafer that at times, - one would fain think, is indeed the "panis caelestis," the bread - of angels, or, robed in the garments of the Passion of Christ, - breaking the Host into the chalice and smiting his breast for his sins. - The fuming censers that the grave boys, in their lace and scarlet, - tossed into the air like great gilt flowers had their subtle - fascination for him. As he passed out, he used to look with wonder - at the black confessionals and long to sit in the dim shadow of one - of them and listen to men and women whispering through the worn - grating the true story of their lives.</p> -<p>But he never fell into the error of arresting his intellectual development - by any formal acceptance of creed or system, or of mistaking, for a house - in which to live, an inn that is but suitable for the sojourn of a night, - or for a few hours of a night in which there are no stars and the moon is - in travail. Mysticism, with its marvellous power of making common things - strange to us, and the subtle antinomianism that always seems to accompany it, - moved him for a season; and for a season he inclined to the materialistic - doctrines of the Darwinismus movement in Germany, and found a curious pleasure - in tracing the thoughts and passions of men to some pearly cell in the brain, - or some white nerve in the body, delighting in the conception of the absolute - dependence of the spirit on certain physical conditions, morbid or healthy, - normal or diseased. Yet, as has been said of him before, no theory of life - seemed to him to be of any importance compared with life itself. He felt - keenly conscious of how barren all intellectual speculation is when separated - from action and experiment. He knew that the senses, no less than the soul, - have their spiritual mysteries to reveal.</p> -<p>And so he would now study perfumes and the secrets of their manufacture, distilling - heavily scented oils and burning odorous gums from the East. He saw that there - was no mood of the mind that had not its counterpart in the sensuous life, and - set himself to discover their true relations, wondering what there was in frankincense - that made one mystical, and in ambergris that stirred one's passions, and in - violets that woke the memory of dead romances, and in musk that troubled the - brain, and in champak that stained the imagination; and seeking often to elaborate - a real psychology of perfumes, and to estimate the several influences of sweet-smelling - roots and scented, pollen-laden flowers; of aromatic balms and of dark and fragrant - woods; of spikenard, that sickens; of hovenia, that makes men mad; and of aloes, - that are said to be able to expel melancholy from the soul.</p> -<p>At another time he devoted himself entirely to music, and in a long - latticed room, with a vermilion-and-gold ceiling and walls of olive-green - lacquer, he used to give curious concerts in which mad gipsies tore wild - music from little zithers, or grave, yellow-shawled Tunisians plucked - at the strained strings of monstrous lutes, while grinning Negroes - beat monotonously upon copper drums and, crouching upon scarlet mats, - slim turbaned Indians blew through long pipes of reed or brass and charmed-- - or feigned to charm--great hooded snakes and horrible horned adders. - The harsh intervals and shrill discords of barbaric music stirred - him at times when Schubert's grace, and Chopin's beautiful sorrows, - and the mighty harmonies of Beethoven himself, fell unheeded on his ear. - He collected together from all parts of the world the strangest instruments - that could be found, either in the tombs of dead nations or among the few - savage tribes that have survived contact with Western civilizations, - and loved to touch and try them. He had the mysterious juruparis of the Rio - Negro Indians, that women are not allowed to look at and that even youths - may not see till they have been subjected to fasting and scourging, - and the earthen jars of the Peruvians that have the shrill cries of birds, - and flutes of human bones such as Alfonso de Ovalle heard in Chile, - and the sonorous green jaspers that are found near Cuzco and give forth - a note of singular sweetness. He had painted gourds filled with pebbles - that rattled when they were shaken; the long clarin of the Mexicans, - into which the performer does not blow, but through which he inhales - the air; the harsh ture of the Amazon tribes, that is sounded by - the sentinels who sit all day long in high trees, and can be heard, - it is said, at a distance of three leagues; the teponaztli, that has - two vibrating tongues of wood and is beaten with sticks that are - smeared with an elastic gum obtained from the milky juice of plants; - the yotl-bells of the Aztecs, that are hung in clusters like grapes; - and a huge cylindrical drum, covered with the skins of great serpents, - like the one that Bernal Diaz saw when he went with Cortes into the Mexican - temple, and of whose doleful sound he has left us so vivid a description. - The fantastic character of these instruments fascinated him, and he felt - a curious delight in the thought that art, like Nature, has her monsters, - things of bestial shape and with hideous voices. Yet, after some time, - he wearied of them, and would sit in his box at the opera, either alone - or with Lord Henry, listening in rapt pleasure to "Tannhauser" and - seeing - in the prelude to that great work of art a presentation of the tragedy of - his own soul.</p> -<p>On one occasion he took up the study of jewels, and appeared - at a costume ball as Anne de Joyeuse, Admiral of France, - in a dress covered with five hundred and sixty pearls. - This taste enthralled him for years, and, indeed, may be said - never to have left him. He would often spend a whole day - settling and resettling in their cases the various stones that he - had collected, such as the olive-green chrysoberyl that turns red - by lamplight, the cymophane with its wirelike line of silver, - the pistachio-coloured peridot, rose-pink and wine-yellow topazes, - carbuncles of fiery scarlet with tremulous, four-rayed stars, - flame-red cinnamon-stones, orange and violet spinels, - and amethysts with their alternate layers of ruby and sapphire. - He loved the red gold of the sunstone, and the moonstone's - pearly whiteness, and the broken rainbow of the milky opal. - He procured from Amsterdam three emeralds of extraordinary size and - richness of colour, and had a turquoise de la vieille roche that was - the envy of all the connoisseurs.</p> -<p>He discovered wonderful stories, also, about jewels. - In Alphonso's Clericalis Disciplina a serpent was mentioned with - eyes of real jacinth, and in the romantic history of Alexander, - the Conqueror of Emathia was said to have found in the vale of Jordan - snakes "with collars of real emeralds growing on their backs." - There was a gem in the brain of the dragon, Philostratus told us, - and "by the exhibition of golden letters and a scarlet robe" - the monster could be thrown into a magical sleep and slain. - According to the great alchemist, Pierre de Boniface, the diamond - rendered a man invisible, and the agate of India made him eloquent. - The cornelian appeased anger, and the hyacinth provoked sleep, - and the amethyst drove away the fumes of wine. The garnet cast - out demons, and the hydropicus deprived the moon of her colour. - The selenite waxed and waned with the moon, and the meloceus, - that discovers thieves, could be affected only by the blood of kids. - Leonardus Camillus had seen a white stone taken from the brain of a newly - killed toad, that was a certain antidote against poison. The bezoar, - that was found in the heart of the Arabian deer, was a charm that could - cure the plague. In the nests of Arabian birds was the aspilates, - that, according to Democritus, kept the wearer from any danger - by fire.</p> -<p>The King of Ceilan rode through his city with a large ruby in his hand, - as the ceremony of his coronation. The gates of the palace of John - the Priest were "made of sardius, with the horn of the horned - snake inwrought, so that no man might bring poison within." - Over the gable were "two golden apples, in which were two carbuncles," - so that the gold might shine by day and the carbuncles by night. - In Lodge's strange romance 'A Margarite of America', it was stated - that in the chamber of the queen one could behold "all the chaste - ladies of the world, inchased out of silver, looking through fair - mirrours of chrysolites, carbuncles, sapphires, and greene emeraults." - Marco Polo had seen the inhabitants of Zipangu place rose-coloured - pearls in the mouths of the dead. A sea-monster had been - enamoured of the pearl that the diver brought to King Perozes, - and had slain the thief, and mourned for seven moons over its loss. - When the Huns lured the king into the great pit, he flung it away-- - Procopius tells the story--nor was it ever found again, - though the Emperor Anastasius offered five hundred-weight of gold - pieces for it. The King of Malabar had shown to a certain Venetian - a rosary of three hundred and four pearls, one for every god that - he worshipped.</p> -<p>When the Duke de Valentinois, son of Alexander VI, visited Louis XII - of France, his horse was loaded with gold leaves, according to Brantome, - and his cap had double rows of rubies that threw out a great light. - Charles of England had ridden in stirrups hung with four hundred and - twenty-one diamonds. Richard II had a coat, valued at thirty thousand marks, - which was covered with balas rubies. Hall described Henry VIII, - on his way to the Tower previous to his coronation, as wearing "a - jacket of raised gold, the placard embroidered with diamonds and other - rich stones, and a great bauderike about his neck of large balasses." - The favourites of James I wore ear-rings of emeralds set in gold filigrane. - Edward II gave to Piers Gaveston a suit of red-gold armour studded - with jacinths, a collar of gold roses set with turquoise-stones, and a - skull-cap parseme with pearls. Henry II wore jewelled gloves reaching - to the elbow, and had a hawk-glove sewn with twelve rubies and fifty-two - great orients. The ducal hat of Charles the Rash, the last Duke - of Burgundy of his race, was hung with pear-shaped pearls and studded - with sapphires.</p> -<p>How exquisite life had once been! How gorgeous in its pomp and decoration! - Even to read of the luxury of the dead was wonderful.</p> -<p>Then he turned his attention to embroideries and to the tapestries - that performed the office of frescoes in the chill rooms of - the northern nations of Europe. As he investigated the subject-- - and he always had an extraordinary faculty of becoming absolutely - absorbed for the moment in whatever he took up--he was almost - saddened by the reflection of the ruin that time brought on - beautiful and wonderful things. He, at any rate, had escaped that. - Summer followed summer, and the yellow jonquils bloomed and died - many times, and nights of horror repeated the story of their shame, - but he was unchanged. No winter marred his face or stained his - flowerlike bloom. How different it was with material things! - Where had they passed to? Where was the great crocus-coloured robe, - on which the gods fought against the giants, that had been worked - by brown girls for the pleasure of Athena? Where the huge - velarium that Nero had stretched across the Colosseum at Rome, - that Titan sail of purple on which was represented the starry sky, - and Apollo driving a chariot drawn by white, gilt-reined steeds? - He longed to see the curious table-napkins wrought for the Priest - of the Sun, on which were displayed all the dainties and viands that - could be wanted for a feast; the mortuary cloth of King Chilperic, - with its three hundred golden bees; the fantastic robes that excited - the indignation of the Bishop of Pontus and were figured with - "lions, panthers, bears, dogs, forests, rocks, hunters--all, in fact, - that a painter can copy from nature"; and the coat that Charles - of Orleans once wore, on the sleeves of which were embroidered - the verses of a song beginning "Madame, je suis tout joyeux," - the musical accompaniment of the words being wrought in gold thread, - and each note, of square shape in those days, formed with four pearls. - He read of the room that was prepared at the palace at Rheims for - the use of Queen Joan of Burgundy and was decorated with "thirteen - hundred and twenty-one parrots, made in broidery, and blazoned - with the king's arms, and five hundred and sixty-one butterflies, - whose wings were similarly ornamented with the arms of the queen, - the whole worked in gold." Catherine de Medicis had a mourning-bed - made for her of black velvet powdered with crescents and suns. - Its curtains were of damask, with leafy wreaths and garlands, - figured upon a gold and silver ground, and fringed along the edges - with broideries of pearls, and it stood in a room hung with rows - of the queen's devices in cut black velvet upon cloth of silver. - Louis XIV had gold embroidered caryatides fifteen feet high - in his apartment. The state bed of Sobieski, King of Poland, - was made of Smyrna gold brocade embroidered in turquoises with verses - from the Koran. Its supports were of silver gilt, beautifully chased, - and profusely set with enamelled and jewelled medallions. - It had been taken from the Turkish camp before Vienna, and the - standard of Mohammed had stood beneath the tremulous gilt of its - canopy.</p> -<p>And so, for a whole year, he sought to accumulate the most exquisite - specimens that he could find of textile and embroidered work, - getting the dainty Delhi muslins, finely wrought with gold-thread palmates - and stitched over with iridescent beetles' wings; the Dacca gauzes, - that from their transparency are known in the East as "woven air," - and "running water," and "evening dew"; strange figured - cloths from Java; - elaborate yellow Chinese hangings; books bound in tawny satins or fair blue - silks and wrought with fleurs-de-lis, birds and images; veils of lacis - worked in Hungary point; Sicilian brocades and stiff Spanish velvets; - Georgian work, with its gilt coins, and Japanese Foukousas, with their - green-toned golds and their marvellously plumaged birds.</p> -<p>He had a special passion, also, for ecclesiastical vestments, - as indeed he had for everything connected with the service - of the Church. In the long cedar chests that lined the west - gallery of his house, he had stored away many rare and beautiful - specimens of what is really the raiment of the Bride of Christ, - who must wear purple and jewels and fine linen that she may - hide the pallid macerated body that is worn by the suffering - that she seeks for and wounded by self-inflicted pain. - He possessed a gorgeous cope of crimson silk and gold-thread damask, - figured with a repeating pattern of golden pomegranates set - in six-petalled formal blossoms, beyond which on either side - was the pine-apple device wrought in seed-pearls. The orphreys - were divided into panels representing scenes from the life - of the Virgin, and the coronation of the Virgin was figured - in coloured silks upon the hood. This was Italian work - of the fifteenth century. Another cope was of green velvet, - embroidered with heart-shaped groups of acanthus-leaves, from - which spread long-stemmed white blossoms, the details of which - were picked out with silver thread and coloured crystals. - The morse bore a seraph's head in gold-thread raised work. - The orphreys were woven in a diaper of red and gold silk, - and were starred with medallions of many saints and martyrs, - among whom was St. Sebastian. He had chasubles, also, - of amber-coloured silk, and blue silk and gold brocade, - and yellow silk damask and cloth of gold, figured with - representations of the Passion and Crucifixion of Christ, - and embroidered with lions and peacocks and other emblems; - dalmatics of white satin and pink silk damask, decorated with - tulips and dolphins and fleurs-de-lis; altar frontals - of crimson velvet and blue linen; and many corporals, - chalice-veils, and sudaria. In the mystic offices to which - such things were put, there was something that quickened - his imagination.</p> -<p>For these treasures, and everything that he collected in his lovely house, - were to be to him means of forgetfulness, modes by which he could escape, - for a season, from the fear that seemed to him at times to be almost too - great to be borne. Upon the walls of the lonely locked room where he had - spent so much of his boyhood, he had hung with his own hands the terrible - portrait whose changing features showed him the real degradation of his life, - and in front of it had draped the purple-and-gold pall as a curtain. - For weeks he would not go there, would forget the hideous painted thing, - and get back his light heart, his wonderful joyousness, his passionate - absorption in mere existence. Then, suddenly, some night he would creep - out of the house, go down to dreadful places near Blue Gate Fields, - and stay there, day after day, until he was driven away. On his return - he would sit in front of the her times, with that pride of individualism - that is half the fascination of sin, and smiling with secret pleasure - at the misshapen shadow that had to bear the burden that should have been - his own.</p> -<p>After a few years he could not endure to be long out of England, - and gave up the villa that he had shared at Trouville with Lord Henry, - as well as the little white walled-in house at Algiers where they - had more than once spent the winter. He hated to be separated from - the picture that was such a part of his life, and was also afraid - that during his absence some one might gain access to the room, - in spite of the elaborate bars that he had caused to be placed upon - the door.</p> -<p>He was quite conscious that this would tell them nothing. - It was true that the portrait still preserved, under all - the foulness and ugliness of the face, its marked likeness - to himself; but what could they learn from that? He would laugh - at any one who tried to taunt him. He had not painted it. - What was it to him how vile and full of shame it looked? - Even if he told them, would they believe it?</p> -<p>Yet he was afraid. Sometimes when he was down at his great house - in Nottinghamshire, entertaining the fashionable young men of his - own rank who were his chief companions, and astounding the county - by the wanton luxury and gorgeous splendour of his mode of life, - he would suddenly leave his guests and rush back to town to see - that the door had not been tampered with and that the picture was - still there. What if it should be stolen? The mere thought made - him cold with horror. Surely the world would know his secret then. - Perhaps the world already suspected it.</p> -<p>For, while he fascinated many, there were not a few who distrusted him. - He was very nearly blackballed at a West End club of which his birth - and social position fully entitled him to become a member, and it - was said that on one occasion, when he was brought by a friend into - the smoking-room of the Churchill, the Duke of Berwick and another - gentleman got up in a marked manner and went out. Curious stories - became current about him after he had passed his twenty-fifth year. - It was rumoured that he had been seen brawling with foreign sailors - in a low den in the distant parts of Whitechapel, and that he consorted - with thieves and coiners and knew the mysteries of their trade. - His extraordinary absences became notorious, and, when he used to reappear - again in society, men would whisper to each other in corners, or pass him - with a sneer, or look at him with cold searching eyes, as though they - were determined to discover his secret.</p> -<p>Of such insolences and attempted slights he, of course, - took no notice, and in the opinion of most people his frank - debonair manner, his charming boyish smile, and the infinite - grace of that wonderful youth that seemed never to leave him, - were in themselves a sufficient answer to the calumnies, - for so they termed them, that were circulated about him. - It was remarked, however, that some of those who had been - most intimate with him appeared, after a time, to shun him. - Women who had wildly adored him, and for his sake had braved - all social censure and set convention at defiance, were seen - to grow pallid with shame or horror if Dorian Gray entered - the room.</p> -<p>Yet these whispered scandals only increased in the eyes of many - his strange and dangerous charm. His great wealth was a certain - element of security. Society--civilized society, at least-- - is never very ready to believe anything to the detriment of those - who are both rich and fascinating. It feels instinctively that - manners are of more importance than morals, and, in its opinion, - the highest respectability is of much less value than the possession - of a good chef. And, after all, it is a very poor consolation - to be told that the man who has given one a bad dinner, - or poor wine, is irreproachable in his private life. - Even the cardinal virtues cannot atone for half-cold entrees, - as Lord Henry remarked once, in a discussion on the subject, - and there is possibly a good deal to be said for his view. - For the canons of good society are, or should be, the same - as the canons of art. Form is absolutely essential to it. - It should have the dignity of a ceremony, as well as - its unreality, and should combine the insincere character - of a romantic play with the wit and beauty that make such plays - delightful to us. Is insincerity such a terrible thing? - I think not. It is merely a method by which we can multiply - our personalities.</p> -<p>Such, at any rate, was Dorian Gray's opinion. He used to wonder - at the shallow psychology of those who conceive the ego in man - as a thing simple, permanent, reliable, and of one essence. - To him, man was a being with myriad lives and myriad sensations, - a complex multiform creature that bore within itself strange - legacies of thought and passion, and whose very flesh was tainted - with the monstrous maladies of the dead. He loved to stroll - through the gaunt cold picture-gallery of his country house and look - at the various portraits of those whose blood flowed in his veins. - Here was Philip Herbert, described by Francis Osborne, - in his Memoires on the Reigns of Queen Elizabeth and King James, - as one who was "caressed by the Court for his handsome face, - which kept him not long company." Was it young Herbert's - life that he sometimes led? Had some strange poisonous - germ crept from body to body till it had reached his own? - Was it some dim sense of that ruined grace that had made - him so suddenly, and almost without cause, give utterance, - in Basil Hallward's studio, to the mad prayer that had so changed - his life? Here, in gold-embroidered red doublet, jewelled surcoat, - and gilt-edged ruff and wristbands, stood Sir Anthony Sherard, - with his silver-and-black armour piled at his feet. - What had this man's legacy been? Had the lover of Giovanna - of Naples bequeathed him some inheritance of sin and shame? - Were his own actions merely the dreams that the dead man - had not dared to realize? Here, from the fading canvas, - smiled Lady Elizabeth Devereux, in her gauze hood, pearl stomacher, - and pink slashed sleeves. A flower was in her right hand, - and her left clasped an enamelled collar of white and damask roses. - On a table by her side lay a mandolin and an apple. - There were large green rosettes upon her little pointed shoes. - He knew her life, and the strange stories that were told about - her lovers. Had he something of her temperament in him? These oval, - heavy-lidded eyes seemed to look curiously at him. What of - George Willoughby, with his powdered hair and fantastic patches? - How evil he looked! The face was saturnine and swarthy, - and the sensual lips seemed to be twisted with disdain. - Delicate lace ruffles fell over the lean yellow hands that - were so overladen with rings. He had been a macaroni of the - eighteenth century, and the friend, in his youth, of Lord Ferrars. - What of the second Lord Beckenham, the companion of the Prince - Regent in his wildest days, and one of the witnesses at - the secret marriage with Mrs. Fitzherbert? How proud and - handsome he was, with his chestnut curls and insolent pose! - What passions had he bequeathed? The world had looked upon - him as infamous. He had led the orgies at Carlton House. - The star of the Garter glittered upon his breast. Beside him hung - the portrait of his wife, a pallid, thin-lipped woman in black. - Her blood, also, stirred within him. How curious it all seemed! - And his mother with her Lady Hamilton face and her moist, - wine-dashed lips--he knew what he had got from her. - He had got from her his beauty, and his passion for the beauty - of others. She laughed at him in her loose Bacchante dress. - There were vine leaves in her hair. The purple spilled - from the cup she was holding. The carnations of the painting - had withered, but the eyes were still wonderful in their depth - and brilliancy of colour. They seemed to follow him wherever he - went.</p> -<p>Yet one had ancestors in literature as well as in one's own race, - nearer perhaps in type and temperament, many of them, and certainly - with an influence of which one was more absolutely conscious. - There were times when it appeared to Dorian Gray that the whole - of history was merely the record of his own life, not as he had lived - it in act and circumstance, but as his imagination had created - it for him, as it had been in his brain and in his passions. - He felt that he had known them all, those strange terrible figures - that had passed across the stage of the world and made sin so marvellous - and evil so full of subtlety. It seemed to him that in some mysterious - way their lives had been his own.</p> -<p>The hero of the wonderful novel that had so influenced his life had - himself known this curious fancy. In the seventh chapter he tells how, - crowned with laurel, lest lightning might strike him, he had sat, - as Tiberius, in a garden at Capri, reading the shameful books - of Elephantis, while dwarfs and peacocks strutted round him and - the flute-player mocked the swinger of the censer; and, as Caligula, - had caroused with the green-shirted jockeys in their stables and supped - in an ivory manger with a jewel-frontleted horse; and, as Domitian, - had wandered through a corridor lined with marble mirrors, - looking round with haggard eyes for the reflection of the dagger - that was to end his days, and sick with that ennui, that terrible - taedium vitae, that comes on those to whom life denies nothing; - and had peered through a clear emerald at the red shambles of the circus - and then, in a litter of pearl and purple drawn by silver-shod mules, - been carried through the Street of Pomegranates to a House of Gold - and heard men cry on Nero Caesar as he passed by; and, as Elagabalus, - had painted his face with colours, and plied the distaff among the women, - and brought the Moon from Carthage and given her in mystic marriage - to the Sun.</p> -<p>Over and over again Dorian used to read this fantastic chapter, - and the two chapters immediately following, in which, as in some - curious tapestries or cunningly wrought enamels, were pictured - the awful and beautiful forms of those whom vice and blood - and weariness had made monstrous or mad: Filippo, Duke of Milan, - who slew his wife and painted her lips with a scarlet poison - that her lover might suck death from the dead thing he fondled; - Pietro Barbi, the Venetian, known as Paul the Second, - who sought in his vanity to assume the title of Formosus, - and whose tiara, valued at two hundred thousand florins, - was bought at the price of a terrible sin; Gian Maria Visconti, - who used hounds to chase living men and whose murdered - body was covered with roses by a harlot who had loved him; - the Borgia on his white horse, with Fratricide riding beside - him and his mantle stained with the blood of Perotto; - Pietro Riario, the young Cardinal Archbishop of Florence, - child and minion of Sixtus IV, whose beauty was equalled only by - his debauchery, and who received Leonora of Aragon in a pavilion - of white and crimson silk, filled with nymphs and centaurs, - and gilded a boy that he might serve at the feast as Ganymede - or Hylas; Ezzelin, whose melancholy could be cured only by - the spectacle of death, and who had a passion for red blood, - as other men have for red wine--the son of the Fiend, - as was reported, and one who had cheated his father at dice - when gambling with him for his own soul; Giambattista Cibo, - who in mockery took the name of Innocent and into whose torpid - veins the blood of three lads was infused by a Jewish doctor; - Sigismondo Malatesta, the lover of Isotta and the lord of Rimini, - whose effigy was burned at Rome as the enemy of God and man, - who strangled Polyssena with a napkin, and gave poison - to Ginevra d'Este in a cup of emerald, and in honour of a - shameful passion built a pagan church for Christian worship; - Charles VI, who had so wildly adored his brother's wife that a - leper had warned him of the insanity that was coming on him, - and who, when his brain had sickened and grown strange, - could only be soothed by Saracen cards painted with the images - of love and death and madness; and, in his trimmed jerkin - and jewelled cap and acanthuslike curls, Grifonetto Baglioni, - who slew Astorre with his bride, and Simonetto with his page, - and whose comeliness was such that, as he lay dying - in the yellow piazza of Perugia, those who had hated him - could not choose but weep, and Atalanta, who had cursed him, - blessed him.</p> -<p>There was a horrible fascination in them all. He saw them - at night, and they troubled his imagination in the day. - The Renaissance knew of strange manners of poisoning-- - poisoning by a helmet and a lighted torch, by an embroidered glove - and a jewelled fan, by a gilded pomander and by an amber chain. - Dorian Gray had been poisoned by a book. There were moments when - he looked on evil simply as a mode through which he could realize - his conception of the beautiful.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 12</p> -<p>It was on the ninth of November, the eve of his own thirty-eighth birthday, - as he often remembered afterwards.</p> -<p>He was walking home about eleven o'clock from Lord Henry's, where he had been - dining, and was wrapped in heavy furs, as the night was cold and foggy. At the - corner of Grosvenor Square and South Audley Street, a man passed him in the - mist, walking very fast and with the collar of his grey ulster turned up. He - had a bag in his hand. Dorian recognized him. It was Basil Hallward. A strange - sense of fear, for which he could not account, came over him. He made no sign - of recognition and went on quickly in the direction of his own house.</p> -<p>But Hallward had seen him. Dorian heard him first stopping - on the pavement and then hurrying after him. In a few moments, - his hand was on his arm.</p> -<p>"Dorian! What an extraordinary piece of luck! I have been - waiting for you in your library ever since nine o'clock. Finally - I took pity on your tired servant and told him to go to bed, - as he let me out. I am off to Paris by the midnight train, - and I particularly wanted to see you before I left. - I thought it was you, or rather your fur coat, as you passed me. - But I wasn't quite sure. Didn't you recognize me?"</p> -<p>"In this fog, my dear Basil? Why, I can't even recognize Grosvenor Square. - I believe my house is somewhere about here, but I don't feel at all certain - about it. I am sorry you are going away, as I have not seen you for ages. - But I suppose you will be back soon?"</p> -<p>"No: I am going to be out of England for six months. - I intend to take a studio in Paris and shut myself up till I have - finished a great picture I have in my head. However, it wasn't - about myself I wanted to talk. Here we are at your door. - Let me come in for a moment. I have something to say - to you."</p> -<p>"I shall be charmed. But won't you miss your train?" said Dorian - Gray - languidly as he passed up the steps and opened the door with his latch-key.</p> -<p>The lamplight struggled out through the fog, and Hallward looked - at his watch. "I have heaps of time," he answered. "The train - doesn't go till twelve-fifteen, and it is only just eleven. - In fact, I was on my way to the club to look for you, when I met you. - You see, I shan't have any delay about luggage, as I have sent on my - heavy things. All I have with me is in this bag, and I can easily - get to Victoria in twenty minutes."</p> -<p>Dorian looked at him and smiled. "What a way for a fashionable - painter to travel! A Gladstone bag and an ulster! Come in, - or the fog will get into the house. And mind you don't - talk about anything serious. Nothing is serious nowadays. - At least nothing should be."</p> -<p>Hallward shook his head, as he entered, and followed Dorian into the library. - There was a bright wood fire blazing in the large open hearth. The lamps - were lit, and an open Dutch silver spirit-case stood, with some siphons of - soda-water and large cut-glass tumblers, on a little marqueterie table.</p> -<p>"You see your servant made me quite at home, Dorian. He gave me - everything I wanted, including your best gold-tipped cigarettes. - He is a most hospitable creature. I like him much better than - the Frenchman you used to have. What has become of the Frenchman, - by the bye?"</p> -<p>Dorian shrugged his shoulders. "I believe he married Lady Radley's maid, - and has established her in Paris as an English dressmaker. Anglomania is - very fashionable over there now, I hear. It seems silly of the French, - doesn't it? But--do you know?--he was not at all a bad servant. - I never liked him, but I had nothing to complain about. One often - imagines things that are quite absurd. He was really very devoted to me - and seemed quite sorry when he went away. Have another brandy-and-soda? Or - would you like hock-and-seltzer? I always take hock-and-seltzer myself. - There is sure to be some in the next room."</p> -<p>"Thanks, I won't have anything more," said the painter, - taking his cap and coat off and throwing them on the bag - that he had placed in the corner. "And now, my dear fellow, - I want to speak to you seriously. Don't frown like that. - You make it so much more difficult for me."</p> -<p>"What is it all about?" cried Dorian in his petulant way, - flinging himself down on the sofa. "I hope it is not about myself. - I am tired of myself to-night. I should like to be somebody else."</p> -<p>"It is about yourself," answered Hallward in his grave deep voice, - "and I must say it to you. I shall only keep you half an hour."</p> -<p>Dorian sighed and lit a cigarette. "Half an hour!" he murmured.</p> -<p>"It is not much to ask of you, Dorian, and it is entirely for your own - sake - that I am speaking. I think it right that you should know that the most - dreadful things are being said against you in London."</p> -<p>"I don't wish to know anything about them. I love scandals - about other people, but scandals about myself don't interest me. - They have not got the charm of novelty."</p> -<p>"They must interest you, Dorian. Every gentleman is interested - in his good name. You don't want people to talk of you as - something vile and degraded. Of course, you have your position, - and your wealth, and all that kind of thing. But position - and wealth are not everything. Mind you, I don't believe these - rumours at all. At least, I can't believe them when I see you. - Sin is a thing that writes itself across a man's face. - It cannot be concealed. People talk sometimes of secret vices. - There are no such things. If a wretched man has a vice, it shows - itself in the lines of his mouth, the droop of his eyelids, - the moulding of his hands even. Somebody--I won't mention his name, - but you know him--came to me last year to have his portrait done. - I had never seen him before, and had never heard anything - about him at the time, though I have heard a good deal since. - He offered an extravagant price. I refused him. - There was something in the shape of his fingers that I hated. - I know now that I was quite right in what I fancied about him. - His life is dreadful. But you, Dorian, with your pure, - bright, innocent face, and your marvellous untroubled youth-- - I can't believe anything against you. And yet I see you - very seldom, and you never come down to the studio now, - and when I am away from you, and I hear all these hideous things - that people are whispering about you, I don't know what to say. - Why is it, Dorian, that a man like the Duke of Berwick leaves - the room of a club when you enter it? Why is it that so many - gentlemen in London will neither go to your house or invite - you to theirs? You used to be a friend of Lord Staveley. - I met him at dinner last week. Your name happened to come up - in conversation, in connection with the miniatures you have lent - to the exhibition at the Dudley. Staveley curled his lip and said - that you might have the most artistic tastes, but that you - were a man whom no pure-minded girl should be allowed to know, - and whom no chaste woman should sit in the same room with. - I reminded him that I was a friend of yours, and asked him what - he meant. He told me. He told me right out before everybody. - It was horrible! Why is your friendship so fatal to young men? - There was that wretched boy in the Guards who committed suicide. - You were his great friend. There was Sir Henry Ashton, - who had to leave England with a tarnished name. You and - he were inseparable. What about Adrian Singleton and his - dreadful end? What about Lord Kent's only son and his career? - I met his father yesterday in St. James's Street. He seemed broken - with shame and sorrow. What about the young Duke of Perth? - What sort of life has he got now? What gentleman would associate with - him?"</p> -<p>"Stop, Basil. You are talking about things of which you know nothing," - said Dorian Gray, biting his lip, and with a note of infinite contempt - in his voice. "You ask me why Berwick leaves a room when I enter it. - It is because I know everything about his life, not because he knows - anything about mine. With such blood as he has in his veins, how could - his record be clean? You ask me about Henry Ashton and young Perth. - Did I teach the one his vices, and the other his debauchery? - If Kent's silly son takes his wife from the streets, what is that to me? - If Adrian Singleton writes his friend's name across a bill, am I his keeper? - I know how people chatter in England. The middle classes air their moral - prejudices over their gross dinner-tables, and whisper about what they - call the profligacies of their betters in order to try and pretend - that they are in smart society and on intimate terms with the people - they slander. In this country, it is enough for a man to have - distinction and brains for every common tongue to wag against him. - And what sort of lives do these people, who pose as being moral, - lead themselves? My dear fellow, you forget that we are in the native land - of the hypocrite."</p> -<p>"Dorian," cried Hallward, "that is not the question. - England is bad enough I know, and English society is all wrong. - That is the reason why I want you to be fine. You have not - been fine. One has a right to judge of a man by the effect - he has over his friends. Yours seem to lose all sense of honour, - of goodness, of purity. You have filled them with a madness - for pleasure. They have gone down into the depths. - You led them there. Yes: you led them there, and yet you - can smile, as you are smiling now. And there is worse behind. - I know you and Harry are inseparable. Surely for that reason, - if for none other, you should not have made his sister's name - a by-word."</p> -<p>"Take care, Basil. You go too far."</p> -<p>"I must speak, and you must listen. You shall listen. - When you met Lady Gwendolen, not a breath of scandal had ever - touched her. Is there a single decent woman in London now - who would drive with her in the park? Why, even her children - are not allowed to live with her. Then there are other stories-- - stories that you have been seen creeping at dawn out of dreadful - houses and slinking in disguise into the foulest dens in London. - Are they true? Can they be true? When I first heard them, - I laughed. I hear them now, and they make me shudder. - What about your country-house and the life that is - led there? Dorian, you don't know what is said about you. - I won't tell you that I don't want to preach to you. - I remember Harry saying once that every man who turned himself - into an amateur curate for the moment always began by saying that, - and then proceeded to break his word. I do want to preach to you. - I want you to lead such a life as will make the world respect you. - I want you to have a clean name and a fair record. - I want you to get rid of the dreadful people you associate with. - Don't shrug your shoulders like that. Don't be so indifferent. - You have a wonderful influence. Let it be for good, not for evil. - They say that you corrupt every one with whom you become intimate, - and that it is quite sufficient for you to enter a house - for shame of some kind to follow after. I don't know whether - it is so or not. How should I know? But it is said of you. - I am told things that it seems impossible to doubt. - Lord Gloucester was one of my greatest friends at Oxford. - He showed me a letter that his wife had written to him when she - was dying alone in her villa at Mentone. Your name was implicated - in the most terrible confession I ever read. I told him that it - was absurd--that I knew you thoroughly and that you were incapable - of anything of the kind. Know you? I wonder do I know you? - Before I could answer that, I should have to see your - soul."</p> -<p>"To see my soul!" muttered Dorian Gray, starting up from the sofa - and turning almost white from fear.</p> -<p>"Yes," answered Hallward gravely, and with deep-toned sorrow in his - voice, - "to see your soul. But only God can do that."</p> -<p>A bitter laugh of mockery broke from the lips of the younger man. - "You shall see it yourself, to-night!" he cried, seizing a - lamp from the table. "Come: it is your own handiwork. - Why shouldn't you look at it? You can tell the world all about - it afterwards, if you choose. Nobody would believe you. - If they did believe you, they would like me all the better for it. - I know the age better than you do, though you will prate - about it so tediously. Come, I tell you. You have chattered - enough about corruption. Now you shall look on it face - to face."</p> -<p>There was the madness of pride in every word he uttered. - He stamped his foot upon the ground in his boyish insolent manner. - He felt a terrible joy at the thought that some one else - was to share his secret, and that the man who had painted - the portrait that was the origin of all his shame was to be - burdened for the rest of his life with the hideous memory of what - he had done.</p> -<p>"Yes," he continued, coming closer to him and looking steadfastly - into his stern eyes, "I shall show you my soul. You shall see - the thing that you fancy only God can see."</p> -<p>Hallward started back. "This is blasphemy, Dorian!" he cried. - "You must not say things like that. They are horrible, and they - don't mean anything."</p> -<p>"You think so?" He laughed again.</p> -<p>"I know so. As for what I said to you to-night, I said it for your good. - You know I have been always a stanch friend to you."</p> -<p>"Don't touch me. Finish what you have to say."</p> -<p>A twisted flash of pain shot across the painter's face. - He paused for a moment, and a wild feeling of pity came over him. - After all, what right had he to pry into the life of Dorian Gray? - If he had done a tithe of what was rumoured about him, - how much he must have suffered! Then he straightened himself up, - and walked over to the fire-place, and stood there, looking at - the burning logs with their frostlike ashes and their throbbing cores - of flame.</p> -<p>"I am waiting, Basil," said the young man in a hard clear voice.</p> -<p>He turned round. "What I have to say is this," he cried. "You - must give - me some answer to these horrible charges that are made against you. - If you tell me that they are absolutely untrue from beginning to end, - I shall believe you. Deny them, Dorian, deny them! Can't you see what I - am going through? My God! don't tell me that you are bad, and corrupt, - and shameful."</p> -<p>Dorian Gray smiled. There was a curl of contempt in his lips. - "Come upstairs, Basil," he said quietly. "I keep a diary of my - life - from day to day, and it never leaves the room in which it is written. - I shall show it to you if you come with me."</p> -<p>"I shall come with you, Dorian, if you wish it. I see I have missed - my train. That makes no matter. I can go to-morrow. But don't ask me - to read anything to-night. All I want is a plain answer to my question."</p> -<p>"That shall be given to you upstairs. I could not give it here. - You will not have to read long."</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 13</p> -<p>He passed out of the room and began the ascent, Basil Hallward following - close behind. They walked softly, as men do instinctively at night. - The lamp cast fantastic shadows on the wall and staircase. A rising wind - made some of the windows rattle.</p> -<p>When they reached the top landing, Dorian set the lamp down - on the floor, and taking out the key, turned it in the lock. - "You insist on knowing, Basil?" he asked in a low voice.</p> -<p>"Yes."</p> -<p>"I am delighted," he answered, smiling. Then he added, - somewhat harshly, "You are the one man in the world who is - entitled to know everything about me. You have had more - to do with my life than you think"; and, taking up the lamp, - he opened the door and went in. A cold current of air passed them, - and the light shot up for a moment in a flame of murky orange. - He shuddered. "Shut the door behind you," he whispered, - as he placed the lamp on the table.</p> -<p>Hallward glanced round him with a puzzled expression. - The room looked as if it had not been lived in for years. - A faded Flemish tapestry, a curtained picture, an old - Italian cassone, and an almost empty book-case--that was all - that it seemed to contain, besides a chair and a table. - As Dorian Gray was lighting a half-burned candle that was - standing on the mantelshelf, he saw that the whole place - was covered with dust and that the carpet was in holes. - A mouse ran scuffling behind the wainscoting. There was a damp odour - of mildew.</p> -<p>"So you think that it is only God who sees the soul, Basil? - Draw that curtain back, and you will see mine."</p> -<p>The voice that spoke was cold and cruel. "You are mad, Dorian, or playing - a part," muttered Hallward, frowning.</p> -<p>"You won't? Then I must do it myself," said the young man, - and he tore the curtain from its rod and flung it on the ground.</p> -<p>An exclamation of horror broke from the painter's lips as he saw in the dim - light the hideous face on the canvas grinning at him. There was something in - its expression that filled him with disgust and loathing. Good heavens! it was - Dorian Gray's own face that he was looking at! The horror, whatever it was, - had not yet entirely spoiled that marvellous beauty. There was still some gold - in the thinning hair and some scarlet on the sensual mouth. The sodden eyes - had kept something of the loveliness of their blue, the noble curves had not - yet completely passed away from chiselled nostrils and from plastic throat. - Yes, it was Dorian himself. But who had done it? He seemed to recognize his - own brushwork, and the frame was his own design. The idea was monstrous, yet - he felt afraid. He seized the lighted candle, and held it to the picture. In - the left-hand corner was his own name, traced in long letters of bright vermilion.</p> -<p>It was some foul parody, some infamous ignoble satire. - He had never done that. Still, it was his own picture. - He knew it, and he felt as if his blood had changed - in a moment from fire to sluggish ice. His own picture! - What did it mean? Why had it altered? He turned and looked - at Dorian Gray with the eyes of a sick man. His mouth twitched, - and his parched tongue seemed unable to articulate. - He passed his hand across his forehead. It was dank with - clammy sweat.</p> -<p>The young man was leaning against the mantelshelf, watching him - with that strange expression that one sees on the faces of those - who are absorbed in a play when some great artist is acting. - There was neither real sorrow in it nor real joy. There was - simply the passion of the spectator, with perhaps a flicker - of triumph in his eyes. He had taken the flower out of his coat, - and was smelling it, or pretending to do so.</p> -<p>"What does this mean?" cried Hallward, at last. His own voice sounded - shrill and curious in his ears.</p> -<p>"Years ago, when I was a boy," said Dorian Gray, crushing the flower - in his hand, "you met me, flattered me, and taught me to be vain - of my good looks. One day you introduced me to a friend of yours, - who explained to me the wonder of youth, and you finished - a portrait of me that revealed to me the wonder of beauty. - In a mad moment that, even now, I don't know whether I regret - or not, I made a wish, perhaps you would call it a prayer. - . . ."</p> -<p>"I remember it! Oh, how well I remember it! No! the thing is impossible. - The room is damp. Mildew has got into the canvas. The paints I used had some - wretched mineral poison in them. I tell you the thing is impossible."</p> -<p>"Ah, what is impossible?" murmured the young man, going over to the - window - and leaning his forehead against the cold, mist-stained glass.</p> -<p>"You told me you had destroyed it."</p> -<p>"I was wrong. It has destroyed me."</p> -<p>"I don't believe it is my picture."</p> -<p>"Can't you see your ideal in it?" said Dorian bitterly.</p> -<p>"My ideal, as you call it. . ."</p> -<p>"As you called it."</p> -<p>"There was nothing evil in it, nothing shameful. You were to me such - an ideal as I shall never meet again. This is the face of a satyr."</p> -<p>"It is the face of my soul."</p> -<p>"Christ! what a thing I must have worshipped! It has the eyes of a devil."</p> -<p>"Each of us has heaven and hell in him, Basil," cried Dorian - with a wild gesture of despair.</p> -<p>Hallward turned again to the portrait and gazed at it. - "My God! If it is true," he exclaimed, "and this is - what you have done with your life, why, you must be worse - even than those who talk against you fancy you to be!" - He held the light up again to the canvas and examined it. - The surface seemed to be quite undisturbed and as he had left it. - It was from within, apparently, that the foulness and horror - had come. Through some strange quickening of inner life - the leprosies of sin were slowly eating the thing away. - The rotting of a corpse in a watery grave was not - so fearful.</p> -<p>His hand shook, and the candle fell from its socket on the floor - and lay there sputtering. He placed his foot on it and put it out. - Then he flung himself into the rickety chair that was standing by - the table and buried his face in his hands.</p> -<p>"Good God, Dorian, what a lesson! What an awful lesson!" - There was no answer, but he could hear the young man - sobbing at the window. "Pray, Dorian, pray," he murmured. - "What is it that one was taught to say in one's boyhood? - 'Lead us not into temptation. Forgive us our sins. - Wash away our iniquities.' Let us say that together. - The prayer of your pride has been answered. The prayer of your - repentance will be answered also. I worshipped you too much. - I am punished for it. You worshipped yourself too much. We are - both punished."</p> -<p>Dorian Gray turned slowly around and looked at him with tear-dimmed eyes. - "It is too late, Basil," he faltered.</p> -<p>"It is never too late, Dorian. Let us kneel down and try if we - cannot remember a prayer. Isn't there a verse somewhere, - 'Though your sins be as scarlet, yet I will make them as white - as snow'?"</p> -<p>"Those words mean nothing to me now."</p> -<p>"Hush! Don't say that. You have done enough evil in your life. - My God! Don't you see that accursed thing leering at us?"</p> -<p>Dorian Gray glanced at the picture, and suddenly an uncontrollable - feeling of hatred for Basil Hallward came over him, as though - it had been suggested to him by the image on the canvas, - whispered into his ear by those grinning lips. The mad - passions of a hunted animal stirred within him, and he loathed - the man who was seated at the table, more than in his whole - life he had ever loathed anything. He glanced wildly around. - Something glimmered on the top of the painted chest that - faced him. His eye fell on it. He knew what it was. - It was a knife that he had brought up, some days before, - to cut a piece of cord, and had forgotten to take away with him. - He moved slowly towards it, passing Hallward as he did so. - As soon as he got behind him, he seized it and turned round. - Hallward stirred in his chair as if he was going to rise. - He rushed at him and dug the knife into the great vein that is behind - the ear, crushing the man's head down on the table and stabbing again - and again.</p> -<p>There was a stifled groan and the horrible sound of some one choking - with blood. Three times the outstretched arms shot up convulsively, - waving grotesque, stiff-fingered hands in the air. He stabbed him twice more, - but the man did not move. Something began to trickle on the floor. - He waited for a moment, still pressing the head down. Then he threw - the knife on the table, and listened.</p> -<p>He could hear nothing, but the drip, drip on the threadbare carpet. - He opened the door and went out on the landing. The house was - absolutely quiet. No one was about. For a few seconds he stood - bending over the balustrade and peering down into the black seething - well of darkness. Then he took out the key and returned to the room, - locking himself in as he did so.</p> -<p>The thing was still seated in the chair, straining over the table - with bowed head, and humped back, and long fantastic arms. - Had it not been for the red jagged tear in the neck and the clotted - black pool that was slowly widening on the table, one would have said - that the man was simply asleep.</p> -<p>How quickly it had all been done! He felt strangely calm, and walking - over to the window, opened it and stepped out on the balcony. - The wind had blown the fog away, and the sky was like a monstrous - peacock's tail, starred with myriads of golden eyes. He looked - down and saw the policeman going his rounds and flashing the long - beam of his lantern on the doors of the silent houses. The crimson - spot of a prowling hansom gleamed at the corner and then vanished. - A woman in a fluttering shawl was creeping slowly by the railings, - staggering as she went. Now and then she stopped and peered back. - Once, she began to sing in a hoarse voice. The policeman strolled - over and said something to her. She stumbled away, laughing. - A bitter blast swept across the square. The gas-lamps flickered - and became blue, and the leafless trees shook their black iron - branches to and fro. He shivered and went back, closing the window - behind him.</p> -<p>Having reached the door, he turned the key and opened it. - He did not even glance at the murdered man. He felt that - the secret of the whole thing was not to realize the situation. - The friend who had painted the fatal portrait to which - all his misery had been due had gone out of his life. - That was enough.</p> -<p>Then he remembered the lamp. It was a rather curious one of - Moorish workmanship, made of dull silver inlaid with arabesques - of burnished steel, and studded with coarse turquoises. - Perhaps it might be missed by his servant, and questions would - be asked. He hesitated for a moment, then he turned back and took - it from the table. He could not help seeing the dead thing. - How still it was! How horribly white the long hands looked! - It was like a dreadful wax image.</p> -<p>Having locked the door behind him, he crept quietly downstairs. - The woodwork creaked and seemed to cry out as if in pain. - He stopped several times and waited. No: everything was still. - It was merely the sound of his own footsteps.</p> -<p>When he reached the library, he saw the bag and coat in the corner. - They must be hidden away somewhere. He unlocked a secret press that was - in the wainscoting, a press in which he kept his own curious disguises, - and put them into it. He could easily burn them afterwards. Then he pulled - out his watch. It was twenty minutes to two.</p> -<p>He sat down and began to think. Every year--every month, almost-- - men were strangled in England for what he had done. There had been - a madness of murder in the air. Some red star had come too close - to the earth. . . . And yet, what evidence was there against him? - Basil Hallward had left the house at eleven. No one had seen - him come in again. Most of the servants were at Selby Royal. - His valet had gone to bed.... Paris! Yes. It was to Paris that - Basil had gone, and by the midnight train, as he had intended. - With his curious reserved habits, it would be months before any - suspicions would be roused. Months! Everything could be destroyed long - before then.</p> -<p>A sudden thought struck him. He put on his fur coat and hat - and went out into the hall. There he paused, hearing the slow - heavy tread of the policeman on the pavement outside and - seeing the flash of the bull's-eye reflected in the window. - He waited and held his breath.</p> -<p>After a few moments he drew back the latch and slipped out, - shutting the door very gently behind him. Then he began - ringing the bell. In about five minutes his valet appeared, - half-dressed and looking very drowsy.</p> -<p>"I am sorry to have had to wake you up, Francis," he said, stepping - in; - "but I had forgotten my latch-key. What time is it?"</p> -<p>"Ten minutes past two, sir," answered the man, looking at the clock - and blinking.</p> -<p>"Ten minutes past two? How horribly late! You must wake me - at nine to-morrow. I have some work to do."</p> -<p>"All right, sir."</p> -<p>"Did any one call this evening?"</p> -<p>"Mr. Hallward, sir. He stayed here till eleven, and then he went - away to catch his train."</p> -<p>"Oh! I am sorry I didn't see him. Did he leave any message?"</p> -<p>"No, sir, except that he would write to you from Paris, - if he did not find you at the club."</p> -<p>"That will do, Francis. Don't forget to call me at nine to-morrow."</p> -<p>"No, sir."</p> -<p>The man shambled down the passage in his slippers.</p> -<p>Dorian Gray threw his hat and coat upon the table and passed - into the library. For a quarter of an hour he walked up and down - the room, biting his lip and thinking. Then he took down the Blue - Book from one of the shelves and began to turn over the leaves. - "Alan Campbell, 152, Hertford Street, Mayfair." Yes; that was the - man - he wanted.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 14</p> -<p>At nine o'clock the next morning his servant came in with a cup of chocolate - on a tray and opened the shutters. Dorian was sleeping quite peacefully, - lying on his right side, with one hand underneath his cheek. He looked - like a boy who had been tired out with play, or study.</p> -<p>The man had to touch him twice on the shoulder before he woke, - and as he opened his eyes a faint smile passed across his lips, - as though he had been lost in some delightful dream. Yet he had - not dreamed at all. His night had been untroubled by any images - of pleasure or of pain. But youth smiles without any reason. - It is one of its chiefest charms.</p> -<p>He turned round, and leaning upon his elbow, began to sip his chocolate. - The mellow November sun came streaming into the room. The sky was bright, - and there was a genial warmth in the air. It was almost like a morning - in May.</p> -<p>Gradually the events of the preceding night crept with silent, blood-stained - feet into his brain and reconstructed themselves there with terrible distinctness. - He winced at the memory of all that he had suffered, and for a moment the same - curious feeling of loathing for Basil Hallward that had made him kill him as - he sat in the chair came back to him, and he grew cold with passion. The dead - man was still sitting there, too, and in the sunlight now. How horrible that - was! Such hideous things were for the darkness, not for the day.</p> -<p> He felt that if he brooded on what he had gone through he would sicken or - grow mad. There were sins whose fascination was more in the memory than in the - doing of them, strange triumphs that gratified the pride more than the passions, - and gave to the intellect a quickened sense of joy, greater than any joy they - brought, or could ever bring, to the senses. But this was not one of them. It - was a thing to be driven out of the mind, to be drugged with poppies, to be - strangled lest it might strangle one itself. </p> -<p>When the half-hour struck, he passed his hand across his forehead, and then - got up hastily and dressed himself with even more than his usual care, giving - a good deal of attention to the choice of his necktie and scarf-pin and changing - his rings more than once. He spent a long time also over breakfast, tasting - the various dishes, talking to his valet about some new liveries that he was - thinking of getting made for the servants at Selby, and going through his correspondence. - At some of the letters, he smiled. Three of them bored him. One he read several - times over and then tore up with a slight look of annoyance in his face. "That - awful thing, a woman's memory!" as Lord Henry had once said.</p> -<p>After he had drunk his cup of black coffee, he wiped his lips slowly with a - napkin, motioned to his servant to wait, and going over to the table, sat down - and wrote two letters. One he put in his pocket, the other he handed to the - valet.</p> -<p>"Take this round to 152, Hertford Street, Francis, and if Mr. Campbell - is out of town, get his address."</p> -<p>As soon as he was alone, he lit a cigarette and began sketching upon a piece - of paper, drawing first flowers and bits of architecture, and then human faces. - Suddenly he remarked that every face that he drew seemed to have a fantastic - likeness to Basil Hallward. He frowned, and getting up, went over to the book-case - and took out a volume at hazard. He was determined that he would not think about - what had happened until it became absolutely necessary that he should do so.</p> -<p>When he had stretched himself on the sofa, he looked at the title-page of the - book. It was Gautier's Emaux et Camees, Charpentier's Japanese-paper edition, - with the Jacquemart etching. The binding was of citron-green leather, with a - design of gilt trellis-work and dotted pomegranates. It had been given to him - by Adrian Singleton. As he turned over the pages, his eye fell on the poem about - the hand of Lacenaire, the cold yellow hand "du supplice encore mal lavee," - with its downy red hairs and its "doigts de faune." He glanced at - his own white taper fingers, shuddering slightly in spite of himself, and passed - on, till he came to those lovely stanzas upon Venice: </p> -<blockquote> - <p>Sur une gamme chromatique,</p> - <p>Le sein de peries ruisselant,</p> - <p>La Venus de l'Adriatique</p> - <p>Sort de l'eau son corps rose et blanc. </p> - <p> Les domes, sur l'azur des ondes</p> - <p>Suivant la phrase au pur contour,</p> - <p>S'enflent comme des gorges rondes</p> - <p>Que souleve un soupir d'amour.</p> - <p> L'esquif aborde et me depose,</p> - <p>Jetant son amarre au pilier,</p> - <p> Devant une facade rose,</p> - <p>Sur le marbre d'un escalier.</p> -</blockquote> -<p>How exquisite they were! As one read them, one seemed to be floating down the - green water-ways of the pink and pearl city, seated in a black gondola with - silver prow and trailing curtains. The mere lines looked to him like those straight - lines of turquoise-blue that follow one as one pushes out to the Lido. The sudden - flashes of colour reminded him of the gleam of the opal-and-iris-throated birds - that flutter round the tall honeycombed Campanile, or stalk, with such stately - grace, through the dim, dust-stained arcades. Leaning back with half-closed - eyes, he kept saying over and over to himself: </p> -<blockquote> - <p> "Devant une facade rose, </p> - <p>Sur le marbre d'un escalier."</p> -</blockquote> -<p>The whole of Venice was in those two lines. He remembered the autumn - that he had passed there, and a wonderful love that had stirred - him to mad delightful follies. There was romance in every place. - But Venice, like Oxford, had kept the background for romance, and, - to the true romantic, background was everything, or almost everything. - Basil had been with him part of the time, and had gone wild over Tintoret. - Poor Basil! What a horrible way for a man to die!</p> -<p>He sighed, and took up the volume again, and tried to forget. - He read of the swallows that fly in and out of the little - cafe at Smyrna where the Hadjis sit counting their amber - beads and the turbaned merchants smoke their long tasselled - pipes and talk gravely to each other; he read of the Obelisk - in the Place de la Concorde that weeps tears of granite - in its lonely sunless exile and longs to be back by the hot, - lotus-covered Nile, where there are Sphinxes, and rose-red ibises, - and white vultures with gilded claws, and crocodiles with - small beryl eyes that crawl over the green steaming mud; - he began to brood over those verses which, drawing music - from kiss-stained marble, tell of that curious statue that - Gautier compares to a contralto voice, the "monstre charmant" - that couches in the porphyry-room of the Louvre. But after a time - the book fell from his hand. He grew nervous, and a horrible - fit of terror came over him. What if Alan Campbell should be - out of England? Days would elapse before he could come back. - Perhaps he might refuse to come. What could he do then? - Every moment was of vital importance.</p> -<p>They had been great friends once, five years before-- - almost inseparable, indeed. Then the intimacy had come suddenly - to an end. When they met in society now, it was only Dorian - Gray who smiled: Alan Campbell never did.</p> -<p>He was an extremely clever young man, though he had no real - appreciation of the visible arts, and whatever little sense - of the beauty of poetry he possessed he had gained entirely - from Dorian. His dominant intellectual passion was for science. - At Cambridge he had spent a great deal of his time working - in the laboratory, and had taken a good class in the Natural - Science Tripos of his year. Indeed, he was still devoted - to the study of chemistry, and had a laboratory of his - own in which he used to shut himself up all day long, - greatly to the annoyance of his mother, who had set her - heart on his standing for Parliament and had a vague idea - that a chemist was a person who made up prescriptions. - He was an excellent musician, however, as well, and played - both the violin and the piano better than most amateurs. - In fact, it was music that had first brought him and Dorian - Gray together--music and that indefinable attraction that - Dorian seemed to be able to exercise whenever he wished-- - and, indeed, exercised often without being conscious of it. - They had met at Lady Berkshire's the night that Rubinstein - played there, and after that used to be always seen together - at the opera and wherever good music was going on. - For eighteen months their intimacy lasted. Campbell was - always either at Selby Royal or in Grosvenor Square. - To him, as to many others, Dorian Gray was the type - of everything that is wonderful and fascinating in life. - Whether or not a quarrel had taken place between them no one - ever knew. But suddenly people remarked that they scarcely - spoke when they met and that Campbell seemed always to go - away early from any party at which Dorian Gray was present. - He had changed, too--was strangely melancholy at times, appeared - almost to dislike hearing music, and would never himself play, - giving as his excuse, when he was called upon, that he was so - absorbed in science that he had no time left in which to practise. - And this was certainly true. Every day he seemed to become - more interested in biology, and his name appeared once or twice - in some of the scientific reviews in connection with certain - curious experiments.</p> -<p>This was the man Dorian Gray was waiting for. Every second - he kept glancing at the clock. As the minutes went by he became - horribly agitated. At last he got up and began to pace up - and down the room, looking like a beautiful caged thing. - He took long stealthy strides. His hands were curiously cold.</p> -<p>The suspense became unbearable. Time seemed to him to be crawling - with feet of lead, while he by monstrous winds was being swept towards - the jagged edge of some black cleft of precipice. He knew what was - waiting for him there; saw it, indeed, and, shuddering, crushed with dank - hands his burning lids as though he would have robbed the very brain - of sight and driven the eyeballs back into their cave. It was useless. - The brain had its own food on which it battened, and the imagination, - made grotesque by terror, twisted and distorted as a living thing by pain, - danced like some foul puppet on a stand and grinned through moving masks. - Then, suddenly, time stopped for him. Yes: that blind, slow-breathing thing - crawled no more, and horrible thoughts, time being dead, raced nimbly on - in front, and dragged a hideous future from its grave, and showed it to him. - He stared at it. Its very horror made him stone.</p> -<p>At last the door opened and his servant entered. He turned - glazed eyes upon him.</p> -<p>"Mr. Campbell, sir," said the man.</p> -<p>A sigh of relief broke from his parched lips, and the colour came - back to his cheeks.</p> -<p>"Ask him to come in at once, Francis." He felt that he was himself - again. - His mood of cowardice had passed away.</p> -<p>The man bowed and retired. In a few moments, Alan Campbell walked in, - looking very stern and rather pale, his pallor being intensified by his - coal-black hair and dark eyebrows.</p> -<p>"Alan! This is kind of you. I thank you for coming."</p> -<p>"I had intended never to enter your house again, Gray. But you said - it was a matter of life and death." His voice was hard and cold. - He spoke with slow deliberation. There was a look of contempt - in the steady searching gaze that he turned on Dorian. - He kept his hands in the pockets of his Astrakhan coat, and seemed - not to have noticed the gesture with which he had been greeted.</p> -<p>"Yes: it is a matter of life and death, Alan, and to more than one person. - Sit down."</p> -<p>Campbell took a chair by the table, and Dorian sat opposite to him. - The two men's eyes met. In Dorian's there was infinite pity. - He knew that what he was going to do was dreadful.</p> -<p>After a strained moment of silence, he leaned across and said, - very quietly, but watching the effect of each word upon the face - of him he had sent for, "Alan, in a locked room at the top - of this house, a room to which nobody but myself has access, - a dead man is seated at a table. He has been dead ten hours now. - Don't stir, and don't look at me like that. Who the man is, - why he died, how he died, are matters that do not concern you. - What you have to do is this--"</p> -<p>"Stop, Gray. I don't want to know anything further. - Whether what you have told me is true or not true doesn't - concern me. I entirely decline to be mixed up in your life. - Keep your horrible secrets to yourself. They don't interest me - any more."</p> -<p>"Alan, they will have to interest you. This one will have to interest - you. - I am awfully sorry for you, Alan. But I can't help myself. - You are the one man who is able to save me. I am forced to bring - you into the matter. I have no option. Alan, you are scientific. - You know about chemistry and things of that kind. You have made experiments. - What you have got to do is to destroy the thing that is upstairs-- - to destroy it so that not a vestige of it will be left. Nobody saw this - person come into the house. Indeed, at the present moment he is supposed - to be in Paris. He will not be missed for months. When he is missed, - there must be no trace of him found here. You, Alan, you must change him, - and everything that belongs to him, into a handful of ashes that I may - scatter in the air."</p> -<p>"You are mad, Dorian."</p> -<p>"Ah! I was waiting for you to call me Dorian."</p> -<p>"You are mad, I tell you--mad to imagine that I would raise - a finger to help you, mad to make this monstrous confession. - I will have nothing to do with this matter, whatever it is. - Do you think I am going to peril my reputation for you? What is it - to me what devil's work you are up to?"</p> -<p>"It was suicide, Alan."</p> -<p>"I am glad of that. But who drove him to it? You, I should fancy."</p> -<p>"Do you still refuse to do this for me?"</p> -<p>"Of course I refuse. I will have absolutely nothing to do with it. I don't - care what shame comes on you. You deserve it all. I should not be sorry to see - you disgraced, publicly disgraced. How dare you ask me, of all men in the world, - to mix myself up in this horror? I should have thought you knew more about people's - characters. Your friend Lord Henry Wotton can't have taught you much about psychology, - whatever else he has taught you. Nothing will induce me to stir a step to help - you. You have come to the wrong man. Go to some of your friends. Don't come - to me."</p> -<p>"Alan, it was murder. I killed him. You don't know what he had made - me suffer. Whatever my life is, he had more to do with the making or - the marring of it than poor Harry has had. He may not have intended it, - the result was the same."</p> -<p>"Murder! Good God, Dorian, is that what you have come to? - I shall not inform upon you. It is not my business. Besides, without - my stirring in the matter, you are certain to be arrested. - Nobody ever commits a crime without doing something stupid. - But I will have nothing to do with it."</p> -<p>"You must have something to do with it. Wait, wait a moment; - listen to me. Only listen, Alan. All I ask of you is to perform - a certain scientific experiment. You go to hospitals and - dead-houses, and the horrors that you do there don't affect you. - If in some hideous dissecting-room or fetid laboratory you - found this man lying on a leaden table with red gutters scooped - out in it for the blood to flow through, you would simply look - upon him as an admirable subject. You would not turn a hair. - You would not believe that you were doing anything wrong. - On the contrary, you would probably feel that you were benefiting - the human race, or increasing the sum of knowledge in the world, - or gratifying intellectual curiosity, or something of that kind. - What I want you to do is merely what you have often done before. - Indeed, to destroy a body must be far less horrible than - what you are accustomed to work at. And, remember, it is - the only piece of evidence against me. If it is discovered, - I am lost; and it is sure to be discovered unless you - help me."</p> -<p>"I have no desire to help you. You forget that. I am simply - indifferent to the whole thing. It has nothing to do with me."</p> -<p>"Alan, I entreat you. Think of the position I am in. - Just before you came I almost fainted with terror. - You may know terror yourself some day. No! don't think of that. - Look at the matter purely from the scientific point of view. - You don't inquire where the dead things on which you - experiment come from. Don't inquire now. I have told you - too much as it is. But I beg of you to do this. We were - friends once, Alan."</p> -<p>"Don't speak about those days, Dorian--they are dead."</p> -<p>"The dead linger sometimes. The man upstairs will not go away. - He is sitting at the table with bowed head and outstretched arms. - Alan! Alan! If you don't come to my assistance, I am ruined. - Why, they will hang me, Alan! Don't you understand? They will hang - me for what I have done."</p> -<p>"There is no good in prolonging this scene. I absolutely refuse - to do anything in the matter. It is insane of you to ask me."</p> -<p>"You refuse?"</p> -<p>"Yes."</p> -<p>"I entreat you, Alan."</p> -<p>"It is useless."</p> -<p>The same look of pity came into Dorian Gray's eyes. Then he stretched - out his hand, took a piece of paper, and wrote something on it. - He read it over twice, folded it carefully, and pushed it across the table. - Having done this, he got up and went over to the window.</p> -<p>Campbell looked at him in surprise, and then took up the paper, - and opened it. As he read it, his face became ghastly pale and he fell - back in his chair. A horrible sense of sickness came over him. - He felt as if his heart was beating itself to death in some - empty hollow.</p> -<p>After two or three minutes of terrible silence, Dorian turned round and came - and stood behind him, putting his hand upon his shoulder.</p> -<p>"I am so sorry for you, Alan," he murmured, "but you leave me - no alternative. I have a letter written already. Here it is. - You see the address. If you don't help me, I must send it. - If you don't help me, I will send it. You know what the result will be. - But you are going to help me. It is impossible for you to refuse now. - I tried to spare you. You will do me the justice to admit that. - You were stern, harsh, offensive. You treated me as no man has ever - dared to treat me--no living man, at any rate. I bore it all. - Now it is for me to dictate terms."</p> -<p>Campbell buried his face in his hands, and a shudder passed through him.</p> -<p>"Yes, it is my turn to dictate terms, Alan. You know what they are. - The thing is quite simple. Come, don't work yourself into this fever. - The thing has to be done. Face it, and do it."</p> -<p>A groan broke from Campbell's lips and he shivered all over. - The ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece seemed to him to be - dividing time into separate atoms of agony, each of which was - too terrible to be borne. He felt as if an iron ring was - being slowly tightened round his forehead, as if the disgrace - with which he was threatened had already come upon him. - The hand upon his shoulder weighed like a hand of lead. - It was intolerable. It seemed to crush him.</p> -<p>"Come, Alan, you must decide at once."</p> -<p>"I cannot do it," he said, mechanically, as though words could alter - things.</p> -<p>"You must. You have no choice. Don't delay."</p> -<p>He hesitated a moment. "Is there a fire in the room upstairs?"</p> -<p>"Yes, there is a gas-fire with asbestos."</p> -<p>"I shall have to go home and get some things from the laboratory."</p> -<p>"No, Alan, you must not leave the house. Write out on a sheet - of notepaper what you want and my servant will take a cab - and bring the things back to you."</p> -<p>Campbell scrawled a few lines, blotted them, and addressed an envelope - to his assistant. Dorian took the note up and read it carefully. - Then he rang the bell and gave it to his valet, with orders to return - as soon as possible and to bring the things with him.</p> -<p>As the hall door shut, Campbell started nervously, and having got up - from the chair, went over to the chimney-piece. He was shivering with - a kind of ague. For nearly twenty minutes, neither of the men spoke. - A fly buzzed noisily about the room, and the ticking of the clock was - like the beat of a hammer.</p> -<p>As the chime struck one, Campbell turned round, and looking at Dorian Gray, - saw that his eyes were filled with tears. There was something in the purity - and refinement of that sad face that seemed to enrage him. "You are infamous, - absolutely infamous!" he muttered.</p> -<p>"Hush, Alan. You have saved my life," said Dorian.</p> -<p>"Your life? Good heavens! what a life that is! You have gone from - corruption to corruption, and now you have culminated in crime. - In doing what I am going to do--what you force me to do-- - it is not of your life that I am thinking."</p> -<p>"Ah, Alan," murmured Dorian with a sigh, "I wish you had - a thousandth part of the pity for me that I have for you." - He turned away as he spoke and stood looking out at the garden. - Campbell made no answer.</p> -<p>After about ten minutes a knock came to the door, and the servant entered, - carrying a large mahogany chest of chemicals, with a long coil of steel and - platinum wire and two rather curiously shaped iron clamps.</p> -<p>"Shall I leave the things here, sir?" he asked Campbell.</p> -<p>"Yes," said Dorian. "And I am afraid, Francis, that I have another - errand for you. What is the name of the man at Richmond who supplies - Selby with orchids?"</p> -<p>"Harden, sir."</p> -<p>"Yes--Harden. You must go down to Richmond at once, see Harden personally, - and tell him to send twice as many orchids as I ordered, and to have - as few white ones as possible. In fact, I don't want any white ones. - It is a lovely day, Francis, and Richmond is a very pretty place-- - otherwise I wouldn't bother you about it."</p> -<p>"No trouble, sir. At what time shall I be back?"</p> -<p>Dorian looked at Campbell. "How long will your experiment take, Alan?" - he said in a calm indifferent voice. The presence of a third person - in the room seemed to give him extraordinary courage.</p> -<p>Campbell frowned and bit his lip. "It will take about five hours," - he answered.</p> -<p>"It will be time enough, then, if you are back at half-past seven, Francis. - Or stay: just leave my things out for dressing. You can have the evening - to yourself. I am not dining at home, so I shall not want you."</p> -<p>"Thank you, sir," said the man, leaving the room.</p> -<p>"Now, Alan, there is not a moment to be lost. How heavy this chest is! - I'll take it for you. You bring the other things." He spoke rapidly - and in an authoritative manner. Campbell felt dominated by him. - They left the room together.</p> -<p>When they reached the top landing, Dorian took out the key and turned it - in the lock. Then he stopped, and a troubled look came into his eyes. - He shuddered. "I don't think I can go in, Alan," he murmured.</p> -<p>"It is nothing to me. I don't require you," said Campbell coldly.</p> -<p>Dorian half opened the door. As he did so, he saw the face - of his portrait leering in the sunlight. On the floor in front - of it the torn curtain was lying. He remembered that the night - before he had forgotten, for the first time in his life, - to hide the fatal canvas, and was about to rush forward, - when he drew back with a shudder.</p> -<p>What was that loathsome red dew that gleamed, wet and glistening, - on one of the hands, as though the canvas had sweated blood? - How horrible it was!--more horrible, it seemed to him for the moment, - than the silent thing that he knew was stretched across the table, - the thing whose grotesque misshapen shadow on the spotted carpet - showed him that it had not stirred, but was still there, as he had - left it.</p> -<p>He heaved a deep breath, opened the door a little wider, - and with half-closed eyes and averted head, walked quickly in, - determined that he would not look even once upon the dead man. - Then, stooping down and taking up the gold-and-purple hanging, - he flung it right over the picture.</p> -<p>There he stopped, feeling afraid to turn round, and his eyes - fixed themselves on the intricacies of the pattern before him. - He heard Campbell bringing in the heavy chest, and the irons, - and the other things that he had required for his dreadful work. - He began to wonder if he and Basil Hallward had ever met, and, if so, - what they had thought of each other.</p> -<p>"Leave me now," said a stern voice behind him.</p> -<p>He turned and hurried out, just conscious that the dead man - had been thrust back into the chair and that Campbell was gazing - into a glistening yellow face. As he was going downstairs, - he heard the key being turned in the lock.</p> -<p>It was long after seven when Campbell came back into the library. - He was pale, but absolutely calm. "I have done what you asked - me to do," he muttered "And now, good-bye. Let us never see each - other again."</p> -<p>"You have saved me from ruin, Alan. I cannot forget that," - said Dorian simply.</p> -<p>As soon as Campbell had left, he went upstairs. There was a horrible - smell of nitric acid in the room. But the thing that had been sitting - at the table was gone.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 15</p> -<p>That evening, at eight-thirty, exquisitely dressed and wearing a large button-hole - of Parma violets, Dorian Gray was ushered into Lady Narborough's drawing-room - by bowing servants. His forehead was throbbing with maddened nerves, and he - felt wildly excited, but his manner as he bent over his hostess's hand was as - easy and graceful as ever. Perhaps one never seems so much at one's ease as - when one has to play a part. Certainly no one looking at Dorian Gray that night - could have believed that he had passed through a tragedy as horrible as any - tragedy of our age. Those finely shaped fingers could never have clutched a - knife for sin, nor those smiling lips have cried out on God and goodness. He - himself could not help wondering at the calm of his demeanour, and for a moment - felt keenly the terrible pleasure of a double life.</p> -<p>It was a small party, got up rather in a hurry by Lady Narborough, - who was a very clever woman with what Lord Henry used to describe - as the remains of really remarkable ugliness. She had proved - an excellent wife to one of our most tedious ambassadors, and having - buried her husband properly in a marble mausoleum, which she - had herself designed, and married off her daughters to some rich, - rather elderly men, she devoted herself now to the pleasures - of French fiction, French cookery, and French esprit when she could - get it.</p> -<p>Dorian was one of her especial favourites, and she always told him - that she was extremely glad she had not met him in early life. - "I know, my dear, I should have fallen madly in love with you," - she used to say, "and thrown my bonnet right over the mills for your sake. - It is most fortunate that you were not thought of at the time. - As it was, our bonnets were so unbecoming, and the mills were - so occupied in trying to raise the wind, that I never had even a - flirtation with anybody. However, that was all Narborough's fault. - He was dreadfully short-sighted, and there is no pleasure in taking - in a husband who never sees anything."</p> -<p>Her guests this evening were rather tedious. The fact was, - as she explained to Dorian, behind a very shabby fan, - one of her married daughters had come up quite suddenly to stay - with her, and, to make matters worse, had actually brought her - husband with her. "I think it is most unkind of her, my dear," - she whispered. "Of course I go and stay with them every summer - after I come from Homburg, but then an old woman like me must - have fresh air sometimes, and besides, I really wake them up. - You don't know what an existence they lead down there. - It is pure unadulterated country life. They get up early, - because they have so much to do, and go to bed early, - because they have so little to think about. There has not been - a scandal in the neighbourhood since the time of Queen Elizabeth, - and consequently they all fall asleep after dinner. - You shan't sit next either of them. You shall sit by me and - amuse me."</p> -<p>Dorian murmured a graceful compliment and looked round - the room. Yes: it was certainly a tedious party. - Two of the people he had never seen before, and the others - consisted of Ernest Harrowden, one of those middle-aged - mediocrities so common in London clubs who have no enemies, - but are thoroughly disliked by their friends; Lady Ruxton, - an overdressed woman of forty-seven, with a hooked nose, - who was always trying to get herself compromised, but was - so peculiarly plain that to her great disappointment no - one would ever believe anything against her; Mrs. Erlynne, - a pushing nobody, with a delightful lisp and Venetian-red hair; - Lady Alice Chapman, his hostess's daughter, a dowdy dull girl, - with one of those characteristic British faces that, once seen, - are never remembered; and her husband, a red-cheeked, - white-whiskered creature who, like so many of his class, - was under the impression that inordinate joviality can atone for - an entire lack of ideas.</p> -<p>He was rather sorry he had come, till Lady Narborough, - looking at the great ormolu gilt clock that sprawled in gaudy - curves on the mauve-draped mantelshelf, exclaimed: "How horrid - of Henry Wotton to be so late! I sent round to him this morning - on chance and he promised faithfully not to disappoint me."</p> -<p>It was some consolation that Harry was to be there, and when the door opened - and he heard his slow musical voice lending charm to some insincere apology, - he ceased to feel bored.</p> -<p>But at dinner he could not eat anything. Plate after plate went - away untasted. Lady Narborough kept scolding him for what she - called "an insult to poor Adolphe, who invented the menu - specially for you," and now and then Lord Henry looked across - at him, wondering at his silence and abstracted manner. - From time to time the butler filled his glass with champagne. - He drank eagerly, and his thirst seemed to increase.</p> -<p>"Dorian," said Lord Henry at last, as the chaud-froid was being handed - round, - "what is the matter with you to-night? You are quite out of sorts."</p> -<p>"I believe he is in love," cried Lady Narborough, "and that - he is - afraid to tell me for fear I should be jealous. He is quite right. - I certainly should."</p> -<p>"Dear Lady Narborough," murmured Dorian, smiling, "I have not - been in love - for a whole week--not, in fact, since Madame de Ferrol left town."</p> -<p>"How you men can fall in love with that woman!" exclaimed the old - lady. - "I really cannot understand it."</p> -<p>"It is simply because she remembers you when you were a little girl, - Lady Narborough," said Lord Henry. "She is the one link between us - and your short frocks."</p> -<p>"She does not remember my short frocks at all, Lord Henry. - But I remember her very well at Vienna thirty years ago, - and how decolletee she was then."</p> -<p>"She is still decolletee," he answered, taking an olive in his long - fingers; - "and when she is in a very smart gown she looks like an edition de luxe - of a bad French novel. She is really wonderful, and full of surprises. - Her capacity for family affection is extraordinary. When her third husband - died, her hair turned quite gold from grief."</p> -<p>"How can you, Harry!" cried Dorian.</p> -<p>"It is a most romantic explanation," laughed the hostess. - "But her third husband, Lord Henry! You don't mean to say Ferrol - is the fourth?"</p> -<p>"Certainly, Lady Narborough."</p> -<p>"I don't believe a word of it."</p> -<p>"Well, ask Mr. Gray. He is one of her most intimate friends."</p> -<p>"Is it true, Mr. Gray?"</p> -<p>"She assures me so, Lady Narborough," said Dorian. "I asked - her whether, - like Marguerite de Navarre, she had their hearts embalmed and hung at - her girdle. She told me she didn't, because none of them had had any - hearts at all."</p> -<p>"Four husbands! Upon my word that is trop de zele."</p> -<p>"Trop d'audace, I tell her," said Dorian.</p> -<p>"Oh! she is audacious enough for anything, my dear. And what is Ferrol - like? - I don't know him."</p> -<p>"The husbands of very beautiful women belong to the criminal classes," - said Lord Henry, sipping his wine.</p> -<p>Lady Narborough hit him with her fan. "Lord Henry, I am not at all surprised - that the world says that you are extremely wicked."</p> -<p>"But what world says that?" asked Lord Henry, elevating his eyebrows. - "It can only be the next world. This world and I are on excellent terms."</p> -<p>"Everybody I know says you are very wicked," cried the old lady, - shaking her head.</p> -<p>Lord Henry looked serious for some moments. "It is perfectly monstrous," - he said, at last, "the way people go about nowadays saying things against - one - behind one's back that are absolutely and entirely true."</p> -<p>"Isn't he incorrigible?" cried Dorian, leaning forward in his chair.</p> -<p>"I hope so," said his hostess, laughing. "But really, - if you all worship Madame de Ferrol in this ridiculous way, - I shall have to marry again so as to be in the fashion."</p> -<p>"You will never marry again, Lady Narborough," broke in Lord Henry. - "You were far too happy. When a woman marries again, it is - because she detested her first husband. When a man marries again, - it is because he adored his first wife. Women try their luck; - men risk theirs."</p> -<p>"Narborough wasn't perfect," cried the old lady.</p> -<p>"If he had been, you would not have loved him, my dear lady," - was the rejoinder. "Women love us for our defects. - If we have enough of them, they will forgive us everything, - even our intellects. You will never ask me to dinner again - after saying this, I am afraid, Lady Narborough, but it is - quite true."</p> -<p>"Of course it is true, Lord Henry. If we women did not love you for - your defects, where would you all be? Not one of you would ever be married. - You would be a set of unfortunate bachelors. Not, however, that that - would alter you much. Nowadays all the married men live like bachelors, - and all the bachelors like married men."</p> -<p>"Fin de siecle," murmured Lord Henry.</p> -<p>"Fin du globe," answered his hostess.</p> -<p>"I wish it were fin du globe," said Dorian with a sigh. - "Life is a great disappointment."</p> -<p>"Ah, my dear," cried Lady Narborough, putting on her gloves, - "don't tell me that you have exhausted life. When a man says that - one knows that life has exhausted him. Lord Henry is very wicked, - and I sometimes wish that I had been; but you are made to be good-- - you look so good. I must find you a nice wife. Lord Henry, don't you - think that Mr. Gray should get married?"</p> -<p>"I am always telling him so, Lady Narborough," said Lord Henry with - a bow.</p> -<p>"Well, we must look out for a suitable match for him. - I shall go through Debrett carefully to-night and draw out a list - of all the eligible young ladies."</p> -<p>"With their ages, Lady Narborough?" asked Dorian.</p> -<p>"Of course, with their ages, slightly edited. But nothing must be done - in a hurry. I want it to be what The Morning Post calls a suitable alliance, - and I want you both to be happy."</p> -<p>"What nonsense people talk about happy marriages!" exclaimed Lord - Henry. - "A man can be happy with any woman, as long as he does not love her."</p> -<p>"Ah! what a cynic you are!" cried the old lady, pushing back her - chair - and nodding to Lady Ruxton. "You must come and dine with me soon again. - You are really an admirable tonic, much better than what Sir Andrew prescribes - for me. You must tell me what people you would like to meet, though. I want - it to be a delightful gathering."</p> -<p>"I like men who have a future and women who have a past," he answered. - "Or do you think that would make it a petticoat party?"</p> -<p>"I fear so," she said, laughing, as she stood up. "A thousand - pardons, - my dear Lady Ruxton," she added, "I didn't see you hadn't finished - your cigarette."</p> -<p>"Never mind, Lady Narborough. I smoke a great deal too much. - I am going to limit myself, for the future."</p> -<p>"Pray don't, Lady Ruxton," said Lord Henry. "Moderation is a - fatal thing. - Enough is as bad as a meal. More than enough is as good as a feast."</p> -<p>Lady Ruxton glanced at him curiously. "You must come and explain that - to me - some afternoon, Lord Henry. It sounds a fascinating theory," she murmured, - as she swept out of the room.</p> -<p>"Now, mind you don't stay too long over your politics and scandal," - cried Lady Narborough from the door. "If you do, we are sure to - squabble upstairs."</p> -<p>The men laughed, and Mr. Chapman got up solemnly - from the foot of the table and came up to the top. - Dorian Gray changed his seat and went and sat by Lord Henry. - Mr. Chapman began to talk in a loud voice about the situation - in the House of Commons. He guffawed at his adversaries. - The word doctrinaire--word full of terror to the British mind-- - reappeared from time to time between his explosions. - An alliterative prefix served as an ornament of oratory. - He hoisted the Union Jack on the pinnacles of thought. - The inherited stupidity of the race--sound English common sense - he jovially termed it--was shown to be the proper bulwark - for society.</p> -<p>A smile curved Lord Henry's lips, and he turned round and looked at Dorian.</p> -<p>"Are you better, my dear fellow?" he asked. "You seemed rather - out of sorts at dinner."</p> -<p>"I am quite well, Harry. I am tired. That is all."</p> -<p>"You were charming last night. The little duchess is quite devoted to - you. - She tells me she is going down to Selby."</p> -<p>"She has promised to come on the twentieth."</p> -<p>"Is Monmouth to be there, too?"</p> -<p>"Oh, yes, Harry."</p> -<p>"He bores me dreadfully, almost as much as he bores her. She is very clever, - too clever for a woman. She lacks the indefinable charm of weakness. - It is the feet of clay that make the gold of the image precious. Her feet - are very pretty, but they are not feet of clay. White porcelain feet, - if you like. They have been through the fire, and what fire does not destroy, - it hardens. She has had experiences."</p> -<p>"How long has she been married?" asked Dorian.</p> -<p>"An eternity, she tells me. I believe, according to the peerage, - it is ten years, but ten years with Monmouth must have been like eternity, - with time thrown in. Who else is coming?"</p> -<p>"Oh, the Willoughbys, Lord Rugby and his wife, our hostess, - Geoffrey Clouston, the usual set. I have asked Lord Grotrian."</p> -<p>"I like him," said Lord Henry. "A great many people don't, but - I find - him charming. He atones for being occasionally somewhat overdressed - by being always absolutely over-educated. He is a very modern type."</p> -<p>"I don't know if he will be able to come, Harry. He may have to go to - Monte - Carlo with his father."</p> -<p>"Ah! what a nuisance people's people are! Try and make him come. - By the way, Dorian, you ran off very early last night. - You left before eleven. What did you do afterwards? Did you go - straight home?"</p> -<p>Dorian glanced at him hurriedly and frowned.</p> -<p>"No, Harry," he said at last, "I did not get home till nearly - three."</p> -<p>"Did you go to the club?"</p> -<p>"Yes," he answered. Then he bit his lip. "No, I don't mean that. - I didn't go to the club. I walked about. I forget what I did. - . . . How inquisitive you are, Harry! You always want to know what - one has been doing. I always want to forget what I have been doing. - I came in at half-past two, if you wish to know the exact time. - I had left my latch-key at home, and my servant had to let me in. - If you want any corroborative evidence on the subject, you can ask - him."</p> -<p>Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. "My dear fellow, as if I cared! - Let us go up to the drawing-room. No sherry, thank you, Mr. Chapman. - Something has happened to you, Dorian. Tell me what it is. - You are not yourself to-night."</p> -<p>"Don't mind me, Harry. I am irritable, and out of temper. - I shall come round and see you to-morrow, or next day. - Make my excuses to Lady Narborough. I shan't go upstairs. - I shall go home. I must go home."</p> -<p>"All right, Dorian. I dare say I shall see you to-morrow at tea-time. - The duchess is coming."</p> -<p>"I will try to be there, Harry," he said, leaving the room. - As he drove back to his own house, he was conscious that the sense - of terror he thought he had strangled had come back to him. - Lord Henry's casual questioning had made him lose his - nerves for the moment, and he wanted his nerve still. - Things that were dangerous had to be destroyed. He winced. - He hated the idea of even touching them.</p> -<p>Yet it had to be done. He realized that, and when he had locked the door of - his library, he opened the secret press into which he had thrust Basil Hallward's - coat and bag. A huge fire was blazing. He piled another log on it. The smell - of the singeing clothes and burning leather was horrible. It took him three-quarters - of an hour to consume everything. At the end he felt faint and sick, and having - lit some Algerian pastilles in a pierced copper brazier, he bathed his hands - and forehead with a cool musk-scented vinegar. </p> -<p>Suddenly he started. His eyes grew strangely bright, and he gnawed - nervously at his underlip. Between two of the windows stood a large - Florentine cabinet, made out of ebony and inlaid with ivory and blue lapis. - He watched it as though it were a thing that could fascinate and make afraid, - as though it held something that he longed for and yet almost loathed. - His breath quickened. A mad craving came over him. He lit a cigarette - and then threw it away. His eyelids drooped till the long fringed - lashes almost touched his cheek. But he still watched the cabinet. - At last he got up from the sofa on which he had been lying, - went over to it, and having unlocked it, touched some hidden spring. - A triangular drawer passed slowly out. His fingers moved instinctively - towards it, dipped in, and closed on something. It was a small - Chinese box of black and gold-dust lacquer, elaborately wrought, - the sides patterned with curved waves, and the silken cords hung with - round crystals and tasselled in plaited metal threads. He opened it. - Inside was a green paste, waxy in lustre, the odour curiously heavy - and persistent.</p> -<p>He hesitated for some moments, with a strangely immobile smile upon his face. - Then shivering, though the atmosphere of the room was terribly hot, he drew - himself up and glanced at the clock. It was twenty minutes to twelve. - He put the box back, shutting the cabinet doors as he did so, and went into - his bedroom.</p> -<p>As midnight was striking bronze blows upon the dusky air, Dorian Gray, - dressed commonly, and with a muffler wrapped round his throat, - crept quietly out of his house. In Bond Street he found a hansom - with a good horse. He hailed it and in a low voice gave the driver - an address.</p> -<p>The man shook his head. "It is too far for me," he muttered.</p> -<p>"Here is a sovereign for you," said Dorian. "You shall have - another if you - drive fast."</p> -<p>"All right, sir," answered the man, "you will be there in an - hour," - and after his fare had got in he turned his horse round and drove - rapidly towards the river.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 16</p> -<p>A cold rain began to fall, and the blurred street-lamps looked ghastly - in the dripping mist. The public-houses were just closing, and dim - men and women were clustering in broken groups round their doors. - From some of the bars came the sound of horrible laughter. In others, - drunkards brawled and screamed.</p> -<p>Lying back in the hansom, with his hat pulled over his forehead, - Dorian Gray watched with listless eyes the sordid shame - of the great city, and now and then he repeated to himself - the words that Lord Henry had said to him on the first day - they had met, "To cure the soul by means of the senses, - and the senses by means of the soul." Yes, that was the secret. - He had often tried it, and would try it again now. - There were opium dens where one could buy oblivion, dens of horror - where the memory of old sins could be destroyed by the madness - of sins that were new.</p> -<p>The moon hung low in the sky like a yellow skull. From time to time - a huge misshapen cloud stretched a long arm across and hid it. - The gas-lamps grew fewer, and the streets more narrow and gloomy. - Once the man lost his way and had to drive back half a mile. - A steam rose from the horse as it splashed up the puddles. - The sidewindows of the hansom were clogged with a grey-flannel mist.</p> -<p>"To cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses - by means of the soul!" How the words rang in his ears! - His soul, certainly, was sick to death. Was it true that - the senses could cure it? Innocent blood had been spilled. - What could atone for that? Ah! for that there was no atonement; - but though forgiveness was impossible, forgetfulness was - possible still, and he was determined to forget, to stamp - the thing out, to crush it as one would crush the adder that - had stung one. Indeed, what right had Basil to have spoken - to him as he had done? Who had made him a judge over others? - He had said things that were dreadful, horrible, not to - be endured.</p> -<p>On and on plodded the hansom, going slower, it seemed to him, - at each step. He thrust up the trap and called to the man - to drive faster. The hideous hunger for opium began to gnaw - at him. His throat burned and his delicate hands twitched - nervously together. He struck at the horse madly with his stick. - The driver laughed and whipped up. He laughed in answer, - and the man was silent.</p> -<p>The way seemed interminable, and the streets like the black - web of some sprawling spider. The monotony became unbearable, - and as the mist thickened, he felt afraid.</p> -<p>Then they passed by lonely brickfields. The fog was lighter here, - and he could see the strange, bottle-shaped kilns with their orange, - fanlike tongues of fire. A dog barked as they went by, - and far away in the darkness some wandering sea-gull screamed. - The horse stumbled in a rut, then swerved aside and broke into - a gallop.</p> -<p>After some time they left the clay road and rattled again - over rough-paven streets. Most of the windows were dark, - but now and then fantastic shadows were silhouetted against - some lamplit blind. He watched them curiously. They moved - like monstrous marionettes and made gestures like live things. - He hated them. A dull rage was in his heart. As they turned - a corner, a woman yelled something at them from an open door, - and two men ran after the hansom for about a hundred yards. - The driver beat at them with his whip.</p> -<p>It is said that passion makes one think in a circle. - Certainly with hideous iteration the bitten lips of Dorian Gray - shaped and reshaped those subtle words that dealt with soul - and sense, till he had found in them the full expression, - as it were, of his mood, and justified, by intellectual approval, - passions that without such justification would still have - dominated his temper. From cell to cell of his brain crept - the one thought; and the wild desire to live, most terrible - of all man's appetites, quickened into force each trembling - nerve and fibre. Ugliness that had once been hateful - to him because it made things real, became dear to him - now for that very reason. Ugliness was the one reality. - The coarse brawl, the loathsome den, the crude violence - of disordered life, the very vileness of thief and outcast, - were more vivid, in their intense actuality of impression, - than all the gracious shapes of art, the dreamy shadows of song. - They were what he needed for forgetfulness. In three days he would - be free.</p> -<p>Suddenly the man drew up with a jerk at the top of a dark lane. - Over the low roofs and jagged chimney-stacks of the houses rose - the black masts of ships. Wreaths of white mist clung like ghostly - sails to the yards.</p> -<p>"Somewhere about here, sir, ain't it?" he asked huskily through the - trap.</p> -<p>Dorian started and peered round. "This will do," he answered, - and having got out hastily and given the driver the extra fare - he had promised him, he walked quickly in the direction of the quay. - Here and there a lantern gleamed at the stern of some huge merchantman. - The light shook and splintered in the puddles. A red glare came from - an outward-bound steamer that was coaling. The slimy pavement looked - like a wet mackintosh.</p> -<p>He hurried on towards the left, glancing back now and then to see - if he was being followed. In about seven or eight minutes he reached - a small shabby house that was wedged in between two gaunt factories. - In one of the top-windows stood a lamp. He stopped and gave a - peculiar knock.</p> -<p>After a little time he heard steps in the passage and the chain - being unhooked. The door opened quietly, and he went in without - saying a word to the squat misshapen figure that flattened - itself into the shadow as he passed. At the end of the hall - hung a tattered green curtain that swayed and shook in - the gusty wind which had followed him in from the street. - He dragged it aside and entered a long low room which looked - as if it had once been a third-rate dancing-saloon. Shrill - flaring gas-jets, dulled and distorted in the fly-blown mirrors - that faced them, were ranged round the walls. Greasy reflectors - of ribbed tin backed them, making quivering disks of light. - The floor was covered with ochre-coloured sawdust, trampled here - and there into mud, and stained with dark rings of spilled liquor. - Some Malays were crouching by a little charcoal stove, playing with - bone counters and showing their white teeth as they chattered. - In one corner, with his head buried in his arms, a sailor sprawled - over a table, and by the tawdrily painted bar that ran across one - complete side stood two haggard women, mocking an old man who was - brushing the sleeves of his coat with an expression of disgust. - "He thinks he's got red ants on him," laughed one of them, - as Dorian passed by. The man looked at her in terror and began - to whimper.</p> -<p>At the end of the room there was a little staircase, - leading to a darkened chamber. As Dorian hurried up its - three rickety steps, the heavy odour of opium met him. - He heaved a deep breath, and his nostrils quivered with pleasure. - When he entered, a young man with smooth yellow hair, who was - bending over a lamp lighting a long thin pipe, looked up at him - and nodded in a hesitating manner.</p> -<p>"You here, Adrian?" muttered Dorian.</p> -<p>"Where else should I be?" he answered, listlessly. "None of - the chaps - will speak to me now."</p> -<p>"I thought you had left England."</p> -<p>"Darlington is not going to do anything. My brother paid the bill at last. - George doesn't speak to me either. . . . I don't care," he added - with a sigh. "As long as one has this stuff, one doesn't want friends. - I think I have had too many friends."</p> -<p>Dorian winced and looked round at the grotesque things that - lay in such fantastic postures on the ragged mattresses. - The twisted limbs, the gaping mouths, the staring lustreless eyes, - fascinated him. He knew in what strange heavens they were suffering, - and what dull hells were teaching them the secret of some new joy. - They were better off than he was. He was prisoned in thought. - Memory, like a horrible malady, was eating his soul away. From time - to time he seemed to see the eyes of Basil Hallward looking at him. - Yet he felt he could not stay. The presence of Adrian Singleton - troubled him. He wanted to be where no one would know who he was. - He wanted to escape from himself.</p> -<p>"I am going on to the other place," he said after a pause.</p> -<p>"On the wharf?"</p> -<p>"Yes."</p> -<p>"That mad-cat is sure to be there. They won't have her in this place now."</p> -<p>Dorian shrugged his shoulders. "I am sick of women who love one. - Women who hate one are much more interesting. Besides, the stuff - is better."</p> -<p>"Much the same."</p> -<p>"I like it better. Come and have something to drink. - I must have something."</p> -<p>"I don't want anything," murmured the young man.</p> -<p>"Never mind."</p> -<p>Adrian Singleton rose up wearily and followed Dorian to the bar. - A half-caste, in a ragged turban and a shabby ulster, grinned a - hideous greeting as he thrust a bottle of brandy and two tumblers - in front of them. The women sidled up and began to chatter. - Dorian turned his back on them and said something in a low voice to - Adrian Singleton.</p> -<p>A crooked smile, like a Malay crease, writhed across the face of one - of the women. "We are very proud to-night," she sneered.</p> -<p>"For God's sake don't talk to me," cried Dorian, stamping his - foot on the ground. "What do you want? Money? Here it is. - Don't ever talk to me again."</p> -<p>Two red sparks flashed for a moment in the woman's sodden eyes, - then flickered out and left them dull and glazed. She tossed - her head and raked the coins off the counter with greedy fingers. - Her companion watched her enviously.</p> -<p>"It's no use," sighed Adrian Singleton. "I don't care to go - back. - What does it matter? I am quite happy here."</p> -<p>"You will write to me if you want anything, won't you?" said Dorian, - after a pause.</p> -<p>"Perhaps."</p> -<p>"Good night, then."</p> -<p>"Good night," answered the young man, passing up the steps and wiping - his parched mouth with a handkerchief.</p> -<p>Dorian walked to the door with a look of pain in his face. - As he drew the curtain aside, a hideous laugh broke from - the painted lips of the woman who had taken his money. - "There goes the devil's bargain!" she hiccoughed, in a - hoarse voice.</p> -<p>"Curse you!" he answered, "don't call me that."</p> -<p>She snapped her fingers. "Prince Charming is what you like to be called, - ain't it?" she yelled after him.</p> -<p>The drowsy sailor leaped to his feet as she spoke, and looked wildly round. - The sound of the shutting of the hall door fell on his ear. He rushed out as - if in pursuit.</p> -<p>Dorian Gray hurried along the quay through the drizzling rain. - His meeting with Adrian Singleton had strangely moved him, and he wondered - if the ruin of that young life was really to be laid at his door, - as Basil Hallward had said to him with such infamy of insult. - He bit his lip, and for a few seconds his eyes grew sad. - Yet, after all, what did it matter to him? One's days were too - brief to take the burden of another's errors on one's shoulders. - Each man lived his own life and paid his own price for living it. - The only pity was one had to pay so often for a single fault. - One had to pay over and over again, indeed. In her dealings with man, - destiny never closed her accounts.</p> -<p>There are moments, psychologists tell us, when the passion for sin, or for - what the world calls sin, so dominates a nature that every fibre of the body, - as every cell of the brain, seems to be instinct with fearful impulses. - Men and women at such moments lose the freedom of their will. They move - to their terrible end as automatons move. Choice is taken from them, - and conscience is either killed, or, if it lives at all, lives but to give - rebellion its fascination and disobedience its charm. For all sins, - as theologians weary not of reminding us, are sins of disobedience. - When that high spirit, that morning star of evil, fell from heaven, it was - as a rebel that he fell.</p> -<p>Callous, concentrated on evil, with stained mind, and soul - hungry for rebellion, Dorian Gray hastened on, quickening his - step as he went, but as he darted aside into a dim archway, - that had served him often as a short cut to the ill-famed place - where he was going, he felt himself suddenly seized from behind, - and before he had time to defend himself, he was thrust back - against the wall, with a brutal hand round his throat.</p> -<p>He struggled madly for life, and by a terrible effort wrenched - the tightening fingers away. In a second he heard the click - of a revolver, and saw the gleam of a polished barrel, - pointing straight at his head, and the dusky form of a short, - thick-set man facing him.</p> -<p>"What do you want?" he gasped.</p> -<p>"Keep quiet," said the man. "If you stir, I shoot you."</p> -<p>"You are mad. What have I done to you?"</p> -<p>"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."</p> -<p>Dorian Gray grew sick with fear. "I never knew her," he stammered. - "I never heard of her. You are mad."</p> -<p>"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 - to-night for India, and I must do my job first. One minute. - That's all."</p> -<p>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!"</p> -<p>"Eighteen years," said the man. "Why do you ask me? - What do years matter?"</p> -<p>"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!"</p> -<p>James Vane hesitated for a moment, not understanding what was meant. - Then he seized Dorian Gray and dragged him from the archway.</p> -<p>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.</p> -<p>He loosened his hold and reeled back. "My God! my God!" - he cried, "and I would have murdered you!"</p> -<p>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."</p> -<p>"Forgive me, sir," muttered James Vane. "I was deceived. - A chance word I heard in that damned den set me on the wrong track."</p> -<p>"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.</p> -<p>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</p> -<p>"Why didn't you kill him?" she hissed out, putting 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."</p> -<p>"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."</p> -<p>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."</p> -<p>"You lie!" cried James Vane.</p> -<p>She raised her hand up to heaven. "Before God I am telling the truth," - she cried.</p> -<p>"Before God?"</p> -<p>"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.</p> -<p>"You swear this?"</p> -<p>"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."</p> -<p>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.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 17</p> -<p>A week later Dorian Gray was sitting in the conservatory at Selby Royal, - talking to the pretty Duchess of Monmouth, who with her husband, - a jaded-looking man of sixty, was amongst his guests. - It was tea-time, and the mellow light of the huge, lace-covered lamp - that stood on the table lit up the delicate china and hammered - silver of the service at which the duchess was presiding. - Her white hands were moving daintily among the cups, and her full red - lips were smiling at something that Dorian had whispered to her. - Lord Henry was lying back in a silk-draped wicker chair, looking at them. - On a peach-coloured divan sat Lady Narborough, pretending to listen - to the duke's description of the last Brazilian beetle that he had - added to his collection. Three young men in elaborate smoking-suits - were handing tea-cakes to some of the women. The house-party - consisted of twelve people, and there were more expected to arrive on - the next day.</p> -<p>"What are you two talking about?" said Lord Henry, strolling over - to - the table and putting his cup down. "I hope Dorian has told you about - my plan for rechristening everything, Gladys. It is a delightful idea."</p> -<p>"But I don't want to be rechristened, Harry," rejoined the duchess, - looking up at him with her wonderful eyes. "I am quite satisfied - with my own name, and I am sure Mr. Gray should be satisfied - with his."</p> -<p>"My dear Gladys, I would not alter either name for the world. - They are both perfect. I was thinking chiefly of flowers. - Yesterday I cut an orchid, for my button-hole. It was a marvellous - spotted thing, as effective as the seven deadly sins. - In a thoughtless moment I asked one of the gardeners what it - was called. He told me it was a fine specimen of Robinsoniana, - or something dreadful of that kind. It is a sad truth, - but we have lost the faculty of giving lovely names to things. - Names are everything. I never quarrel with actions. - My one quarrel is with words. That is the reason I hate vulgar - realism in literature. The man who could call a spade a spade - should be compelled to use one. It is the only thing he is fit - for."</p> -<p>"Then what should we call you, Harry?" she asked.</p> -<p>"His name is Prince Paradox," said Dorian.</p> -<p>"I recognize him in a flash," exclaimed the duchess.</p> -<p>"I won't hear of it," laughed Lord Henry, sinking into a chair. - "From a label there is no escape! I refuse the title."</p> -<p>"Royalties may not abdicate," fell as a warning from pretty lips.</p> -<p>"You wish me to defend my throne, then?"</p> -<p>"Yes."</p> -<p>"I give the truths of to-morrow."</p> -<p>"I prefer the mistakes of to-day," she answered.</p> -<p>"You disarm me, Gladys," he cried, catching the wilfulness of her - mood.</p> -<p>"Of your shield, Harry, not of your spear."</p> -<p>"I never tilt against beauty," he said, with a wave of his hand.</p> -<p>"That is your error, Harry, believe me. You value beauty far too much."</p> -<p>"How can you say that? I admit that I think that it is better - to be beautiful than to be good. But on the other hand, - no one is more ready than I am to acknowledge that it is better - to be good than to be ugly."</p> -<p>"Ugliness is one of the seven deadly sins, then?" cried the duchess. - "What becomes of your simile about the orchid?"</p> -<p>"Ugliness is one of the seven deadly virtues, Gladys. You, as a good Tory, - must not underrate them. Beer, the Bible, and the seven deadly virtues have - made our England what she is."</p> -<p>"You don't like your country, then?" she asked.</p> -<p>"I live in it."</p> -<p>"That you may censure it the better."</p> -<p>"Would you have me take the verdict of Europe on it?" he inquired.</p> -<p>"What do they say of us?"</p> -<p>"That Tartuffe has emigrated to England and opened a shop."</p> -<p>"Is that yours, Harry?"</p> -<p>"I give it to you."</p> -<p>"I could not use it. It is too true."</p> -<p>"You need not be afraid. Our countrymen never recognize a description."</p> -<p>"They are practical."</p> -<p>"They are more cunning than practical. When they make up their ledger, - they balance stupidity by wealth, and vice by hypocrisy."</p> -<p>"Still, we have done great things."</p> -<p>"Great things have been thrust on us, Gladys."</p> -<p>"We have carried their burden."</p> -<p>"Only as far as the Stock Exchange."</p> -<p>She shook her head. "I believe in the race," she cried.</p> -<p>"It represents the survival of the pushing."</p> -<p>"It has development."</p> -<p>"Decay fascinates me more."</p> -<p>"What of art?" she asked.</p> -<p>"It is a malady."</p> -<p>"Love?"</p> -<p>"An illusion."</p> -<p>"Religion?"</p> -<p>"The fashionable substitute for belief."</p> -<p>"You are a sceptic."</p> -<p>"Never! Scepticism is the beginning of faith."</p> -<p>"What are you?"</p> -<p>"To define is to limit."</p> -<p>"Give me a clue."</p> -<p>"Threads snap. You would lose your way in the labyrinth."</p> -<p>"You bewilder me. Let us talk of some one else."</p> -<p>"Our host is a delightful topic. Years ago he was christened - Prince Charming."</p> -<p>"Ah! don't remind me of that," cried Dorian Gray.</p> -<p>"Our host is rather horrid this evening," answered the duchess, colouring. - "I believe he thinks that Monmouth married me on purely scientific principles - as the best specimen he could find of a modern butterfly."</p> -<p>"Well, I hope he won't stick pins into you, Duchess," laughed Dorian.</p> -<p>"Oh! my maid does that already, Mr. Gray, when she is annoyed with me."</p> -<p>"And what does she get annoyed with you about, Duchess?"</p> -<p>"For the most trivial things, Mr. Gray, I assure you. - Usually because I come in at ten minutes to nine and tell her - that I must be dressed by half-past eight."</p> -<p>"How unreasonable of her! You should give her warning."</p> -<p>"I daren't, Mr. Gray. Why, she invents hats for me. - You remember the one I wore at Lady Hilstone's garden-party? - You don't, but it is nice of you to pretend that you do. - Well, she made if out of nothing. All good hats are made out - of nothing."</p> -<p>"Like all good reputations, Gladys," interrupted Lord Henry. - "Every effect that one produces gives one an enemy. - To be popular one must be a mediocrity."</p> -<p>"Not with women," said the duchess, shaking her head; "and women - rule the world. I assure you we can't bear mediocrities. - We women, as some one says, love with our ears, just as you men - love with your eyes, if you ever love at all."</p> -<p>"It seems to me that we never do anything else," murmured Dorian.</p> -<p>"Ah! then, you never really love, Mr. Gray," answered the duchess - with mock sadness.</p> -<p>"My dear Gladys!" cried Lord Henry. "How can you say that? Romance - lives by repetition, and repetition converts an appetite into an art. Besides, - each time that one loves is the only time one has ever loved. Difference of - object does not alter singleness of passion. It merely intensifies it. We can - have in life but one great experience at best, and the secret of life is to - reproduce that experience as often as possible." </p> -<p>"Even when one has been wounded by it, Harry?" asked the duchess - after a pause.</p> -<p>"Especially when one has been wounded by it," answered Lord Henry.</p> -<p>The duchess turned and looked at Dorian Gray with a curious - expression in her eyes. "What do you say to that, Mr. Gray?" - she inquired.</p> -<p>Dorian hesitated for a moment. Then he threw his head back and laughed. - "I always agree with Harry, Duchess."</p> -<p>"Even when he is wrong?"</p> -<p>"Harry is never wrong, Duchess."</p> -<p>"And does his philosophy make you happy?"</p> -<p>"I have never searched for happiness. Who wants happiness? - I have searched for pleasure."</p> -<p>"And found it, Mr. Gray?"</p> -<p>"Often. Too often."</p> -<p>The duchess sighed. "I am searching for peace," she said, - "and if I don't go and dress, I shall have none this evening."</p> -<p>"Let me get you some orchids, Duchess," cried Dorian, starting to - his feet - and walking down the conservatory.</p> -<p>"You are flirting disgracefully with him," said Lord Henry to his - cousin. - "You had better take care. He is very fascinating."</p> -<p>"If he were not, there would be no battle."</p> -<p>"Greek meets Greek, then?"</p> -<p>"I am on the side of the Trojans. They fought for a woman."</p> -<p>"They were defeated."</p> -<p>"There are worse things than capture," she answered.</p> -<p>"You gallop with a loose rein."</p> -<p>"Pace gives life," was the riposte.</p> -<p>"I shall write it in my diary to-night."</p> -<p>"What?"</p> -<p>"That a burnt child loves the fire."</p> -<p>"I am not even singed. My wings are untouched."</p> -<p>"You use them for everything, except flight."</p> -<p>"Courage has passed from men to women. It is a new experience for us."</p> -<p>"You have a rival."</p> -<p>"Who?"</p> -<p>He laughed. "Lady Narborough," he whispered. "She perfectly - adores him."</p> -<p>"You fill me with apprehension. The appeal to antiquity is fatal - to us who are romanticists."</p> -<p>"Romanticists! You have all the methods of science."</p> -<p>"Men have educated us."</p> -<p>"But not explained you."</p> -<p>"Describe us as a sex," was her challenge.</p> -<p>"Sphinxes without secrets."</p> -<p>She looked at him, smiling. "How long Mr. Gray is!" she said. - "Let us go and help him. I have not yet told him the colour of - my frock."</p> -<p>"Ah! you must suit your frock to his flowers, Gladys."</p> -<p>"That would be a premature surrender."</p> -<p>"Romantic art begins with its climax."</p> -<p>"I must keep an opportunity for retreat."</p> -<p>"In the Parthian manner?"</p> -<p>"They found safety in the desert. I could not do that."</p> -<p>"Women are not always allowed a choice," he answered, but hardly - had - he finished the sentence before from the far end of the conservatory - came a stifled groan, followed by the dull sound of a heavy fall. - Everybody started up. The duchess stood motionless in horror. - And with fear in his eyes, Lord Henry rushed through the flapping - palms to find Dorian Gray lying face downwards on the tiled floor in a - deathlike swoon.</p> -<p>He was carried at once into the blue drawing-room and laid - upon one of the sofas. After a short time, he came to himself - and looked round with a dazed expression.</p> -<p>"What has happened?" he asked. "Oh! I remember. Am I safe here, - Harry?" - He began to tremble.</p> -<p>"My dear Dorian," answered Lord Henry, "you merely fainted. - That was all. - You must have overtired yourself. You had better not come down to dinner. - I will take your place."</p> -<p>"No, I will come down," he said, struggling to his feet. - "I would rather come down. I must not be alone."</p> -<p>He went to his room and dressed. There was a wild recklessness - of gaiety in his manner as he sat at table, but now and then - a thrill of terror ran through him when he remembered that, - pressed against the window of the conservatory, like a - white handkerchief, he had seen the face of James Vane watching him.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 18</p> -<p>The next day he did not leave the house, and, indeed, spent most - of the time in his own room, sick with a wild terror of dying, - and yet indifferent to life itself. The consciousness of - being hunted, snared, tracked down, had begun to dominate him. - If the tapestry did but tremble in the wind, he shook. - The dead leaves that were blown against the leaded panes seemed - to him like his own wasted resolutions and wild regrets. - When he closed his eyes, he saw again the sailor's face peering - through the mist-stained glass, and horror seemed once more to lay its - hand upon his heart.</p> -<p>But perhaps it had been only his fancy that had called vengeance out - of the night and set the hideous shapes of punishment before him. - Actual life was chaos, but there was something terribly logical - in the imagination. It was the imagination that set remorse - to dog the feet of sin. It was the imagination that made - each crime bear its misshapen brood. In the common world - of fact the wicked were not punished, nor the good rewarded. - Success was given to the strong, failure thrust upon the weak. - That was all. Besides, had any stranger been prowling round - the house, he would have been seen by the servants or the keepers. - Had any foot-marks been found on the flower-beds, the gardeners - would have reported it. Yes, it had been merely fancy. - Sibyl Vane's brother had not come back to kill him. - He had sailed away in his ship to founder in some winter sea. - From him, at any rate, he was safe. Why, the man did not know - who he was, could not know who he was. The mask of youth had - saved him.</p> -<p>And yet if it had been merely an illusion, how terrible it - was to think that conscience could raise such fearful phantoms, - and give them visible form, and make them move before one! - What sort of life would his be if, day and night, - shadows of his crime were to peer at him from silent corners, - to mock him from secret places, to whisper in his ear as he sat - at the feast, to wake him with icy fingers as he lay asleep! - As the thought crept through his brain, he grew pale with terror, - and the air seemed to him to have become suddenly colder. - Oh! in what a wild hour of madness he had killed his friend! - How ghastly the mere memory of the scene! He saw it all again. - Each hideous detail came back to him with added horror. - Out of the black cave of time, terrible and swathed in scarlet, - rose the image of his sin. When Lord Henry came in at - six o'clock, he found him crying as one whose heart will - break.</p> -<p>It was not till the third day that he ventured to go out. - There was something in the clear, pine-scented air of that - winter morning that seemed to bring him back his joyousness - and his ardour for life. But it was not merely the physical - conditions of environment that had caused the change. - His own nature had revolted against the excess of anguish - that had sought to maim and mar the perfection of its calm. - With subtle and finely wrought temperaments it is always so. - Their strong passions must either bruise or bend. They either - slay the man, or themselves die. Shallow sorrows and shallow - loves live on. The loves and sorrows that are great are destroyed - by their own plenitude. Besides, he had convinced himself that - he had been the victim of a terror-stricken imagination, and looked - back now on his fears with something of pity and not a little - of contempt.</p> -<p>After breakfast, he walked with the duchess for an hour in the garden - and then drove across the park to join the shooting-party. The crisp frost - lay like salt upon the grass. The sky was an inverted cup of blue metal. - A thin film of ice bordered the flat, reed-grown lake.</p> -<p>At the corner of the pine-wood he caught sight of Sir Geoffrey Clouston, - the duchess's brother, jerking two spent cartridges out of his gun. - He jumped from the cart, and having told the groom to take the mare home, - made his way towards his guest through the withered bracken and - rough undergrowth.</p> -<p>"Have you had good sport, Geoffrey?" he asked.</p> -<p>"Not very good, Dorian. I think most of the birds have gone to the open. - I dare say it will be better after lunch, when we get to new ground."</p> -<p>Dorian strolled along by his side. The keen aromatic air, - the brown and red lights that glimmered in the wood, - the hoarse cries of the beaters ringing out from time to time, - and the sharp snaps of the guns that followed, fascinated him - and filled him with a sense of delightful freedom. - He was dominated by the carelessness of happiness, by the high - indifference of joy.</p> -<p>Suddenly from a lumpy tussock of old grass some twenty yards in front - of them, with black-tipped ears erect and long hinder limbs throwing - it forward, started a hare. It bolted for a thicket of alders. - Sir Geoffrey put his gun to his shoulder, but there was something - in the animal's grace of movement that strangely charmed Dorian Gray, - and he cried out at once, "Don't shoot it, Geoffrey. Let it live."</p> -<p>"What nonsense, Dorian!" laughed his companion, and as the hare - bounded into the thicket, he fired. There were two cries heard, - the cry of a hare in pain, which is dreadful, the cry of a man in agony, - which is worse.</p> -<p>"Good heavens! I have hit a beater!" exclaimed Sir Geoffrey. - "What an ass the man was to get in front of the guns! - Stop shooting there!" he called out at the top of his voice. - "A man is hurt."</p> -<p>The head-keeper came running up with a stick in his hand.</p> -<p>"Where, sir? Where is he?" he shouted. At the same time, - the firing ceased along the line.</p> -<p>"Here," answered Sir Geoffrey angrily, hurrying towards the thicket. - "Why on earth don't you keep your men back? Spoiled my shooting for - the day."</p> -<p>Dorian watched them as they plunged into the alder-clump, - brushing the lithe swinging branches aside. In a few moments - they emerged, dragging a body after them into the sunlight. - He turned away in horror. It seemed to him that misfortune - followed wherever he went. He heard Sir Geoffrey ask if the man - was really dead, and the affirmative answer of the keeper. - The wood seemed to him to have become suddenly alive with faces. - There was the trampling of myriad feet and the low buzz of voices. - A great copper-breasted pheasant came beating through the - boughs overhead.</p> -<p>After a few moments--that were to him, in his perturbed state, - like endless hours of pain--he felt a hand laid on his shoulder. - He started and looked round.</p> -<p>"Dorian," said Lord Henry, "I had better tell them that the - shooting - is stopped for to-day. It would not look well to go on."</p> -<p>"I wish it were stopped for ever, Harry," he answered bitterly. - "The whole thing is hideous and cruel. Is the man ... ?"</p> -<p>He could not finish the sentence.</p> -<p>"I am afraid so," rejoined Lord Henry. "He got the whole charge - of shot - in his chest. He must have died almost instantaneously. Come; let us - go home."</p> -<p>They walked side by side in the direction of the avenue for nearly fifty - yards without speaking. Then Dorian looked at Lord Henry and said, - with a heavy sigh, "It is a bad omen, Harry, a very bad omen."</p> -<p>"What is?" asked Lord Henry. "Oh! this accident, I suppose. - My dear fellow, it can't be helped. It was the man's own fault. - Why did he get in front of the guns? Besides, it is nothing to us. - It is rather awkward for Geoffrey, of course. It does not do to - pepper beaters. It makes people think that one is a wild shot. - And Geoffrey is not; he shoots very straight. But there is no use talking - about the matter."</p> -<p>Dorian shook his head. "It is a bad omen, Harry. I feel - as if something horrible were going to happen to some of us. - To myself, perhaps," he added, passing his hand over his eyes, - with a gesture of pain.</p> -<p>The elder man laughed. "The only horrible thing in the world - is ennui, Dorian. That is the one sin for which there is - no forgiveness. But we are not likely to suffer from it unless - these fellows keep chattering about this thing at dinner. - I must tell them that the subject is to be tabooed. - As for omens, there is no such thing as an omen. - Destiny does not send us heralds. She is too wise or too cruel - for that. Besides, what on earth could happen to you, Dorian? - You have everything in the world that a man can want. - There is no one who would not be delighted to change places - with you."</p> -<p>"There is no one with whom I would not change places, Harry. - Don't laugh like that. I am telling you the truth. The wretched - peasant who has just died is better off than I am. I have no - terror of death. It is the coming of death that terrifies me. - Its monstrous wings seem to wheel in the leaden air around me. - Good heavens! don't you see a man moving behind the trees there, - watching me, waiting for me?"</p> -<p>Lord Henry looked in the direction in which the trembling gloved hand - was pointing. "Yes," he said, smiling, "I see the gardener waiting - for you. - I suppose he wants to ask you what flowers you wish to have on the table - to-night. How absurdly nervous you are, my dear fellow! You must come - and see my doctor, when we get back to town."</p> -<p>Dorian heaved a sigh of relief as he saw the gardener approaching. - The man touched his hat, glanced for a moment at Lord Henry in a - hesitating manner, and then produced a letter, which he handed - to his master. "Her Grace told me to wait for an answer," - he murmured.</p> -<p>Dorian put the letter into his pocket. "Tell her Grace that I am coming - in," - he said, coldly. The man turned round and went rapidly in the direction of - the house.</p> -<p>"How fond women are of doing dangerous things!" laughed Lord Henry. - "It is one of the qualities in them that I admire most. A woman - will flirt with anybody in the world as long as other people are - looking on."</p> -<p>"How fond you are of saying dangerous things, Harry! In the present instance, - you are quite astray. I like the duchess very much, but I don't love her."</p> -<p>"And the duchess loves you very much, but she likes you less, - so you are excellently matched."</p> -<p>"You are talking scandal, Harry, and there is never any basis for scandal."</p> -<p>"The basis of every scandal is an immoral certainty," said Lord Henry, - lighting a cigarette.</p> -<p>"You would sacrifice anybody, Harry, for the sake of an epigram."</p> -<p>"The world goes to the altar of its own accord," was the answer.</p> -<p>"I wish I could love," cried Dorian Gray with a deep note - of pathos in his voice. "But I seem to have lost the passion - and forgotten the desire. I am too much concentrated on myself. - My own personality has become a burden to me. I want to escape, - to go away, to forget. It was silly of me to come down here at all. - I think I shall send a wire to Harvey to have the yacht got ready. - On a yacht one is safe."</p> -<p>"Safe from what, Dorian? You are in some trouble. Why not tell - me what it is? You know I would help you."</p> -<p>"I can't tell you, Harry," he answered sadly. "And I dare say - it - is only a fancy of mine. This unfortunate accident has upset me. - I have a horrible presentiment that something of the kind may happen - to me."</p> -<p>"What nonsense!"</p> -<p>"I hope it is, but I can't help feeling it. Ah! here is - the duchess, looking like Artemis in a tailor-made gown. - You see we have come back, Duchess."</p> -<p>"I have heard all about it, Mr. Gray," she answered. "Poor Geoffrey - is - terribly upset. And it seems that you asked him not to shoot the hare. - How curious!"</p> -<p>"Yes, it was very curious. I don't know what made me say it. - Some whim, I suppose. It looked the loveliest of little - live things. But I am sorry they told you about the man. - It is a hideous subject."</p> -<p>"It is an annoying subject," broke in Lord Henry. "It has no - psychological - value at all. Now if Geoffrey had done the thing on purpose, how interesting - he would be! I should like to know some one who had committed a real murder."</p> -<p>"How horrid of you, Harry!" cried the duchess. "Isn't it, - Mr. Gray? Harry, Mr. Gray is ill again. He is going to faint."</p> -<p>Dorian drew himself up with an effort and smiled. "It is nothing, Duchess," - he murmured; "my nerves are dreadfully out of order. That is all. - I am afraid I walked too far this morning. I didn't hear what Harry said. - Was it very bad? You must tell me some other time. I think I must go and - lie down. You will excuse me, won't you?"</p> -<p>They had reached the great flight of steps that led from the conservatory - on to the terrace. As the glass door closed behind Dorian, Lord Henry turned - and looked at the duchess with his slumberous eyes. "Are you very much - in love with him?" he asked.</p> -<p>She did not answer for some time, but stood gazing at the landscape. - "I wish I knew," she said at last.</p> -<p>He shook his head. "Knowledge would be fatal. It is the uncertainty - that charms one. A mist makes things wonderful."</p> -<p>"One may lose one's way."</p> -<p>"All ways end at the same point, my dear Gladys."</p> -<p>"What is that?"</p> -<p>"Disillusion."</p> -<p>"It was my debut in life," she sighed.</p> -<p>"It came to you crowned."</p> -<p>"I am tired of strawberry leaves."</p> -<p>"They become you."</p> -<p>"Only in public."</p> -<p>"You would miss them," said Lord Henry.</p> -<p>"I will not part with a petal."</p> -<p>"Monmouth has ears."</p> -<p>"Old age is dull of hearing."</p> -<p>"Has he never been jealous?"</p> -<p>"I wish he had been."</p> -<p>He glanced about as if in search of something. "What are you looking for?" - she inquired.</p> -<p>"The button from your foil," he answered. "You have dropped - it."</p> -<p>She laughed. "I have still the mask."</p> -<p>"It makes your eyes lovelier," was his reply.</p> -<p>She laughed again. Her teeth showed like white seeds in a scarlet fruit.</p> -<p>Upstairs, in his own room, Dorian Gray was lying on a sofa, - with terror in every tingling fibre of his body. Life had suddenly - become too hideous a burden for him to bear. The dreadful death - of the unlucky beater, shot in the thicket like a wild animal, - had seemed to him to pre-figure death for himself also. - He had nearly swooned at what Lord Henry had said in a chance mood - of cynical jesting.</p> -<p>At five o'clock he rang his bell for his servant and gave - him orders to pack his things for the night-express to town, - and to have the brougham at the door by eight-thirty. He - was determined not to sleep another night at Selby Royal. - It was an ill-omened place. Death walked there in the sunlight. - The grass of the forest had been spotted with blood.</p> -<p>Then he wrote a note to Lord Henry, telling him that he was going up to town - to consult his doctor and asking him to entertain his guests in his absence. - As he was putting it into the envelope, a knock came to the door, and his valet - informed him that the head-keeper wished to see him. He frowned and bit his - lip. "Send him in," he muttered, after some moments' hesitation.</p> -<p>As soon as the man entered, Dorian pulled his chequebook out of a drawer - and spread it out before him.</p> -<p>"I suppose you have come about the unfortunate accident - of this morning, Thornton?" he said, taking up a pen.</p> -<p>"Yes, sir," answered the gamekeeper.</p> -<p>"Was the poor fellow married? Had he any people dependent on him?" - asked Dorian, looking bored. "If so, I should not like them to be left - in want, and will send them any sum of money you may think necessary."</p> -<p>"We don't know who he is, sir. That is what I took the liberty - of coming to you about."</p> -<p>"Don't know who he is?" said Dorian, listlessly. "What do you - mean? - Wasn't he one of your men?"</p> -<p>"No, sir. Never saw him before. Seems like a sailor, sir."</p> -<p>The pen dropped from Dorian Gray's hand, and he felt as if his - heart had suddenly stopped beating. "A sailor?" he cried out. - "Did you say a sailor?"</p> -<p>"Yes, sir. He looks as if he had been a sort of sailor; - tattooed on both arms, and that kind of thing."</p> -<p>"Was there anything found on him?" said Dorian, leaning forward and - looking - at the man with startled eyes. "Anything that would tell his name?"</p> -<p>"Some money, sir--not much, and a six-shooter. There was no name of any - kind. - A decent-looking man, sir, but rough-like. A sort of sailor we think."</p> -<p>Dorian started to his feet. A terrible hope fluttered past him. - He clutched at it madly. "Where is the body?" he exclaimed. - "Quick! I must see it at once."</p> -<p>"It is in an empty stable in the Home Farm, sir. The folk - don't like to have that sort of thing in their houses. - They say a corpse brings bad luck."</p> -<p>"The Home Farm! Go there at once and meet me. Tell one of the grooms - to bring my horse round. No. Never mind. I'll go to the stables myself. - It will save time."</p> -<p>In less than a quarter of an hour, Dorian Gray was galloping down the long - avenue as hard as he could go. The trees seemed to sweep past him in - spectral procession, and wild shadows to fling themselves across his path. - Once the mare swerved at a white gate-post and nearly threw him. He lashed - her across the neck with his crop. She cleft the dusky air like an arrow. - The stones flew from her hoofs.</p> -<p>At last he reached the Home Farm. Two men were loitering in the yard. - He leaped from the saddle and threw the reins to one of them. - In the farthest stable a light was glimmering. Something seemed - to tell him that the body was there, and he hurried to the door - and put his hand upon the latch.</p> -<p>There he paused for a moment, feeling that he was on the brink - of a discovery that would either make or mar his life. - Then he thrust the door open and entered.</p> -<p>On a heap of sacking in the far corner was lying the dead body - of a man dressed in a coarse shirt and a pair of blue trousers. - A spotted handkerchief had been placed over the face. - A coarse candle, stuck in a bottle, sputtered beside it.</p> -<p>Dorian Gray shuddered. He felt that his could not be the hand to take - the handkerchief away, and called out to one of the farm-servants to come - to him.</p> -<p>"Take that thing off the face. I wish to see it," he said, - clutching at the door-post for support.</p> -<p>When the farm-servant had done so, he stepped forward. - A cry of joy broke from his lips. The man who had been shot in - the thicket was James Vane.</p> -<p>He stood there for some minutes looking at the dead body. - As he rode home, his eyes were full of tears, for he knew - he was safe.</p> -<p> - CHAPTER 19</p> -<p>"There is no use your telling me that you are going to be good," - cried Lord Henry, dipping his white fingers into a red copper bowl - filled with rose-water. "You are quite perfect. Pray, don't change."</p> -<p>Dorian Gray shook his head. "No, Harry, I have done too many - dreadful things in my life. I am not going to do any more. - I began my good actions yesterday."</p> -<p>"Where were you yesterday?"</p> -<p>"In the country, Harry. I was staying at a little inn by myself."</p> -<p>"My dear boy," said Lord Henry, smiling, "anybody can be good - in the country. - There are no temptations there. That is the reason why people who live out - of town are so absolutely uncivilized. Civilization is not by any means an - easy thing to attain to. There are only two ways by which man can reach it. - One is by being cultured, the other by being corrupt. Country people have no - opportunity of being either, so they stagnate."</p> -<p>"Culture and corruption," echoed Dorian. "I have known something - of both. - It seems terrible to me now that they should ever be found together. - For I have a new ideal, Harry. I am going to alter. I think I - have altered."</p> -<p>"You have not yet told me what your good action was. - Or did you say you had done more than one?" asked his companion - as he spilled into his plate a little crimson pyramid of seeded - strawberries and, through a perforated, shell-shaped spoon, - snowed white sugar upon them.</p> -<p>"I can tell you, Harry. It is not a story I could tell to any one else. - I spared somebody. It sounds vain, but you understand what I mean. - She was quite beautiful and wonderfully like Sibyl Vane. I think it was - that which first attracted me to her. You remember Sibyl, don't you? - How long ago that seems! Well, Hetty was not one of our own class, - of course. She was simply a girl in a village. But I really loved her. - I am quite sure that I loved her. All during this wonderful May that we - have been having, I used to run down and see her two or three times a week. - Yesterday she met me in a little orchard. The apple-blossoms kept tumbling - down on her hair, and she was laughing. We were to have gone away together - this morning at dawn. Suddenly I determined to leave her as flowerlike as I - had found her."</p> -<p>"I should think the novelty of the emotion must have given you - a thrill of real pleasure, Dorian," interrupted Lord Henry. - "But I can finish your idyll for you. You gave her good advice - and broke her heart. That was the beginning of your reformation."</p> -<p>"Harry, you are horrible! You mustn't say these dreadful things. - Hetty's heart is not broken. Of course, she cried and all that. - But there is no disgrace upon her. She can live, like Perdita, in her - garden of mint and marigold."</p> -<p>"And weep over a faithless Florizel," said Lord Henry, - laughing, as he leaned back in his chair. "My dear Dorian, - you have the most curiously boyish moods. Do you think this girl - will ever be really content now with any one of her own rank? - I suppose she will be married some day to a rough carter - or a grinning ploughman. Well, the fact of having met you, - and loved you, will teach her to despise her husband, - and she will be wretched. From a moral point of view, - I cannot say that I think much of your great renunciation. - Even as a beginning, it is poor. Besides, how do you know - that Hetty isn't floating at the present moment in some - starlit mill-pond, with lovely water-lilies round her, - like Ophelia?"</p> -<p>"I can't bear this, Harry! You mock at everything, and then - suggest the most serious tragedies. I am sorry I told you now. - I don't care what you say to me. I know I was right in acting - as I did. Poor Hetty! As I rode past the farm this morning, - I saw her white face at the window, like a spray of jasmine. - Don't let us talk about it any more, and don't try to persuade - me that the first good action I have done for years, - the first little bit of self-sacrifice I have ever known, - is really a sort of sin. I want to be better. - I am going to be better. Tell me something about yourself. - What is going on in town? I have not been to the club - for days."</p> -<p>"The people are still discussing poor Basil's disappearance."</p> -<p>"I should have thought they had got tired of that by this time," - said Dorian, pouring himself out some wine and frowning slightly.</p> -<p>"My dear boy, they have only been talking about it for six weeks, - and the British public are really not equal to the mental - strain of having more than one topic every three months. - They have been very fortunate lately, however. They have - had my own divorce-case and Alan Campbell's suicide. - Now they have got the mysterious disappearance of an artist. - Scotland Yard still insists that the man in the grey ulster - who left for Paris by the midnight train on the ninth of November - was poor Basil, and the French police declare that Basil never - arrived in Paris at all. I suppose in about a fortnight we shall - be told that he has been seen in San Francisco. It is an odd thing, - but every one who disappears is said to be seen at San Francisco. - It must be a delightful city, and possess all the attractions - of the next world."</p> -<p>"What do you think has happened to Basil?" asked Dorian, - holding up his Burgundy against the light and wondering how it - was that he could discuss the matter so calmly.</p> -<p>"I have not the slightest idea. If Basil chooses to hide himself, - it is no business of mine. If he is dead, I don't want to think - about him. Death is the only thing that ever terrifies me. - I hate it."</p> -<p>"Why?" said the younger man wearily.</p> -<p>"Because," said Lord Henry, passing beneath his nostrils the gilt - trellis - of an open vinaigrette box, "one can survive everything nowadays except - that. - Death and vulgarity are the only two facts in the nineteenth century that one - cannot explain away. Let us have our coffee in the music-room, Dorian. - You must play Chopin to me. The man with whom my wife ran away played - Chopin exquisitely. Poor Victoria! I was very fond of her. The house - is rather lonely without her. Of course, married life is merely a habit, - a bad habit. But then one regrets the loss even of one's worst habits. - Perhaps one regrets them the most. They are such an essential part of - one's personality."</p> -<p>Dorian said nothing, but rose from the table, and passing into the next room, - sat down to the piano and let his fingers stray across the white and black - ivory of the keys. After the coffee had been brought in, he stopped, - and looking over at Lord Henry, said, "Harry, did it ever occur to you - that - Basil was murdered?"</p> -<p>Lord Henry yawned. "Basil was very popular, and always - wore a Waterbury watch. Why should he have been murdered? - He was not clever enough to have enemies. Of course, - he had a wonderful genius for painting. But a man can - paint like Velasquez and yet be as dull as possible. - Basil was really rather dull. He only interested me once, - and that was when he told me, years ago, that he had a wild - adoration for you and that you were the dominant motive of - his art."</p> -<p>"I was very fond of Basil," said Dorian with a note of sadness in - his voice. - "But don't people say that he was murdered?"</p> -<p>"Oh, some of the papers do. It does not seem to me to be at all probable. - I know there are dreadful places in Paris, but Basil was not the sort of man - to have gone to them. He had no curiosity. It was his chief defect."</p> -<p>"What would you say, Harry, if I told you that I had murdered Basil?" - said the younger man. He watched him intently after he had spoken.</p> -<p>"I would say, my dear fellow, that you were posing for a character - that doesn't suit you. All crime is vulgar, just as all vulgarity - is crime. It is not in you, Dorian, to commit a murder. - I am sorry if I hurt your vanity by saying so, but I assure you - it is true. Crime belongs exclusively to the lower orders. - I don't blame them in the smallest degree. I should fancy that - crime was to them what art is to us, simply a method of procuring - extraordinary sensations."</p> -<p>"A method of procuring sensations? Do you think, then, that a man - who has once committed a murder could possibly do the same crime again? - Don't tell me that."</p> -<p>"Oh! anything becomes a pleasure if one does it too often," - cried Lord Henry, laughing. "That is one of the most important secrets - of life. I should fancy, however, that murder is always a mistake. - One should never do anything that one cannot talk about after dinner. - But let us pass from poor Basil. I wish I could believe that he had - come to such a really romantic end as you suggest, but I can't. I - dare say he fell into the Seine off an omnibus and that the conductor - hushed up the scandal. Yes: I should fancy that was his end. - I see him lying now on his back under those dull-green waters, - with the heavy barges floating over him and long weeds catching - in his hair. Do you know, I don't think he would have done much - more good work. During the last ten years his painting had gone off - very much."</p> -<p>Dorian heaved a sigh, and Lord Henry strolled across the room - and began to stroke the head of a curious Java parrot, a large, - grey-plumaged bird with pink crest and tail, that was balancing - itself upon a bamboo perch. As his pointed fingers touched it, - it dropped the white scurf of crinkled lids over black, - glasslike eyes and began to sway backwards and forwards.</p> -<p>"Yes," he continued, turning round and taking his handkerchief out - of his pocket; "his painting had quite gone off. It seemed to me to have - lost something. It had lost an ideal. When you and he ceased to be great friends, - he ceased to be a great artist. What was it separated you? I suppose he bored - you. If so, he never forgave you. It's a habit bores have. By the way, what - has become of that wonderful portrait he did of you? I don't think I have ever - seen it since he finished it. Oh! I remember your telling me years ago that - you had sent it down to Selby, and that it had got mislaid or stolen on the - way. You never got it back? What a pity! it was really a masterpiece. I remember - I wanted to buy it. I wish I had now. It belonged to Basil's best period. Since - then, his work was that curious mixture of bad painting and good intentions - that always entitles a man to be called a representative British artist. Did - you advertise for it? You should."</p> -<p>"I forget," said Dorian. "I suppose I did. But I never really - liked it. I am sorry I sat for it. The memory of the thing is hateful to me. - Why do you talk of it? It used to remind me of those curious lines in some play--Hamlet, - I think--how do they run?--</p> -<blockquote> - <p> "Like the painting of a sorrow,</p> - <p> A face without a heart."</p> -</blockquote> -<p>Yes: that is what it was like."</p> -<p>Lord Henry laughed. "If a man treats life artistically, - his brain is his heart," he answered, sinking into an arm-chair.</p> -<p>Dorian Gray shook his head and struck some soft chords on the piano. - "'Like the painting of a sorrow,'" he repeated, "'a face without - a heart.'"</p> -<p>The elder man lay back and looked at him with half-closed eyes. - "By the way, Dorian," he said after a pause, "'what does it profit - a man if he gain the whole world and lose--how does the quotation run?-- - his own soul'?"</p> -<p>The music jarred, and Dorian Gray started and stared at his friend. - "Why do you ask me that, Harry?"</p> -<p>"My dear fellow," said Lord Henry, elevating his eyebrows in surprise, - "I asked you because I thought you might be able to give me an answer. - That is all. I was going through the park last Sunday, and close by the - Marble Arch there stood a little crowd of shabby-looking people listening - to some vulgar street-preacher. As I passed by, I heard the man yelling - out that question to his audience. It struck me as being rather dramatic. - London is very rich in curious effects of that kind. A wet Sunday, - an uncouth Christian in a mackintosh, a ring of sickly white faces under - a broken roof of dripping umbrellas, and a wonderful phrase flung into - the air by shrill hysterical lips--it was really very good in its way, - quite a suggestion. I thought of telling the prophet that art had - a soul, but that man had not. I am afraid, however, he would not have - understood me."</p> -<p>"Don't, Harry. The soul is a terrible reality. It can be bought, - and sold, and bartered away. It can be poisoned, or made perfect. - There is a soul in each one of us. I know it."</p> -<p>"Do you feel quite sure of that, Dorian?"</p> -<p>"Quite sure."</p> -<p>"Ah! then it must be an illusion. The things one feels - absolutely certain about are never true. That is the fatality - of faith, and the lesson of romance. How grave you are! - Don't be so serious. What have you or I to do with the superstitions - of our age? No: we have given up our belief in the soul. - Play me something. Play me a nocturne, Dorian, and, as you play, - tell me, in a low voice, how you have kept your youth. - You must have some secret. I am only ten years older than - you are, and I am wrinkled, and worn, and yellow. You are - really wonderful, Dorian. You have never looked more charming - than you do to-night. You remind me of the day I saw you first. - You were rather cheeky, very shy, and absolutely extraordinary. - You have changed, of course, but not in appearance. - I wish you would tell me your secret. To get back my youth - I would do anything in the world, except take exercise, - get up early, or be respectable. Youth! There is nothing - like it. It's absurd to talk of the ignorance of youth. - The only people to whose opinions I listen now with any respect - are people much younger than myself. They seem in front of me. - Life has revealed to them her latest wonder. As for the aged, - I always contradict the aged. I do it on principle. - If you ask them their opinion on something that happened yesterday, - they solemnly give you the opinions current in 1820, - when people wore high stocks, believed in everything, and knew - absolutely nothing. How lovely that thing you are playing is! - I wonder, did Chopin write it at Majorca, with the sea weeping - round the villa and the salt spray dashing against the panes? - It is marvellously romantic. What a blessing it is - that there is one art left to us that is not imitative! - Don't stop. I want music to-night. It seems to me that you - are the young Apollo and that I am Marsyas listening to you. - I have sorrows, Dorian, of my own, that even you know nothing of. - The tragedy of old age is not that one is old, but that one - is young. I am amazed sometimes at my own sincerity. - Ah, Dorian, how happy you are! What an exquisite life - you have had! You have drunk deeply of everything. - You have crushed the grapes against your palate. Nothing has - been hidden from you. And it has all been to you no more than - the sound of music. It has not marred you. You are still the - same."</p> -<p>"I am not the same, Harry."</p> -<p>"Yes, you are the same. I wonder what the rest of your life will be. - Don't spoil it by renunciations. At present you are a perfect type. - Don't make yourself incomplete. You are quite flawless now. - You need not shake your head: you know you are. Besides, Dorian, - don't deceive yourself. Life is not governed by will or intention. - Life is a question of nerves, and fibres, and slowly built-up - cells in which thought hides itself and passion has its dreams. - You may fancy yourself safe and think yourself strong. But a chance - tone of colour in a room or a morning sky, a particular perfume - that you had once loved and that brings subtle memories with it, - a line from a forgotten poem that you had come across again, - a cadence from a piece of music that you had ceased to play-- - I tell you, Dorian, that it is on things like these that our lives depend. - Browning writes about that somewhere; but our own senses will imagine - them for us. There are moments when the odour of lilas blanc passes - suddenly across me, and I have to live the strangest month of my life - over again. I wish I could change places with you, Dorian. The world - has cried out against us both, but it has always worshipped you. - It always will worship you. You are the type of what the age - is searching for, and what it is afraid it has found. I am - so glad that you have never done anything, never carved a statue, - or painted a picture, or produced anything outside of yourself! - Life has been your art. You have set yourself to music. Your days are - your sonnets."</p> -<p>Dorian rose up from the piano and passed his hand through his hair. - "Yes, life has been exquisite," he murmured, "but I am not going - to have the same life, Harry. And you must not say these - extravagant things to me. You don't know everything about me. - I think that if you did, even you would turn from me. You laugh. - Don't laugh."</p> -<p>"Why have you stopped playing, Dorian? Go back and give me - the nocturne over again. Look at that great, honey-coloured moon - that hangs in the dusky air. She is waiting for you to charm her, - and if you play she will come closer to the earth. You won't? - Let us go to the club, then. It has been a charming evening, - and we must end it charmingly. There is some one at White's who wants - immensely to know you--young Lord Poole, Bournemouth's eldest son. - He has already copied your neckties, and has begged me to introduce - him to you. He is quite delightful and rather reminds me of you."</p> -<p>"I hope not," said Dorian with a sad look in his eyes. - "But I am tired to-night, Harry. I shan't go to the club. - It is nearly eleven, and I want to go to bed early."</p> -<p>"Do stay. You have never played so well as to-night. There was something - in your touch that was wonderful. It had more expression than I had ever - heard from it before."</p> -<p>"It is because I am going to be good," he answered, smiling. - "I am a little changed already."</p> -<p>"You cannot change to me, Dorian," said Lord Henry. "You and - I will always - be friends."</p> -<p>"Yet you poisoned me with a book once. I should not forgive that. - Harry, promise me that you will never lend that book to any one. - It does harm."</p> -<p>"My dear boy, you are really beginning to moralize. You will - soon be going about like the converted, and the revivalist, - warning people against all the sins of which you have grown tired. - You are much too delightful to do that. Besides, it is no use. - You and I are what we are, and will be what we will be. - As for being poisoned by a book, there is no such thing as that. - Art has no influence upon action. It annihilates the desire - to act. It is superbly sterile. The books that the world - calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame. - That is all. But we won't discuss literature. Come round - to-morrow. I am going to ride at eleven. We might go together, - and I will take you to lunch afterwards with Lady Branksome. - She is a charming woman, and wants to consult you about some - tapestries she is thinking of buying. Mind you come. Or shall we - lunch with our little duchess? She says she never sees you now. - Perhaps you are tired of Gladys? I thought you would be. - Her clever tongue gets on one's nerves. Well, in any case, be here at - eleven."</p> -<p>"Must I really come, Harry?"</p> -<p>"Certainly. The park is quite lovely now. I don't think there - have been such lilacs since the year I met you."</p> -<p>"Very well. I shall be here at eleven," said Dorian. - "Good night, Harry." As he reached the door, he hesitated - for a moment, as if he had something more to say. Then he sighed - and went out.</p> -<p></p> -<p>CHAPTER 20</p> -<p>It was a lovely night, so warm that he threw his coat over his arm and did - not even put his silk scarf round his throat. As he strolled home, - smoking his cigarette, two young men in evening dress passed him. - He heard one of them whisper to the other, "That is Dorian Gray." - He remembered how pleased he used to be when he was pointed out, - or stared at, or talked about. He was tired of hearing his own name now. - Half the charm of the little village where he had been so often lately - was that no one knew who he was. He had often told the girl whom - he had lured to love him that he was poor, and she had believed him. - He had told her once that he was wicked, and she had laughed at him - and answered that wicked people were always very old and very ugly. - What a laugh she had!--just like a thrush singing. And how pretty she had - been in her cotton dresses and her large hats! She knew nothing, but she had - everything that he had lost.</p> -<p>When he reached home, he found his servant waiting up for him. - He sent him to bed, and threw himself down on the sofa in the library, - and began to think over some of the things that Lord Henry had said - to him.</p> -<p>Was it really true that one could never change? He felt - a wild longing for the unstained purity of his boyhood-- - his rose-white boyhood, as Lord Henry had once called it. - He knew that he had tarnished himself, filled his mind with - corruption and given horror to his fancy; that he had been - an evil influence to others, and had experienced a terrible joy - in being so; and that of the lives that had crossed his own, - it had been the fairest and the most full of promise that - he had brought to shame. But was it all irretrievable? - Was there no hope for him?</p> -<p>Ah! in what a monstrous moment of pride and passion he had - prayed that the portrait should bear the burden of his days, - and he keep the unsullied splendour of eternal youth! - All his failure had been due to that. Better for him that each sin - of his life had brought its sure swift penalty along with it. - There was purification in punishment. Not "Forgive us our sins" - but "Smite us for our iniquities" should be the prayer of man to a - most just God.</p> -<p>The curiously carved mirror that Lord Henry had given - to him, so many years ago now, was standing on the table, - and the white-limbed Cupids laughed round it as of old. - He took it up, as he had done on that night of horror - when he had first noted the change in the fatal picture, - and with wild, tear-dimmed eyes looked into its polished shield. - Once, some one who had terribly loved him had written - to him a mad letter, ending with these idolatrous words: - "The world is changed because you are made of ivory and gold. - The curves of your lips rewrite history." The phrases came back - to his memory, and he repeated them over and over to himself. - Then he loathed his own beauty, and flinging the mirror on - the floor, crushed it into silver splinters beneath his heel. - It was his beauty that had ruined him, his beauty and the youth - that he had prayed for. But for those two things, his life - might have been free from stain. His beauty had been to him - but a mask, his youth but a mockery. What was youth at best? - A green, an unripe time, a time of shallow moods, - and sickly thoughts. Why had he worn its livery? Youth had - spoiled him.</p> -<p>It was better not to think of the past. Nothing could alter that. - It was of himself, and of his own future, that he had to think. - James Vane was hidden in a nameless grave in Selby churchyard. - Alan Campbell had shot himself one night in his laboratory, - but had not revealed the secret that he had been forced to know. - The excitement, such as it was, over Basil Hallward's - disappearance would soon pass away. It was already waning. - He was perfectly safe there. Nor, indeed, was it the death - of Basil Hallward that weighed most upon his mind. - It was the living death of his own soul that troubled him. - Basil had painted the portrait that had marred his life. - He could not forgive him that. It was the portrait that had - done everything. Basil had said things to him that were unbearable, - and that he had yet borne with patience. The murder had - been simply the madness of a moment. As for Alan Campbell, - his suicide had been his own act. He had chosen to do it. - It was nothing to him.</p> -<p>A new life! That was what he wanted. That was what he was waiting for. - Surely he had begun it already. He had spared one innocent thing, - at any rate. He would never again tempt innocence. He would be good.</p> -<p>As he thought of Hetty Merton, he began to wonder if the portrait in the - locked room had changed. Surely it was not still so horrible as it had been? - Perhaps if his life became pure, he would be able to expel every sign of evil - passion from the face. Perhaps the signs of evil had already gone away. - He would go and look.</p> -<p>He took the lamp from the table and crept upstairs. As he unbarred the door, - a smile of joy flitted across his strangely young-looking face and lingered - for a moment about his lips. Yes, he would be good, and the hideous thing - that he had hidden away would no longer be a terror to him. He felt as if - the load had been lifted from him already.</p> -<p>He went in quietly, locking the door behind him, as was his custom, and dragged - the purple hanging from the portrait. A cry of pain and indignation broke from - him. He could see no change, save that in the eyes there was a look of cunning - and in the mouth the curved wrinkle of the hypocrite. The thing was still loathsome--more - loathsome, if possible, than before--and the scarlet dew that spotted the hand - seemed brighter, and more like blood newly spilled. Then he trembled. Had it - been merely vanity that had made him do his one good deed? Or the desire for - a new sensation, as Lord Henry had hinted, with his mocking laugh? Or that passion - to act a part that sometimes makes us do things finer than we are ourselves? - Or, perhaps, all these? And why was the red stain larger than it had been? It - seemed to have crept like a horrible disease over the wrinkled fingers. There - was blood on the painted feet, as though the thing had dripped--blood even on - the hand that had not held the knife. Confess? Did it mean that he was to confess? - To give himself up and be put to death? He laughed. He felt that the idea was - monstrous. Besides, even if he did confess, who would believe him? There was - no trace of the murdered man anywhere. Everything belonging to him had been - destroyed. He himself had burned what had been below-stairs. The world would - simply say that he was mad. They would shut him up if he persisted in his story. - . . . Yet it was his duty to confess, to suffer public shame, and to make public - atonement. There was a God who called upon men to tell their sins to earth as - well as to heaven. Nothing that he could do would cleanse him till he had told - his own sin. His sin? He shrugged his shoulders. The death of Basil Hallward - seemed very little to him. He was thinking of Hetty Merton. For it was an unjust - mirror, this mirror of his soul that he was looking at. Vanity? Curiosity? Hypocrisy? - Had there been nothing more in his renunciation than that? There had been something - more. At least he thought so. But who could tell? . . . No. There had been nothing - more. Through vanity he had spared her. In hypocrisy he had worn the mask of - goodness. For curiosity's sake he had tried the denial of self. He recognized - that now.</p> -<p>But this murder--was it to dog him all his life? Was he always to be - burdened by his past? Was he really to confess? Never. There was - only one bit of evidence left against him. The picture itself-- - that was evidence. He would destroy it. Why had he kept it so long? - Once it had given him pleasure to watch it changing and growing old. - Of late he had felt no such pleasure. It had kept him awake at night. - When he had been away, he had been filled with terror lest other eyes - should look upon it. It had brought melancholy across his passions. - Its mere memory had marred many moments of joy. It had been - like conscience to him. Yes, it had been conscience. He would - destroy it.</p> -<p>He looked round and saw the knife that had stabbed Basil Hallward. - He had cleaned it many times, till there was no stain left upon it. - It was bright, and glistened. As it had killed the painter, - so it would kill the painter's work, and all that that meant. - It would kill the past, and when that was dead, he would be free. - It would kill this monstrous soul-life, and without its hideous warnings, - he would be at peace. He seized the thing, and stabbed the picture - with it.</p> -<p>There was a cry heard, and a crash. The cry was so horrible - in its agony that the frightened servants woke and crept - out of their rooms. Two gentlemen, who were passing in - the square below, stopped and looked up at the great house. - They walked on till they met a policeman and brought him back. - The man rang the bell several times, but there was no answer. - Except for a light in one of the top windows, the house was all dark. - After a time, he went away and stood in an adjoining portico - and watched.</p> -<p>"Whose house is that, Constable?" asked the elder of the two gentlemen.</p> -<p>"Mr. Dorian Gray's, sir," answered the policeman.</p> -<p>They looked at each other, as they walked away, and sneered. - One of them was Sir Henry Ashton's uncle.</p> -<p>Inside, in the servants' part of the house, the half-clad - domestics were talking in low whispers to each other. - Old Mrs. Leaf was crying and wringing her hands. Francis was - as pale as death.</p> -<p>After about a quarter of an hour, he got the coachman and one of the footmen - and crept upstairs. They knocked, but there was no reply. They called out. - Everything was still. Finally, after vainly trying to force the door, - they got on the roof and dropped down on to the balcony. The windows - yielded easily--their bolts were old.</p> -<p>When they entered, they found hanging upon the wall a splendid - portrait of their master as they had last seen him, in all - the wonder of his exquisite youth and beauty. Lying on the floor - was a dead man, in evening dress, with a knife in his heart. - He was withered, wrinkled, and loathsome of visage. - It was not till they had examined the rings that they - recognized who it was.</p> -<p> -<pre> -*****This file should be named dgray10h.htm or dgray10h.zip***** - -Corrected EDITIONS of our etexts get a new NUMBER, dgray11h.htm. -VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, dgray10ah.htm. - -Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US -unless a copyright notice is included. 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You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: The Picture of Dorian Gray - -Author: Oscar Wilde - -Release Date: October, 1994 [eBook #174] -[Most recently updated: February 3, 2022] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -Produced by: Judith Boss. HTML version by Al Haines. - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY *** - - - - -The Picture of Dorian Gray - -by Oscar Wilde - - -Contents - - THE PREFACE - CHAPTER I. - CHAPTER II. - CHAPTER III. - CHAPTER IV. - CHAPTER V. - CHAPTER VI. - CHAPTER VII. - CHAPTER VIII. - CHAPTER IX. - CHAPTER X. - CHAPTER XI. - CHAPTER XII. - CHAPTER XIII. - CHAPTER XIV. - CHAPTER XV. - CHAPTER XVI. - CHAPTER XVII. - CHAPTER XVIII. - CHAPTER XIX. - CHAPTER XX. - - - - -THE PREFACE - - -The artist is the creator of beautiful things. To reveal art and -conceal the artist is art’s aim. The critic is he who can translate -into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful -things. - -The highest as the lowest form of criticism is a mode of autobiography. -Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without -being charming. This is a fault. - -Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the -cultivated. For these there is hope. They are the elect to whom -beautiful things mean only beauty. - -There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well -written, or badly written. That is all. - -The nineteenth century dislike of realism is the rage of Caliban seeing -his own face in a glass. - -The nineteenth century dislike of romanticism is the rage of Caliban -not seeing his own face in a glass. The moral life of man forms part of -the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality of art consists in -the perfect use of an imperfect medium. No artist desires to prove -anything. Even things that are true can be proved. No artist has -ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in an artist is an unpardonable -mannerism of style. No artist is ever morbid. The artist can express -everything. Thought and language are to the artist instruments of an -art. Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for an art. From the -point of view of form, the type of all the arts is the art of the -musician. From the point of view of feeling, the actor’s craft is the -type. All art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath the -surface do so at their peril. Those who read the symbol do so at their -peril. It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors. -Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, -complex, and vital. When critics disagree, the artist is in accord with -himself. We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he -does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that -one admires it intensely. - -All art is quite useless. - -OSCAR WILDE - - - - -CHAPTER I. - - -The studio was filled with the rich odour of roses, and when the light -summer wind stirred amidst the trees of the garden, there came through -the open door the heavy scent of the lilac, or the more delicate -perfume of the pink-flowering thorn. - -From the corner of the divan of Persian saddle-bags on which he was -lying, smoking, as was his custom, innumerable cigarettes, Lord Henry -Wotton could just catch the gleam of the honey-sweet and honey-coloured -blossoms of a laburnum, whose tremulous branches seemed hardly able to -bear the burden of a beauty so flamelike as theirs; and now and then -the fantastic shadows of birds in flight flitted across the long -tussore-silk curtains that were stretched in front of the huge window, -producing a kind of momentary Japanese effect, and making him think of -those pallid, jade-faced painters of Tokyo who, through the medium of -an art that is necessarily immobile, seek to convey the sense of -swiftness and motion. The sullen murmur of the bees shouldering their -way through the long unmown grass, or circling with monotonous -insistence round the dusty gilt horns of the straggling woodbine, -seemed to make the stillness more oppressive. The dim roar of London -was like the bourdon note of a distant organ. - -In the centre of the room, clamped to an upright easel, stood the -full-length portrait of a young man of extraordinary personal beauty, -and in front of it, some little distance away, was sitting the artist -himself, Basil Hallward, whose sudden disappearance some years ago -caused, at the time, such public excitement and gave rise to so many -strange conjectures. - -As the painter looked at the gracious and comely form he had so -skilfully mirrored in his art, a smile of pleasure passed across his -face, and seemed about to linger there. But he suddenly started up, and -closing his eyes, placed his fingers upon the lids, as though he sought -to imprison within his brain some curious dream from which he feared he -might awake. - -“It is your best work, Basil, the best thing you have ever done,” said -Lord Henry languidly. “You must certainly send it next year to the -Grosvenor. The Academy is too large and too vulgar. Whenever I have -gone there, there have been either so many people that I have not been -able to see the pictures, which was dreadful, or so many pictures that -I have not been able to see the people, which was worse. The Grosvenor -is really the only place.” - -“I don’t think I shall send it anywhere,” he answered, tossing his head -back in that odd way that used to make his friends laugh at him at -Oxford. “No, I won’t send it anywhere.” - -Lord Henry elevated his eyebrows and looked at him in amazement through -the thin blue wreaths of smoke that curled up in such fanciful whorls -from his heavy, opium-tainted cigarette. “Not send it anywhere? My dear -fellow, why? Have you any reason? What odd chaps you painters are! You -do anything in the world to gain a reputation. As soon as you have one, -you seem to want to throw it away. It is silly of you, for there is -only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is -not being talked about. A portrait like this would set you far above -all the young men in England, and make the old men quite jealous, if -old men are ever capable of any emotion.” - -“I know you will laugh at me,” he replied, “but I really can’t exhibit -it. I have put too much of myself into it.” - -Lord Henry stretched himself out on the divan and laughed. - -“Yes, I knew you would; but it is quite true, all the same.” - -“Too much of yourself in it! Upon my word, Basil, I didn’t know you -were so vain; and I really can’t see any resemblance between you, with -your rugged strong face and your coal-black hair, and this young -Adonis, who looks as if he was made out of ivory and rose-leaves. Why, -my dear Basil, he is a Narcissus, and you—well, of course you have an -intellectual expression and all that. But beauty, real beauty, ends -where an intellectual expression begins. Intellect is in itself a mode -of exaggeration, and destroys the harmony of any face. The moment one -sits down to think, one becomes all nose, or all forehead, or something -horrid. Look at the successful men in any of the learned professions. -How perfectly hideous they are! Except, of course, in the Church. But -then in the Church they don’t think. A bishop keeps on saying at the -age of eighty what he was told to say when he was a boy of eighteen, -and as a natural consequence he always looks absolutely delightful. -Your mysterious young friend, whose name you have never told me, but -whose picture really fascinates me, never thinks. I feel quite sure of -that. He is some brainless beautiful creature who should be always here -in winter when we have no flowers to look at, and always here in summer -when we want something to chill our intelligence. Don’t flatter -yourself, Basil: you are not in the least like him.” - -“You don’t understand me, Harry,” answered the artist. “Of course I am -not like him. I know that perfectly well. Indeed, I should be sorry to -look like him. You shrug your shoulders? I am telling you the truth. -There is a fatality about all physical and intellectual distinction, -the sort of fatality that seems to dog through history the faltering -steps of kings. It is better not to be different from one’s fellows. -The ugly and the stupid have the best of it in this world. They can sit -at their ease and gape at the play. If they know nothing of victory, -they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat. They live as we all -should live—undisturbed, indifferent, and without disquiet. They -neither bring ruin upon others, nor ever receive it from alien hands. -Your rank and wealth, Harry; my brains, such as they are—my art, -whatever it may be worth; Dorian Gray’s good looks—we shall all suffer -for what the gods have given us, suffer terribly.” - -“Dorian Gray? Is that his name?” asked Lord Henry, walking across the -studio towards Basil Hallward. - -“Yes, that is his name. I didn’t intend to tell it to you.” - -“But why not?” - -“Oh, I can’t explain. When I like people immensely, I never tell their -names to any one. It is like surrendering a part of them. I have grown -to love secrecy. It seems to be the one thing that can make modern life -mysterious or marvellous to us. The commonest thing is delightful if -one only hides it. When I leave town now I never tell my people where I -am going. If I did, I would lose all my pleasure. It is a silly habit, -I dare say, but somehow it seems to bring a great deal of romance into -one’s life. I suppose you think me awfully foolish about it?” - -“Not at all,” answered Lord Henry, “not at all, my dear Basil. You seem -to forget that I am married, and the one charm of marriage is that it -makes a life of deception absolutely necessary for both parties. I -never know where my wife is, and my wife never knows what I am doing. -When we meet—we do meet occasionally, when we dine out together, or go -down to the Duke’s—we tell each other the most absurd stories with the -most serious faces. My wife is very good at it—much better, in fact, -than I am. She never gets confused over her dates, and I always do. But -when she does find me out, she makes no row at all. I sometimes wish -she would; but she merely laughs at me.” - -“I hate the way you talk about your married life, Harry,” said Basil -Hallward, strolling towards the door that led into the garden. “I -believe that you are really a very good husband, but that you are -thoroughly ashamed of your own virtues. You are an extraordinary -fellow. You never say a moral thing, and you never do a wrong thing. -Your cynicism is simply a pose.” - -“Being natural is simply a pose, and the most irritating pose I know,” -cried Lord Henry, laughing; and the two young men went out into the -garden together and ensconced themselves on a long bamboo seat that -stood in the shade of a tall laurel bush. The sunlight slipped over the -polished leaves. In the grass, white daisies were tremulous. - -After a pause, Lord Henry pulled out his watch. “I am afraid I must be -going, Basil,” he murmured, “and before I go, I insist on your -answering a question I put to you some time ago.” - -“What is that?” said the painter, keeping his eyes fixed on the ground. - -“You know quite well.” - -“I do not, Harry.” - -“Well, I will tell you what it is. I want you to explain to me why you -won’t exhibit Dorian Gray’s picture. I want the real reason.” - -“I told you the real reason.” - -“No, you did not. You said it was because there was too much of -yourself in it. Now, that is childish.” - -“Harry,” said Basil Hallward, looking him straight in the face, “every -portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not -of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. It is -not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on -the coloured canvas, reveals himself. The reason I will not exhibit -this picture is that I am afraid that I have shown in it the secret of -my own soul.” - -Lord Henry laughed. “And what is that?” he asked. - -“I will tell you,” said Hallward; but an expression of perplexity came -over his face. - -“I am all expectation, Basil,” continued his companion, glancing at -him. - -“Oh, there is really very little to tell, Harry,” answered the painter; -“and I am afraid you will hardly understand it. Perhaps you will hardly -believe it.” - -Lord Henry smiled, and leaning down, plucked a pink-petalled daisy from -the grass and examined it. “I am quite sure I shall understand it,” he -replied, gazing intently at the little golden, white-feathered disk, -“and as for believing things, I can believe anything, provided that it -is quite incredible.” - -The wind shook some blossoms from the trees, and the heavy -lilac-blooms, with their clustering stars, moved to and fro in the -languid air. A grasshopper began to chirrup by the wall, and like a -blue thread a long thin dragon-fly floated past on its brown gauze -wings. Lord Henry felt as if he could hear Basil Hallward’s heart -beating, and wondered what was coming. - -“The story is simply this,” said the painter after some time. “Two -months ago I went to a crush at Lady Brandon’s. You know we poor -artists have to show ourselves in society from time to time, just to -remind the public that we are not savages. With an evening coat and a -white tie, as you told me once, anybody, even a stock-broker, can gain -a reputation for being civilized. Well, after I had been in the room -about ten minutes, talking to huge overdressed dowagers and tedious -academicians, I suddenly became conscious that some one was looking at -me. I turned half-way round and saw Dorian Gray for the first time. -When our eyes met, I felt that I was growing pale. A curious sensation -of terror came over me. I knew that I had come face to face with some -one whose mere personality was so fascinating that, if I allowed it to -do so, it would absorb my whole nature, my whole soul, my very art -itself. I did not want any external influence in my life. You know -yourself, Harry, how independent I am by nature. I have always been my -own master; had at least always been so, till I met Dorian Gray. -Then—but I don’t know how to explain it to you. Something seemed to -tell me that I was on the verge of a terrible crisis in my life. I had -a strange feeling that fate had in store for me exquisite joys and -exquisite sorrows. I grew afraid and turned to quit the room. It was -not conscience that made me do so: it was a sort of cowardice. I take -no credit to myself for trying to escape.” - -“Conscience and cowardice are really the same things, Basil. Conscience -is the trade-name of the firm. That is all.” - -“I don’t believe that, Harry, and I don’t believe you do either. -However, whatever was my motive—and it may have been pride, for I used -to be very proud—I certainly struggled to the door. There, of course, I -stumbled against Lady Brandon. ‘You are not going to run away so soon, -Mr. Hallward?’ she screamed out. You know her curiously shrill voice?” - -“Yes; she is a peacock in everything but beauty,” said Lord Henry, -pulling the daisy to bits with his long nervous fingers. - -“I could not get rid of her. She brought me up to royalties, and people -with stars and garters, and elderly ladies with gigantic tiaras and -parrot noses. She spoke of me as her dearest friend. I had only met her -once before, but she took it into her head to lionize me. I believe -some picture of mine had made a great success at the time, at least had -been chattered about in the penny newspapers, which is the -nineteenth-century standard of immortality. Suddenly I found myself -face to face with the young man whose personality had so strangely -stirred me. We were quite close, almost touching. Our eyes met again. -It was reckless of me, but I asked Lady Brandon to introduce me to him. -Perhaps it was not so reckless, after all. It was simply inevitable. We -would have spoken to each other without any introduction. I am sure of -that. Dorian told me so afterwards. He, too, felt that we were destined -to know each other.” - -“And how did Lady Brandon describe this wonderful young man?” asked his -companion. “I know she goes in for giving a rapid _précis_ of all her -guests. I remember her bringing me up to a truculent and red-faced old -gentleman covered all over with orders and ribbons, and hissing into my -ear, in a tragic whisper which must have been perfectly audible to -everybody in the room, the most astounding details. I simply fled. I -like to find out people for myself. But Lady Brandon treats her guests -exactly as an auctioneer treats his goods. She either explains them -entirely away, or tells one everything about them except what one wants -to know.” - -“Poor Lady Brandon! You are hard on her, Harry!” said Hallward -listlessly. - -“My dear fellow, she tried to found a _salon_, and only succeeded in -opening a restaurant. How could I admire her? But tell me, what did she -say about Mr. Dorian Gray?” - -“Oh, something like, ‘Charming boy—poor dear mother and I absolutely -inseparable. Quite forget what he does—afraid he—doesn’t do -anything—oh, yes, plays the piano—or is it the violin, dear Mr. Gray?’ -Neither of us could help laughing, and we became friends at once.” - -“Laughter is not at all a bad beginning for a friendship, and it is far -the best ending for one,” said the young lord, plucking another daisy. - -Hallward shook his head. “You don’t understand what friendship is, -Harry,” he murmured—“or what enmity is, for that matter. You like every -one; that is to say, you are indifferent to every one.” - -“How horribly unjust of you!” cried Lord Henry, tilting his hat back -and looking up at the little clouds that, like ravelled skeins of -glossy white silk, were drifting across the hollowed turquoise of the -summer sky. “Yes; horribly unjust of you. I make a great difference -between people. I choose my friends for their good looks, my -acquaintances for their good characters, and my enemies for their good -intellects. A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies. I -have not got one who is a fool. They are all men of some intellectual -power, and consequently they all appreciate me. Is that very vain of -me? I think it is rather vain.” - -“I should think it was, Harry. But according to your category I must be -merely an acquaintance.” - -“My dear old Basil, you are much more than an acquaintance.” - -“And much less than a friend. A sort of brother, I suppose?” - -“Oh, brothers! I don’t care for brothers. My elder brother won’t die, -and my younger brothers seem never to do anything else.” - -“Harry!” exclaimed Hallward, frowning. - -“My dear fellow, I am not quite serious. But I can’t help detesting my -relations. I suppose it comes from the fact that none of us can stand -other people having the same faults as ourselves. I quite sympathize -with the rage of the English democracy against what they call the vices -of the upper orders. The masses feel that drunkenness, stupidity, and -immorality should be their own special property, and that if any one of -us makes an ass of himself, he is poaching on their preserves. When -poor Southwark got into the divorce court, their indignation was quite -magnificent. And yet I don’t suppose that ten per cent of the -proletariat live correctly.” - -“I don’t agree with a single word that you have said, and, what is -more, Harry, I feel sure you don’t either.” - -Lord Henry stroked his pointed brown beard and tapped the toe of his -patent-leather boot with a tasselled ebony cane. “How English you are -Basil! That is the second time you have made that observation. If one -puts forward an idea to a true Englishman—always a rash thing to do—he -never dreams of considering whether the idea is right or wrong. The -only thing he considers of any importance is whether one believes it -oneself. Now, the value of an idea has nothing whatsoever to do with -the sincerity of the man who expresses it. Indeed, the probabilities -are that the more insincere the man is, the more purely intellectual -will the idea be, as in that case it will not be coloured by either his -wants, his desires, or his prejudices. However, I don’t propose to -discuss politics, sociology, or metaphysics with you. I like persons -better than principles, and I like persons with no principles better -than anything else in the world. Tell me more about Mr. Dorian Gray. -How often do you see him?” - -“Every day. I couldn’t be happy if I didn’t see him every day. He is -absolutely necessary to me.” - -“How extraordinary! I thought you would never care for anything but -your art.” - -“He is all my art to me now,” said the painter gravely. “I sometimes -think, Harry, that there are only two eras of any importance in the -world’s history. The first is the appearance of a new medium for art, -and the second is the appearance of a new personality for art also. -What the invention of oil-painting was to the Venetians, the face of -Antinous was to late Greek sculpture, and the face of Dorian Gray will -some day be to me. It is not merely that I paint from him, draw from -him, sketch from him. Of course, I have done all that. But he is much -more to me than a model or a sitter. I won’t tell you that I am -dissatisfied with what I have done of him, or that his beauty is such -that art cannot express it. There is nothing that art cannot express, -and I know that the work I have done, since I met Dorian Gray, is good -work, is the best work of my life. But in some curious way—I wonder -will you understand me?—his personality has suggested to me an entirely -new manner in art, an entirely new mode of style. I see things -differently, I think of them differently. I can now recreate life in a -way that was hidden from me before. ‘A dream of form in days of -thought’—who is it who says that? I forget; but it is what Dorian Gray -has been to me. The merely visible presence of this lad—for he seems to -me little more than a lad, though he is really over twenty—his merely -visible presence—ah! I wonder can you realize all that that means? -Unconsciously he defines for me the lines of a fresh school, a school -that is to have in it all the passion of the romantic spirit, all the -perfection of the spirit that is Greek. The harmony of soul and -body—how much that is! We in our madness have separated the two, and -have invented a realism that is vulgar, an ideality that is void. -Harry! if you only knew what Dorian Gray is to me! You remember that -landscape of mine, for which Agnew offered me such a huge price but -which I would not part with? It is one of the best things I have ever -done. And why is it so? Because, while I was painting it, Dorian Gray -sat beside me. Some subtle influence passed from him to me, and for the -first time in my life I saw in the plain woodland the wonder I had -always looked for and always missed.” - -“Basil, this is extraordinary! I must see Dorian Gray.” - -Hallward got up from the seat and walked up and down the garden. After -some time he came back. “Harry,” he said, “Dorian Gray is to me simply -a motive in art. You might see nothing in him. I see everything in him. -He is never more present in my work than when no image of him is there. -He is a suggestion, as I have said, of a new manner. I find him in the -curves of certain lines, in the loveliness and subtleties of certain -colours. That is all.” - -“Then why won’t you exhibit his portrait?” asked Lord Henry. - -“Because, without intending it, I have put into it some expression of -all this curious artistic idolatry, of which, of course, I have never -cared to speak to him. He knows nothing about it. He shall never know -anything about it. But the world might guess it, and I will not bare my -soul to their shallow prying eyes. My heart shall never be put under -their microscope. There is too much of myself in the thing, Harry—too -much of myself!” - -“Poets are not so scrupulous as you are. They know how useful passion -is for publication. Nowadays a broken heart will run to many editions.” - -“I hate them for it,” cried Hallward. “An artist should create -beautiful things, but should put nothing of his own life into them. We -live in an age when men treat art as if it were meant to be a form of -autobiography. We have lost the abstract sense of beauty. Some day I -will show the world what it is; and for that reason the world shall -never see my portrait of Dorian Gray.” - -“I think you are wrong, Basil, but I won’t argue with you. It is only -the intellectually lost who ever argue. Tell me, is Dorian Gray very -fond of you?” - -The painter considered for a few moments. “He likes me,” he answered -after a pause; “I know he likes me. Of course I flatter him dreadfully. -I find a strange pleasure in saying things to him that I know I shall -be sorry for having said. As a rule, he is charming to me, and we sit -in the studio and talk of a thousand things. Now and then, however, he -is horribly thoughtless, and seems to take a real delight in giving me -pain. Then I feel, Harry, that I have given away my whole soul to some -one who treats it as if it were a flower to put in his coat, a bit of -decoration to charm his vanity, an ornament for a summer’s day.” - -“Days in summer, Basil, are apt to linger,” murmured Lord Henry. -“Perhaps you will tire sooner than he will. It is a sad thing to think -of, but there is no doubt that genius lasts longer than beauty. That -accounts for the fact that we all take such pains to over-educate -ourselves. In the wild struggle for existence, we want to have -something that endures, and so we fill our minds with rubbish and -facts, in the silly hope of keeping our place. The thoroughly -well-informed man—that is the modern ideal. And the mind of the -thoroughly well-informed man is a dreadful thing. It is like a -_bric-à-brac_ shop, all monsters and dust, with everything priced above -its proper value. I think you will tire first, all the same. Some day -you will look at your friend, and he will seem to you to be a little -out of drawing, or you won’t like his tone of colour, or something. You -will bitterly reproach him in your own heart, and seriously think that -he has behaved very badly to you. The next time he calls, you will be -perfectly cold and indifferent. It will be a great pity, for it will -alter you. What you have told me is quite a romance, a romance of art -one might call it, and the worst of having a romance of any kind is -that it leaves one so unromantic.” - -“Harry, don’t talk like that. As long as I live, the personality of -Dorian Gray will dominate me. You can’t feel what I feel. You change -too often.” - -“Ah, my dear Basil, that is exactly why I can feel it. Those who are -faithful know only the trivial side of love: it is the faithless who -know love’s tragedies.” And Lord Henry struck a light on a dainty -silver case and began to smoke a cigarette with a self-conscious and -satisfied air, as if he had summed up the world in a phrase. There was -a rustle of chirruping sparrows in the green lacquer leaves of the ivy, -and the blue cloud-shadows chased themselves across the grass like -swallows. How pleasant it was in the garden! And how delightful other -people’s emotions were!—much more delightful than their ideas, it -seemed to him. One’s own soul, and the passions of one’s friends—those -were the fascinating things in life. He pictured to himself with silent -amusement the tedious luncheon that he had missed by staying so long -with Basil Hallward. Had he gone to his aunt’s, he would have been sure -to have met Lord Goodbody there, and the whole conversation would have -been about the feeding of the poor and the necessity for model -lodging-houses. Each class would have preached the importance of those -virtues, for whose exercise there was no necessity in their own lives. -The rich would have spoken on the value of thrift, and the idle grown -eloquent over the dignity of labour. It was charming to have escaped -all that! As he thought of his aunt, an idea seemed to strike him. He -turned to Hallward and said, “My dear fellow, I have just remembered.” - -“Remembered what, Harry?” - -“Where I heard the name of Dorian Gray.” - -“Where was it?” asked Hallward, with a slight frown. - -“Don’t look so angry, Basil. It was at my aunt, Lady Agatha’s. She told -me she had discovered a wonderful young man who was going to help her -in the East End, and that his name was Dorian Gray. I am bound to state -that she never told me he was good-looking. Women have no appreciation -of good looks; at least, good women have not. She said that he was very -earnest and had a beautiful nature. I at once pictured to myself a -creature with spectacles and lank hair, horribly freckled, and tramping -about on huge feet. I wish I had known it was your friend.” - -“I am very glad you didn’t, Harry.” - -“Why?” - -“I don’t want you to meet him.” - -“You don’t want me to meet him?” - -“No.” - -“Mr. Dorian Gray is in the studio, sir,” said the butler, coming into -the garden. - -“You must introduce me now,” cried Lord Henry, laughing. - -The painter turned to his servant, who stood blinking in the sunlight. -“Ask Mr. Gray to wait, Parker: I shall be in in a few moments.” The man -bowed and went up the walk. - -Then he looked at Lord Henry. “Dorian Gray is my dearest friend,” he -said. “He has a simple and a beautiful nature. Your aunt was quite -right in what she said of him. Don’t spoil him. Don’t try to influence -him. Your influence would be bad. The world is wide, and has many -marvellous people in it. Don’t take away from me the one person who -gives to my art whatever charm it possesses: my life as an artist -depends on him. Mind, Harry, I trust you.” He spoke very slowly, and -the words seemed wrung out of him almost against his will. - -“What nonsense you talk!” said Lord Henry, smiling, and taking Hallward -by the arm, he almost led him into the house. - - - - -CHAPTER II. - - -As they entered they saw Dorian Gray. He was seated at the piano, with -his back to them, turning over the pages of a volume of Schumann’s -“Forest Scenes.” “You must lend me these, Basil,” he cried. “I want to -learn them. They are perfectly charming.” - -“That entirely depends on how you sit to-day, Dorian.” - -“Oh, I am tired of sitting, and I don’t want a life-sized portrait of -myself,” answered the lad, swinging round on the music-stool in a -wilful, petulant manner. When he caught sight of Lord Henry, a faint -blush coloured his cheeks for a moment, and he started up. “I beg your -pardon, Basil, but I didn’t know you had any one with you.” - -“This is Lord Henry Wotton, Dorian, an old Oxford friend of mine. I -have just been telling him what a capital sitter you were, and now you -have spoiled everything.” - -“You have not spoiled my pleasure in meeting you, Mr. Gray,” said Lord -Henry, stepping forward and extending his hand. “My aunt has often -spoken to me about you. You are one of her favourites, and, I am -afraid, one of her victims also.” - -“I am in Lady Agatha’s black books at present,” answered Dorian with a -funny look of penitence. “I promised to go to a club in Whitechapel -with her last Tuesday, and I really forgot all about it. We were to -have played a duet together—three duets, I believe. I don’t know what -she will say to me. I am far too frightened to call.” - -“Oh, I will make your peace with my aunt. She is quite devoted to you. -And I don’t think it really matters about your not being there. The -audience probably thought it was a duet. When Aunt Agatha sits down to -the piano, she makes quite enough noise for two people.” - -“That is very horrid to her, and not very nice to me,” answered Dorian, -laughing. - -Lord Henry looked at him. Yes, he was certainly wonderfully handsome, -with his finely curved scarlet lips, his frank blue eyes, his crisp -gold hair. There was something in his face that made one trust him at -once. All the candour of youth was there, as well as all youth’s -passionate purity. One felt that he had kept himself unspotted from the -world. No wonder Basil Hallward worshipped him. - -“You are too charming to go in for philanthropy, Mr. Gray—far too -charming.” And Lord Henry flung himself down on the divan and opened -his cigarette-case. - -The painter had been busy mixing his colours and getting his brushes -ready. He was looking worried, and when he heard Lord Henry’s last -remark, he glanced at him, hesitated for a moment, and then said, -“Harry, I want to finish this picture to-day. Would you think it -awfully rude of me if I asked you to go away?” - -Lord Henry smiled and looked at Dorian Gray. “Am I to go, Mr. Gray?” he -asked. - -“Oh, please don’t, Lord Henry. I see that Basil is in one of his sulky -moods, and I can’t bear him when he sulks. Besides, I want you to tell -me why I should not go in for philanthropy.” - -“I don’t know that I shall tell you that, Mr. Gray. It is so tedious a -subject that one would have to talk seriously about it. But I certainly -shall not run away, now that you have asked me to stop. You don’t -really mind, Basil, do you? You have often told me that you liked your -sitters to have some one to chat to.” - -Hallward bit his lip. “If Dorian wishes it, of course you must stay. -Dorian’s whims are laws to everybody, except himself.” - -Lord Henry took up his hat and gloves. “You are very pressing, Basil, -but I am afraid I must go. I have promised to meet a man at the -Orleans. Good-bye, Mr. Gray. Come and see me some afternoon in Curzon -Street. I am nearly always at home at five o’clock. Write to me when -you are coming. I should be sorry to miss you.” - -“Basil,” cried Dorian Gray, “if Lord Henry Wotton goes, I shall go, -too. You never open your lips while you are painting, and it is -horribly dull standing on a platform and trying to look pleasant. Ask -him to stay. I insist upon it.” - -“Stay, Harry, to oblige Dorian, and to oblige me,” said Hallward, -gazing intently at his picture. “It is quite true, I never talk when I -am working, and never listen either, and it must be dreadfully tedious -for my unfortunate sitters. I beg you to stay.” - -“But what about my man at the Orleans?” - -The painter laughed. “I don’t think there will be any difficulty about -that. Sit down again, Harry. And now, Dorian, get up on the platform, -and don’t move about too much, or pay any attention to what Lord Henry -says. He has a very bad influence over all his friends, with the single -exception of myself.” - -Dorian Gray stepped up on the dais with the air of a young Greek -martyr, and made a little _moue_ of discontent to Lord Henry, to whom -he had rather taken a fancy. He was so unlike Basil. They made a -delightful contrast. And he had such a beautiful voice. After a few -moments he said to him, “Have you really a very bad influence, Lord -Henry? As bad as Basil says?” - -“There is no such thing as a good influence, Mr. Gray. All influence is -immoral—immoral from the scientific point of view.” - -“Why?” - -“Because to influence a person is to give him one’s own soul. He does -not think his natural thoughts, or burn with his natural passions. His -virtues are not real to him. His sins, if there are such things as -sins, are borrowed. He becomes an echo of some one else’s music, an -actor of a part that has not been written for him. The aim of life is -self-development. To realize one’s nature perfectly—that is what each -of us is here for. People are afraid of themselves, nowadays. They have -forgotten the highest of all duties, the duty that one owes to one’s -self. Of course, they are charitable. They feed the hungry and clothe -the beggar. But their own souls starve, and are naked. Courage has gone -out of our race. Perhaps we never really had it. The terror of society, -which is the basis of morals, the terror of God, which is the secret of -religion—these are the two things that govern us. And yet—” - -“Just turn your head a little more to the right, Dorian, like a good -boy,” said the painter, deep in his work and conscious only that a look -had come into the lad’s face that he had never seen there before. - -“And yet,” continued Lord Henry, in his low, musical voice, and with -that graceful wave of the hand that was always so characteristic of -him, and that he had even in his Eton days, “I believe that if one man -were to live out his life fully and completely, were to give form to -every feeling, expression to every thought, reality to every dream—I -believe that the world would gain such a fresh impulse of joy that we -would forget all the maladies of mediævalism, and return to the -Hellenic ideal—to something finer, richer than the Hellenic ideal, it -may be. But the bravest man amongst us is afraid of himself. The -mutilation of the savage has its tragic survival in the self-denial -that mars our lives. We are punished for our refusals. Every impulse -that we strive to strangle broods in the mind and poisons us. The body -sins once, and has done with its sin, for action is a mode of -purification. Nothing remains then but the recollection of a pleasure, -or the luxury of a regret. The only way to get rid of a temptation is -to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for -the things it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its -monstrous laws have made monstrous and unlawful. It has been said that -the great events of the world take place in the brain. It is in the -brain, and the brain only, that the great sins of the world take place -also. You, Mr. Gray, you yourself, with your rose-red youth and your -rose-white boyhood, you have had passions that have made you afraid, -thoughts that have filled you with terror, day-dreams and sleeping -dreams whose mere memory might stain your cheek with shame—” - -“Stop!” faltered Dorian Gray, “stop! you bewilder me. I don’t know what -to say. There is some answer to you, but I cannot find it. Don’t speak. -Let me think. Or, rather, let me try not to think.” - -For nearly ten minutes he stood there, motionless, with parted lips and -eyes strangely bright. He was dimly conscious that entirely fresh -influences were at work within him. Yet they seemed to him to have come -really from himself. The few words that Basil’s friend had said to -him—words spoken by chance, no doubt, and with wilful paradox in -them—had touched some secret chord that had never been touched before, -but that he felt was now vibrating and throbbing to curious pulses. - -Music had stirred him like that. Music had troubled him many times. But -music was not articulate. It was not a new world, but rather another -chaos, that it created in us. Words! Mere words! How terrible they -were! How clear, and vivid, and cruel! One could not escape from them. -And yet what a subtle magic there was in them! They seemed to be able -to give a plastic form to formless things, and to have a music of their -own as sweet as that of viol or of lute. Mere words! Was there anything -so real as words? - -Yes; there had been things in his boyhood that he had not understood. -He understood them now. Life suddenly became fiery-coloured to him. It -seemed to him that he had been walking in fire. Why had he not known -it? - -With his subtle smile, Lord Henry watched him. He knew the precise -psychological moment when to say nothing. He felt intensely interested. -He was amazed at the sudden impression that his words had produced, -and, remembering a book that he had read when he was sixteen, a book -which had revealed to him much that he had not known before, he -wondered whether Dorian Gray was passing through a similar experience. -He had merely shot an arrow into the air. Had it hit the mark? How -fascinating the lad was! - -Hallward painted away with that marvellous bold touch of his, that had -the true refinement and perfect delicacy that in art, at any rate comes -only from strength. He was unconscious of the silence. - -“Basil, I am tired of standing,” cried Dorian Gray suddenly. “I must go -out and sit in the garden. The air is stifling here.” - -“My dear fellow, I am so sorry. When I am painting, I can’t think of -anything else. But you never sat better. You were perfectly still. And -I have caught the effect I wanted—the half-parted lips and the bright -look in the eyes. I don’t know what Harry has been saying to you, but -he has certainly made you have the most wonderful expression. I suppose -he has been paying you compliments. You mustn’t believe a word that he -says.” - -“He has certainly not been paying me compliments. Perhaps that is the -reason that I don’t believe anything he has told me.” - -“You know you believe it all,” said Lord Henry, looking at him with his -dreamy languorous eyes. “I will go out to the garden with you. It is -horribly hot in the studio. Basil, let us have something iced to drink, -something with strawberries in it.” - -“Certainly, Harry. Just touch the bell, and when Parker comes I will -tell him what you want. I have got to work up this background, so I -will join you later on. Don’t keep Dorian too long. I have never been -in better form for painting than I am to-day. This is going to be my -masterpiece. It is my masterpiece as it stands.” - -Lord Henry went out to the garden and found Dorian Gray burying his -face in the great cool lilac-blossoms, feverishly drinking in their -perfume as if it had been wine. He came close to him and put his hand -upon his shoulder. “You are quite right to do that,” he murmured. -“Nothing can cure the soul but the senses, just as nothing can cure the -senses but the soul.” - -The lad started and drew back. He was bareheaded, and the leaves had -tossed his rebellious curls and tangled all their gilded threads. There -was a look of fear in his eyes, such as people have when they are -suddenly awakened. His finely chiselled nostrils quivered, and some -hidden nerve shook the scarlet of his lips and left them trembling. - -“Yes,” continued Lord Henry, “that is one of the great secrets of -life—to cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses by means -of the soul. You are a wonderful creation. You know more than you think -you know, just as you know less than you want to know.” - -Dorian Gray frowned and turned his head away. He could not help liking -the tall, graceful young man who was standing by him. His romantic, -olive-coloured face and worn expression interested him. There was -something in his low languid voice that was absolutely fascinating. His -cool, white, flowerlike hands, even, had a curious charm. They moved, -as he spoke, like music, and seemed to have a language of their own. -But he felt afraid of him, and ashamed of being afraid. Why had it been -left for a stranger to reveal him to himself? He had known Basil -Hallward for months, but the friendship between them had never altered -him. Suddenly there had come some one across his life who seemed to -have disclosed to him life’s mystery. And, yet, what was there to be -afraid of? He was not a schoolboy or a girl. It was absurd to be -frightened. - -“Let us go and sit in the shade,” said Lord Henry. “Parker has brought -out the drinks, and if you stay any longer in this glare, you will be -quite spoiled, and Basil will never paint you again. You really must -not allow yourself to become sunburnt. It would be unbecoming.” - -“What can it matter?” cried Dorian Gray, laughing, as he sat down on -the seat at the end of the garden. - -“It should matter everything to you, Mr. Gray.” - -“Why?” - -“Because you have the most marvellous youth, and youth is the one thing -worth having.” - -“I don’t feel that, Lord Henry.” - -“No, you don’t feel it now. Some day, when you are old and wrinkled and -ugly, when thought has seared your forehead with its lines, and passion -branded your lips with its hideous fires, you will feel it, you will -feel it terribly. Now, wherever you go, you charm the world. Will it -always be so? ... You have a wonderfully beautiful face, Mr. Gray. -Don’t frown. You have. And beauty is a form of genius—is higher, -indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. It is of the great -facts of the world, like sunlight, or spring-time, or the reflection in -dark waters of that silver shell we call the moon. It cannot be -questioned. It has its divine right of sovereignty. It makes princes of -those who have it. You smile? Ah! when you have lost it you won’t -smile.... People say sometimes that beauty is only superficial. That -may be so, but at least it is not so superficial as thought is. To me, -beauty is the wonder of wonders. It is only shallow people who do not -judge by appearances. The true mystery of the world is the visible, not -the invisible.... Yes, Mr. Gray, the gods have been good to you. But -what the gods give they quickly take away. You have only a few years in -which to live really, perfectly, and fully. When your youth goes, your -beauty will go with it, and then you will suddenly discover that there -are no triumphs left for you, or have to content yourself with those -mean triumphs that the memory of your past will make more bitter than -defeats. Every month as it wanes brings you nearer to something -dreadful. Time is jealous of you, and wars against your lilies and your -roses. You will become sallow, and hollow-cheeked, and dull-eyed. You -will suffer horribly.... Ah! realize your youth while you have it. -Don’t squander the gold of your days, listening to the tedious, trying -to improve the hopeless failure, or giving away your life to the -ignorant, the common, and the vulgar. These are the sickly aims, the -false ideals, of our age. Live! Live the wonderful life that is in you! -Let nothing be lost upon you. Be always searching for new sensations. -Be afraid of nothing.... A new Hedonism—that is what our century wants. -You might be its visible symbol. With your personality there is nothing -you could not do. The world belongs to you for a season.... The moment -I met you I saw that you were quite unconscious of what you really are, -of what you really might be. There was so much in you that charmed me -that I felt I must tell you something about yourself. I thought how -tragic it would be if you were wasted. For there is such a little time -that your youth will last—such a little time. The common hill-flowers -wither, but they blossom again. The laburnum will be as yellow next -June as it is now. In a month there will be purple stars on the -clematis, and year after year the green night of its leaves will hold -its purple stars. But we never get back our youth. The pulse of joy -that beats in us at twenty becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail, our senses -rot. We degenerate into hideous puppets, haunted by the memory of the -passions of which we were too much afraid, and the exquisite -temptations that we had not the courage to yield to. Youth! Youth! -There is absolutely nothing in the world but youth!” - -Dorian Gray listened, open-eyed and wondering. The spray of lilac fell -from his hand upon the gravel. A furry bee came and buzzed round it for -a moment. Then it began to scramble all over the oval stellated globe -of the tiny blossoms. He watched it with that strange interest in -trivial things that we try to develop when things of high import make -us afraid, or when we are stirred by some new emotion for which we -cannot find expression, or when some thought that terrifies us lays -sudden siege to the brain and calls on us to yield. After a time the -bee flew away. He saw it creeping into the stained trumpet of a Tyrian -convolvulus. The flower seemed to quiver, and then swayed gently to and -fro. - -Suddenly the painter appeared at the door of the studio and made -staccato signs for them to come in. They turned to each other and -smiled. - -“I am waiting,” he cried. “Do come in. The light is quite perfect, and -you can bring your drinks.” - -They rose up and sauntered down the walk together. Two green-and-white -butterflies fluttered past them, and in the pear-tree at the corner of -the garden a thrush began to sing. - -“You are glad you have met me, Mr. Gray,” said Lord Henry, looking at -him. - -“Yes, I am glad now. I wonder shall I always be glad?” - -“Always! That is a dreadful word. It makes me shudder when I hear it. -Women are so fond of using it. They spoil every romance by trying to -make it last for ever. It is a meaningless word, too. The only -difference between a caprice and a lifelong passion is that the caprice -lasts a little longer.” - -As they entered the studio, Dorian Gray put his hand upon Lord Henry’s -arm. “In that case, let our friendship be a caprice,” he murmured, -flushing at his own boldness, then stepped up on the platform and -resumed his pose. - -Lord Henry flung himself into a large wicker arm-chair and watched him. -The sweep and dash of the brush on the canvas made the only sound that -broke the stillness, except when, now and then, Hallward stepped back -to look at his work from a distance. In the slanting beams that -streamed through the open doorway the dust danced and was golden. The -heavy scent of the roses seemed to brood over everything. - -After about a quarter of an hour Hallward stopped painting, looked for -a long time at Dorian Gray, and then for a long time at the picture, -biting the end of one of his huge brushes and frowning. “It is quite -finished,” he cried at last, and stooping down he wrote his name in -long vermilion letters on the left-hand corner of the canvas. - -Lord Henry came over and examined the picture. It was certainly a -wonderful work of art, and a wonderful likeness as well. - -“My dear fellow, I congratulate you most warmly,” he said. “It is the -finest portrait of modern times. Mr. Gray, come over and look at -yourself.” - -The lad started, as if awakened from some dream. - -“Is it really finished?” he murmured, stepping down from the platform. - -“Quite finished,” said the painter. “And you have sat splendidly -to-day. I am awfully obliged to you.” - -“That is entirely due to me,” broke in Lord Henry. “Isn’t it, Mr. -Gray?” - -Dorian made no answer, but passed listlessly in front of his picture -and turned towards it. When he saw it he drew back, and his cheeks -flushed for a moment with pleasure. A look of joy came into his eyes, -as if he had recognized himself for the first time. He stood there -motionless and in wonder, dimly conscious that Hallward was speaking to -him, but not catching the meaning of his words. The sense of his own -beauty came on him like a revelation. He had never felt it before. -Basil Hallward’s compliments had seemed to him to be merely the -charming exaggeration of friendship. He had listened to them, laughed -at them, forgotten them. They had not influenced his nature. Then had -come Lord Henry Wotton with his strange panegyric on youth, his -terrible warning of its brevity. That had stirred him at the time, and -now, as he stood gazing at the shadow of his own loveliness, the full -reality of the description flashed across him. Yes, there would be a -day when his face would be wrinkled and wizen, his eyes dim and -colourless, the grace of his figure broken and deformed. The scarlet -would pass away from his lips and the gold steal from his hair. The -life that was to make his soul would mar his body. He would become -dreadful, hideous, and uncouth. - -As he thought of it, a sharp pang of pain struck through him like a -knife and made each delicate fibre of his nature quiver. His eyes -deepened into amethyst, and across them came a mist of tears. He felt -as if a hand of ice had been laid upon his heart. - -“Don’t you like it?” cried Hallward at last, stung a little by the -lad’s silence, not understanding what it meant. - -“Of course he likes it,” said Lord Henry. “Who wouldn’t like it? It is -one of the greatest things in modern art. I will give you anything you -like to ask for it. I must have it.” - -“It is not my property, Harry.” - -“Whose property is it?” - -“Dorian’s, of course,” answered the painter. - -“He is a very lucky fellow.” - -“How sad it is!” murmured Dorian Gray with his eyes still fixed upon -his own portrait. “How sad it is! I shall grow old, and horrible, and -dreadful. But this picture will remain always young. It will never be -older than this particular day of June.... If it were only the other -way! If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was -to grow old! For that—for that—I would give everything! Yes, there is -nothing in the whole world I would not give! I would give my soul for -that!” - -“You would hardly care for such an arrangement, Basil,” cried Lord -Henry, laughing. “It would be rather hard lines on your work.” - -“I should object very strongly, Harry,” said Hallward. - -Dorian Gray turned and looked at him. “I believe you would, Basil. You -like your art better than your friends. I am no more to you than a -green bronze figure. Hardly as much, I dare say.” - -The painter stared in amazement. It was so unlike Dorian to speak like -that. What had happened? He seemed quite angry. His face was flushed -and his cheeks burning. - -“Yes,” he continued, “I am less to you than your ivory Hermes or your -silver Faun. You will like them always. How long will you like me? Till -I have my first wrinkle, I suppose. I know, now, that when one loses -one’s good looks, whatever they may be, one loses everything. Your -picture has taught me that. Lord Henry Wotton is perfectly right. Youth -is the only thing worth having. When I find that I am growing old, I -shall kill myself.” - -Hallward turned pale and caught his hand. “Dorian! Dorian!” he cried, -“don’t talk like that. I have never had such a friend as you, and I -shall never have such another. You are not jealous of material things, -are you?—you who are finer than any of them!” - -“I am jealous of everything whose beauty does not die. I am jealous of -the portrait you have painted of me. Why should it keep what I must -lose? Every moment that passes takes something from me and gives -something to it. Oh, if it were only the other way! If the picture -could change, and I could be always what I am now! Why did you paint -it? It will mock me some day—mock me horribly!” The hot tears welled -into his eyes; he tore his hand away and, flinging himself on the -divan, he buried his face in the cushions, as though he was praying. - -“This is your doing, Harry,” said the painter bitterly. - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. “It is the real Dorian Gray—that is -all.” - -“It is not.” - -“If it is not, what have I to do with it?” - -“You should have gone away when I asked you,” he muttered. - -“I stayed when you asked me,” was Lord Henry’s answer. - -“Harry, I can’t quarrel with my two best friends at once, but between -you both you have made me hate the finest piece of work I have ever -done, and I will destroy it. What is it but canvas and colour? I will -not let it come across our three lives and mar them.” - -Dorian Gray lifted his golden head from the pillow, and with pallid -face and tear-stained eyes, looked at him as he walked over to the deal -painting-table that was set beneath the high curtained window. What was -he doing there? His fingers were straying about among the litter of tin -tubes and dry brushes, seeking for something. Yes, it was for the long -palette-knife, with its thin blade of lithe steel. He had found it at -last. He was going to rip up the canvas. - -With a stifled sob the lad leaped from the couch, and, rushing over to -Hallward, tore the knife out of his hand, and flung it to the end of -the studio. “Don’t, Basil, don’t!” he cried. “It would be murder!” - -“I am glad you appreciate my work at last, Dorian,” said the painter -coldly when he had recovered from his surprise. “I never thought you -would.” - -“Appreciate it? I am in love with it, Basil. It is part of myself. I -feel that.” - -“Well, as soon as you are dry, you shall be varnished, and framed, and -sent home. Then you can do what you like with yourself.” And he walked -across the room and rang the bell for tea. “You will have tea, of -course, Dorian? And so will you, Harry? Or do you object to such simple -pleasures?” - -“I adore simple pleasures,” said Lord Henry. “They are the last refuge -of the complex. But I don’t like scenes, except on the stage. What -absurd fellows you are, both of you! I wonder who it was defined man as -a rational animal. It was the most premature definition ever given. Man -is many things, but he is not rational. I am glad he is not, after -all—though I wish you chaps would not squabble over the picture. You -had much better let me have it, Basil. This silly boy doesn’t really -want it, and I really do.” - -“If you let any one have it but me, Basil, I shall never forgive you!” -cried Dorian Gray; “and I don’t allow people to call me a silly boy.” - -“You know the picture is yours, Dorian. I gave it to you before it -existed.” - -“And you know you have been a little silly, Mr. Gray, and that you -don’t really object to being reminded that you are extremely young.” - -“I should have objected very strongly this morning, Lord Henry.” - -“Ah! this morning! You have lived since then.” - -There came a knock at the door, and the butler entered with a laden -tea-tray and set it down upon a small Japanese table. There was a -rattle of cups and saucers and the hissing of a fluted Georgian urn. -Two globe-shaped china dishes were brought in by a page. Dorian Gray -went over and poured out the tea. The two men sauntered languidly to -the table and examined what was under the covers. - -“Let us go to the theatre to-night,” said Lord Henry. “There is sure to -be something on, somewhere. I have promised to dine at White’s, but it -is only with an old friend, so I can send him a wire to say that I am -ill, or that I am prevented from coming in consequence of a subsequent -engagement. I think that would be a rather nice excuse: it would have -all the surprise of candour.” - -“It is such a bore putting on one’s dress-clothes,” muttered Hallward. -“And, when one has them on, they are so horrid.” - -“Yes,” answered Lord Henry dreamily, “the costume of the nineteenth -century is detestable. It is so sombre, so depressing. Sin is the only -real colour-element left in modern life.” - -“You really must not say things like that before Dorian, Harry.” - -“Before which Dorian? The one who is pouring out tea for us, or the one -in the picture?” - -“Before either.” - -“I should like to come to the theatre with you, Lord Henry,” said the -lad. - -“Then you shall come; and you will come, too, Basil, won’t you?” - -“I can’t, really. I would sooner not. I have a lot of work to do.” - -“Well, then, you and I will go alone, Mr. Gray.” - -“I should like that awfully.” - -The painter bit his lip and walked over, cup in hand, to the picture. -“I shall stay with the real Dorian,” he said, sadly. - -“Is it the real Dorian?” cried the original of the portrait, strolling -across to him. “Am I really like that?” - -“Yes; you are just like that.” - -“How wonderful, Basil!” - -“At least you are like it in appearance. But it will never alter,” -sighed Hallward. “That is something.” - -“What a fuss people make about fidelity!” exclaimed Lord Henry. “Why, -even in love it is purely a question for physiology. It has nothing to -do with our own will. Young men want to be faithful, and are not; old -men want to be faithless, and cannot: that is all one can say.” - -“Don’t go to the theatre to-night, Dorian,” said Hallward. “Stop and -dine with me.” - -“I can’t, Basil.” - -“Why?” - -“Because I have promised Lord Henry Wotton to go with him.” - -“He won’t like you the better for keeping your promises. He always -breaks his own. I beg you not to go.” - -Dorian Gray laughed and shook his head. - -“I entreat you.” - -The lad hesitated, and looked over at Lord Henry, who was watching them -from the tea-table with an amused smile. - -“I must go, Basil,” he answered. - -“Very well,” said Hallward, and he went over and laid down his cup on -the tray. “It is rather late, and, as you have to dress, you had better -lose no time. Good-bye, Harry. Good-bye, Dorian. Come and see me soon. -Come to-morrow.” - -“Certainly.” - -“You won’t forget?” - -“No, of course not,” cried Dorian. - -“And ... Harry!” - -“Yes, Basil?” - -“Remember what I asked you, when we were in the garden this morning.” - -“I have forgotten it.” - -“I trust you.” - -“I wish I could trust myself,” said Lord Henry, laughing. “Come, Mr. -Gray, my hansom is outside, and I can drop you at your own place. -Good-bye, Basil. It has been a most interesting afternoon.” - -As the door closed behind them, the painter flung himself down on a -sofa, and a look of pain came into his face. - - - - -CHAPTER III. - - -At half-past twelve next day Lord Henry Wotton strolled from Curzon -Street over to the Albany to call on his uncle, Lord Fermor, a genial -if somewhat rough-mannered old bachelor, whom the outside world called -selfish because it derived no particular benefit from him, but who was -considered generous by Society as he fed the people who amused him. His -father had been our ambassador at Madrid when Isabella was young and -Prim unthought of, but had retired from the diplomatic service in a -capricious moment of annoyance on not being offered the Embassy at -Paris, a post to which he considered that he was fully entitled by -reason of his birth, his indolence, the good English of his dispatches, -and his inordinate passion for pleasure. The son, who had been his -father’s secretary, had resigned along with his chief, somewhat -foolishly as was thought at the time, and on succeeding some months -later to the title, had set himself to the serious study of the great -aristocratic art of doing absolutely nothing. He had two large town -houses, but preferred to live in chambers as it was less trouble, and -took most of his meals at his club. He paid some attention to the -management of his collieries in the Midland counties, excusing himself -for this taint of industry on the ground that the one advantage of -having coal was that it enabled a gentleman to afford the decency of -burning wood on his own hearth. In politics he was a Tory, except when -the Tories were in office, during which period he roundly abused them -for being a pack of Radicals. He was a hero to his valet, who bullied -him, and a terror to most of his relations, whom he bullied in turn. -Only England could have produced him, and he always said that the -country was going to the dogs. His principles were out of date, but -there was a good deal to be said for his prejudices. - -When Lord Henry entered the room, he found his uncle sitting in a rough -shooting-coat, smoking a cheroot and grumbling over _The Times_. “Well, -Harry,” said the old gentleman, “what brings you out so early? I -thought you dandies never got up till two, and were not visible till -five.” - -“Pure family affection, I assure you, Uncle George. I want to get -something out of you.” - -“Money, I suppose,” said Lord Fermor, making a wry face. “Well, sit -down and tell me all about it. Young people, nowadays, imagine that -money is everything.” - -“Yes,” murmured Lord Henry, settling his button-hole in his coat; “and -when they grow older they know it. But I don’t want money. It is only -people who pay their bills who want that, Uncle George, and I never pay -mine. Credit is the capital of a younger son, and one lives charmingly -upon it. Besides, I always deal with Dartmoor’s tradesmen, and -consequently they never bother me. What I want is information: not -useful information, of course; useless information.” - -“Well, I can tell you anything that is in an English Blue Book, Harry, -although those fellows nowadays write a lot of nonsense. When I was in -the Diplomatic, things were much better. But I hear they let them in -now by examination. What can you expect? Examinations, sir, are pure -humbug from beginning to end. If a man is a gentleman, he knows quite -enough, and if he is not a gentleman, whatever he knows is bad for -him.” - -“Mr. Dorian Gray does not belong to Blue Books, Uncle George,” said -Lord Henry languidly. - -“Mr. Dorian Gray? Who is he?” asked Lord Fermor, knitting his bushy -white eyebrows. - -“That is what I have come to learn, Uncle George. Or rather, I know who -he is. He is the last Lord Kelso’s grandson. His mother was a Devereux, -Lady Margaret Devereux. I want you to tell me about his mother. What -was she like? Whom did she marry? You have known nearly everybody in -your time, so you might have known her. I am very much interested in -Mr. Gray at present. I have only just met him.” - -“Kelso’s grandson!” echoed the old gentleman. “Kelso’s grandson! ... Of -course.... I knew his mother intimately. I believe I was at her -christening. She was an extraordinarily beautiful girl, Margaret -Devereux, and made all the men frantic by running away with a penniless -young fellow—a mere nobody, sir, a subaltern in a foot regiment, or -something of that kind. Certainly. I remember the whole thing as if it -happened yesterday. The poor chap was killed in a duel at Spa a few -months after the marriage. There was an ugly story about it. They said -Kelso got some rascally adventurer, some Belgian brute, to insult his -son-in-law in public—paid him, sir, to do it, paid him—and that the -fellow spitted his man as if he had been a pigeon. The thing was hushed -up, but, egad, Kelso ate his chop alone at the club for some time -afterwards. He brought his daughter back with him, I was told, and she -never spoke to him again. Oh, yes; it was a bad business. The girl -died, too, died within a year. So she left a son, did she? I had -forgotten that. What sort of boy is he? If he is like his mother, he -must be a good-looking chap.” - -“He is very good-looking,” assented Lord Henry. - -“I hope he will fall into proper hands,” continued the old man. “He -should have a pot of money waiting for him if Kelso did the right thing -by him. His mother had money, too. All the Selby property came to her, -through her grandfather. Her grandfather hated Kelso, thought him a -mean dog. He was, too. Came to Madrid once when I was there. Egad, I -was ashamed of him. The Queen used to ask me about the English noble -who was always quarrelling with the cabmen about their fares. They made -quite a story of it. I didn’t dare show my face at Court for a month. I -hope he treated his grandson better than he did the jarvies.” - -“I don’t know,” answered Lord Henry. “I fancy that the boy will be well -off. He is not of age yet. He has Selby, I know. He told me so. And ... -his mother was very beautiful?” - -“Margaret Devereux was one of the loveliest creatures I ever saw, -Harry. What on earth induced her to behave as she did, I never could -understand. She could have married anybody she chose. Carlington was -mad after her. She was romantic, though. All the women of that family -were. The men were a poor lot, but, egad! the women were wonderful. -Carlington went on his knees to her. Told me so himself. She laughed at -him, and there wasn’t a girl in London at the time who wasn’t after -him. And by the way, Harry, talking about silly marriages, what is this -humbug your father tells me about Dartmoor wanting to marry an -American? Ain’t English girls good enough for him?” - -“It is rather fashionable to marry Americans just now, Uncle George.” - -“I’ll back English women against the world, Harry,” said Lord Fermor, -striking the table with his fist. - -“The betting is on the Americans.” - -“They don’t last, I am told,” muttered his uncle. - -“A long engagement exhausts them, but they are capital at a -steeplechase. They take things flying. I don’t think Dartmoor has a -chance.” - -“Who are her people?” grumbled the old gentleman. “Has she got any?” - -Lord Henry shook his head. “American girls are as clever at concealing -their parents, as English women are at concealing their past,” he said, -rising to go. - -“They are pork-packers, I suppose?” - -“I hope so, Uncle George, for Dartmoor’s sake. I am told that -pork-packing is the most lucrative profession in America, after -politics.” - -“Is she pretty?” - -“She behaves as if she was beautiful. Most American women do. It is the -secret of their charm.” - -“Why can’t these American women stay in their own country? They are -always telling us that it is the paradise for women.” - -“It is. That is the reason why, like Eve, they are so excessively -anxious to get out of it,” said Lord Henry. “Good-bye, Uncle George. I -shall be late for lunch, if I stop any longer. Thanks for giving me the -information I wanted. I always like to know everything about my new -friends, and nothing about my old ones.” - -“Where are you lunching, Harry?” - -“At Aunt Agatha’s. I have asked myself and Mr. Gray. He is her latest -_protégé_.” - -“Humph! tell your Aunt Agatha, Harry, not to bother me any more with -her charity appeals. I am sick of them. Why, the good woman thinks that -I have nothing to do but to write cheques for her silly fads.” - -“All right, Uncle George, I’ll tell her, but it won’t have any effect. -Philanthropic people lose all sense of humanity. It is their -distinguishing characteristic.” - -The old gentleman growled approvingly and rang the bell for his -servant. Lord Henry passed up the low arcade into Burlington Street and -turned his steps in the direction of Berkeley Square. - -So that was the story of Dorian Gray’s parentage. Crudely as it had -been told to him, it had yet stirred him by its suggestion of a -strange, almost modern romance. A beautiful woman risking everything -for a mad passion. A few wild weeks of happiness cut short by a -hideous, treacherous crime. Months of voiceless agony, and then a child -born in pain. The mother snatched away by death, the boy left to -solitude and the tyranny of an old and loveless man. Yes; it was an -interesting background. It posed the lad, made him more perfect, as it -were. Behind every exquisite thing that existed, there was something -tragic. Worlds had to be in travail, that the meanest flower might -blow.... And how charming he had been at dinner the night before, as -with startled eyes and lips parted in frightened pleasure he had sat -opposite to him at the club, the red candleshades staining to a richer -rose the wakening wonder of his face. Talking to him was like playing -upon an exquisite violin. He answered to every touch and thrill of the -bow.... There was something terribly enthralling in the exercise of -influence. No other activity was like it. To project one’s soul into -some gracious form, and let it tarry there for a moment; to hear one’s -own intellectual views echoed back to one with all the added music of -passion and youth; to convey one’s temperament into another as though -it were a subtle fluid or a strange perfume: there was a real joy in -that—perhaps the most satisfying joy left to us in an age so limited -and vulgar as our own, an age grossly carnal in its pleasures, and -grossly common in its aims.... He was a marvellous type, too, this lad, -whom by so curious a chance he had met in Basil’s studio, or could be -fashioned into a marvellous type, at any rate. Grace was his, and the -white purity of boyhood, and beauty such as old Greek marbles kept for -us. There was nothing that one could not do with him. He could be made -a Titan or a toy. What a pity it was that such beauty was destined to -fade! ... And Basil? From a psychological point of view, how -interesting he was! The new manner in art, the fresh mode of looking at -life, suggested so strangely by the merely visible presence of one who -was unconscious of it all; the silent spirit that dwelt in dim -woodland, and walked unseen in open field, suddenly showing herself, -Dryadlike and not afraid, because in his soul who sought for her there -had been wakened that wonderful vision to which alone are wonderful -things revealed; the mere shapes and patterns of things becoming, as it -were, refined, and gaining a kind of symbolical value, as though they -were themselves patterns of some other and more perfect form whose -shadow they made real: how strange it all was! He remembered something -like it in history. Was it not Plato, that artist in thought, who had -first analyzed it? Was it not Buonarotti who had carved it in the -coloured marbles of a sonnet-sequence? But in our own century it was -strange.... Yes; he would try to be to Dorian Gray what, without -knowing it, the lad was to the painter who had fashioned the wonderful -portrait. He would seek to dominate him—had already, indeed, half done -so. He would make that wonderful spirit his own. There was something -fascinating in this son of love and death. - -Suddenly he stopped and glanced up at the houses. He found that he had -passed his aunt’s some distance, and, smiling to himself, turned back. -When he entered the somewhat sombre hall, the butler told him that they -had gone in to lunch. He gave one of the footmen his hat and stick and -passed into the dining-room. - -“Late as usual, Harry,” cried his aunt, shaking her head at him. - -He invented a facile excuse, and having taken the vacant seat next to -her, looked round to see who was there. Dorian bowed to him shyly from -the end of the table, a flush of pleasure stealing into his cheek. -Opposite was the Duchess of Harley, a lady of admirable good-nature and -good temper, much liked by every one who knew her, and of those ample -architectural proportions that in women who are not duchesses are -described by contemporary historians as stoutness. Next to her sat, on -her right, Sir Thomas Burdon, a Radical member of Parliament, who -followed his leader in public life and in private life followed the -best cooks, dining with the Tories and thinking with the Liberals, in -accordance with a wise and well-known rule. The post on her left was -occupied by Mr. Erskine of Treadley, an old gentleman of considerable -charm and culture, who had fallen, however, into bad habits of silence, -having, as he explained once to Lady Agatha, said everything that he -had to say before he was thirty. His own neighbour was Mrs. Vandeleur, -one of his aunt’s oldest friends, a perfect saint amongst women, but so -dreadfully dowdy that she reminded one of a badly bound hymn-book. -Fortunately for him she had on the other side Lord Faudel, a most -intelligent middle-aged mediocrity, as bald as a ministerial statement -in the House of Commons, with whom she was conversing in that intensely -earnest manner which is the one unpardonable error, as he remarked once -himself, that all really good people fall into, and from which none of -them ever quite escape. - -“We are talking about poor Dartmoor, Lord Henry,” cried the duchess, -nodding pleasantly to him across the table. “Do you think he will -really marry this fascinating young person?” - -“I believe she has made up her mind to propose to him, Duchess.” - -“How dreadful!” exclaimed Lady Agatha. “Really, some one should -interfere.” - -“I am told, on excellent authority, that her father keeps an American -dry-goods store,” said Sir Thomas Burdon, looking supercilious. - -“My uncle has already suggested pork-packing, Sir Thomas.” - -“Dry-goods! What are American dry-goods?” asked the duchess, raising -her large hands in wonder and accentuating the verb. - -“American novels,” answered Lord Henry, helping himself to some quail. - -The duchess looked puzzled. - -“Don’t mind him, my dear,” whispered Lady Agatha. “He never means -anything that he says.” - -“When America was discovered,” said the Radical member—and he began to -give some wearisome facts. Like all people who try to exhaust a -subject, he exhausted his listeners. The duchess sighed and exercised -her privilege of interruption. “I wish to goodness it never had been -discovered at all!” she exclaimed. “Really, our girls have no chance -nowadays. It is most unfair.” - -“Perhaps, after all, America never has been discovered,” said Mr. -Erskine; “I myself would say that it had merely been detected.” - -“Oh! but I have seen specimens of the inhabitants,” answered the -duchess vaguely. “I must confess that most of them are extremely -pretty. And they dress well, too. They get all their dresses in Paris. -I wish I could afford to do the same.” - -“They say that when good Americans die they go to Paris,” chuckled Sir -Thomas, who had a large wardrobe of Humour’s cast-off clothes. - -“Really! And where do bad Americans go to when they die?” inquired the -duchess. - -“They go to America,” murmured Lord Henry. - -Sir Thomas frowned. “I am afraid that your nephew is prejudiced against -that great country,” he said to Lady Agatha. “I have travelled all over -it in cars provided by the directors, who, in such matters, are -extremely civil. I assure you that it is an education to visit it.” - -“But must we really see Chicago in order to be educated?” asked Mr. -Erskine plaintively. “I don’t feel up to the journey.” - -Sir Thomas waved his hand. “Mr. Erskine of Treadley has the world on -his shelves. We practical men like to see things, not to read about -them. The Americans are an extremely interesting people. They are -absolutely reasonable. I think that is their distinguishing -characteristic. Yes, Mr. Erskine, an absolutely reasonable people. I -assure you there is no nonsense about the Americans.” - -“How dreadful!” cried Lord Henry. “I can stand brute force, but brute -reason is quite unbearable. There is something unfair about its use. It -is hitting below the intellect.” - -“I do not understand you,” said Sir Thomas, growing rather red. - -“I do, Lord Henry,” murmured Mr. Erskine, with a smile. - -“Paradoxes are all very well in their way....” rejoined the baronet. - -“Was that a paradox?” asked Mr. Erskine. “I did not think so. Perhaps -it was. Well, the way of paradoxes is the way of truth. To test reality -we must see it on the tight rope. When the verities become acrobats, we -can judge them.” - -“Dear me!” said Lady Agatha, “how you men argue! I am sure I never can -make out what you are talking about. Oh! Harry, I am quite vexed with -you. Why do you try to persuade our nice Mr. Dorian Gray to give up the -East End? I assure you he would be quite invaluable. They would love -his playing.” - -“I want him to play to me,” cried Lord Henry, smiling, and he looked -down the table and caught a bright answering glance. - -“But they are so unhappy in Whitechapel,” continued Lady Agatha. - -“I can sympathize with everything except suffering,” said Lord Henry, -shrugging his shoulders. “I cannot sympathize with that. It is too -ugly, too horrible, too distressing. There is something terribly morbid -in the modern sympathy with pain. One should sympathize with the -colour, the beauty, the joy of life. The less said about life’s sores, -the better.” - -“Still, the East End is a very important problem,” remarked Sir Thomas -with a grave shake of the head. - -“Quite so,” answered the young lord. “It is the problem of slavery, and -we try to solve it by amusing the slaves.” - -The politician looked at him keenly. “What change do you propose, -then?” he asked. - -Lord Henry laughed. “I don’t desire to change anything in England -except the weather,” he answered. “I am quite content with philosophic -contemplation. But, as the nineteenth century has gone bankrupt through -an over-expenditure of sympathy, I would suggest that we should appeal -to science to put us straight. The advantage of the emotions is that -they lead us astray, and the advantage of science is that it is not -emotional.” - -“But we have such grave responsibilities,” ventured Mrs. Vandeleur -timidly. - -“Terribly grave,” echoed Lady Agatha. - -Lord Henry looked over at Mr. Erskine. “Humanity takes itself too -seriously. It is the world’s original sin. If the caveman had known how -to laugh, history would have been different.” - -“You are really very comforting,” warbled the duchess. “I have always -felt rather guilty when I came to see your dear aunt, for I take no -interest at all in the East End. For the future I shall be able to look -her in the face without a blush.” - -“A blush is very becoming, Duchess,” remarked Lord Henry. - -“Only when one is young,” she answered. “When an old woman like myself -blushes, it is a very bad sign. Ah! Lord Henry, I wish you would tell -me how to become young again.” - -He thought for a moment. “Can you remember any great error that you -committed in your early days, Duchess?” he asked, looking at her across -the table. - -“A great many, I fear,” she cried. - -“Then commit them over again,” he said gravely. “To get back one’s -youth, one has merely to repeat one’s follies.” - -“A delightful theory!” she exclaimed. “I must put it into practice.” - -“A dangerous theory!” came from Sir Thomas’s tight lips. Lady Agatha -shook her head, but could not help being amused. Mr. Erskine listened. - -“Yes,” he continued, “that is one of the great secrets of life. -Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and -discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are -one’s mistakes.” - -A laugh ran round the table. - -He played with the idea and grew wilful; tossed it into the air and -transformed it; let it escape and recaptured it; made it iridescent -with fancy and winged it with paradox. The praise of folly, as he went -on, soared into a philosophy, and philosophy herself became young, and -catching the mad music of pleasure, wearing, one might fancy, her -wine-stained robe and wreath of ivy, danced like a Bacchante over the -hills of life, and mocked the slow Silenus for being sober. Facts fled -before her like frightened forest things. Her white feet trod the huge -press at which wise Omar sits, till the seething grape-juice rose round -her bare limbs in waves of purple bubbles, or crawled in red foam over -the vat’s black, dripping, sloping sides. It was an extraordinary -improvisation. He felt that the eyes of Dorian Gray were fixed on him, -and the consciousness that amongst his audience there was one whose -temperament he wished to fascinate seemed to give his wit keenness and -to lend colour to his imagination. He was brilliant, fantastic, -irresponsible. He charmed his listeners out of themselves, and they -followed his pipe, laughing. Dorian Gray never took his gaze off him, -but sat like one under a spell, smiles chasing each other over his lips -and wonder growing grave in his darkening eyes. - -At last, liveried in the costume of the age, reality entered the room -in the shape of a servant to tell the duchess that her carriage was -waiting. She wrung her hands in mock despair. “How annoying!” she -cried. “I must go. I have to call for my husband at the club, to take -him to some absurd meeting at Willis’s Rooms, where he is going to be -in the chair. If I am late he is sure to be furious, and I couldn’t -have a scene in this bonnet. It is far too fragile. A harsh word would -ruin it. No, I must go, dear Agatha. Good-bye, Lord Henry, you are -quite delightful and dreadfully demoralizing. I am sure I don’t know -what to say about your views. You must come and dine with us some -night. Tuesday? Are you disengaged Tuesday?” - -“For you I would throw over anybody, Duchess,” said Lord Henry with a -bow. - -“Ah! that is very nice, and very wrong of you,” she cried; “so mind you -come”; and she swept out of the room, followed by Lady Agatha and the -other ladies. - -When Lord Henry had sat down again, Mr. Erskine moved round, and taking -a chair close to him, placed his hand upon his arm. - -“You talk books away,” he said; “why don’t you write one?” - -“I am too fond of reading books to care to write them, Mr. Erskine. I -should like to write a novel certainly, a novel that would be as lovely -as a Persian carpet and as unreal. But there is no literary public in -England for anything except newspapers, primers, and encyclopaedias. Of -all people in the world the English have the least sense of the beauty -of literature.” - -“I fear you are right,” answered Mr. Erskine. “I myself used to have -literary ambitions, but I gave them up long ago. And now, my dear young -friend, if you will allow me to call you so, may I ask if you really -meant all that you said to us at lunch?” - -“I quite forget what I said,” smiled Lord Henry. “Was it all very bad?” - -“Very bad indeed. In fact I consider you extremely dangerous, and if -anything happens to our good duchess, we shall all look on you as being -primarily responsible. But I should like to talk to you about life. The -generation into which I was born was tedious. Some day, when you are -tired of London, come down to Treadley and expound to me your -philosophy of pleasure over some admirable Burgundy I am fortunate -enough to possess.” - -“I shall be charmed. A visit to Treadley would be a great privilege. It -has a perfect host, and a perfect library.” - -“You will complete it,” answered the old gentleman with a courteous -bow. “And now I must bid good-bye to your excellent aunt. I am due at -the Athenaeum. It is the hour when we sleep there.” - -“All of you, Mr. Erskine?” - -“Forty of us, in forty arm-chairs. We are practising for an English -Academy of Letters.” - -Lord Henry laughed and rose. “I am going to the park,” he cried. - -As he was passing out of the door, Dorian Gray touched him on the arm. -“Let me come with you,” he murmured. - -“But I thought you had promised Basil Hallward to go and see him,” -answered Lord Henry. - -“I would sooner come with you; yes, I feel I must come with you. Do let -me. And you will promise to talk to me all the time? No one talks so -wonderfully as you do.” - -“Ah! I have talked quite enough for to-day,” said Lord Henry, smiling. -“All I want now is to look at life. You may come and look at it with -me, if you care to.” - - - - -CHAPTER IV. - - -One afternoon, a month later, Dorian Gray was reclining in a luxurious -arm-chair, in the little library of Lord Henry’s house in Mayfair. It -was, in its way, a very charming room, with its high panelled -wainscoting of olive-stained oak, its cream-coloured frieze and ceiling -of raised plasterwork, and its brickdust felt carpet strewn with silk, -long-fringed Persian rugs. On a tiny satinwood table stood a statuette -by Clodion, and beside it lay a copy of Les Cent Nouvelles, bound for -Margaret of Valois by Clovis Eve and powdered with the gilt daisies -that Queen had selected for her device. Some large blue china jars and -parrot-tulips were ranged on the mantelshelf, and through the small -leaded panes of the window streamed the apricot-coloured light of a -summer day in London. - -Lord Henry had not yet come in. He was always late on principle, his -principle being that punctuality is the thief of time. So the lad was -looking rather sulky, as with listless fingers he turned over the pages -of an elaborately illustrated edition of Manon Lescaut that he had -found in one of the book-cases. The formal monotonous ticking of the -Louis Quatorze clock annoyed him. Once or twice he thought of going -away. - -At last he heard a step outside, and the door opened. “How late you -are, Harry!” he murmured. - -“I am afraid it is not Harry, Mr. Gray,” answered a shrill voice. - -He glanced quickly round and rose to his feet. “I beg your pardon. I -thought—” - -“You thought it was my husband. It is only his wife. You must let me -introduce myself. I know you quite well by your photographs. I think my -husband has got seventeen of them.” - -“Not seventeen, Lady Henry?” - -“Well, eighteen, then. And I saw you with him the other night at the -opera.” She laughed nervously as she spoke, and watched him with her -vague forget-me-not eyes. She was a curious woman, whose dresses always -looked as if they had been designed in a rage and put on in a tempest. -She was usually in love with somebody, and, as her passion was never -returned, she had kept all her illusions. She tried to look -picturesque, but only succeeded in being untidy. Her name was Victoria, -and she had a perfect mania for going to church. - -“That was at Lohengrin, Lady Henry, I think?” - -“Yes; it was at dear Lohengrin. I like Wagner’s music better than -anybody’s. It is so loud that one can talk the whole time without other -people hearing what one says. That is a great advantage, don’t you -think so, Mr. Gray?” - -The same nervous staccato laugh broke from her thin lips, and her -fingers began to play with a long tortoise-shell paper-knife. - -Dorian smiled and shook his head: “I am afraid I don’t think so, Lady -Henry. I never talk during music—at least, during good music. If one -hears bad music, it is one’s duty to drown it in conversation.” - -“Ah! that is one of Harry’s views, isn’t it, Mr. Gray? I always hear -Harry’s views from his friends. It is the only way I get to know of -them. But you must not think I don’t like good music. I adore it, but I -am afraid of it. It makes me too romantic. I have simply worshipped -pianists—two at a time, sometimes, Harry tells me. I don’t know what it -is about them. Perhaps it is that they are foreigners. They all are, -ain’t they? Even those that are born in England become foreigners after -a time, don’t they? It is so clever of them, and such a compliment to -art. Makes it quite cosmopolitan, doesn’t it? You have never been to -any of my parties, have you, Mr. Gray? You must come. I can’t afford -orchids, but I spare no expense in foreigners. They make one’s rooms -look so picturesque. But here is Harry! Harry, I came in to look for -you, to ask you something—I forget what it was—and I found Mr. Gray -here. We have had such a pleasant chat about music. We have quite the -same ideas. No; I think our ideas are quite different. But he has been -most pleasant. I am so glad I’ve seen him.” - -“I am charmed, my love, quite charmed,” said Lord Henry, elevating his -dark, crescent-shaped eyebrows and looking at them both with an amused -smile. “So sorry I am late, Dorian. I went to look after a piece of old -brocade in Wardour Street and had to bargain for hours for it. Nowadays -people know the price of everything and the value of nothing.” - -“I am afraid I must be going,” exclaimed Lady Henry, breaking an -awkward silence with her silly sudden laugh. “I have promised to drive -with the duchess. Good-bye, Mr. Gray. Good-bye, Harry. You are dining -out, I suppose? So am I. Perhaps I shall see you at Lady Thornbury’s.” - -“I dare say, my dear,” said Lord Henry, shutting the door behind her -as, looking like a bird of paradise that had been out all night in the -rain, she flitted out of the room, leaving a faint odour of -frangipanni. Then he lit a cigarette and flung himself down on the -sofa. - -“Never marry a woman with straw-coloured hair, Dorian,” he said after a -few puffs. - -“Why, Harry?” - -“Because they are so sentimental.” - -“But I like sentimental people.” - -“Never marry at all, Dorian. Men marry because they are tired; women, -because they are curious: both are disappointed.” - -“I don’t think I am likely to marry, Harry. I am too much in love. That -is one of your aphorisms. I am putting it into practice, as I do -everything that you say.” - -“Who are you in love with?” asked Lord Henry after a pause. - -“With an actress,” said Dorian Gray, blushing. - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. “That is a rather commonplace -_début_.” - -“You would not say so if you saw her, Harry.” - -“Who is she?” - -“Her name is Sibyl Vane.” - -“Never heard of her.” - -“No one has. People will some day, however. She is a genius.” - -“My dear boy, no woman is a genius. Women are a decorative sex. They -never have anything to say, but they say it charmingly. Women represent -the triumph of matter over mind, just as men represent the triumph of -mind over morals.” - -“Harry, how can you?” - -“My dear Dorian, it is quite true. I am analysing women at present, so -I ought to know. The subject is not so abstruse as I thought it was. I -find that, ultimately, there are only two kinds of women, the plain and -the coloured. The plain women are very useful. If you want to gain a -reputation for respectability, you have merely to take them down to -supper. The other women are very charming. They commit one mistake, -however. They paint in order to try and look young. Our grandmothers -painted in order to try and talk brilliantly. _Rouge_ and _esprit_ used -to go together. That is all over now. As long as a woman can look ten -years younger than her own daughter, she is perfectly satisfied. As for -conversation, there are only five women in London worth talking to, and -two of these can’t be admitted into decent society. However, tell me -about your genius. How long have you known her?” - -“Ah! Harry, your views terrify me.” - -“Never mind that. How long have you known her?” - -“About three weeks.” - -“And where did you come across her?” - -“I will tell you, Harry, but you mustn’t be unsympathetic about it. -After all, it never would have happened if I had not met you. You -filled me with a wild desire to know everything about life. For days -after I met you, something seemed to throb in my veins. As I lounged in -the park, or strolled down Piccadilly, I used to look at every one who -passed me and wonder, with a mad curiosity, what sort of lives they -led. Some of them fascinated me. Others filled me with terror. There -was an exquisite poison in the air. I had a passion for sensations.... -Well, one evening about seven o’clock, I determined to go out in search -of some adventure. I felt that this grey monstrous London of ours, with -its myriads of people, its sordid sinners, and its splendid sins, as -you once phrased it, must have something in store for me. I fancied a -thousand things. The mere danger gave me a sense of delight. I -remembered what you had said to me on that wonderful evening when we -first dined together, about the search for beauty being the real secret -of life. I don’t know what I expected, but I went out and wandered -eastward, soon losing my way in a labyrinth of grimy streets and black -grassless squares. About half-past eight I passed by an absurd little -theatre, with great flaring gas-jets and gaudy play-bills. A hideous -Jew, in the most amazing waistcoat I ever beheld in my life, was -standing at the entrance, smoking a vile cigar. He had greasy ringlets, -and an enormous diamond blazed in the centre of a soiled shirt. ‘Have a -box, my Lord?’ he said, when he saw me, and he took off his hat with an -air of gorgeous servility. There was something about him, Harry, that -amused me. He was such a monster. You will laugh at me, I know, but I -really went in and paid a whole guinea for the stage-box. To the -present day I can’t make out why I did so; and yet if I hadn’t—my dear -Harry, if I hadn’t—I should have missed the greatest romance of my -life. I see you are laughing. It is horrid of you!” - -“I am not laughing, Dorian; at least I am not laughing at you. But you -should not say the greatest romance of your life. You should say the -first romance of your life. You will always be loved, and you will -always be in love with love. A _grande passion_ is the privilege of -people who have nothing to do. That is the one use of the idle classes -of a country. Don’t be afraid. There are exquisite things in store for -you. This is merely the beginning.” - -“Do you think my nature so shallow?” cried Dorian Gray angrily. - -“No; I think your nature so deep.” - -“How do you mean?” - -“My dear boy, the people who love only once in their lives are really -the shallow people. What they call their loyalty, and their fidelity, I -call either the lethargy of custom or their lack of imagination. -Faithfulness is to the emotional life what consistency is to the life -of the intellect—simply a confession of failure. Faithfulness! I must -analyse it some day. The passion for property is in it. There are many -things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that others might -pick them up. But I don’t want to interrupt you. Go on with your -story.” - -“Well, I found myself seated in a horrid little private box, with a -vulgar drop-scene staring me in the face. I looked out from behind the -curtain and surveyed the house. It was a tawdry affair, all Cupids and -cornucopias, like a third-rate wedding-cake. The gallery and pit were -fairly full, but the two rows of dingy stalls were quite empty, and -there was hardly a person in what I suppose they called the -dress-circle. Women went about with oranges and ginger-beer, and there -was a terrible consumption of nuts going on.” - -“It must have been just like the palmy days of the British drama.” - -“Just like, I should fancy, and very depressing. I began to wonder what -on earth I should do when I caught sight of the play-bill. What do you -think the play was, Harry?” - -“I should think ‘The Idiot Boy’, or ‘Dumb but Innocent’. Our fathers -used to like that sort of piece, I believe. The longer I live, Dorian, -the more keenly I feel that whatever was good enough for our fathers is -not good enough for us. In art, as in politics, _les grandpères ont -toujours tort_.” - -“This play was good enough for us, Harry. It was Romeo and Juliet. I -must admit that I was rather annoyed at the idea of seeing Shakespeare -done in such a wretched hole of a place. Still, I felt interested, in a -sort of way. At any rate, I determined to wait for the first act. There -was a dreadful orchestra, presided over by a young Hebrew who sat at a -cracked piano, that nearly drove me away, but at last the drop-scene -was drawn up and the play began. Romeo was a stout elderly gentleman, -with corked eyebrows, a husky tragedy voice, and a figure like a -beer-barrel. Mercutio was almost as bad. He was played by the -low-comedian, who had introduced gags of his own and was on most -friendly terms with the pit. They were both as grotesque as the -scenery, and that looked as if it had come out of a country-booth. But -Juliet! Harry, imagine a girl, hardly seventeen years of age, with a -little, flowerlike face, a small Greek head with plaited coils of -dark-brown hair, eyes that were violet wells of passion, lips that were -like the petals of a rose. She was the loveliest thing I had ever seen -in my life. You said to me once that pathos left you unmoved, but that -beauty, mere beauty, could fill your eyes with tears. I tell you, -Harry, I could hardly see this girl for the mist of tears that came -across me. And her voice—I never heard such a voice. It was very low at -first, with deep mellow notes that seemed to fall singly upon one’s -ear. Then it became a little louder, and sounded like a flute or a -distant hautboy. In the garden-scene it had all the tremulous ecstasy -that one hears just before dawn when nightingales are singing. There -were moments, later on, when it had the wild passion of violins. You -know how a voice can stir one. Your voice and the voice of Sibyl Vane -are two things that I shall never forget. When I close my eyes, I hear -them, and each of them says something different. I don’t know which to -follow. Why should I not love her? Harry, I do love her. She is -everything to me in life. Night after night I go to see her play. One -evening she is Rosalind, and the next evening she is Imogen. I have -seen her die in the gloom of an Italian tomb, sucking the poison from -her lover’s lips. I have watched her wandering through the forest of -Arden, disguised as a pretty boy in hose and doublet and dainty cap. -She has been mad, and has come into the presence of a guilty king, and -given him rue to wear and bitter herbs to taste of. She has been -innocent, and the black hands of jealousy have crushed her reedlike -throat. I have seen her in every age and in every costume. Ordinary -women never appeal to one’s imagination. They are limited to their -century. No glamour ever transfigures them. One knows their minds as -easily as one knows their bonnets. One can always find them. There is -no mystery in any of them. They ride in the park in the morning and -chatter at tea-parties in the afternoon. They have their stereotyped -smile and their fashionable manner. They are quite obvious. But an -actress! How different an actress is! Harry! why didn’t you tell me -that the only thing worth loving is an actress?” - -“Because I have loved so many of them, Dorian.” - -“Oh, yes, horrid people with dyed hair and painted faces.” - -“Don’t run down dyed hair and painted faces. There is an extraordinary -charm in them, sometimes,” said Lord Henry. - -“I wish now I had not told you about Sibyl Vane.” - -“You could not have helped telling me, Dorian. All through your life -you will tell me everything you do.” - -“Yes, Harry, I believe that is true. I cannot help telling you things. -You have a curious influence over me. If I ever did a crime, I would -come and confess it to you. You would understand me.” - -“People like you—the wilful sunbeams of life—don’t commit crimes, -Dorian. But I am much obliged for the compliment, all the same. And now -tell me—reach me the matches, like a good boy—thanks—what are your -actual relations with Sibyl Vane?” - -Dorian Gray leaped to his feet, with flushed cheeks and burning eyes. -“Harry! Sibyl Vane is sacred!” - -“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,” laughed Dorian. -“By this time, however, the lights were being put out in the theatre, -and I had to go. He wanted me to try some cigars that he strongly -recommended. I declined. The next night, of course, I arrived at the -place again. When he saw me, he made me a low bow and assured me that I -was a munificent patron of art. He was a most offensive brute, though -he had an extraordinary passion for Shakespeare. He told me once, with -an air of pride, that his five bankruptcies were entirely due to ‘The -Bard,’ as he insisted on calling him. He seemed to think it a -distinction.” - -“It was a distinction, my dear Dorian—a great distinction. Most people -become bankrupt through having invested too heavily in the prose of -life. To have ruined one’s self over poetry is an honour. But when did -you first speak to Miss Sibyl Vane?” - -“The third night. She had been playing Rosalind. I could not help going -round. I had thrown her some flowers, and she had looked at me—at least -I fancied that she had. The old Jew was persistent. He seemed -determined to take me behind, so I consented. It was curious my not -wanting to know her, wasn’t it?” - -“No; I don’t think so.” - -“My dear Harry, why?” - -“I will tell you some other time. Now I want to know about the girl.” - -“Sibyl? Oh, she was so shy and so gentle. There is something of a child -about her. Her eyes opened wide in exquisite wonder when I told her -what I thought of her performance, and she seemed quite unconscious of -her power. I think we were both rather nervous. The old Jew stood -grinning at the doorway of the dusty greenroom, making elaborate -speeches about us both, while we stood looking at each other like -children. He would insist on calling me ‘My Lord,’ so I had to assure -Sibyl that I was not anything of the kind. She said quite simply to me, -‘You look more like a prince. I must call you Prince Charming.’” - -“Upon my word, Dorian, Miss Sibyl knows how to pay compliments.” - -“You don’t understand her, Harry. She regarded me merely as a person in -a play. She knows nothing of life. She lives with her mother, a faded -tired woman who played Lady Capulet in a sort of magenta -dressing-wrapper on the first night, and looks as if she had seen -better days.” - -“I know that look. It depresses me,” murmured Lord Henry, examining his -rings. - -“The Jew wanted to tell me her history, but I said it did not interest -me.” - -“You were quite right. There is always something infinitely mean about -other people’s tragedies.” - -“Sibyl is the only thing I care about. What is it to me where she came -from? From her little head to her little feet, she is absolutely and -entirely divine. Every night of my life I go to see her act, and every -night she is more marvellous.” - -“That is the reason, I suppose, that you never dine with me now. I -thought you must have some curious romance on hand. You have; but it is -not quite what I expected.” - -“My dear Harry, we either lunch or sup together every day, and I have -been to the opera with you several times,” said Dorian, opening his -blue eyes in wonder. - -“You always come dreadfully late.” - -“Well, I can’t help going to see Sibyl play,” he cried, “even if it is -only for a single act. I get hungry for her presence; and when I think -of the wonderful soul that is hidden away in that little ivory body, I -am filled with awe.” - -“You can dine with me to-night, Dorian, can’t you?” - -He shook his head. “To-night she is Imogen,” he answered, “and -to-morrow night she will be Juliet.” - -“When is she Sibyl Vane?” - -“Never.” - -“I congratulate you.” - -“How horrid you are! She is all the great heroines of the world in one. -She is more than an individual. You laugh, but I tell you she has -genius. I love her, and I must make her love me. You, who know all the -secrets of life, tell me how to charm Sibyl Vane to love me! I want to -make Romeo jealous. I want the dead lovers of the world to hear our -laughter and grow sad. I want a breath of our passion to stir their -dust into consciousness, to wake their ashes into pain. My God, Harry, -how I worship her!” He was walking up and down the room as he spoke. -Hectic spots of red burned on his cheeks. He was terribly excited. - -Lord Henry watched him with a subtle sense of pleasure. How different -he was now from the shy frightened boy he had met in Basil Hallward’s -studio! His nature had developed like a flower, had borne blossoms of -scarlet flame. Out of its secret hiding-place had crept his soul, and -desire had come to meet it on the way. - -“And what do you propose to do?” said Lord Henry at last. - -“I want you and Basil to come with me some night and see her act. I -have not the slightest fear of the result. You are certain to -acknowledge her genius. Then we must get her out of the Jew’s hands. -She is bound to him for three years—at least for two years and eight -months—from the present time. I shall have to pay him something, of -course. When all that is settled, I shall take a West End theatre and -bring her out properly. She will make the world as mad as she has made -me.” - -“That would be impossible, my dear boy.” - -“Yes, she will. She has not merely art, consummate art-instinct, in -her, but she has personality also; and you have often told me that it -is personalities, not principles, that move the age.” - -“Well, what night shall we go?” - -“Let me see. To-day is Tuesday. Let us fix to-morrow. She plays Juliet -to-morrow.” - -“All right. The Bristol at eight o’clock; and I will get Basil.” - -“Not eight, Harry, please. Half-past six. We must be there before the -curtain rises. You must see her in the first act, where she meets -Romeo.” - -“Half-past six! What an hour! It will be like having a meat-tea, or -reading an English novel. It must be seven. No gentleman dines before -seven. Shall you see Basil between this and then? Or shall I write to -him?” - -“Dear Basil! I have not laid eyes on him for a week. It is rather -horrid of me, as he has sent me my portrait in the most wonderful -frame, specially designed by himself, and, though I am a little jealous -of the picture for being a whole month younger than I am, I must admit -that I delight in it. Perhaps you had better write to him. I don’t want -to see him alone. He says things that annoy me. He gives me good -advice.” - -Lord Henry smiled. “People are very fond of giving away what they need -most themselves. It is what I call the depth of generosity.” - -“Oh, Basil is the best of fellows, but he seems to me to be just a bit -of a Philistine. Since I have known you, Harry, I have discovered -that.” - -“Basil, my dear boy, puts everything that is charming in him into his -work. The consequence is that he has nothing left for life but his -prejudices, his principles, and his common sense. The only artists I -have ever known who are personally delightful are bad artists. Good -artists exist simply in what they make, and consequently are perfectly -uninteresting in what they are. A great poet, a really great poet, is -the most unpoetical of all creatures. But inferior poets are absolutely -fascinating. The worse their rhymes are, the more picturesque they -look. The mere fact of having published a book of second-rate sonnets -makes a man quite irresistible. He lives the poetry that he cannot -write. The others write the poetry that they dare not realize.” - -“I wonder is that really so, Harry?” said Dorian Gray, putting some -perfume on his handkerchief out of a large, gold-topped bottle that -stood on the table. “It must be, if you say it. And now I am off. -Imogen is waiting for me. Don’t forget about to-morrow. Good-bye.” - -As he left the room, Lord Henry’s heavy eyelids drooped, and he began -to think. Certainly few people had ever interested him so much as -Dorian Gray, and yet the lad’s mad adoration of some one else caused -him not the slightest pang of annoyance or jealousy. He was pleased by -it. It made him a more interesting study. He had been always enthralled -by the methods of natural science, but the ordinary subject-matter of -that science had seemed to him trivial and of no import. And so he had -begun by vivisecting himself, as he had ended by vivisecting others. -Human life—that appeared to him the one thing worth investigating. -Compared to it there was nothing else of any value. It was true that as -one watched life in its curious crucible of pain and pleasure, one -could not wear over one’s face a mask of glass, nor keep the sulphurous -fumes from troubling the brain and making the imagination turbid with -monstrous fancies and misshapen dreams. There were poisons so subtle -that to know their properties one had to sicken of them. There were -maladies so strange that one had to pass through them if one sought to -understand their nature. And, yet, what a great reward one received! -How wonderful the whole world became to one! To note the curious hard -logic of passion, and the emotional coloured life of the intellect—to -observe where they met, and where they separated, at what point they -were in unison, and at what point they were at discord—there was a -delight in that! What matter what the cost was? One could never pay too -high a price for any sensation. - -He was conscious—and the thought brought a gleam of pleasure into his -brown agate eyes—that it was through certain words of his, musical -words said with musical utterance, that Dorian Gray’s soul had turned -to this white girl and bowed in worship before her. To a large extent -the lad was his own creation. He had made him premature. That was -something. Ordinary people waited till life disclosed to them its -secrets, but to the few, to the elect, the mysteries of life were -revealed before the veil was drawn away. Sometimes this was the effect -of art, and chiefly of the art of literature, which dealt immediately -with the passions and the intellect. But now and then a complex -personality took the place and assumed the office of art, was indeed, -in its way, a real work of art, life having its elaborate masterpieces, -just as poetry has, or sculpture, or painting. - -Yes, the lad was premature. He was gathering his harvest while it was -yet spring. The pulse and passion of youth were in him, but he was -becoming self-conscious. It was delightful to watch him. With his -beautiful face, and his beautiful soul, he was a thing to wonder at. It -was no matter how it all ended, or was destined to end. He was like one -of those gracious figures in a pageant or a play, whose joys seem to be -remote from one, but whose sorrows stir one’s sense of beauty, and -whose wounds are like red roses. - -Soul and body, body and soul—how mysterious they were! There was -animalism in the soul, and the body had its moments of spirituality. -The senses could refine, and the intellect could degrade. Who could say -where the fleshly impulse ceased, or the psychical impulse began? How -shallow were the arbitrary definitions of ordinary psychologists! And -yet how difficult to decide between the claims of the various schools! -Was the soul a shadow seated in the house of sin? Or was the body -really in the soul, as Giordano Bruno thought? The separation of spirit -from matter was a mystery, and the union of spirit with matter was a -mystery also. - -He began to wonder whether we could ever make psychology so absolute a -science that each little spring of life would be revealed to us. As it -was, we always misunderstood ourselves and rarely understood others. -Experience was of no ethical value. It was merely the name men gave to -their mistakes. Moralists had, as a rule, regarded it as a mode of -warning, had claimed for it a certain ethical efficacy in the formation -of character, had praised it as something that taught us what to follow -and showed us what to avoid. But there was no motive power in -experience. It was as little of an active cause as conscience itself. -All that it really demonstrated was that our future would be the same -as our past, and that the sin we had done once, and with loathing, we -would do many times, and with joy. - -It was clear to him that the experimental method was the only method by -which one could arrive at any scientific analysis of the passions; and -certainly Dorian Gray was a subject made to his hand, and seemed to -promise rich and fruitful results. His sudden mad love for Sibyl Vane -was a psychological phenomenon of no small interest. There was no doubt -that curiosity had much to do with it, curiosity and the desire for new -experiences, yet it was not a simple, but rather a very complex -passion. What there was in it of the purely sensuous instinct of -boyhood had been transformed by the workings of the imagination, -changed into something that seemed to the lad himself to be remote from -sense, and was for that very reason all the more dangerous. It was the -passions about whose origin we deceived ourselves that tyrannized most -strongly over us. Our weakest motives were those of whose nature we -were conscious. It often happened that when we thought we were -experimenting on others we were really experimenting on ourselves. - -While Lord Henry sat dreaming on these things, a knock came to the -door, and his valet entered and reminded him it was time to dress for -dinner. He got up and looked out into the street. The sunset had -smitten into scarlet gold the upper windows of the houses opposite. The -panes glowed like plates of heated metal. The sky above was like a -faded rose. He thought of his friend’s young fiery-coloured life and -wondered how it was all going to end. - -When he arrived home, about half-past twelve o’clock, he saw a telegram -lying on the hall table. He opened it and found it was from Dorian -Gray. It was to tell him that he was engaged to be married to Sibyl -Vane. - - - - -CHAPTER V. - - -“Mother, Mother, I am so happy!” whispered the girl, burying her face -in the lap of the faded, tired-looking woman who, with back turned to -the shrill intrusive light, was sitting in the one arm-chair that their -dingy sitting-room contained. “I am so happy!” she repeated, “and you -must be happy, too!” - -Mrs. Vane winced and put her thin, bismuth-whitened hands on her -daughter’s head. “Happy!” she echoed, “I am only happy, Sibyl, when I -see you act. You must not think of anything but your acting. Mr. Isaacs -has been very good to us, and we owe him money.” - -The girl looked up and pouted. “Money, Mother?” she cried, “what does -money matter? Love is more than money.” - -“Mr. Isaacs has advanced us fifty pounds to pay off our debts and to -get a proper outfit for James. You must not forget that, Sibyl. Fifty -pounds is a very large sum. Mr. Isaacs has been most considerate.” - -“He is not a gentleman, Mother, and I hate the way he talks to me,” -said the girl, rising to her feet and going over to the window. - -“I don’t know how we could manage without him,” answered the elder -woman querulously. - -Sibyl Vane tossed her head and laughed. “We don’t want him any more, -Mother. Prince Charming rules life for us now.” Then she paused. A rose -shook in her blood and shadowed her cheeks. Quick breath parted the -petals of her lips. They trembled. Some southern wind of passion swept -over her and stirred the dainty folds of her dress. “I love him,” she -said simply. - -“Foolish child! foolish child!” was the parrot-phrase flung in answer. -The waving of crooked, false-jewelled fingers gave grotesqueness to the -words. - -The girl laughed again. The joy of a caged bird was in her voice. Her -eyes caught the melody and echoed it in radiance, then closed for a -moment, as though to hide their secret. When they opened, the mist of a -dream had passed across them. - -Thin-lipped wisdom spoke at her from the worn chair, hinted at -prudence, quoted from that book of cowardice whose author apes the name -of common sense. She did not listen. She was free in her prison of -passion. Her prince, Prince Charming, was with her. She had called on -memory to remake him. She had sent her soul to search for him, and it -had brought him back. His kiss burned again upon her mouth. Her eyelids -were warm with his breath. - -Then wisdom altered its method and spoke of espial and discovery. This -young man might be rich. If so, marriage should be thought of. Against -the shell of her ear broke the waves of worldly cunning. The arrows of -craft shot by her. She saw the thin lips moving, and smiled. - -Suddenly she felt the need to speak. The wordy silence troubled her. -“Mother, Mother,” she cried, “why does he love me so much? I know why I -love him. I love him because he is like what love himself should be. -But what does he see in me? I am not worthy of him. And yet—why, I -cannot tell—though I feel so much beneath him, I don’t feel humble. I -feel proud, terribly proud. Mother, did you love my father as I love -Prince Charming?” - -The elder woman grew pale beneath the coarse powder that daubed her -cheeks, and her dry lips twitched with a spasm of pain. Sybil rushed to -her, flung her arms round her neck, and kissed her. “Forgive me, -Mother. I know it pains you to talk about our father. But it only pains -you because you loved him so much. Don’t look so sad. I am as happy -to-day as you were twenty years ago. Ah! let me be happy for ever!” - -“My child, you are far too young to think of falling in love. Besides, -what do you know of this young man? You don’t even know his name. The -whole thing is most inconvenient, and really, when James is going away -to Australia, and I have so much to think of, I must say that you -should have shown more consideration. However, as I said before, if he -is rich ...” - -“Ah! Mother, Mother, let me be happy!” - -Mrs. Vane glanced at her, and with one of those false theatrical -gestures that so often become a mode of second nature to a -stage-player, clasped her in her arms. At this moment, the door opened -and a young lad with rough brown hair came into the room. He was -thick-set of figure, and his hands and feet were large and somewhat -clumsy in movement. He was not so finely bred as his sister. One would -hardly have guessed the close relationship that existed between them. -Mrs. Vane fixed her eyes on him and intensified her smile. She mentally -elevated her son to the dignity of an audience. She felt sure that the -_tableau_ was interesting. - -“You might keep some of your kisses for me, Sibyl, I think,” said the -lad with a good-natured grumble. - -“Ah! but you don’t like being kissed, Jim,” she cried. “You are a -dreadful old bear.” And she ran across the room and hugged him. - -James Vane looked into his sister’s face with tenderness. “I want you -to come out with me for a walk, Sibyl. I don’t suppose I shall ever see -this horrid London again. I am sure I don’t want to.” - -“My son, don’t say such dreadful things,” murmured Mrs. Vane, taking up -a tawdry theatrical dress, with a sigh, and beginning to patch it. She -felt a little disappointed that he had not joined the group. It would -have increased the theatrical picturesqueness of the situation. - -“Why not, Mother? I mean it.” - -“You pain me, my son. I trust you will return from Australia in a -position of affluence. I believe there is no society of any kind in the -Colonies—nothing that I would call society—so when you have made your -fortune, you must come back and assert yourself in London.” - -“Society!” muttered the lad. “I don’t want to know anything about that. -I should like to make some money to take you and Sibyl off the stage. I -hate it.” - -“Oh, Jim!” said Sibyl, laughing, “how unkind of you! But are you really -going for a walk with me? That will be nice! I was afraid you were -going to say good-bye to some of your friends—to Tom Hardy, who gave -you that hideous pipe, or Ned Langton, who makes fun of you for smoking -it. It is very sweet of you to let me have your last afternoon. Where -shall we go? Let us go to the park.” - -“I am too shabby,” he answered, frowning. “Only swell people go to the -park.” - -“Nonsense, Jim,” she whispered, stroking the sleeve of his coat. - -He hesitated for a moment. “Very well,” he said at last, “but don’t be -too long dressing.” She danced out of the door. One could hear her -singing as she ran upstairs. Her little feet pattered overhead. - -He walked up and down the room two or three times. Then he turned to -the still figure in the chair. “Mother, are my things ready?” he asked. - -“Quite ready, James,” she answered, keeping her eyes on her work. For -some months past she had felt ill at ease when she was alone with this -rough stern son of hers. Her shallow secret nature was troubled when -their eyes met. She used to wonder if he suspected anything. The -silence, for he made no other observation, became intolerable to her. -She began to complain. Women defend themselves by attacking, just as -they attack by sudden and strange surrenders. “I hope you will be -contented, James, with your sea-faring life,” she said. “You must -remember that it is your own choice. You might have entered a -solicitor’s office. Solicitors are a very respectable class, and in the -country often dine with the best families.” - -“I hate offices, and I hate clerks,” he replied. “But you are quite -right. I have chosen my own life. All I say is, watch over Sibyl. Don’t -let her come to any harm. Mother, you must watch over her.” - -“James, you really talk very strangely. Of course I watch over Sibyl.” - -“I hear a gentleman comes every night to the theatre and goes behind to -talk to her. Is that right? What about that?” - -“You are speaking about things you don’t understand, James. In the -profession we are accustomed to receive a great deal of most gratifying -attention. I myself used to receive many bouquets at one time. That was -when acting was really understood. As for Sibyl, I do not know at -present whether her attachment is serious or not. But there is no doubt -that the young man in question is a perfect gentleman. He is always -most polite to me. Besides, he has the appearance of being rich, and -the flowers he sends are lovely.” - -“You don’t know his name, though,” said the lad harshly. - -“No,” answered his mother with a placid expression in her face. “He has -not yet revealed his real name. I think it is quite romantic of him. He -is probably a member of the aristocracy.” - -James Vane bit his lip. “Watch over Sibyl, Mother,” he cried, “watch -over her.” - -“My son, you distress me very much. Sibyl is always under my special -care. Of course, if this gentleman is wealthy, there is no reason why -she should not contract an alliance with him. I trust he is one of the -aristocracy. He has all the appearance of it, I must say. It might be a -most brilliant marriage for Sibyl. They would make a charming couple. -His good looks are really quite remarkable; everybody notices them.” - -The lad muttered something to himself and drummed on the window-pane -with his coarse fingers. He had just turned round to say something when -the door opened and Sibyl ran in. - -“How serious you both are!” she cried. “What is the matter?” - -“Nothing,” he answered. “I suppose one must be serious sometimes. -Good-bye, Mother; I will have my dinner at five o’clock. Everything is -packed, except my shirts, so you need not trouble.” - -“Good-bye, my son,” she answered with a bow of strained stateliness. - -She was extremely annoyed at the tone he had adopted with her, and -there was something in his look that had made her feel afraid. - -“Kiss me, Mother,” said the girl. Her flowerlike lips touched the -withered cheek and warmed its frost. - -“My child! my child!” cried Mrs. Vane, looking up to the ceiling in -search of an imaginary gallery. - -“Come, Sibyl,” said her brother impatiently. He hated his mother’s -affectations. - -They went out into the flickering, wind-blown sunlight and strolled -down the dreary Euston Road. The passersby glanced in wonder at the -sullen heavy youth who, in coarse, ill-fitting clothes, was in the -company of such a graceful, refined-looking girl. He was like a common -gardener walking with a rose. - -Jim frowned from time to time when he caught the inquisitive glance of -some stranger. He had that dislike of being stared at, which comes on -geniuses late in life and never leaves the commonplace. Sibyl, however, -was quite unconscious of the effect she was producing. Her love was -trembling in laughter on her lips. She was thinking of Prince Charming, -and, that she might think of him all the more, she did not talk of him, -but prattled on about the ship in which Jim was going to sail, about -the gold he was certain to find, about the wonderful heiress whose life -he was to save from the wicked, red-shirted bushrangers. For he was not -to remain a sailor, or a supercargo, or whatever he was going to be. -Oh, no! A sailor’s existence was dreadful. Fancy being cooped up in a -horrid ship, with the hoarse, hump-backed waves trying to get in, and a -black wind blowing the masts down and tearing the sails into long -screaming ribands! He was to leave the vessel at Melbourne, bid a -polite good-bye to the captain, and go off at once to the gold-fields. -Before a week was over he was to come across a large nugget of pure -gold, the largest nugget that had ever been discovered, and bring it -down to the coast in a waggon guarded by six mounted policemen. The -bushrangers were to attack them three times, and be defeated with -immense slaughter. Or, no. He was not to go to the gold-fields at all. -They were horrid places, where men got intoxicated, and shot each other -in bar-rooms, and used bad language. He was to be a nice sheep-farmer, -and one evening, as he was riding home, he was to see the beautiful -heiress being carried off by a robber on a black horse, and give chase, -and rescue her. Of course, she would fall in love with him, and he with -her, and they would get married, and come home, and live in an immense -house in London. Yes, there were delightful things in store for him. -But he must be very good, and not lose his temper, or spend his money -foolishly. She was only a year older than he was, but she knew so much -more of life. He must be sure, also, to write to her by every mail, and -to say his prayers each night before he went to sleep. God was very -good, and would watch over him. She would pray for him, too, and in a -few years he would come back quite rich and happy. - -The lad listened sulkily to her and made no answer. He was heart-sick -at leaving home. - -Yet it was not this alone that made him gloomy and morose. -Inexperienced though he was, he had still a strong sense of the danger -of Sibyl’s position. This young dandy who was making love to her could -mean her no good. He was a gentleman, and he hated him for that, hated -him through some curious race-instinct for which he could not account, -and which for that reason was all the more dominant within him. He was -conscious also of the shallowness and vanity of his mother’s nature, -and in that saw infinite peril for Sibyl and Sibyl’s happiness. -Children begin by loving their parents; as they grow older they judge -them; sometimes they forgive them. - -His mother! He had something on his mind to ask of her, something that -he had brooded on for many months of silence. A chance phrase that he -had heard at the theatre, a whispered sneer that had reached his ears -one night as he waited at the stage-door, had set loose a train of -horrible thoughts. He remembered it as if it had been the lash of a -hunting-crop across his face. His brows knit together into a wedge-like -furrow, and with a twitch of pain he bit his underlip. - -“You are not listening to a word I am saying, Jim,” cried Sibyl, “and I -am making the most delightful plans for your future. Do say something.” - -“What do you want me to say?” - -“Oh! that you will be a good boy and not forget us,” she answered, -smiling at him. - -He shrugged his shoulders. “You are more likely to forget me than I am -to forget you, Sibyl.” - -She flushed. “What do you mean, Jim?” she asked. - -“You have a new friend, I hear. Who is he? Why have you not told me -about him? He means you no good.” - -“Stop, Jim!” she exclaimed. “You must not say anything against him. I -love him.” - -“Why, you don’t even know his name,” answered the lad. “Who is he? I -have a right to know.” - -“He is called Prince Charming. Don’t you like the name. Oh! you silly -boy! you should never forget it. If you only saw him, you would think -him the most wonderful person in the world. Some day you will meet -him—when you come back from Australia. You will like him so much. -Everybody likes him, and I ... love him. I wish you could come to the -theatre to-night. He is going to be there, and I am to play Juliet. Oh! -how I shall play it! Fancy, Jim, to be in love and play Juliet! To have -him sitting there! To play for his delight! I am afraid I may frighten -the company, frighten or enthrall them. To be in love is to surpass -one’s self. Poor dreadful Mr. Isaacs will be shouting ‘genius’ to his -loafers at the bar. He has preached me as a dogma; to-night he will -announce me as a revelation. I feel it. And it is all his, his only, -Prince Charming, my wonderful lover, my god of graces. But I am poor -beside him. Poor? What does that matter? When poverty creeps in at the -door, love flies in through the window. Our proverbs want rewriting. -They were made in winter, and it is summer now; spring-time for me, I -think, a very dance of blossoms in blue skies.” - -“He is a gentleman,” said the lad sullenly. - -“A prince!” she cried musically. “What more do you want?” - -“He wants to enslave you.” - -“I shudder at the thought of being free.” - -“I want you to beware of him.” - -“To see him is to worship him; to know him is to trust him.” - -“Sibyl, you are mad about him.” - -She laughed and took his arm. “You dear old Jim, you talk as if you -were a hundred. Some day you will be in love yourself. Then you will -know what it is. Don’t look so sulky. Surely you should be glad to -think that, though you are going away, you leave me happier than I have -ever been before. Life has been hard for us both, terribly hard and -difficult. But it will be different now. You are going to a new world, -and I have found one. Here are two chairs; let us sit down and see the -smart people go by.” - -They took their seats amidst a crowd of watchers. The tulip-beds across -the road flamed like throbbing rings of fire. A white dust—tremulous -cloud of orris-root it seemed—hung in the panting air. The brightly -coloured parasols danced and dipped like monstrous butterflies. - -She made her brother talk of himself, his hopes, his prospects. He -spoke slowly and with effort. They passed words to each other as -players at a game pass counters. Sibyl felt oppressed. She could not -communicate her joy. A faint smile curving that sullen mouth was all -the echo she could win. After some time she became silent. Suddenly she -caught a glimpse of golden hair and laughing lips, and in an open -carriage with two ladies Dorian Gray drove past. - -She started to her feet. “There he is!” she cried. - -“Who?” said Jim Vane. - -“Prince Charming,” she answered, looking after the victoria. - -He jumped up and seized her roughly by the arm. “Show him to me. Which -is he? Point him out. I must see him!” he exclaimed; but at that moment -the Duke of Berwick’s four-in-hand came between, and when it had left -the space clear, the carriage had swept out of the park. - -“He is gone,” murmured Sibyl sadly. “I wish you had seen him.” - -“I wish I had, for as sure as there is a God in heaven, if he ever does -you any wrong, I shall kill him.” - -She looked at him in horror. He repeated his words. They cut the air -like a dagger. The people round began to gape. A lady standing close to -her tittered. - -“Come away, Jim; come away,” she whispered. He followed her doggedly as -she passed through the crowd. He felt glad at what he had said. - -When they reached the Achilles Statue, she turned round. There was pity -in her eyes that became laughter on her lips. She shook her head at -him. “You are foolish, Jim, utterly foolish; a bad-tempered boy, that -is all. How can you say such horrible things? You don’t know what you -are talking about. You are simply jealous and unkind. Ah! I wish you -would fall in love. Love makes people good, and what you said was -wicked.” - -“I am sixteen,” he answered, “and I know what I am about. Mother is no -help to you. She doesn’t understand how to look after you. I wish now -that I was not going to Australia at all. I have a great mind to chuck -the whole thing up. I would, if my articles hadn’t been signed.” - -“Oh, don’t be so serious, Jim. You are like one of the heroes of those -silly melodramas Mother used to be so fond of acting in. I am not going -to quarrel with you. I have seen him, and oh! to see him is perfect -happiness. We won’t quarrel. I know you would never harm any one I -love, would you?” - -“Not as long as you love him, I suppose,” was the sullen answer. - -“I shall love him for ever!” she cried. - -“And he?” - -“For ever, too!” - -“He had better.” - -She shrank from him. Then she laughed and put her hand on his arm. He -was merely a boy. - -At the Marble Arch they hailed an omnibus, which left them close to -their shabby home in the Euston Road. It was after five o’clock, and -Sibyl had to lie down for a couple of hours before acting. Jim insisted -that she should do so. He said that he would sooner part with her when -their mother was not present. She would be sure to make a scene, and he -detested scenes of every kind. - -In Sybil’s own room they parted. There was jealousy in the lad’s heart, -and a fierce murderous hatred of the stranger who, as it seemed to him, -had come between them. Yet, when her arms were flung round his neck, -and her fingers strayed through his hair, he softened and kissed her -with real affection. There were tears in his eyes as he went -downstairs. - -His mother was waiting for him below. She grumbled at his -unpunctuality, as he entered. He made no answer, but sat down to his -meagre meal. The flies buzzed round the table and crawled over the -stained cloth. Through the rumble of omnibuses, and the clatter of -street-cabs, he could hear the droning voice devouring each minute that -was left to him. - -After some time, he thrust away his plate and put his head in his -hands. He felt that he had a right to know. It should have been told to -him before, if it was as he suspected. Leaden with fear, his mother -watched him. Words dropped mechanically from her lips. A tattered lace -handkerchief twitched in her fingers. When the clock struck six, he got -up and went to the door. Then he turned back and looked at her. Their -eyes met. In hers he saw a wild appeal for mercy. It enraged him. - -“Mother, I have something to ask you,” he said. Her eyes wandered -vaguely about the room. She made no answer. “Tell me the truth. I have -a right to know. Were you married to my father?” - -She heaved a deep sigh. It was a sigh of relief. The terrible moment, -the moment that night and day, for weeks and months, she had dreaded, -had come at last, and yet she felt no terror. Indeed, in some measure -it was a disappointment to her. The vulgar directness of the question -called for a direct answer. The situation had not been gradually led up -to. It was crude. It reminded her of a bad rehearsal. - -“No,” she answered, wondering at the harsh simplicity of life. - -“My father was a scoundrel then!” cried the lad, clenching his fists. - -She shook her head. “I knew he was not free. We loved each other very -much. If he had lived, he would have made provision for us. Don’t speak -against him, my son. He was your father, and a gentleman. Indeed, he -was highly connected.” - -An oath broke from his lips. “I don’t care for myself,” he exclaimed, -“but don’t let Sibyl.... It is a gentleman, isn’t it, who is in love -with her, or says he is? Highly connected, too, I suppose.” - -For a moment a hideous sense of humiliation came over the woman. Her -head drooped. She wiped her eyes with shaking hands. “Sibyl has a -mother,” she murmured; “I had none.” - -The lad was touched. He went towards her, and stooping down, he kissed -her. “I am sorry if I have pained you by asking about my father,” he -said, “but I could not help it. I must go now. Good-bye. Don’t forget -that you will have only one child now to look after, and believe me -that if this man wrongs my sister, I will find out who he is, track him -down, and kill him like a dog. I swear it.” - -The exaggerated folly of the threat, the passionate gesture that -accompanied it, the mad melodramatic words, made life seem more vivid -to her. She was familiar with the atmosphere. She breathed more freely, -and for the first time for many months she really admired her son. She -would have liked to have continued the scene on the same emotional -scale, but he cut her short. Trunks had to be carried down and mufflers -looked for. The lodging-house drudge bustled in and out. There was the -bargaining with the cabman. The moment was lost in vulgar details. It -was with a renewed feeling of disappointment that she waved the -tattered lace handkerchief from the window, as her son drove away. She -was conscious that a great opportunity had been wasted. She consoled -herself by telling Sibyl how desolate she felt her life would be, now -that she had only one child to look after. She remembered the phrase. -It had pleased her. Of the threat she said nothing. It was vividly and -dramatically expressed. She felt that they would all laugh at it some -day. - - - - -CHAPTER VI. - - -“I suppose you have heard the news, Basil?” said Lord Henry that -evening as Hallward was shown into a little private room at the Bristol -where dinner had been laid for three. - -“No, Harry,” answered the artist, giving his hat and coat to the bowing -waiter. “What is it? Nothing about politics, I hope! They don’t -interest me. There is hardly a single person in the House of Commons -worth painting, though many of them would be the better for a little -whitewashing.” - -“Dorian Gray is engaged to be married,” said Lord Henry, watching him -as he spoke. - -Hallward started and then frowned. “Dorian engaged to be married!” he -cried. “Impossible!” - -“It is perfectly true.” - -“To whom?” - -“To some little actress or other.” - -“I can’t believe it. Dorian is far too sensible.” - -“Dorian is far too wise not to do foolish things now and then, my dear -Basil.” - -“Marriage is hardly a thing that one can do now and then, Harry.” - -“Except in America,” rejoined Lord Henry languidly. “But I didn’t say -he was married. I said he was engaged to be married. There is a great -difference. I have a distinct remembrance of being married, but I have -no recollection at all of being engaged. I am inclined to think that I -never was engaged.” - -“But think of Dorian’s birth, and position, and wealth. It would be -absurd for him to marry so much beneath him.” - -“If you want to make him marry this girl, tell him that, Basil. He is -sure to do it, then. Whenever a man does a thoroughly stupid thing, it -is always from the noblest motives.” - -“I hope the girl is good, Harry. I don’t want to see Dorian tied to -some vile creature, who might degrade his nature and ruin his -intellect.” - -“Oh, she is better than good—she is beautiful,” murmured Lord Henry, -sipping a glass of vermouth and orange-bitters. “Dorian says she is -beautiful, and he is not often wrong about things of that kind. Your -portrait of him has quickened his appreciation of the personal -appearance of other people. It has had that excellent effect, amongst -others. We are to see her to-night, if that boy doesn’t forget his -appointment.” - -“Are you serious?” - -“Quite serious, Basil. I should be miserable if I thought I should ever -be more serious than I am at the present moment.” - -“But do you approve of it, Harry?” asked the painter, walking up and -down the room and biting his lip. “You can’t approve of it, possibly. -It is some silly infatuation.” - -“I never approve, or disapprove, of anything now. It is an absurd -attitude to take towards life. We are not sent into the world to air -our moral prejudices. I never take any notice of what common people -say, and I never interfere with what charming people do. If a -personality fascinates me, whatever mode of expression that personality -selects is absolutely delightful to me. Dorian Gray falls in love with -a beautiful girl who acts Juliet, and proposes to marry her. Why not? -If he wedded Messalina, he would be none the less interesting. You know -I am not a champion of marriage. The real drawback to marriage is that -it makes one unselfish. And unselfish people are colourless. They lack -individuality. Still, there are certain temperaments that marriage -makes more complex. They retain their egotism, and add to it many other -egos. They are forced to have more than one life. They become more -highly organized, and to be highly organized is, I should fancy, the -object of man’s existence. Besides, every experience is of value, and -whatever one may say against marriage, it is certainly an experience. I -hope that Dorian Gray will make this girl his wife, passionately adore -her for six months, and then suddenly become fascinated by some one -else. He would be a wonderful study.” - -“You don’t mean a single word of all that, Harry; you know you don’t. -If Dorian Gray’s life were spoiled, no one would be sorrier than -yourself. You are much better than you pretend to be.” - -Lord Henry laughed. “The reason we all like to think so well of others -is that we are all afraid for ourselves. The basis of optimism is sheer -terror. We think that we are generous because we credit our neighbour -with the possession of those virtues that are likely to be a benefit to -us. We praise the banker that we may overdraw our account, and find -good qualities in the highwayman in the hope that he may spare our -pockets. I mean everything that I have said. I have the greatest -contempt for optimism. As for a spoiled life, no life is spoiled but -one whose growth is arrested. If you want to mar a nature, you have -merely to reform it. As for marriage, of course that would be silly, -but there are other and more interesting bonds between men and women. I -will certainly encourage them. They have the charm of being -fashionable. But here is Dorian himself. He will tell you more than I -can.” - -“My dear Harry, my dear Basil, you must both congratulate me!” said the -lad, throwing off his evening cape with its satin-lined wings and -shaking each of his friends by the hand in turn. “I have never been so -happy. Of course, it is sudden—all really delightful things are. And -yet it seems to me to be the one thing I have been looking for all my -life.” He was flushed with excitement and pleasure, and looked -extraordinarily handsome. - -“I hope you will always be very happy, Dorian,” said Hallward, “but I -don’t quite forgive you for not having let me know of your engagement. -You let Harry know.” - -“And I don’t forgive you for being late for dinner,” broke in Lord -Henry, putting his hand on the lad’s shoulder and smiling as he spoke. -“Come, let us sit down and try what the new _chef_ here is like, and -then you will tell us how it all came about.” - -“There is really not much to tell,” cried Dorian as they took their -seats at the small round table. “What happened was simply this. After I -left you yesterday evening, Harry, I dressed, had some dinner at that -little Italian restaurant in Rupert Street you introduced me to, and -went down at eight o’clock to the theatre. Sibyl was playing Rosalind. -Of course, the scenery was dreadful and the Orlando absurd. But Sibyl! -You should have seen her! When she came on in her boy’s clothes, she -was perfectly wonderful. She wore a moss-coloured velvet jerkin with -cinnamon sleeves, slim, brown, cross-gartered hose, a dainty little -green cap with a hawk’s feather caught in a jewel, and a hooded cloak -lined with dull red. She had never seemed to me more exquisite. She had -all the delicate grace of that Tanagra figurine that you have in your -studio, Basil. Her hair clustered round her face like dark leaves round -a pale rose. As for her acting—well, you shall see her to-night. She is -simply a born artist. I sat in the dingy box absolutely enthralled. I -forgot that I was in London and in the nineteenth century. I was away -with my love in a forest that no man had ever seen. After the -performance was over, I went behind and spoke to her. As we were -sitting together, suddenly there came into her eyes a look that I had -never seen there before. My lips moved towards hers. We kissed each -other. I can’t describe to you what I felt at that moment. It seemed to -me that all my life had been narrowed to one perfect point of -rose-coloured joy. She trembled all over and shook like a white -narcissus. Then she flung herself on her knees and kissed my hands. I -feel that I should not tell you all this, but I can’t help it. Of -course, our engagement is a dead secret. She has not even told her own -mother. I don’t know what my guardians will say. Lord Radley is sure to -be furious. I don’t care. I shall be of age in less than a year, and -then I can do what I like. I have been right, Basil, haven’t I, to take -my love out of poetry and to find my wife in Shakespeare’s plays? Lips -that Shakespeare taught to speak have whispered their secret in my ear. -I have had the arms of Rosalind around me, and kissed Juliet on the -mouth.” - -“Yes, Dorian, I suppose you were right,” said Hallward slowly. - -“Have you seen her to-day?” asked Lord Henry. - -Dorian Gray shook his head. “I left her in the forest of Arden; I shall -find her in an orchard in Verona.” - -Lord Henry sipped his champagne in a meditative manner. “At what -particular point did you mention the word marriage, Dorian? And what -did she say in answer? Perhaps you forgot all about it.” - -“My dear Harry, I did not treat it as a business transaction, and I did -not make any formal proposal. I told her that I loved her, and she said -she was not worthy to be my wife. Not worthy! Why, the whole world is -nothing to me compared with her.” - -“Women are wonderfully practical,” murmured Lord Henry, “much more -practical than we are. In situations of that kind we often forget to -say anything about marriage, and they always remind us.” - -Hallward laid his hand upon his arm. “Don’t, Harry. You have annoyed -Dorian. He is not like other men. He would never bring misery upon any -one. His nature is too fine for that.” - -Lord Henry looked across the table. “Dorian is never annoyed with me,” -he answered. “I asked the question for the best reason possible, for -the only reason, indeed, that excuses one for asking any -question—simple curiosity. I have a theory that it is always the women -who propose to us, and not we who propose to the women. Except, of -course, in middle-class life. But then the middle classes are not -modern.” - -Dorian Gray laughed, and tossed his head. “You are quite incorrigible, -Harry; but I don’t mind. It is impossible to be angry with you. When -you see Sibyl Vane, you will feel that the man who could wrong her -would be a beast, a beast without a heart. I cannot understand how any -one can wish to shame the thing he loves. I love Sibyl Vane. I want to -place her on a pedestal of gold and to see the world worship the woman -who is mine. What is marriage? An irrevocable vow. You mock at it for -that. Ah! don’t mock. It is an irrevocable vow that I want to take. Her -trust makes me faithful, her belief makes me good. When I am with her, -I regret all that you have taught me. I become different from what you -have known me to be. I am changed, and the mere touch of Sibyl Vane’s -hand makes me forget you and all your wrong, fascinating, poisonous, -delightful theories.” - -“And those are ...?” asked Lord Henry, helping himself to some salad. - -“Oh, your theories about life, your theories about love, your theories -about pleasure. All your theories, in fact, Harry.” - -“Pleasure is the only thing worth having a theory about,” he answered -in his slow melodious voice. “But I am afraid I cannot claim my theory -as my own. It belongs to Nature, not to me. Pleasure is Nature’s test, -her sign of approval. When we are happy, we are always good, but when -we are good, we are not always happy.” - -“Ah! but what do you mean by good?” cried Basil Hallward. - -“Yes,” echoed Dorian, leaning back in his chair and looking at Lord -Henry over the heavy clusters of purple-lipped irises that stood in the -centre of the table, “what do you mean by good, Harry?” - -“To be good is to be in harmony with one’s self,” he replied, touching -the thin stem of his glass with his pale, fine-pointed fingers. -“Discord is to be forced to be in harmony with others. One’s own -life—that is the important thing. As for the lives of one’s neighbours, -if one wishes to be a prig or a Puritan, one can flaunt one’s moral -views about them, but they are not one’s concern. Besides, -individualism has really the higher aim. Modern morality consists in -accepting the standard of one’s age. I consider that for any man of -culture to accept the standard of his age is a form of the grossest -immorality.” - -“But, surely, if one lives merely for one’s self, Harry, one pays a -terrible price for doing so?” suggested the painter. - -“Yes, we are overcharged for everything nowadays. I should fancy that -the real tragedy of the poor is that they can afford nothing but -self-denial. Beautiful sins, like beautiful things, are the privilege -of the rich.” - -“One has to pay in other ways but money.” - -“What sort of ways, Basil?” - -“Oh! I should fancy in remorse, in suffering, in ... well, in the -consciousness of degradation.” - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. “My dear fellow, mediæval art is -charming, but mediæval emotions are out of date. One can use them in -fiction, of course. But then the only things that one can use in -fiction are the things that one has ceased to use in fact. Believe me, -no civilized man ever regrets a pleasure, and no uncivilized man ever -knows what a pleasure is.” - -“I know what pleasure is,” cried Dorian Gray. “It is to adore some -one.” - -“That is certainly better than being adored,” he answered, toying with -some fruits. “Being adored is a nuisance. Women treat us just as -humanity treats its gods. They worship us, and are always bothering us -to do something for them.” - -“I should have said that whatever they ask for they had first given to -us,” murmured the lad gravely. “They create love in our natures. They -have a right to demand it back.” - -“That is quite true, Dorian,” cried Hallward. - -“Nothing is ever quite true,” said Lord Henry. - -“This is,” interrupted Dorian. “You must admit, Harry, that women give -to men the very gold of their lives.” - -“Possibly,” he sighed, “but they invariably want it back in such very -small change. That is the worry. Women, as some witty Frenchman once -put it, inspire us with the desire to do masterpieces and always -prevent us from carrying them out.” - -“Harry, you are dreadful! I don’t know why I like you so much.” - -“You will always like me, Dorian,” he replied. “Will you have some -coffee, you fellows? Waiter, bring coffee, and _fine-champagne_, and -some cigarettes. No, don’t mind the cigarettes—I have some. Basil, I -can’t allow you to smoke cigars. You must have a cigarette. A cigarette -is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it -leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want? Yes, Dorian, you will -always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you have never -had the courage to commit.” - -“What nonsense you talk, Harry!” cried the lad, taking a light from a -fire-breathing silver dragon that the waiter had placed on the table. -“Let us go down to the theatre. When Sibyl comes on the stage you will -have a new ideal of life. She will represent something to you that you -have never known.” - -“I have known everything,” said Lord Henry, with a tired look in his -eyes, “but I am always ready for a new emotion. I am afraid, however, -that, for me at any rate, there is no such thing. Still, your wonderful -girl may thrill me. I love acting. It is so much more real than life. -Let us go. Dorian, you will come with me. I am so sorry, Basil, but -there is only room for two in the brougham. You must follow us in a -hansom.” - -They got up and put on their coats, sipping their coffee standing. The -painter was silent and preoccupied. There was a gloom over him. He -could not bear this marriage, and yet it seemed to him to be better -than many other things that might have happened. After a few minutes, -they all passed downstairs. He drove off by himself, as had been -arranged, and watched the flashing lights of the little brougham in -front of him. A strange sense of loss came over him. He felt that -Dorian Gray would never again be to him all that he had been in the -past. Life had come between them.... His eyes darkened, and the crowded -flaring streets became blurred to his eyes. When the cab drew up at the -theatre, it seemed to him that he had grown years older. - - - - -CHAPTER VII. - - -For some reason or other, the house was crowded that night, and the fat -Jew manager who met them at the door was beaming from ear to ear with -an oily tremulous smile. He escorted them to their box with a sort of -pompous humility, waving his fat jewelled hands and talking at the top -of his voice. Dorian Gray loathed him more than ever. He felt as if he -had come to look for Miranda and had been met by Caliban. Lord Henry, -upon the other hand, rather liked him. At least he declared he did, and -insisted on shaking him by the hand and assuring him that he was proud -to meet a man who had discovered a real genius and gone bankrupt over a -poet. Hallward amused himself with watching the faces in the pit. The -heat was terribly oppressive, and the huge sunlight flamed like a -monstrous dahlia with petals of yellow fire. The youths in the gallery -had taken off their coats and waistcoats and hung them over the side. -They talked to each other across the theatre and shared their oranges -with the tawdry girls who sat beside them. Some women were laughing in -the pit. Their voices were horribly shrill and discordant. The sound of -the popping of corks came from the bar. - -“What a place to find one’s divinity in!” said Lord Henry. - -“Yes!” answered Dorian Gray. “It was here I found her, and she is -divine beyond all living things. When she acts, you will forget -everything. These common rough people, with their coarse faces and -brutal gestures, become quite different when she is on the stage. They -sit silently and watch her. They weep and laugh as she wills them to -do. She makes them as responsive as a violin. She spiritualizes them, -and one feels that they are of the same flesh and blood as one’s self.” - -“The same flesh and blood as one’s self! Oh, I hope not!” exclaimed -Lord Henry, who was scanning the occupants of the gallery through his -opera-glass. - -“Don’t pay any attention to him, Dorian,” said the painter. “I -understand what you mean, and I believe in this girl. Any one you love -must be marvellous, and any girl who has the effect you describe must -be fine and noble. To spiritualize one’s age—that is something worth -doing. If this girl can give a soul to those who have lived without -one, if she can create the sense of beauty in people whose lives have -been sordid and ugly, if she can strip them of their selfishness and -lend them tears for sorrows that are not their own, she is worthy of -all your adoration, worthy of the adoration of the world. This marriage -is quite right. I did not think so at first, but I admit it now. The -gods made Sibyl Vane for you. Without her you would have been -incomplete.” - -“Thanks, Basil,” answered Dorian Gray, pressing his hand. “I knew that -you would understand me. Harry is so cynical, he terrifies me. But here -is the orchestra. It is quite dreadful, but it only lasts for about -five minutes. Then the curtain rises, and you will see the girl to whom -I am going to give all my life, to whom I have given everything that is -good in me.” - -A quarter of an hour afterwards, amidst an extraordinary turmoil of -applause, Sibyl Vane stepped on to the stage. Yes, she was certainly -lovely to look at—one of the loveliest creatures, Lord Henry thought, -that he had ever seen. There was something of the fawn in her shy grace -and startled eyes. A faint blush, like the shadow of a rose in a mirror -of silver, came to her cheeks as she glanced at the crowded -enthusiastic house. She stepped back a few paces and her lips seemed to -tremble. Basil Hallward leaped to his feet and began to applaud. -Motionless, and as one in a dream, sat Dorian Gray, gazing at her. Lord -Henry peered through his glasses, murmuring, “Charming! charming!” - -The scene was the hall of Capulet’s house, and Romeo in his pilgrim’s -dress had entered with Mercutio and his other friends. The band, such -as it was, struck up a few bars of music, and the dance began. Through -the crowd of ungainly, shabbily dressed actors, Sibyl Vane moved like a -creature from a finer world. Her body swayed, while she danced, as a -plant sways in the water. The curves of her throat were the curves of a -white lily. Her hands seemed to be made of cool ivory. - -Yet she was curiously listless. She showed no sign of joy when her eyes -rested on Romeo. The few words she had to speak— - -Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, - Which mannerly devotion shows in this; -For saints have hands that pilgrims’ hands do touch, - And palm to palm is holy palmers’ kiss— - - -with the brief dialogue that follows, were spoken in a thoroughly -artificial manner. The voice was exquisite, but from the point of view -of tone it was absolutely false. It was wrong in colour. It took away -all the life from the verse. It made the passion unreal. - -Dorian Gray grew pale as he watched her. He was puzzled and anxious. -Neither of his friends dared to say anything to him. She seemed to them -to be absolutely incompetent. They were horribly disappointed. - -Yet they felt that the true test of any Juliet is the balcony scene of -the second act. They waited for that. If she failed there, there was -nothing in her. - -She looked charming as she came out in the moonlight. That could not be -denied. But the staginess of her acting was unbearable, and grew worse -as she went on. Her gestures became absurdly artificial. She -overemphasized everything that she had to say. The beautiful passage— - -Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face, -Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek -For that which thou hast heard me speak to-night— - - -was declaimed with the painful precision of a schoolgirl who has been -taught to recite by some second-rate professor of elocution. When she -leaned over the balcony and came to those wonderful lines— - -Although I joy in thee, -I have no joy of this contract to-night: -It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden; -Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be -Ere one can say, “It lightens.” Sweet, good-night! -This bud of love by summer’s ripening breath -May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet— - - -she spoke the words as though they conveyed no meaning to her. It was -not nervousness. Indeed, so far from being nervous, she was absolutely -self-contained. It was simply bad art. She was a complete failure. - -Even the common uneducated audience of the pit and gallery lost their -interest in the play. They got restless, and began to talk loudly and -to whistle. The Jew manager, who was standing at the back of the -dress-circle, stamped and swore with rage. The only person unmoved was -the girl herself. - -When the second act was over, there came a storm of hisses, and Lord -Henry got up from his chair and put on his coat. “She is quite -beautiful, Dorian,” he said, “but she can’t act. Let us go.” - -“I am going to see the play through,” answered the lad, in a hard -bitter voice. “I am awfully sorry that I have made you waste an -evening, Harry. I apologize to you both.” - -“My dear Dorian, I should think Miss Vane was ill,” interrupted -Hallward. “We will come some other night.” - -“I wish she were ill,” he rejoined. “But she seems to me to be simply -callous and cold. She has entirely altered. Last night she was a great -artist. This evening she is merely a commonplace mediocre actress.” - -“Don’t talk like that about any one you love, Dorian. Love is a more -wonderful thing than art.” - -“They are both simply forms of imitation,” remarked Lord Henry. “But do -let us go. Dorian, you must not stay here any longer. It is not good -for one’s morals to see bad acting. Besides, I don’t suppose you will -want your wife to act, so what does it matter if she plays Juliet like -a wooden doll? She is very lovely, and if she knows as little about -life as she does about acting, she will be a delightful experience. -There are only two kinds of people who are really fascinating—people -who know absolutely everything, and people who know absolutely nothing. -Good heavens, my dear boy, don’t look so tragic! The secret of -remaining young is never to have an emotion that is unbecoming. Come to -the club with Basil and myself. We will smoke cigarettes and drink to -the beauty of Sibyl Vane. She is beautiful. What more can you want?” - -“Go away, Harry,” cried the lad. “I want to be alone. Basil, you must -go. Ah! can’t you see that my heart is breaking?” The hot tears came to -his eyes. His lips trembled, and rushing to the back of the box, he -leaned up against the wall, hiding his face in his hands. - -“Let us go, Basil,” said Lord Henry with a strange tenderness in his -voice, and the two young men passed out together. - -A few moments afterwards the footlights flared up and the curtain rose -on the third act. Dorian Gray went back to his seat. He looked pale, -and proud, and indifferent. The play dragged on, and seemed -interminable. Half of the audience went out, tramping in heavy boots -and laughing. The whole thing was a _fiasco_. The last act was played -to almost empty benches. The curtain went down on a titter and some -groans. - -As soon as it was over, Dorian Gray rushed behind the scenes into the -greenroom. The girl was standing there alone, with a look of triumph on -her face. Her eyes were lit with an exquisite fire. There was a -radiance about her. Her parted lips were smiling over some secret of -their own. - -When he entered, she looked at him, and an expression of infinite joy -came over her. “How badly I acted to-night, Dorian!” she cried. - -“Horribly!” he answered, gazing at her in amazement. “Horribly! It was -dreadful. Are you ill? You have no idea what it was. You have no idea -what I suffered.” - -The girl smiled. “Dorian,” she answered, lingering over his name with -long-drawn music in her voice, as though it were sweeter than honey to -the red petals of her mouth. “Dorian, you should have understood. But -you understand now, don’t you?” - -“Understand what?” he asked, angrily. - -“Why I was so bad to-night. Why I shall always be bad. Why I shall -never act well again.” - -He shrugged his shoulders. “You are ill, I suppose. When you are ill -you shouldn’t act. You make yourself ridiculous. My friends were bored. -I was bored.” - -She seemed not to listen to him. She was transfigured with joy. An -ecstasy of happiness dominated her. - -“Dorian, Dorian,” she cried, “before I knew you, acting was the one -reality of my life. It was only in the theatre that I lived. I thought -that it was all true. I was Rosalind one night and Portia the other. -The joy of Beatrice was my joy, and the sorrows of Cordelia were mine -also. I believed in everything. The common people who acted with me -seemed to me to be godlike. The painted scenes were my world. I knew -nothing but shadows, and I thought them real. You came—oh, my beautiful -love!—and you freed my soul from prison. You taught me what reality -really is. To-night, for the first time in my life, I saw through the -hollowness, the sham, the silliness of the empty pageant in which I had -always played. To-night, for the first time, I became conscious that -the Romeo was hideous, and old, and painted, that the moonlight in the -orchard was false, that the scenery was vulgar, and that the words I -had to speak were unreal, were not my words, were not what I wanted to -say. You had brought me something higher, something of which all art is -but a reflection. You had made me understand what love really is. My -love! My love! Prince Charming! Prince of life! I have grown sick of -shadows. You are more to me than all art can ever be. What have I to do -with the puppets of a play? When I came on to-night, I could not -understand how it was that everything had gone from me. I thought that -I was going to be wonderful. I found that I could do nothing. Suddenly -it dawned on my soul what it all meant. The knowledge was exquisite to -me. I heard them hissing, and I smiled. What could they know of love -such as ours? Take me away, Dorian—take me away with you, where we can -be quite alone. I hate the stage. I might mimic a passion that I do not -feel, but I cannot mimic one that burns me like fire. Oh, Dorian, -Dorian, you understand now what it signifies? Even if I could do it, it -would be profanation for me to play at being in love. You have made me -see that.” - -He flung himself down on the sofa and turned away his face. “You have -killed my love,” he muttered. - -She looked at him in wonder and laughed. He made no answer. She came -across to him, and with her little fingers stroked his hair. She knelt -down and pressed his hands to her lips. He drew them away, and a -shudder ran through him. - -Then he leaped up and went to the door. “Yes,” he cried, “you have -killed my love. You used to stir my imagination. Now you don’t even -stir my curiosity. You simply produce no effect. I loved you because -you were marvellous, because you had genius and intellect, because you -realized the dreams of great poets and gave shape and substance to the -shadows of art. You have thrown it all away. You are shallow and -stupid. My God! how mad I was to love you! What a fool I have been! You -are nothing to me now. I will never see you again. I will never think -of you. I will never mention your name. You don’t know what you were to -me, once. Why, once ... Oh, I can’t bear to think of it! I wish I had -never laid eyes upon you! You have spoiled the romance of my life. How -little you can know of love, if you say it mars your art! Without your -art, you are nothing. I would have made you famous, splendid, -magnificent. The world would have worshipped you, and you would have -borne my name. What are you now? A third-rate actress with a pretty -face.” - -The girl grew white, and trembled. She clenched her hands together, and -her voice seemed to catch in her throat. “You are not serious, Dorian?” -she murmured. “You are acting.” - -“Acting! I leave that to you. You do it so well,” he answered bitterly. - -She rose from her knees and, with a piteous expression of pain in her -face, came across the room to him. She put her hand upon his arm and -looked into his eyes. He thrust her back. “Don’t touch me!” he cried. - -A low moan broke from her, and she flung herself at his feet and lay -there like a trampled flower. “Dorian, Dorian, don’t leave me!” she -whispered. “I am so sorry I didn’t act well. I was thinking of you all -the time. But I will try—indeed, I will try. It came so suddenly across -me, my love for you. I think I should never have known it if you had -not kissed me—if we had not kissed each other. Kiss me again, my love. -Don’t go away from me. I couldn’t bear it. Oh! don’t go away from me. -My brother ... No; never mind. He didn’t mean it. He was in jest.... -But you, oh! can’t you forgive me for to-night? I will work so hard and -try to improve. Don’t be cruel to me, because I love you better than -anything in the world. After all, it is only once that I have not -pleased you. But you are quite right, Dorian. I should have shown -myself more of an artist. It was foolish of me, and yet I couldn’t help -it. Oh, don’t leave me, don’t leave me.” A fit of passionate sobbing -choked her. She crouched on the floor like a wounded thing, and Dorian -Gray, with his beautiful eyes, looked down at her, and his chiselled -lips curled in exquisite disdain. There is always something ridiculous -about the emotions of people whom one has ceased to love. Sibyl Vane -seemed to him to be absurdly melodramatic. Her tears and sobs annoyed -him. - -“I am going,” he said at last in his calm clear voice. “I don’t wish to -be unkind, but I can’t see you again. You have disappointed me.” - -She wept silently, and made no answer, but crept nearer. Her little -hands stretched blindly out, and appeared to be seeking for him. He -turned on his heel and left the room. In a few moments he was out of -the theatre. - -Where he went to he hardly knew. He remembered wandering through dimly -lit streets, past gaunt, black-shadowed archways and evil-looking -houses. Women with hoarse voices and harsh laughter had called after -him. Drunkards had reeled by, cursing and chattering to themselves like -monstrous apes. He had seen grotesque children huddled upon door-steps, -and heard shrieks and oaths from gloomy courts. - -As the dawn was just breaking, he found himself close to Covent Garden. -The darkness lifted, and, flushed with faint fires, the sky hollowed -itself into a perfect pearl. Huge carts filled with nodding lilies -rumbled slowly down the polished empty street. The air was heavy with -the perfume of the flowers, and their beauty seemed to bring him an -anodyne for his pain. He followed into the market and watched the men -unloading their waggons. A white-smocked carter offered him some -cherries. He thanked him, wondered why he refused to accept any money -for them, and began to eat them listlessly. They had been plucked at -midnight, and the coldness of the moon had entered into them. A long -line of boys carrying crates of striped tulips, and of yellow and red -roses, defiled in front of him, threading their way through the huge, -jade-green piles of vegetables. Under the portico, with its grey, -sun-bleached pillars, loitered a troop of draggled bareheaded girls, -waiting for the auction to be over. Others crowded round the swinging -doors of the coffee-house in the piazza. The heavy cart-horses slipped -and stamped upon the rough stones, shaking their bells and trappings. -Some of the drivers were lying asleep on a pile of sacks. Iris-necked -and pink-footed, the pigeons ran about picking up seeds. - -After a little while, he hailed a hansom and drove home. For a few -moments he loitered upon the doorstep, looking round at the silent -square, with its blank, close-shuttered windows and its staring blinds. -The sky was pure opal now, and the roofs of the houses glistened like -silver against it. From some chimney opposite a thin wreath of smoke -was rising. It curled, a violet riband, through the nacre-coloured air. - -In the huge gilt Venetian lantern, spoil of some Doge’s barge, that -hung from the ceiling of the great, oak-panelled hall of entrance, -lights were still burning from three flickering jets: thin blue petals -of flame they seemed, rimmed with white fire. He turned them out and, -having thrown his hat and cape on the table, passed through the library -towards the door of his bedroom, a large octagonal chamber on the -ground floor that, in his new-born feeling for luxury, he had just had -decorated for himself and hung with some curious Renaissance tapestries -that had been discovered stored in a disused attic at Selby Royal. As -he was turning the handle of the door, his eye fell upon the portrait -Basil Hallward had painted of him. He started back as if in surprise. -Then he went on into his own room, looking somewhat puzzled. After he -had taken the button-hole out of his coat, he seemed to hesitate. -Finally, he came back, went over to the picture, and examined it. In -the dim arrested light that struggled through the cream-coloured silk -blinds, the face appeared to him to be a little changed. The expression -looked different. One would have said that there was a touch of cruelty -in the mouth. It was certainly strange. - -He turned round and, walking to the window, drew up the blind. The -bright dawn flooded the room and swept the fantastic shadows into dusky -corners, where they lay shuddering. But the strange expression that he -had noticed in the face of the portrait seemed to linger there, to be -more intensified even. The quivering ardent sunlight showed him the -lines of cruelty round the mouth as clearly as if he had been looking -into a mirror after he had done some dreadful thing. - -He winced and, taking up from the table an oval glass framed in ivory -Cupids, one of Lord Henry’s many presents to him, glanced hurriedly -into its polished depths. No line like that warped his red lips. What -did it mean? - -He rubbed his eyes, and came close to the picture, and examined it -again. There were no signs of any change when he looked into the actual -painting, and yet there was no doubt that the whole expression had -altered. It was not a mere fancy of his own. The thing was horribly -apparent. - -He threw himself into a chair and began to think. Suddenly there -flashed across his mind what he had said in Basil Hallward’s studio the -day the picture had been finished. Yes, he remembered it perfectly. He -had uttered a mad wish that he himself might remain young, and the -portrait grow old; that his own beauty might be untarnished, and the -face on the canvas bear the burden of his passions and his sins; that -the painted image might be seared with the lines of suffering and -thought, and that he might keep all the delicate bloom and loveliness -of his then just conscious boyhood. Surely his wish had not been -fulfilled? Such things were impossible. It seemed monstrous even to -think of them. And, yet, there was the picture before him, with the -touch of cruelty in the mouth. - -Cruelty! Had he been cruel? It was the girl’s fault, not his. He had -dreamed of her as a great artist, had given his love to her because he -had thought her great. Then she had disappointed him. She had been -shallow and unworthy. And, yet, a feeling of infinite regret came over -him, as he thought of her lying at his feet sobbing like a little -child. He remembered with what callousness he had watched her. Why had -he been made like that? Why had such a soul been given to him? But he -had suffered also. During the three terrible hours that the play had -lasted, he had lived centuries of pain, aeon upon aeon of torture. His -life was well worth hers. She had marred him for a moment, if he had -wounded her for an age. Besides, women were better suited to bear -sorrow than men. They lived on their emotions. They only thought of -their emotions. When they took lovers, it was merely to have some one -with whom they could have scenes. Lord Henry had told him that, and -Lord Henry knew what women were. 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. - -Yet it was watching him, with its beautiful marred face and its cruel -smile. Its bright hair gleamed in the early sunlight. Its blue eyes met -his own. A sense of infinite pity, not for himself, but for the painted -image of himself, came over him. It had altered already, and would -alter more. Its gold would wither into grey. Its red and white roses -would die. For every sin that he committed, a stain would fleck and -wreck its fairness. But he would not sin. The picture, changed or -unchanged, would be to him the visible emblem of conscience. He would -resist temptation. He would not see Lord Henry any more—would not, at -any rate, listen to those subtle poisonous theories that in Basil -Hallward’s garden had first stirred within him the passion for -impossible things. He would go back to Sibyl Vane, make her amends, -marry her, try to love her again. Yes, it was his duty to do so. She -must have suffered more than he had. Poor child! He had been selfish -and cruel to her. The fascination that she had exercised over him would -return. They would be happy together. His life with her would be -beautiful and pure. - -He got up from his chair and drew a large screen right in front of the -portrait, shuddering as he glanced at it. “How horrible!” he murmured -to himself, and he walked across to the window and opened it. When he -stepped out on to the grass, he drew a deep breath. The fresh morning -air seemed to drive away all his sombre passions. He thought only of -Sibyl. A faint echo of his love came back to him. He repeated her name -over and over again. The birds that were singing in the dew-drenched -garden seemed to be telling the flowers about her. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII. - - -It was long past noon when he awoke. His valet had crept several times -on tiptoe into the room to see if he was stirring, and had wondered -what made his young master sleep so late. Finally his bell sounded, and -Victor came in softly with a cup of tea, and a pile of letters, on a -small tray of old Sevres china, and drew back the olive-satin curtains, -with their shimmering blue lining, that hung in front of the three tall -windows. - -“Monsieur has well slept this morning,” he said, smiling. - -“What o’clock is it, Victor?” asked Dorian Gray drowsily. - -“One hour and a quarter, Monsieur.” - -How late it was! He sat up, and having sipped some tea, turned over his -letters. One of them was from Lord Henry, and had been brought by hand -that morning. He hesitated for a moment, and then put it aside. The -others he opened listlessly. They contained the usual collection of -cards, invitations to dinner, tickets for private views, programmes of -charity concerts, and the like that are showered on fashionable young -men every morning during the season. There was a rather heavy bill for -a chased silver Louis-Quinze toilet-set that he had not yet had the -courage to send on to his guardians, who were extremely old-fashioned -people and did not realize that we live in an age when unnecessary -things are our only necessities; and there were several very -courteously worded communications from Jermyn Street money-lenders -offering to advance any sum of money at a moment’s notice and at the -most reasonable rates of interest. - -After about ten minutes he got up, and throwing on an elaborate -dressing-gown of silk-embroidered cashmere wool, passed into the -onyx-paved bathroom. The cool water refreshed him after his long sleep. -He seemed to have forgotten all that he had gone through. A dim sense -of having taken part in some strange tragedy came to him once or twice, -but there was the unreality of a dream about it. - -As soon as he was dressed, he went into the library and sat down to a -light French breakfast that had been laid out for him on a small round -table close to the open window. It was an exquisite day. The warm air -seemed laden with spices. A bee flew in and buzzed round the -blue-dragon bowl that, filled with sulphur-yellow roses, stood before -him. He felt perfectly happy. - -Suddenly his eye fell on the screen that he had placed in front of the -portrait, and he started. - -“Too cold for Monsieur?” asked his valet, putting an omelette on the -table. “I shut the window?” - -Dorian shook his head. “I am not cold,” he murmured. - -Was it all true? Had the portrait really changed? Or had it been simply -his own imagination that had made him see a look of evil where there -had been a look of joy? Surely a painted canvas could not alter? The -thing was absurd. It would serve as a tale to tell Basil some day. It -would make him smile. - -And, yet, how vivid was his recollection of the whole thing! First in -the dim twilight, and then in the bright dawn, he had seen the touch of -cruelty round the warped lips. He almost dreaded his valet leaving the -room. He knew that when he was alone he would have to examine the -portrait. He was afraid of certainty. When the coffee and cigarettes -had been brought and the man turned to go, he felt a wild desire to -tell him to remain. As the door was closing behind him, he called him -back. The man stood waiting for his orders. Dorian looked at him for a -moment. “I am not at home to any one, Victor,” he said with a sigh. The -man bowed and retired. - -Then he rose from the table, lit a cigarette, and flung himself down on -a luxuriously cushioned couch that stood facing the screen. The screen -was an old one, of gilt Spanish leather, stamped and wrought with a -rather florid Louis-Quatorze pattern. He scanned it curiously, -wondering if ever before it had concealed the secret of a man’s life. - -Should he move it aside, after all? Why not let it stay there? What was -the use of knowing? If the thing was true, it was terrible. If it was -not true, why trouble about it? But what if, by some fate or deadlier -chance, eyes other than his spied behind and saw the horrible change? -What should he do if Basil Hallward came and asked to look at his own -picture? Basil would be sure to do that. No; the thing had to be -examined, and at once. Anything would be better than this dreadful -state of doubt. - -He got up and locked both doors. At least he would be alone when he -looked upon the mask of his shame. Then he drew the screen aside and -saw himself face to face. It was perfectly true. The portrait had -altered. - -As he often remembered afterwards, and always with no small wonder, he -found himself at first gazing at the portrait with a feeling of almost -scientific interest. That such a change should have taken place was -incredible to him. And yet it was a fact. Was there some subtle -affinity between the chemical atoms that shaped themselves into form -and colour on the canvas and the soul that was within him? Could it be -that what that soul thought, they realized?—that what it dreamed, they -made true? Or was there some other, more terrible reason? He shuddered, -and felt afraid, and, going back to the couch, lay there, gazing at the -picture in sickened horror. - -One thing, however, he felt that it had done for him. It had made him -conscious how unjust, how cruel, he had been to Sibyl Vane. It was not -too late to make reparation for that. She could still be his wife. His -unreal and selfish love would yield to some higher influence, would be -transformed into some nobler passion, and the portrait that Basil -Hallward had painted of him would be a guide to him through life, would -be to him what holiness is to some, and conscience to others, and the -fear of God to us all. There were opiates for remorse, drugs that could -lull the moral sense to sleep. But here was a visible symbol of the -degradation of sin. Here was an ever-present sign of the ruin men -brought upon their souls. - -Three o’clock struck, and four, and the half-hour rang its double -chime, but Dorian Gray did not stir. He was trying to gather up the -scarlet threads of life and to weave them into a pattern; to find his -way through the sanguine labyrinth of passion through which he was -wandering. He did not know what to do, or what to think. Finally, he -went over to the table and wrote a passionate letter to the girl he had -loved, imploring her forgiveness and accusing himself of madness. He -covered page after page with wild words of sorrow and wilder words of -pain. There is a luxury in self-reproach. When we blame ourselves, we -feel that no one else has a right to blame us. It is the confession, -not the priest, that gives us absolution. When Dorian had finished the -letter, he felt that he had been forgiven. - -Suddenly there came a knock to the door, and he heard Lord Henry’s -voice outside. “My dear boy, I must see you. Let me in at once. I can’t -bear your shutting yourself up like this.” - -He made no answer at first, but remained quite still. The knocking -still continued and grew louder. Yes, it was better to let Lord Henry -in, and to explain to him the new life he was going to lead, to quarrel -with him if it became necessary to quarrel, to part if parting was -inevitable. He jumped up, drew the screen hastily across the picture, -and unlocked the door. - -“I am so sorry for it all, Dorian,” said Lord Henry as he entered. “But -you must not think too much about it.” - -“Do you mean about Sibyl Vane?” asked the lad. - -“Yes, of course,” answered Lord Henry, sinking into a chair and slowly -pulling off his yellow gloves. “It is dreadful, from one point of view, -but it was not your fault. Tell me, did you go behind and see her, -after the play was over?” - -“Yes.” - -“I felt sure you had. Did you make a scene with her?” - -“I was brutal, Harry—perfectly brutal. But it is all right now. I am -not sorry for anything that has happened. It has taught me to know -myself better.” - -“Ah, Dorian, I am so glad you take it in that way! I was afraid I would -find you plunged in remorse and tearing that nice curly hair of yours.” - -“I have got through all that,” said Dorian, shaking his head and -smiling. “I am perfectly happy now. I know what conscience is, to begin -with. It is not what you told me it was. It is the divinest thing in -us. Don’t sneer at it, Harry, any more—at least not before me. I want -to be good. I can’t bear the idea of my soul being hideous.” - -“A very charming artistic basis for ethics, Dorian! I congratulate you -on it. But how are you going to begin?” - -“By marrying Sibyl Vane.” - -“Marrying Sibyl Vane!” cried Lord Henry, standing up and looking at him -in perplexed amazement. “But, my dear Dorian—” - -“Yes, Harry, I know what you are going to say. Something dreadful about -marriage. Don’t say it. Don’t ever say things of that kind to me again. -Two days ago I asked Sibyl to marry me. I am not going to break my word -to her. She is to be my wife.” - -“Your wife! Dorian! ... Didn’t you get my letter? I wrote to you this -morning, and sent the note down by my own man.” - -“Your letter? Oh, yes, I remember. I have not read it yet, Harry. I was -afraid there might be something in it that I wouldn’t like. You cut -life to pieces with your epigrams.” - -“You know nothing then?” - -“What do you mean?” - -Lord Henry walked across the room, and sitting down by Dorian Gray, -took both his hands in his own and held them tightly. “Dorian,” he -said, “my letter—don’t be frightened—was to tell you that Sibyl Vane is -dead.” - -A cry of pain broke from the lad’s lips, and he leaped to his feet, -tearing his hands away from Lord Henry’s grasp. “Dead! Sibyl dead! It -is not true! It is a horrible lie! How dare you say it?” - -“It is quite true, Dorian,” said Lord Henry, gravely. “It is in all the -morning papers. I wrote down to you to ask you not to see any one till -I came. There will have to be an inquest, of course, and you must not -be mixed up in it. Things like that make a man fashionable in Paris. -But in London people are so prejudiced. Here, one should never make -one’s _début_ with a scandal. One should reserve that to give an -interest to one’s old age. I suppose they don’t know your name at the -theatre? If they don’t, it is all right. Did any one see you going -round to her room? That is an important point.” - -Dorian did not answer for a few moments. He was dazed with horror. -Finally he stammered, in a stifled voice, “Harry, did you say an -inquest? What did you mean by that? Did Sibyl—? Oh, Harry, I can’t bear -it! But be quick. Tell me everything at once.” - -“I have no doubt it was not an accident, Dorian, though it must be put -in that way to the public. It seems that as she was leaving the theatre -with her mother, about half-past twelve or so, she said she had -forgotten something upstairs. They waited some time for her, but she -did not come down again. They ultimately found her lying dead on the -floor of her dressing-room. She had swallowed something by mistake, -some dreadful thing they use at theatres. I don’t know what it was, but -it had either prussic acid or white lead in it. I should fancy it was -prussic acid, as she seems to have died instantaneously.” - -“Harry, Harry, it is terrible!” cried the lad. - -“Yes; it is very tragic, of course, but you must not get yourself mixed -up in it. I see by _The Standard_ that she was seventeen. I should have -thought she was almost younger than that. She looked such a child, and -seemed to know so little about acting. Dorian, you mustn’t let this -thing get on your nerves. You must come and dine with me, and -afterwards we will look in at the opera. It is a Patti night, and -everybody will be there. You can come to my sister’s box. She has got -some smart women with her.” - -“So I have murdered Sibyl Vane,” said Dorian Gray, half to himself, -“murdered her as surely as if I had cut her little throat with a knife. -Yet the roses are not less lovely for all that. The birds sing just as -happily in my garden. And to-night I am to dine with you, and then go -on to the opera, and sup somewhere, I suppose, afterwards. How -extraordinarily dramatic life is! If I had read all this in a book, -Harry, I think I would have wept over it. Somehow, now that it has -happened actually, and to me, it seems far too wonderful for tears. -Here is the first passionate love-letter I have ever written in my -life. Strange, that my first passionate love-letter should have been -addressed to a dead girl. Can they feel, I wonder, those white silent -people we call the dead? Sibyl! Can she feel, or know, or listen? Oh, -Harry, how I loved her once! It seems years ago to me now. She was -everything to me. Then came that dreadful night—was it really only last -night?—when she played so badly, and my heart almost broke. She -explained it all to me. It was terribly pathetic. But I was not moved a -bit. I thought her shallow. Suddenly something happened that made me -afraid. I can’t tell you what it was, but it was terrible. I said I -would go back to her. I felt I had done wrong. And now she is dead. My -God! My God! Harry, what shall I do? You don’t know the danger I am in, -and there is nothing to keep me straight. She would have done that for -me. She had no right to kill herself. It was selfish of her.” - -“My dear Dorian,” answered Lord Henry, taking a cigarette from his case -and producing a gold-latten matchbox, “the only way a woman can ever -reform a man is by boring him so completely that he loses all possible -interest in life. If you had married this girl, you would have been -wretched. Of course, you would have treated her kindly. One can always -be kind to people about whom one cares nothing. But she would have soon -found out that you were absolutely indifferent to her. And when a woman -finds that out about her husband, she either becomes dreadfully dowdy, -or wears very smart bonnets that some other woman’s husband has to pay -for. I say nothing about the social mistake, which would have been -abject—which, of course, I would not have allowed—but I assure you that -in any case the whole thing would have been an absolute failure.” - -“I suppose it would,” muttered the lad, walking up and down the room -and looking horribly pale. “But I thought it was my duty. It is not my -fault that this terrible tragedy has prevented my doing what was right. -I remember your saying once that there is a fatality about good -resolutions—that they are always made too late. Mine certainly were.” - -“Good resolutions are useless attempts to interfere with scientific -laws. Their origin is pure vanity. Their result is absolutely _nil_. -They give us, now and then, some of those luxurious sterile emotions -that have a certain charm for the weak. That is all that can be said -for them. They are simply cheques that men draw on a bank where they -have no account.” - -“Harry,” cried Dorian Gray, coming over and sitting down beside him, -“why is it that I cannot feel this tragedy as much as I want to? I -don’t think I am heartless. Do you?” - -“You have done too many foolish things during the last fortnight to be -entitled to give yourself that name, Dorian,” answered Lord Henry with -his sweet melancholy smile. - -The lad frowned. “I don’t like that explanation, Harry,” he rejoined, -“but I am glad you don’t think I am heartless. I am nothing of the -kind. I know I am not. And yet I must admit that this thing that has -happened does not affect me as it should. It seems to me to be simply -like a wonderful ending to a wonderful play. It has all the terrible -beauty of a Greek tragedy, a tragedy in which I took a great part, but -by which I have not been wounded.” - -“It is an interesting question,” said Lord Henry, who found an -exquisite pleasure in playing on the lad’s unconscious egotism, “an -extremely interesting question. I fancy that the true explanation is -this: It often happens that the real tragedies of life occur in such an -inartistic manner that they hurt us by their crude violence, their -absolute incoherence, their absurd want of meaning, their entire lack -of style. They affect us just as vulgarity affects us. They give us an -impression of sheer brute force, and we revolt against that. Sometimes, -however, a tragedy that possesses artistic elements of beauty crosses -our lives. If these elements of beauty are real, the whole thing simply -appeals to our sense of dramatic effect. Suddenly we find that we are -no longer the actors, but the spectators of the play. Or rather we are -both. We watch ourselves, and the mere wonder of the spectacle -enthralls us. In the present case, what is it that has really happened? -Some one has killed herself for love of you. I wish that I had ever had -such an experience. It would have made me in love with love for the -rest of my life. The people who have adored me—there have not been very -many, but there have been some—have always insisted on living on, long -after I had ceased to care for them, or they to care for me. They have -become stout and tedious, and when I meet them, they go in at once for -reminiscences. That awful memory of woman! What a fearful thing it is! -And what an utter intellectual stagnation it reveals! One should absorb -the colour of life, but one should never remember its details. Details -are always vulgar.” - -“I must sow poppies in my garden,” sighed Dorian. - -“There is no necessity,” rejoined his companion. “Life has always -poppies in her hands. Of course, now and then things linger. I once -wore nothing but violets all through one season, as a form of artistic -mourning for a romance that would not die. Ultimately, however, it did -die. I forget what killed it. I think it was her proposing to sacrifice -the whole world for me. That is always a dreadful moment. It fills one -with the terror of eternity. Well—would you believe it?—a week ago, at -Lady Hampshire’s, I found myself seated at dinner next the lady in -question, and she insisted on going over the whole thing again, and -digging up the past, and raking up the future. I had buried my romance -in a bed of asphodel. She dragged it out again and assured me that I -had spoiled her life. I am bound to state that she ate an enormous -dinner, so I did not feel any anxiety. But what a lack of taste she -showed! The one charm of the past is that it is the past. But women -never know when the curtain has fallen. They always want a sixth act, -and as soon as the interest of the play is entirely over, they propose -to continue it. If they were allowed their own way, every comedy would -have a tragic ending, and every tragedy would culminate in a farce. -They are charmingly artificial, but they have no sense of art. You are -more fortunate than I am. I assure you, Dorian, that not one of the -women I have known would have done for me what Sibyl Vane did for you. -Ordinary women always console themselves. Some of them do it by going -in for sentimental colours. Never trust a woman who wears mauve, -whatever her age may be, or a woman over thirty-five who is fond of -pink ribbons. It always means that they have a history. Others find a -great consolation in suddenly discovering the good qualities of their -husbands. They flaunt their conjugal felicity in one’s face, as if it -were the most fascinating of sins. Religion consoles some. Its -mysteries have all the charm of a flirtation, a woman once told me, and -I can quite understand it. Besides, nothing makes one so vain as being -told that one is a sinner. Conscience makes egotists of us all. Yes; -there is really no end to the consolations that women find in modern -life. Indeed, I have not mentioned the most important one.” - -“What is that, Harry?” said the lad listlessly. - -“Oh, the obvious consolation. Taking some one else’s admirer when one -loses one’s own. In good society that always whitewashes a woman. But -really, Dorian, how different Sibyl Vane must have been from all the -women one meets! There is something to me quite beautiful about her -death. I am glad I am living in a century when such wonders happen. -They make one believe in the reality of the things we all play with, -such as romance, passion, and love.” - -“I was terribly cruel to her. You forget that.” - -“I am afraid that women appreciate cruelty, downright cruelty, more -than anything else. They have wonderfully primitive instincts. We have -emancipated them, but they remain slaves looking for their masters, all -the same. They love being dominated. I am sure you were splendid. I -have never seen you really and absolutely angry, but I can fancy how -delightful you looked. And, after all, you said something to me the day -before yesterday that seemed to me at the time to be merely fanciful, -but that I see now was absolutely true, and it holds the key to -everything.” - -“What was that, Harry?” - -“You said to me that Sibyl Vane represented to you all the heroines of -romance—that she was Desdemona one night, and Ophelia the other; that -if she died as Juliet, she came to life as Imogen.” - -“She will never come to life again now,” muttered the lad, burying his -face in his hands. - -“No, she will never come to life. She has played her last part. But you -must think of that lonely death in the tawdry dressing-room simply as a -strange lurid fragment from some Jacobean tragedy, as a wonderful scene -from Webster, or Ford, or Cyril Tourneur. The girl never really lived, -and so she has never really died. To you at least she was always a -dream, a phantom that flitted through Shakespeare’s plays and left them -lovelier for its presence, a reed through which Shakespeare’s music -sounded richer and more full of joy. The moment she touched actual -life, she marred it, and it marred her, and so she passed away. Mourn -for Ophelia, if you like. Put ashes on your head because Cordelia was -strangled. Cry out against Heaven because the daughter of Brabantio -died. But don’t waste your tears over Sibyl Vane. She was less real -than they are.” - -There was a silence. The evening darkened in the room. Noiselessly, and -with silver feet, the shadows crept in from the garden. The colours -faded wearily out of things. - -After some time Dorian Gray looked up. “You have explained me to -myself, Harry,” he murmured with something of a sigh of relief. “I felt -all that you have said, but somehow I was afraid of it, and I could not -express it to myself. How well you know me! But we will not talk again -of what has happened. It has been a marvellous experience. That is all. -I wonder if life has still in store for me anything as marvellous.” - -“Life has everything in store for you, Dorian. There is nothing that -you, with your extraordinary good looks, will not be able to do.” - -“But suppose, Harry, I became haggard, and old, and wrinkled? What -then?” - -“Ah, then,” said Lord Henry, rising to go, “then, my dear Dorian, you -would have to fight for your victories. As it is, they are brought to -you. No, you must keep your good looks. We live in an age that reads -too much to be wise, and that thinks too much to be beautiful. We -cannot spare you. And now you had better dress and drive down to the -club. We are rather late, as it is.” - -“I think I shall join you at the opera, Harry. I feel too tired to eat -anything. What is the number of your sister’s box?” - -“Twenty-seven, I believe. It is on the grand tier. You will see her -name on the door. But I am sorry you won’t come and dine.” - -“I don’t feel up to it,” said Dorian listlessly. “But I am awfully -obliged to you for all that you have said to me. You are certainly my -best friend. No one has ever understood me as you have.” - -“We are only at the beginning of our friendship, Dorian,” answered Lord -Henry, shaking him by the hand. “Good-bye. I shall see you before -nine-thirty, I hope. Remember, Patti is singing.” - -As he closed the door behind him, Dorian Gray touched the bell, and in -a few minutes Victor appeared with the lamps and drew the blinds down. -He waited impatiently for him to go. The man seemed to take an -interminable time over everything. - -As soon as he had left, he rushed to the screen and drew it back. No; -there was no further change in the picture. It had received the news of -Sibyl Vane’s death before he had known of it himself. It was conscious -of the events of life as they occurred. The vicious cruelty that marred -the fine lines of the mouth had, no doubt, appeared at the very moment -that the girl had drunk the poison, whatever it was. Or was it -indifferent to results? Did it merely take cognizance of what passed -within the soul? He wondered, and hoped that some day he would see the -change taking place before his very eyes, shuddering as he hoped it. - -Poor Sibyl! What a romance it had all been! She had often mimicked -death on the stage. Then Death himself had touched her and taken her -with him. How had she played that dreadful last scene? Had she cursed -him, as she died? No; she had died for love of him, and love would -always be a sacrament to him now. She had atoned for everything by the -sacrifice she had made of her life. He would not think any more of what -she had made him go through, on that horrible night at the theatre. -When he thought of her, it would be as a wonderful tragic figure sent -on to the world’s stage to show the supreme reality of love. A -wonderful tragic figure? Tears came to his eyes as he remembered her -childlike look, and winsome fanciful ways, and shy tremulous grace. He -brushed them away hastily and looked again at the picture. - -He felt that the time had really come for making his choice. Or had his -choice already been made? Yes, life had decided that for him—life, and -his own infinite curiosity about life. Eternal youth, infinite passion, -pleasures subtle and secret, wild joys and wilder sins—he was to have -all these things. The portrait was to bear the burden of his shame: -that was all. - -A feeling of pain crept over him as he thought of the desecration that -was in store for the fair face on the canvas. Once, in boyish mockery -of Narcissus, he had kissed, or feigned to kiss, those painted lips -that now smiled so cruelly at him. Morning after morning he had sat -before the portrait wondering at its beauty, almost enamoured of it, as -it seemed to him at times. Was it to alter now with every mood to which -he yielded? Was it to become a monstrous and loathsome thing, to be -hidden away in a locked room, to be shut out from the sunlight that had -so often touched to brighter gold the waving wonder of its hair? The -pity of it! the pity of it! - -For a moment, he thought of praying that the horrible sympathy that -existed between him and the picture might cease. It had changed in -answer to a prayer; perhaps in answer to a prayer it might remain -unchanged. And yet, who, that knew anything about life, would surrender -the chance of remaining always young, however fantastic that chance -might be, or with what fateful consequences it might be fraught? -Besides, was it really under his control? Had it indeed been prayer -that had produced the substitution? Might there not be some curious -scientific reason for it all? If thought could exercise its influence -upon a living organism, might not thought exercise an influence upon -dead and inorganic things? Nay, without thought or conscious desire, -might not things external to ourselves vibrate in unison with our moods -and passions, atom calling to atom in secret love or strange affinity? -But the reason was of no importance. He would never again tempt by a -prayer any terrible power. If the picture was to alter, it was to -alter. That was all. Why inquire too closely into it? - -For there would be a real pleasure in watching it. He would be able to -follow his mind into its secret places. This portrait would be to him -the most magical of mirrors. As it had revealed to him his own body, so -it would reveal to him his own soul. And when winter came upon it, he -would still be standing where spring trembles on the verge of summer. -When the blood crept from its face, and left behind a pallid mask of -chalk with leaden eyes, he would keep the glamour of boyhood. Not one -blossom of his loveliness would ever fade. Not one pulse of his life -would ever weaken. Like the gods of the Greeks, he would be strong, and -fleet, and joyous. What did it matter what happened to the coloured -image on the canvas? He would be safe. That was everything. - -He drew the screen back into its former place in front of the picture, -smiling as he did so, and passed into his bedroom, where his valet was -already waiting for him. An hour later he was at the opera, and Lord -Henry was leaning over his chair. - - - - -CHAPTER IX. - - -As he was sitting at breakfast next morning, Basil Hallward was shown -into the room. - -“I am so glad I have found you, Dorian,” he said gravely. “I called -last night, and they told me you were at the opera. Of course, I knew -that was impossible. But I wish you had left word where you had really -gone to. I passed a dreadful evening, half afraid that one tragedy -might be followed by another. I think you might have telegraphed for me -when you heard of it first. I read of it quite by chance in a late -edition of _The Globe_ that I picked up at the club. I came here at -once and was miserable at not finding you. I can’t tell you how -heart-broken I am about the whole thing. I know what you must suffer. -But where were you? Did you go down and see the girl’s mother? For a -moment I thought of following you there. They gave the address in the -paper. Somewhere in the Euston Road, isn’t it? But I was afraid of -intruding upon a sorrow that I could not lighten. Poor woman! What a -state she must be in! And her only child, too! What did she say about -it all?” - -“My dear Basil, how do I know?” murmured Dorian Gray, sipping some -pale-yellow wine from a delicate, gold-beaded bubble of Venetian glass -and looking dreadfully bored. “I was at the opera. You should have come -on there. I met Lady Gwendolen, Harry’s sister, for the first time. We -were in her box. She is perfectly charming; and Patti sang divinely. -Don’t talk about horrid subjects. If one doesn’t talk about a thing, it -has never happened. It is simply expression, as Harry says, that gives -reality to things. I may mention that she was not the woman’s only -child. There is a son, a charming fellow, I believe. But he is not on -the stage. He is a sailor, or something. And now, tell me about -yourself and what you are painting.” - -“You went to the opera?” said Hallward, speaking very slowly and with a -strained touch of pain in his voice. “You went to the opera while Sibyl -Vane was lying dead in some sordid lodging? You can talk to me of other -women being charming, and of Patti singing divinely, before the girl -you loved has even the quiet of a grave to sleep in? Why, man, there -are horrors in store for that little white body of hers!” - -“Stop, Basil! I won’t hear it!” cried Dorian, leaping to his feet. “You -must not tell me about things. What is done is done. What is past is -past.” - -“You call yesterday the past?” - -“What has the actual lapse of time got to do with it? It is only -shallow people who require years to get rid of an emotion. A man who is -master of himself can end a sorrow as easily as he can invent a -pleasure. I don’t want to be at the mercy of my emotions. I want to use -them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them.” - -“Dorian, this is horrible! Something has changed you completely. You -look exactly the same wonderful boy who, day after day, used to come -down to my studio to sit for his picture. But you were simple, natural, -and affectionate then. You were the most unspoiled creature in the -whole world. Now, I don’t know what has come over you. You talk as if -you had no heart, no pity in you. It is all Harry’s influence. I see -that.” - -The lad flushed up and, going to the window, looked out for a few -moments on the green, flickering, sun-lashed garden. “I owe a great -deal to Harry, Basil,” he said at last, “more than I owe to you. You -only taught me to be vain.” - -“Well, I am punished for that, Dorian—or shall be some day.” - -“I don’t know what you mean, Basil,” he exclaimed, turning round. “I -don’t know what you want. What do you want?” - -“I want the Dorian Gray I used to paint,” said the artist sadly. - -“Basil,” said the lad, going over to him and putting his hand on his -shoulder, “you have come too late. Yesterday, when I heard that Sibyl -Vane had killed herself—” - -“Killed herself! Good heavens! is there no doubt about that?” cried -Hallward, looking up at him with an expression of horror. - -“My dear Basil! Surely you don’t think it was a vulgar accident? Of -course she killed herself.” - -The elder man buried his face in his hands. “How fearful,” he muttered, -and a shudder ran through him. - -“No,” said Dorian Gray, “there is nothing fearful about it. It is one -of the great romantic tragedies of the age. As a rule, people who act -lead the most commonplace lives. They are good husbands, or faithful -wives, or something tedious. You know what I mean—middle-class virtue -and all that kind of thing. How different Sibyl was! She lived her -finest tragedy. She was always a heroine. The last night she played—the -night you saw her—she acted badly because she had known the reality of -love. When she knew its unreality, she died, as Juliet might have died. -She passed again into the sphere of art. There is something of the -martyr about her. Her death has all the pathetic uselessness of -martyrdom, all its wasted beauty. But, as I was saying, you must not -think I have not suffered. If you had come in yesterday at a particular -moment—about half-past five, perhaps, or a quarter to six—you would -have found me in tears. Even Harry, who was here, who brought me the -news, in fact, had no idea what I was going through. I suffered -immensely. Then it passed away. I cannot repeat an emotion. No one can, -except sentimentalists. And you are awfully unjust, Basil. You come -down here to console me. That is charming of you. You find me consoled, -and you are furious. How like a sympathetic person! You remind me of a -story Harry told me about a certain philanthropist who spent twenty -years of his life in trying to get some grievance redressed, or some -unjust law altered—I forget exactly what it was. Finally he succeeded, -and nothing could exceed his disappointment. He had absolutely nothing -to do, almost died of _ennui_, and became a confirmed misanthrope. And -besides, my dear old Basil, if you really want to console me, teach me -rather to forget what has happened, or to see it from a proper artistic -point of view. Was it not Gautier who used to write about _la -consolation des arts_? I remember picking up a little vellum-covered -book in your studio one day and chancing on that delightful phrase. -Well, I am not like that young man you told me of when we were down at -Marlow together, the young man who used to say that yellow satin could -console one for all the miseries of life. I love beautiful things that -one can touch and handle. Old brocades, green bronzes, lacquer-work, -carved ivories, exquisite surroundings, luxury, pomp—there is much to -be got from all these. But the artistic temperament that they create, -or at any rate reveal, is still more to me. To become the spectator of -one’s own life, as Harry says, is to escape the suffering of life. I -know you are surprised at my talking to you like this. You have not -realized how I have developed. I was a schoolboy when you knew me. I am -a man now. I have new passions, new thoughts, new ideas. I am -different, but you must not like me less. I am changed, but you must -always be my friend. Of course, I am very fond of Harry. But I know -that you are better than he is. You are not stronger—you are too much -afraid of life—but you are better. And how happy we used to be -together! Don’t leave me, Basil, and don’t quarrel with me. I am what I -am. There is nothing more to be said.” - -The painter felt strangely moved. The lad was infinitely dear to him, -and his personality had been the great turning point in his art. He -could not bear the idea of reproaching him any more. After all, his -indifference was probably merely a mood that would pass away. There was -so much in him that was good, so much in him that was noble. - -“Well, Dorian,” he said at length, with a sad smile, “I won’t speak to -you again about this horrible thing, after to-day. I only trust your -name won’t be mentioned in connection with it. The inquest is to take -place this afternoon. Have they summoned you?” - -Dorian shook his head, and a look of annoyance passed over his face at -the mention of the word “inquest.” There was something so crude and -vulgar about everything of the kind. “They don’t know my name,” he -answered. - -“But surely she did?” - -“Only my Christian name, and that I am quite sure she never mentioned -to any one. She told me once that they were all rather curious to learn -who I was, and that she invariably told them my name was Prince -Charming. It was pretty of her. You must do me a drawing of Sibyl, -Basil. I should like to have something more of her than the memory of a -few kisses and some broken pathetic words.” - -“I will try and do something, Dorian, if it would please you. But you -must come and sit to me yourself again. I can’t get on without you.” - -“I can never sit to you again, Basil. It is impossible!” he exclaimed, -starting back. - -The painter stared at him. “My dear boy, what nonsense!” he cried. “Do -you mean to say you don’t like what I did of you? Where is it? Why have -you pulled the screen in front of it? Let me look at it. It is the best -thing I have ever done. Do take the screen away, Dorian. It is simply -disgraceful of your servant hiding my work like that. I felt the room -looked different as I came in.” - -“My servant has nothing to do with it, Basil. You don’t imagine I let -him arrange my room for me? He settles my flowers for me sometimes—that -is all. No; I did it myself. The light was too strong on the portrait.” - -“Too strong! Surely not, my dear fellow? It is an admirable place for -it. Let me see it.” And Hallward walked towards the corner of the room. - -A cry of terror broke from Dorian Gray’s lips, and he rushed between -the painter and the screen. “Basil,” he said, looking very pale, “you -must not look at it. I don’t wish you to.” - -“Not look at my own work! You are not serious. Why shouldn’t I look at -it?” exclaimed Hallward, laughing. - -“If you try to look at it, Basil, on my word of honour I will never -speak to you again as long as I live. I am quite serious. I don’t offer -any explanation, and you are not to ask for any. But, remember, if you -touch this screen, everything is over between us.” - -Hallward was thunderstruck. He looked at Dorian Gray in absolute -amazement. He had never seen him like this before. The lad was actually -pallid with rage. His hands were clenched, and the pupils of his eyes -were like disks of blue fire. He was trembling all over. - -“Dorian!” - -“Don’t speak!” - -“But what is the matter? Of course I won’t look at it if you don’t want -me to,” he said, rather coldly, turning on his heel and going over -towards the window. “But, really, it seems rather absurd that I -shouldn’t see my own work, especially as I am going to exhibit it in -Paris in the autumn. I shall probably have to give it another coat of -varnish before that, so I must see it some day, and why not to-day?” - -“To exhibit it! You want to exhibit it?” exclaimed Dorian Gray, a -strange sense of terror creeping over him. Was the world going to be -shown his secret? Were people to gape at the mystery of his life? That -was impossible. Something—he did not know what—had to be done at once. - -“Yes; I don’t suppose you will object to that. Georges Petit is going -to collect all my best pictures for a special exhibition in the Rue de -Sèze, which will open the first week in October. The portrait will only -be away a month. I should think you could easily spare it for that -time. In fact, you are sure to be out of town. And if you keep it -always behind a screen, you can’t care much about it.” - -Dorian Gray passed his hand over his forehead. There were beads of -perspiration there. He felt that he was on the brink of a horrible -danger. “You told me a month ago that you would never exhibit it,” he -cried. “Why have you changed your mind? You people who go in for being -consistent have just as many moods as others have. The only difference -is that your moods are rather meaningless. You can’t have forgotten -that you assured me most solemnly that nothing in the world would -induce you to send it to any exhibition. You told Harry exactly the -same thing.” He stopped suddenly, and a gleam of light came into his -eyes. He remembered that Lord Henry had said to him once, half -seriously and half in jest, “If you want to have a strange quarter of -an hour, get Basil to tell you why he won’t exhibit your picture. He -told me why he wouldn’t, and it was a revelation to me.” Yes, perhaps -Basil, too, had his secret. He would ask him and try. - -“Basil,” he said, coming over quite close and looking him straight in -the face, “we have each of us a secret. Let me know yours, and I shall -tell you mine. What was your reason for refusing to exhibit my -picture?” - -The painter shuddered in spite of himself. “Dorian, if I told you, you -might like me less than you do, and you would certainly laugh at me. I -could not bear your doing either of those two things. If you wish me -never to look at your picture again, I am content. I have always you to -look at. If you wish the best work I have ever done to be hidden from -the world, I am satisfied. Your friendship is dearer to me than any -fame or reputation.” - -“No, Basil, you must tell me,” insisted Dorian Gray. “I think I have a -right to know.” His feeling of terror had passed away, and curiosity -had taken its place. He was determined to find out Basil Hallward’s -mystery. - -“Let us sit down, Dorian,” said the painter, looking troubled. “Let us -sit down. And just answer me one question. Have you noticed in the -picture something curious?—something that probably at first did not -strike you, but that revealed itself to you suddenly?” - -“Basil!” cried the lad, clutching the arms of his chair with trembling -hands and gazing at him with wild startled eyes. - -“I see you did. Don’t speak. Wait till you hear what I have to say. -Dorian, from the moment I met you, your personality had the most -extraordinary influence over me. I was dominated, soul, brain, and -power, by you. You became to me the visible incarnation of that unseen -ideal whose memory haunts us artists like an exquisite dream. I -worshipped you. I grew jealous of every one to whom you spoke. I wanted -to have you all to myself. I was only happy when I was with you. When -you were away from me, you were still present in my art.... Of course, -I never let you know anything about this. It would have been -impossible. You would not have understood it. I hardly understood it -myself. I only knew that I had seen perfection face to face, and that -the world had become wonderful to my eyes—too wonderful, perhaps, for -in such mad worships there is peril, the peril of losing them, no less -than the peril of keeping them.... Weeks and weeks went on, and I grew -more and more absorbed in you. Then came a new development. I had drawn -you as Paris in dainty armour, and as Adonis with huntsman’s cloak and -polished boar-spear. Crowned with heavy lotus-blossoms you had sat on -the prow of Adrian’s barge, gazing across the green turbid Nile. You -had leaned over the still pool of some Greek woodland and seen in the -water’s silent silver the marvel of your own face. And it had all been -what art should be—unconscious, ideal, and remote. One day, a fatal day -I sometimes think, I determined to paint a wonderful portrait of you as -you actually are, not in the costume of dead ages, but in your own -dress and in your own time. Whether it was the realism of the method, -or the mere wonder of your own personality, thus directly presented to -me without mist or veil, I cannot tell. But I know that as I worked at -it, every flake and film of colour seemed to me to reveal my secret. I -grew afraid that others would know of my idolatry. I felt, Dorian, that -I had told too much, that I had put too much of myself into it. Then it -was that I resolved never to allow the picture to be exhibited. You -were a little annoyed; but then you did not realize all that it meant -to me. Harry, to whom I talked about it, laughed at me. But I did not -mind that. When the picture was finished, and I sat alone with it, I -felt that I was right.... Well, after a few days the thing left my -studio, and as soon as I had got rid of the intolerable fascination of -its presence, it seemed to me that I had been foolish in imagining that -I had seen anything in it, more than that you were extremely -good-looking and that I could paint. Even now I cannot help feeling -that it is a mistake to think that the passion one feels in creation is -ever really shown in the work one creates. Art is always more abstract -than we fancy. Form and colour tell us of form and colour—that is all. -It often seems to me that art conceals the artist far more completely -than it ever reveals him. And so when I got this offer from Paris, I -determined to make your portrait the principal thing in my exhibition. -It never occurred to me that you would refuse. I see now that you were -right. The picture cannot be shown. You must not be angry with me, -Dorian, for what I have told you. As I said to Harry, once, you are -made to be worshipped.” - -Dorian Gray drew a long breath. The colour came back to his cheeks, and -a smile played about his lips. The peril was over. He was safe for the -time. Yet he could not help feeling infinite pity for the painter who -had just made this strange confession to him, and wondered if he -himself would ever be so dominated by the personality of a friend. Lord -Henry had the charm of being very dangerous. But that was all. He was -too clever and too cynical to be really fond of. Would there ever be -some one who would fill him with a strange idolatry? Was that one of -the things that life had in store? - -“It is extraordinary to me, Dorian,” said Hallward, “that you should -have seen this in the portrait. Did you really see it?” - -“I saw something in it,” he answered, “something that seemed to me very -curious.” - -“Well, you don’t mind my looking at the thing now?” - -Dorian shook his head. “You must not ask me that, Basil. I could not -possibly let you stand in front of that picture.” - -“You will some day, surely?” - -“Never.” - -“Well, perhaps you are right. And now good-bye, Dorian. You have been -the one person in my life who has really influenced my art. Whatever I -have done that is good, I owe to you. Ah! you don’t know what it cost -me to tell you all that I have told you.” - -“My dear Basil,” said Dorian, “what have you told me? Simply that you -felt that you admired me too much. That is not even a compliment.” - -“It was not intended as a compliment. It was a confession. Now that I -have made it, something seems to have gone out of me. Perhaps one -should never put one’s worship into words.” - -“It was a very disappointing confession.” - -“Why, what did you expect, Dorian? You didn’t see anything else in the -picture, did you? There was nothing else to see?” - -“No; there was nothing else to see. Why do you ask? But you mustn’t -talk about worship. It is foolish. You and I are friends, Basil, and we -must always remain so.” - -“You have got Harry,” said the painter sadly. - -“Oh, Harry!” cried the lad, with a ripple of laughter. “Harry spends -his days in saying what is incredible and his evenings in doing what is -improbable. Just the sort of life I would like to lead. But still I -don’t think I would go to Harry if I were in trouble. I would sooner go -to you, Basil.” - -“You will sit to me again?” - -“Impossible!” - -“You spoil my life as an artist by refusing, Dorian. No man comes -across two ideal things. Few come across one.” - -“I can’t explain it to you, Basil, but I must never sit to you again. -There is something fatal about a portrait. It has a life of its own. I -will come and have tea with you. That will be just as pleasant.” - -“Pleasanter for you, I am afraid,” murmured Hallward regretfully. “And -now good-bye. I am sorry you won’t let me look at the picture once -again. But that can’t be helped. I quite understand what you feel about -it.” - -As he left the room, Dorian Gray smiled to himself. Poor Basil! How -little he knew of the true reason! And how strange it was that, instead -of having been forced to reveal his own secret, he had succeeded, -almost by chance, in wresting a secret from his friend! How much that -strange confession explained to him! The painter’s absurd fits of -jealousy, his wild devotion, his extravagant panegyrics, his curious -reticences—he understood them all now, and he felt sorry. There seemed -to him to be something tragic in a friendship so coloured by romance. - -He sighed and touched the bell. The portrait must be hidden away at all -costs. He could not run such a risk of discovery again. It had been mad -of him to have allowed the thing to remain, even for an hour, in a room -to which any of his friends had access. - - - - -CHAPTER X. - - -When his servant entered, he looked at him steadfastly and wondered if -he had thought of peering behind the screen. The man was quite -impassive and waited for his orders. Dorian lit a cigarette and walked -over to the glass and glanced into it. He could see the reflection of -Victor’s face perfectly. It was like a placid mask of servility. There -was nothing to be afraid of, there. Yet he thought it best to be on his -guard. - -Speaking very slowly, he told him to tell the house-keeper that he -wanted to see her, and then to go to the frame-maker and ask him to -send two of his men round at once. It seemed to him that as the man -left the room his eyes wandered in the direction of the screen. Or was -that merely his own fancy? - -After a few moments, in her black silk dress, with old-fashioned thread -mittens on her wrinkled hands, Mrs. Leaf bustled into the library. He -asked her for the key of the schoolroom. - -“The old schoolroom, Mr. Dorian?” she exclaimed. “Why, it is full of -dust. I must get it arranged and put straight before you go into it. It -is not fit for you to see, sir. It is not, indeed.” - -“I don’t want it put straight, Leaf. I only want the key.” - -“Well, sir, you’ll be covered with cobwebs if you go into it. Why, it -hasn’t been opened for nearly five years—not since his lordship died.” - -He winced at the mention of his grandfather. He had hateful memories of -him. “That does not matter,” he answered. “I simply want to see the -place—that is all. Give me the key.” - -“And here is the key, sir,” said the old lady, going over the contents -of her bunch with tremulously uncertain hands. “Here is the key. I’ll -have it off the bunch in a moment. But you don’t think of living up -there, sir, and you so comfortable here?” - -“No, no,” he cried petulantly. “Thank you, Leaf. That will do.” - -She lingered for a few moments, and was garrulous over some detail of -the household. He sighed and told her to manage things as she thought -best. She left the room, wreathed in smiles. - -As the door closed, Dorian put the key in his pocket and looked round -the room. His eye fell on a large, purple satin coverlet heavily -embroidered with gold, a splendid piece of late seventeenth-century -Venetian work that his grandfather had found in a convent near Bologna. -Yes, that would serve to wrap the dreadful thing in. It had perhaps -served often as a pall for the dead. Now it was to hide something that -had a corruption of its own, worse than the corruption of death -itself—something that would breed horrors and yet would never die. What -the worm was to the corpse, his sins would be to the painted image on -the canvas. They would mar its beauty and eat away its grace. They -would defile it and make it shameful. And yet the thing would still -live on. It would be always alive. - -He shuddered, and for a moment he regretted that he had not told Basil -the true reason why he had wished to hide the picture away. Basil would -have helped him to resist Lord Henry’s influence, and the still more -poisonous influences that came from his own temperament. The love that -he bore him—for it was really love—had nothing in it that was not noble -and intellectual. It was not that mere physical admiration of beauty -that is born of the senses and that dies when the senses tire. It was -such love as Michelangelo had known, and Montaigne, and Winckelmann, -and Shakespeare himself. Yes, Basil could have saved him. But it was -too late now. The past could always be annihilated. Regret, denial, or -forgetfulness could do that. But the future was inevitable. There were -passions in him that would find their terrible outlet, dreams that -would make the shadow of their evil real. - -He took up from the couch the great purple-and-gold texture that -covered it, and, holding it in his hands, passed behind the screen. Was -the face on the canvas viler than before? It seemed to him that it was -unchanged, and yet his loathing of it was intensified. Gold hair, blue -eyes, and rose-red lips—they all were there. It was simply the -expression that had altered. That was horrible in its cruelty. Compared -to what he saw in it of censure or rebuke, how shallow Basil’s -reproaches about Sibyl Vane had been!—how shallow, and of what little -account! His own soul was looking out at him from the canvas and -calling him to judgement. A look of pain came across him, and he flung -the rich pall over the picture. As he did so, a knock came to the door. -He passed out as his servant entered. - -“The persons are here, Monsieur.” - -He felt that the man must be got rid of at once. He must not be allowed -to know where the picture was being taken to. There was something sly -about him, and he had thoughtful, treacherous eyes. Sitting down at the -writing-table he scribbled a note to Lord Henry, asking him to send him -round something to read and reminding him that they were to meet at -eight-fifteen that evening. - -“Wait for an answer,” he said, handing it to him, “and show the men in -here.” - -In two or three minutes there was another knock, and Mr. Hubbard -himself, the celebrated frame-maker of South Audley Street, came in -with a somewhat rough-looking young assistant. Mr. Hubbard was a -florid, red-whiskered little man, whose admiration for art was -considerably tempered by the inveterate impecuniosity of most of the -artists who dealt with him. As a rule, he never left his shop. He -waited for people to come to him. But he always made an exception in -favour of Dorian Gray. There was something about Dorian that charmed -everybody. It was a pleasure even to see him. - -“What can I do for you, Mr. Gray?” he said, rubbing his fat freckled -hands. “I thought I would do myself the honour of coming round in -person. I have just got a beauty of a frame, sir. Picked it up at a -sale. Old Florentine. Came from Fonthill, I believe. Admirably suited -for a religious subject, Mr. Gray.” - -“I am so sorry you have given yourself the trouble of coming round, Mr. -Hubbard. I shall certainly drop in and look at the frame—though I don’t -go in much at present for religious art—but to-day I only want a -picture carried to the top of the house for me. It is rather heavy, so -I thought I would ask you to lend me a couple of your men.” - -“No trouble at all, Mr. Gray. I am delighted to be of any service to -you. Which is the work of art, sir?” - -“This,” replied Dorian, moving the screen back. “Can you move it, -covering and all, just as it is? I don’t want it to get scratched going -upstairs.” - -“There will be no difficulty, sir,” said the genial frame-maker, -beginning, with the aid of his assistant, to unhook the picture from -the long brass chains by which it was suspended. “And, now, where shall -we carry it to, Mr. Gray?” - -“I will show you the way, Mr. Hubbard, if you will kindly follow me. Or -perhaps you had better go in front. I am afraid it is right at the top -of the house. We will go up by the front staircase, as it is wider.” - -He held the door open for them, and they passed out into the hall and -began the ascent. The elaborate character of the frame had made the -picture extremely bulky, and now and then, in spite of the obsequious -protests of Mr. Hubbard, who had the true tradesman’s spirited dislike -of seeing a gentleman doing anything useful, Dorian put his hand to it -so as to help them. - -“Something of a load to carry, sir,” gasped the little man when they -reached the top landing. And he wiped his shiny forehead. - -“I am afraid it is rather heavy,” murmured Dorian as he unlocked the -door that opened into the room that was to keep for him the curious -secret of his life and hide his soul from the eyes of men. - -He had not entered the place for more than four years—not, indeed, -since he had used it first as a play-room when he was a child, and then -as a study when he grew somewhat older. It was a large, -well-proportioned room, which had been specially built by the last Lord -Kelso for the use of the little grandson whom, for his strange likeness -to his mother, and also for other reasons, he had always hated and -desired to keep at a distance. It appeared to Dorian to have but little -changed. There was the huge Italian _cassone_, with its fantastically -painted panels and its tarnished gilt mouldings, in which he had so -often hidden himself as a boy. There the satinwood book-case filled -with his dog-eared schoolbooks. On the wall behind it was hanging the -same ragged Flemish tapestry where a faded king and queen were playing -chess in a garden, while a company of hawkers rode by, carrying hooded -birds on their gauntleted wrists. How well he remembered it all! Every -moment of his lonely childhood came back to him as he looked round. He -recalled the stainless purity of his boyish life, and it seemed -horrible to him that it was here the fatal portrait was to be hidden -away. How little he had thought, in those dead days, of all that was in -store for him! - -But there was no other place in the house so secure from prying eyes as -this. He had the key, and no one else could enter it. Beneath its -purple pall, the face painted on the canvas could grow bestial, sodden, -and unclean. What did it matter? No one could see it. He himself would -not see it. Why should he watch the hideous corruption of his soul? He -kept his youth—that was enough. And, besides, might not his nature grow -finer, after all? There was no reason that the future should be so full -of shame. Some love might come across his life, and purify him, and -shield him from those sins that seemed to be already stirring in spirit -and in flesh—those curious unpictured sins whose very mystery lent them -their subtlety and their charm. Perhaps, some day, the cruel look would -have passed away from the scarlet sensitive mouth, and he might show to -the world Basil Hallward’s masterpiece. - -No; that was impossible. Hour by hour, and week by week, the thing upon -the canvas was growing old. It might escape the hideousness of sin, but -the hideousness of age was in store for it. The cheeks would become -hollow or flaccid. Yellow crow’s feet would creep round the fading eyes -and make them horrible. The hair would lose its brightness, the mouth -would gape or droop, would be foolish or gross, as the mouths of old -men are. There would be the wrinkled throat, the cold, blue-veined -hands, the twisted body, that he remembered in the grandfather who had -been so stern to him in his boyhood. The picture had to be concealed. -There was no help for it. - -“Bring it in, Mr. Hubbard, please,” he said, wearily, turning round. “I -am sorry I kept you so long. I was thinking of something else.” - -“Always glad to have a rest, Mr. Gray,” answered the frame-maker, who -was still gasping for breath. “Where shall we put it, sir?” - -“Oh, anywhere. Here: this will do. I don’t want to have it hung up. -Just lean it against the wall. Thanks.” - -“Might one look at the work of art, sir?” - -Dorian started. “It would not interest you, Mr. Hubbard,” he said, -keeping his eye on the man. He felt ready to leap upon him and fling -him to the ground if he dared to lift the gorgeous hanging that -concealed the secret of his life. “I shan’t trouble you any more now. I -am much obliged for your kindness in coming round.” - -“Not at all, not at all, Mr. Gray. Ever ready to do anything for you, -sir.” And Mr. Hubbard tramped downstairs, followed by the assistant, -who glanced back at Dorian with a look of shy wonder in his rough -uncomely face. He had never seen any one so marvellous. - -When the sound of their footsteps had died away, Dorian locked the door -and put the key in his pocket. He felt safe now. No one would ever look -upon the horrible thing. No eye but his would ever see his shame. - -On reaching the library, he found that it was just after five o’clock -and that the tea had been already brought up. On a little table of dark -perfumed wood thickly incrusted with nacre, a present from Lady Radley, -his guardian’s wife, a pretty professional invalid who had spent the -preceding winter in Cairo, was lying a note from Lord Henry, and beside -it was a book bound in yellow paper, the cover slightly torn and the -edges soiled. A copy of the third edition of _The St. James’s Gazette_ -had been placed on the tea-tray. It was evident that Victor had -returned. He wondered if he had met the men in the hall as they were -leaving the house and had wormed out of them what they had been doing. -He would be sure to miss the picture—had no doubt missed it already, -while he had been laying the tea-things. The screen had not been set -back, and a blank space was visible on the wall. Perhaps some night he -might find him creeping upstairs and trying to force the door of the -room. It was a horrible thing to have a spy in one’s house. He had -heard of rich men who had been blackmailed all their lives by some -servant who had read a letter, or overheard a conversation, or picked -up a card with an address, or found beneath a pillow a withered flower -or a shred of crumpled lace. - -He sighed, and having poured himself out some tea, opened Lord Henry’s -note. It was simply to say that he sent him round the evening paper, -and a book that might interest him, and that he would be at the club at -eight-fifteen. He opened _The St. James’s_ languidly, and looked -through it. A red pencil-mark on the fifth page caught his eye. It drew -attention to the following paragraph: - -INQUEST ON AN ACTRESS.—An inquest was held this morning at the Bell -Tavern, Hoxton Road, by Mr. Danby, the District Coroner, on the body of -Sibyl Vane, a young actress recently engaged at the Royal Theatre, -Holborn. A verdict of death by misadventure was returned. Considerable -sympathy was expressed for the mother of the deceased, who was greatly -affected during the giving of her own evidence, and that of Dr. -Birrell, who had made the post-mortem examination of the deceased. - - -He frowned, and tearing the paper in two, went across the room and -flung the pieces away. How ugly it all was! And how horribly real -ugliness made things! He felt a little annoyed with Lord Henry for -having sent him the report. And it was certainly stupid of him to have -marked it with red pencil. Victor might have read it. The man knew more -than enough English for that. - -Perhaps he had read it and had begun to suspect something. And, yet, -what did it matter? What had Dorian Gray to do with Sibyl Vane’s death? -There was nothing to fear. Dorian Gray had not killed her. - -His eye fell on the yellow book that Lord Henry had sent him. What was -it, he wondered. He went towards the little, pearl-coloured octagonal -stand that had always looked to him like the work of some strange -Egyptian bees that wrought in silver, and taking up the volume, flung -himself into an arm-chair and began to turn over the leaves. After a -few minutes he became absorbed. It was the strangest book that he had -ever read. It seemed to him that in exquisite raiment, and to the -delicate sound of flutes, the sins of the world were passing in dumb -show before him. Things that he had dimly dreamed of were suddenly made -real to him. Things of which he had never dreamed were gradually -revealed. - -It was a novel without a plot and with only one character, being, -indeed, simply a psychological study of a certain young Parisian who -spent his life trying to realize in the nineteenth century all the -passions and modes of thought that belonged to every century except his -own, and to sum up, as it were, in himself the various moods through -which the world-spirit had ever passed, loving for their mere -artificiality those renunciations that men have unwisely called virtue, -as much as those natural rebellions that wise men still call sin. The -style in which it was written was that curious jewelled style, vivid -and obscure at once, full of _argot_ and of archaisms, of technical -expressions and of elaborate paraphrases, that characterizes the work -of some of the finest artists of the French school of _Symbolistes_. -There were in it metaphors as monstrous as orchids and as subtle in -colour. The life of the senses was described in the terms of mystical -philosophy. One hardly knew at times whether one was reading the -spiritual ecstasies of some mediæval saint or the morbid confessions of -a modern sinner. It was a poisonous book. The heavy odour of incense -seemed to cling about its pages and to trouble the brain. The mere -cadence of the sentences, the subtle monotony of their music, so full -as it was of complex refrains and movements elaborately repeated, -produced in the mind of the lad, as he passed from chapter to chapter, -a form of reverie, a malady of dreaming, that made him unconscious of -the falling day and creeping shadows. - -Cloudless, and pierced by one solitary star, a copper-green sky gleamed -through the windows. He read on by its wan light till he could read no -more. Then, after his valet had reminded him several times of the -lateness of the hour, he got up, and going into the next room, placed -the book on the little Florentine table that always stood at his -bedside and began to dress for dinner. - -It was almost nine o’clock before he reached the club, where he found -Lord Henry sitting alone, in the morning-room, looking very much bored. - -“I am so sorry, Harry,” he cried, “but really it is entirely your -fault. That book you sent me so fascinated me that I forgot how the -time was going.” - -“Yes, I thought you would like it,” replied his host, rising from his -chair. - -“I didn’t say I liked it, Harry. I said it fascinated me. There is a -great difference.” - -“Ah, you have discovered that?” murmured Lord Henry. And they passed -into the dining-room. - - - - -CHAPTER XI. - - -For years, Dorian Gray could not free himself from the influence of -this book. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that he never -sought to free himself from it. He procured from Paris no less than -nine large-paper copies of the first edition, and had them bound in -different colours, so that they might suit his various moods and the -changing fancies of a nature over which he seemed, at times, to have -almost entirely lost control. The hero, the wonderful young Parisian in -whom the romantic and the scientific temperaments were so strangely -blended, became to him a kind of prefiguring type of himself. And, -indeed, the whole book seemed to him to contain the story of his own -life, written before he had lived it. - -In one point he was more fortunate than the novel’s fantastic hero. He -never knew—never, indeed, had any cause to know—that somewhat grotesque -dread of mirrors, and polished metal surfaces, and still water which -came upon the young Parisian so early in his life, and was occasioned -by the sudden decay of a beau that had once, apparently, been so -remarkable. It was with an almost cruel joy—and perhaps in nearly every -joy, as certainly in every pleasure, cruelty has its place—that he used -to read the latter part of the book, with its really tragic, if -somewhat overemphasized, account of the sorrow and despair of one who -had himself lost what in others, and the world, he had most dearly -valued. - -For the wonderful beauty that had so fascinated Basil Hallward, and -many others besides him, seemed never to leave him. Even those who had -heard the most evil things against him—and from time to time strange -rumours about his mode of life crept through London and became the -chatter of the clubs—could not believe anything to his dishonour when -they saw him. He had always the look of one who had kept himself -unspotted from the world. Men who talked grossly became silent when -Dorian Gray entered the room. There was something in the purity of his -face that rebuked them. His mere presence seemed to recall to them the -memory of the innocence that they had tarnished. They wondered how one -so charming and graceful as he was could have escaped the stain of an -age that was at once sordid and sensual. - -Often, on returning home from one of those mysterious and prolonged -absences that gave rise to such strange conjecture among those who were -his friends, or thought that they were so, he himself would creep -upstairs to the locked room, open the door with the key that never left -him now, and stand, with a mirror, in front of the portrait that Basil -Hallward had painted of him, looking now at the evil and aging face on -the canvas, and now at the fair young face that laughed back at him -from the polished glass. The very sharpness of the contrast used to -quicken his sense of pleasure. He grew more and more enamoured of his -own beauty, more and more interested in the corruption of his own soul. -He would examine with minute care, and sometimes with a monstrous and -terrible delight, the hideous lines that seared the wrinkling forehead -or crawled around the heavy sensual mouth, wondering sometimes which -were the more horrible, the signs of sin or the signs of age. He would -place his white hands beside the coarse bloated hands of the picture, -and smile. He mocked the misshapen body and the failing limbs. - -There were moments, indeed, at night, when, lying sleepless in his own -delicately scented chamber, or in the sordid room of the little -ill-famed tavern near the docks which, under an assumed name and in -disguise, it was his habit to frequent, he would think of the ruin he -had brought upon his soul with a pity that was all the more poignant -because it was purely selfish. But moments such as these were rare. -That curiosity about life which Lord Henry had first stirred in him, as -they sat together in the garden of their friend, seemed to increase -with gratification. The more he knew, the more he desired to know. He -had mad hungers that grew more ravenous as he fed them. - -Yet he was not really reckless, at any rate in his relations to -society. Once or twice every month during the winter, and on each -Wednesday evening while the season lasted, he would throw open to the -world his beautiful house and have the most celebrated musicians of the -day to charm his guests with the wonders of their art. His little -dinners, in the settling of which Lord Henry always assisted him, were -noted as much for the careful selection and placing of those invited, -as for the exquisite taste shown in the decoration of the table, with -its subtle symphonic arrangements of exotic flowers, and embroidered -cloths, and antique plate of gold and silver. Indeed, there were many, -especially among the very young men, who saw, or fancied that they saw, -in Dorian Gray the true realization of a type of which they had often -dreamed in Eton or Oxford days, a type that was to combine something of -the real culture of the scholar with all the grace and distinction and -perfect manner of a citizen of the world. To them he seemed to be of -the company of those whom Dante describes as having sought to “make -themselves perfect by the worship of beauty.” Like Gautier, he was one -for whom “the visible world existed.” - -And, certainly, to him life itself was the first, the greatest, of the -arts, and for it all the other arts seemed to be but a preparation. -Fashion, by which what is really fantastic becomes for a moment -universal, and dandyism, which, in its own way, is an attempt to assert -the absolute modernity of beauty, had, of course, their fascination for -him. His mode of dressing, and the particular styles that from time to -time he affected, had their marked influence on the young exquisites of -the Mayfair balls and Pall Mall club windows, who copied him in -everything that he did, and tried to reproduce the accidental charm of -his graceful, though to him only half-serious, fopperies. - -For, while he was but too ready to accept the position that was almost -immediately offered to him on his coming of age, and found, indeed, a -subtle pleasure in the thought that he might really become to the -London of his own day what to imperial Neronian Rome the author of the -Satyricon once had been, yet in his inmost heart he desired to be -something more than a mere _arbiter elegantiarum_, to be consulted on -the wearing of a jewel, or the knotting of a necktie, or the conduct of -a cane. He sought to elaborate some new scheme of life that would have -its reasoned philosophy and its ordered principles, and find in the -spiritualizing of the senses its highest realization. - -The worship of the senses has often, and with much justice, been -decried, men feeling a natural instinct of terror about passions and -sensations that seem stronger than themselves, and that they are -conscious of sharing with the less highly organized forms of existence. -But it appeared to Dorian Gray that the true nature of the senses had -never been understood, and that they had remained savage and animal -merely because the world had sought to starve them into submission or -to kill them by pain, instead of aiming at making them elements of a -new spirituality, of which a fine instinct for beauty was to be the -dominant characteristic. As he looked back upon man moving through -history, he was haunted by a feeling of loss. So much had been -surrendered! and to such little purpose! There had been mad wilful -rejections, monstrous forms of self-torture and self-denial, whose -origin was fear and whose result was a degradation infinitely more -terrible than that fancied degradation from which, in their ignorance, -they had sought to escape; Nature, in her wonderful irony, driving out -the anchorite to feed with the wild animals of the desert and giving to -the hermit the beasts of the field as his companions. - -Yes: there was to be, as Lord Henry had prophesied, a new Hedonism that -was to recreate life and to save it from that harsh uncomely puritanism -that is having, in our own day, its curious revival. It was to have its -service of the intellect, certainly, yet it was never to accept any -theory or system that would involve the sacrifice of any mode of -passionate experience. Its aim, indeed, was to be experience itself, -and not the fruits of experience, sweet or bitter as they might be. Of -the asceticism that deadens the senses, as of the vulgar profligacy -that dulls them, it was to know nothing. But it was to teach man to -concentrate himself upon the moments of a life that is itself but a -moment. - -There are few of us who have not sometimes wakened before dawn, either -after one of those dreamless nights that make us almost enamoured of -death, or one of those nights of horror and misshapen joy, when through -the chambers of the brain sweep phantoms more terrible than reality -itself, and instinct with that vivid life that lurks in all grotesques, -and that lends to Gothic art its enduring vitality, this art being, one -might fancy, especially the art of those whose minds have been troubled -with the malady of reverie. Gradually white fingers creep through the -curtains, and they appear to tremble. In black fantastic shapes, dumb -shadows crawl into the corners of the room and crouch there. Outside, -there is the stirring of birds among the leaves, or the sound of men -going forth to their work, or the sigh and sob of the wind coming down -from the hills and wandering round the silent house, as though it -feared to wake the sleepers and yet must needs call forth sleep from -her purple cave. Veil after veil of thin dusky gauze is lifted, and by -degrees the forms and colours of things are restored to them, and we -watch the dawn remaking the world in its antique pattern. The wan -mirrors get back their mimic life. The flameless tapers stand where we -had left them, and beside them lies the half-cut book that we had been -studying, or the wired flower that we had worn at the ball, or the -letter that we had been afraid to read, or that we had read too often. -Nothing seems to us changed. Out of the unreal shadows of the night -comes back the real life that we had known. We have to resume it where -we had left off, and there steals over us a terrible sense of the -necessity for the continuance of energy in the same wearisome round of -stereotyped habits, or a wild longing, it may be, that our eyelids -might open some morning upon a world that had been refashioned anew in -the darkness for our pleasure, a world in which things would have fresh -shapes and colours, and be changed, or have other secrets, a world in -which the past would have little or no place, or survive, at any rate, -in no conscious form of obligation or regret, the remembrance even of -joy having its bitterness and the memories of pleasure their pain. - -It was the creation of such worlds as these that seemed to Dorian Gray -to be the true object, or amongst the true objects, of life; and in his -search for sensations that would be at once new and delightful, and -possess that element of strangeness that is so essential to romance, he -would often adopt certain modes of thought that he knew to be really -alien to his nature, abandon himself to their subtle influences, and -then, having, as it were, caught their colour and satisfied his -intellectual curiosity, leave them with that curious indifference that -is not incompatible with a real ardour of temperament, and that, -indeed, according to certain modern psychologists, is often a condition -of it. - -It was rumoured of him once that he was about to join the Roman -Catholic communion, and certainly the Roman ritual had always a great -attraction for him. The daily sacrifice, more awful really than all the -sacrifices of the antique world, stirred him as much by its superb -rejection of the evidence of the senses as by the primitive simplicity -of its elements and the eternal pathos of the human tragedy that it -sought to symbolize. He loved to kneel down on the cold marble pavement -and watch the priest, in his stiff flowered dalmatic, slowly and with -white hands moving aside the veil of the tabernacle, or raising aloft -the jewelled, lantern-shaped monstrance with that pallid wafer that at -times, one would fain think, is indeed the “_panis cælestis_,” the -bread of angels, or, robed in the garments of the Passion of Christ, -breaking the Host into the chalice and smiting his breast for his sins. -The fuming censers that the grave boys, in their lace and scarlet, -tossed into the air like great gilt flowers had their subtle -fascination for him. As he passed out, he used to look with wonder at -the black confessionals and long to sit in the dim shadow of one of -them and listen to men and women whispering through the worn grating -the true story of their lives. - -But he never fell into the error of arresting his intellectual -development by any formal acceptance of creed or system, or of -mistaking, for a house in which to live, an inn that is but suitable -for the sojourn of a night, or for a few hours of a night in which -there are no stars and the moon is in travail. Mysticism, with its -marvellous power of making common things strange to us, and the subtle -antinomianism that always seems to accompany it, moved him for a -season; and for a season he inclined to the materialistic doctrines of -the _Darwinismus_ movement in Germany, and found a curious pleasure in -tracing the thoughts and passions of men to some pearly cell in the -brain, or some white nerve in the body, delighting in the conception of -the absolute dependence of the spirit on certain physical conditions, -morbid or healthy, normal or diseased. Yet, as has been said of him -before, no theory of life seemed to him to be of any importance -compared with life itself. He felt keenly conscious of how barren all -intellectual speculation is when separated from action and experiment. -He knew that the senses, no less than the soul, have their spiritual -mysteries to reveal. - -And so he would now study perfumes and the secrets of their -manufacture, distilling heavily scented oils and burning odorous gums -from the East. He saw that there was no mood of the mind that had not -its counterpart in the sensuous life, and set himself to discover their -true relations, wondering what there was in frankincense that made one -mystical, and in ambergris that stirred one’s passions, and in violets -that woke the memory of dead romances, and in musk that troubled the -brain, and in champak that stained the imagination; and seeking often -to elaborate a real psychology of perfumes, and to estimate the several -influences of sweet-smelling roots and scented, pollen-laden flowers; -of aromatic balms and of dark and fragrant woods; of spikenard, that -sickens; of hovenia, that makes men mad; and of aloes, that are said to -be able to expel melancholy from the soul. - -At another time he devoted himself entirely to music, and in a long -latticed room, with a vermilion-and-gold ceiling and walls of -olive-green lacquer, he used to give curious concerts in which mad -gipsies tore wild music from little zithers, or grave, yellow-shawled -Tunisians plucked at the strained strings of monstrous lutes, while -grinning Negroes beat monotonously upon copper drums and, crouching -upon scarlet mats, slim turbaned Indians blew through long pipes of -reed or brass and charmed—or feigned to charm—great hooded snakes and -horrible horned adders. The harsh intervals and shrill discords of -barbaric music stirred him at times when Schubert’s grace, and Chopin’s -beautiful sorrows, and the mighty harmonies of Beethoven himself, fell -unheeded on his ear. He collected together from all parts of the world -the strangest instruments that could be found, either in the tombs of -dead nations or among the few savage tribes that have survived contact -with Western civilizations, and loved to touch and try them. He had the -mysterious _juruparis_ of the Rio Negro Indians, that women are not -allowed to look at and that even youths may not see till they have been -subjected to fasting and scourging, and the earthen jars of the -Peruvians that have the shrill cries of birds, and flutes of human -bones such as Alfonso de Ovalle heard in Chile, and the sonorous green -jaspers that are found near Cuzco and give forth a note of singular -sweetness. He had painted gourds filled with pebbles that rattled when -they were shaken; the long _clarin_ of the Mexicans, into which the -performer does not blow, but through which he inhales the air; the -harsh _ture_ of the Amazon tribes, that is sounded by the sentinels who -sit all day long in high trees, and can be heard, it is said, at a -distance of three leagues; the _teponaztli_, that has two vibrating -tongues of wood and is beaten with sticks that are smeared with an -elastic gum obtained from the milky juice of plants; the _yotl_-bells -of the Aztecs, that are hung in clusters like grapes; and a huge -cylindrical drum, covered with the skins of great serpents, like the -one that Bernal Diaz saw when he went with Cortes into the Mexican -temple, and of whose doleful sound he has left us so vivid a -description. The fantastic character of these instruments fascinated -him, and he felt a curious delight in the thought that art, like -Nature, has her monsters, things of bestial shape and with hideous -voices. Yet, after some time, he wearied of them, and would sit in his -box at the opera, either alone or with Lord Henry, listening in rapt -pleasure to “Tannhauser” and seeing in the prelude to that great work -of art a presentation of the tragedy of his own soul. - -On one occasion he took up the study of jewels, and appeared at a -costume ball as Anne de Joyeuse, Admiral of France, in a dress covered -with five hundred and sixty pearls. This taste enthralled him for -years, and, indeed, may be said never to have left him. He would often -spend a whole day settling and resettling in their cases the various -stones that he had collected, such as the olive-green chrysoberyl that -turns red by lamplight, the cymophane with its wirelike line of silver, -the pistachio-coloured peridot, rose-pink and wine-yellow topazes, -carbuncles of fiery scarlet with tremulous, four-rayed stars, flame-red -cinnamon-stones, orange and violet spinels, and amethysts with their -alternate layers of ruby and sapphire. He loved the red gold of the -sunstone, and the moonstone’s pearly whiteness, and the broken rainbow -of the milky opal. He procured from Amsterdam three emeralds of -extraordinary size and richness of colour, and had a turquoise _de la -vieille roche_ that was the envy of all the connoisseurs. - -He discovered wonderful stories, also, about jewels. In Alphonso’s -Clericalis Disciplina a serpent was mentioned with eyes of real -jacinth, and in the romantic history of Alexander, the Conqueror of -Emathia was said to have found in the vale of Jordan snakes “with -collars of real emeralds growing on their backs.” There was a gem in -the brain of the dragon, Philostratus told us, and “by the exhibition -of golden letters and a scarlet robe” the monster could be thrown into -a magical sleep and slain. According to the great alchemist, Pierre de -Boniface, the diamond rendered a man invisible, and the agate of India -made him eloquent. The cornelian appeased anger, and the hyacinth -provoked sleep, and the amethyst drove away the fumes of wine. The -garnet cast out demons, and the hydropicus deprived the moon of her -colour. The selenite waxed and waned with the moon, and the meloceus, -that discovers thieves, could be affected only by the blood of kids. -Leonardus Camillus had seen a white stone taken from the brain of a -newly killed toad, that was a certain antidote against poison. The -bezoar, that was found in the heart of the Arabian deer, was a charm -that could cure the plague. In the nests of Arabian birds was the -aspilates, that, according to Democritus, kept the wearer from any -danger by fire. - -The King of Ceilan rode through his city with a large ruby in his hand, -as the ceremony of his coronation. The gates of the palace of John the -Priest were “made of sardius, with the horn of the horned snake -inwrought, so that no man might bring poison within.” Over the gable -were “two golden apples, in which were two carbuncles,” so that the -gold might shine by day and the carbuncles by night. In Lodge’s strange -romance ‘A Margarite of America’, it was stated that in the chamber of -the queen one could behold “all the chaste ladies of the world, -inchased out of silver, looking through fair mirrours of chrysolites, -carbuncles, sapphires, and greene emeraults.” Marco Polo had seen the -inhabitants of Zipangu place rose-coloured pearls in the mouths of the -dead. A sea-monster had been enamoured of the pearl that the diver -brought to King Perozes, and had slain the thief, and mourned for seven -moons over its loss. When the Huns lured the king into the great pit, -he flung it away—Procopius tells the story—nor was it ever found again, -though the Emperor Anastasius offered five hundred-weight of gold -pieces for it. The King of Malabar had shown to a certain Venetian a -rosary of three hundred and four pearls, one for every god that he -worshipped. - -When the Duke de Valentinois, son of Alexander VI., visited Louis XII. -of France, his horse was loaded with gold leaves, according to -Brantome, and his cap had double rows of rubies that threw out a great -light. Charles of England had ridden in stirrups hung with four hundred -and twenty-one diamonds. Richard II had a coat, valued at thirty -thousand marks, which was covered with balas rubies. Hall described -Henry VIII., on his way to the Tower previous to his coronation, as -wearing “a jacket of raised gold, the placard embroidered with diamonds -and other rich stones, and a great bauderike about his neck of large -balasses.” The favourites of James I wore ear-rings of emeralds set in -gold filigrane. Edward II gave to Piers Gaveston a suit of red-gold -armour studded with jacinths, a collar of gold roses set with -turquoise-stones, and a skull-cap _parsemé_ with pearls. Henry II. wore -jewelled gloves reaching to the elbow, and had a hawk-glove sewn with -twelve rubies and fifty-two great orients. The ducal hat of Charles the -Rash, the last Duke of Burgundy of his race, was hung with pear-shaped -pearls and studded with sapphires. - -How exquisite life had once been! How gorgeous in its pomp and -decoration! Even to read of the luxury of the dead was wonderful. - -Then he turned his attention to embroideries and to the tapestries that -performed the office of frescoes in the chill rooms of the northern -nations of Europe. As he investigated the subject—and he always had an -extraordinary faculty of becoming absolutely absorbed for the moment in -whatever he took up—he was almost saddened by the reflection of the -ruin that time brought on beautiful and wonderful things. He, at any -rate, had escaped that. Summer followed summer, and the yellow jonquils -bloomed and died many times, and nights of horror repeated the story of -their shame, but he was unchanged. No winter marred his face or stained -his flowerlike bloom. How different it was with material things! Where -had they passed to? Where was the great crocus-coloured robe, on which -the gods fought against the giants, that had been worked by brown girls -for the pleasure of Athena? Where the huge velarium that Nero had -stretched across the Colosseum at Rome, that Titan sail of purple on -which was represented the starry sky, and Apollo driving a chariot -drawn by white, gilt-reined steeds? He longed to see the curious -table-napkins wrought for the Priest of the Sun, on which were -displayed all the dainties and viands that could be wanted for a feast; -the mortuary cloth of King Chilperic, with its three hundred golden -bees; the fantastic robes that excited the indignation of the Bishop of -Pontus and were figured with “lions, panthers, bears, dogs, forests, -rocks, hunters—all, in fact, that a painter can copy from nature”; and -the coat that Charles of Orleans once wore, on the sleeves of which -were embroidered the verses of a song beginning “_Madame, je suis tout -joyeux_,” the musical accompaniment of the words being wrought in gold -thread, and each note, of square shape in those days, formed with four -pearls. He read of the room that was prepared at the palace at Rheims -for the use of Queen Joan of Burgundy and was decorated with “thirteen -hundred and twenty-one parrots, made in broidery, and blazoned with the -king’s arms, and five hundred and sixty-one butterflies, whose wings -were similarly ornamented with the arms of the queen, the whole worked -in gold.” Catherine de Medicis had a mourning-bed made for her of black -velvet powdered with crescents and suns. Its curtains were of damask, -with leafy wreaths and garlands, figured upon a gold and silver ground, -and fringed along the edges with broideries of pearls, and it stood in -a room hung with rows of the queen’s devices in cut black velvet upon -cloth of silver. Louis XIV. had gold embroidered caryatides fifteen -feet high in his apartment. The state bed of Sobieski, King of Poland, -was made of Smyrna gold brocade embroidered in turquoises with verses -from the Koran. Its supports were of silver gilt, beautifully chased, -and profusely set with enamelled and jewelled medallions. It had been -taken from the Turkish camp before Vienna, and the standard of Mohammed -had stood beneath the tremulous gilt of its canopy. - -And so, for a whole year, he sought to accumulate the most exquisite -specimens that he could find of textile and embroidered work, getting -the dainty Delhi muslins, finely wrought with gold-thread palmates and -stitched over with iridescent beetles’ wings; the Dacca gauzes, that -from their transparency are known in the East as “woven air,” and -“running water,” and “evening dew”; strange figured cloths from Java; -elaborate yellow Chinese hangings; books bound in tawny satins or fair -blue silks and wrought with _fleurs-de-lis_, birds and images; veils of -_lacis_ worked in Hungary point; Sicilian brocades and stiff Spanish -velvets; Georgian work, with its gilt coins, and Japanese _Foukousas_, -with their green-toned golds and their marvellously plumaged birds. - -He had a special passion, also, for ecclesiastical vestments, as indeed -he had for everything connected with the service of the Church. In the -long cedar chests that lined the west gallery of his house, he had -stored away many rare and beautiful specimens of what is really the -raiment of the Bride of Christ, who must wear purple and jewels and -fine linen that she may hide the pallid macerated body that is worn by -the suffering that she seeks for and wounded by self-inflicted pain. He -possessed a gorgeous cope of crimson silk and gold-thread damask, -figured with a repeating pattern of golden pomegranates set in -six-petalled formal blossoms, beyond which on either side was the -pine-apple device wrought in seed-pearls. The orphreys were divided -into panels representing scenes from the life of the Virgin, and the -coronation of the Virgin was figured in coloured silks upon the hood. -This was Italian work of the fifteenth century. Another cope was of -green velvet, embroidered with heart-shaped groups of acanthus-leaves, -from which spread long-stemmed white blossoms, the details of which -were picked out with silver thread and coloured crystals. The morse -bore a seraph’s head in gold-thread raised work. The orphreys were -woven in a diaper of red and gold silk, and were starred with -medallions of many saints and martyrs, among whom was St. Sebastian. He -had chasubles, also, of amber-coloured silk, and blue silk and gold -brocade, and yellow silk damask and cloth of gold, figured with -representations of the Passion and Crucifixion of Christ, and -embroidered with lions and peacocks and other emblems; dalmatics of -white satin and pink silk damask, decorated with tulips and dolphins -and _fleurs-de-lis_; altar frontals of crimson velvet and blue linen; -and many corporals, chalice-veils, and sudaria. In the mystic offices -to which such things were put, there was something that quickened his -imagination. - -For these treasures, and everything that he collected in his lovely -house, were to be to him means of forgetfulness, modes by which he -could escape, for a season, from the fear that seemed to him at times -to be almost too great to be borne. Upon the walls of the lonely locked -room where he had spent so much of his boyhood, he had hung with his -own hands the terrible portrait whose changing features showed him the -real degradation of his life, and in front of it had draped the -purple-and-gold pall as a curtain. For weeks he would not go there, -would forget the hideous painted thing, and get back his light heart, -his wonderful joyousness, his passionate absorption in mere existence. -Then, suddenly, some night he would creep out of the house, go down to -dreadful places near Blue Gate Fields, and stay there, day after day, -until he was driven away. On his return he would sit in front of the -picture, sometimes loathing it and himself, but filled, at other times, -with that pride of individualism that is half the fascination of sin, -and smiling with secret pleasure at the misshapen shadow that had to -bear the burden that should have been his own. - -After a few years he could not endure to be long out of England, and -gave up the villa that he had shared at Trouville with Lord Henry, as -well as the little white walled-in house at Algiers where they had more -than once spent the winter. He hated to be separated from the picture -that was such a part of his life, and was also afraid that during his -absence some one might gain access to the room, in spite of the -elaborate bars that he had caused to be placed upon the door. - -He was quite conscious that this would tell them nothing. It was true -that the portrait still preserved, under all the foulness and ugliness -of the face, its marked likeness to himself; but what could they learn -from that? He would laugh at any one who tried to taunt him. He had not -painted it. What was it to him how vile and full of shame it looked? -Even if he told them, would they believe it? - -Yet he was afraid. Sometimes when he was down at his great house in -Nottinghamshire, entertaining the fashionable young men of his own rank -who were his chief companions, and astounding the county by the wanton -luxury and gorgeous splendour of his mode of life, he would suddenly -leave his guests and rush back to town to see that the door had not -been tampered with and that the picture was still there. What if it -should be stolen? The mere thought made him cold with horror. Surely -the world would know his secret then. Perhaps the world already -suspected it. - -For, while he fascinated many, there were not a few who distrusted him. -He was very nearly blackballed at a West End club of which his birth -and social position fully entitled him to become a member, and it was -said that on one occasion, when he was brought by a friend into the -smoking-room of the Churchill, the Duke of Berwick and another -gentleman got up in a marked manner and went out. Curious stories -became current about him after he had passed his twenty-fifth year. It -was rumoured that he had been seen brawling with foreign sailors in a -low den in the distant parts of Whitechapel, and that he consorted with -thieves and coiners and knew the mysteries of their trade. His -extraordinary absences became notorious, and, when he used to reappear -again in society, men would whisper to each other in corners, or pass -him with a sneer, or look at him with cold searching eyes, as though -they were determined to discover his secret. - -Of such insolences and attempted slights he, of course, took no notice, -and in the opinion of most people his frank debonair manner, his -charming boyish smile, and the infinite grace of that wonderful youth -that seemed never to leave him, were in themselves a sufficient answer -to the calumnies, for so they termed them, that were circulated about -him. It was remarked, however, that some of those who had been most -intimate with him appeared, after a time, to shun him. Women who had -wildly adored him, and for his sake had braved all social censure and -set convention at defiance, were seen to grow pallid with shame or -horror if Dorian Gray entered the room. - -Yet these whispered scandals only increased in the eyes of many his -strange and dangerous charm. His great wealth was a certain element of -security. Society—civilized society, at least—is never very ready to -believe anything to the detriment of those who are both rich and -fascinating. It feels instinctively that manners are of more importance -than morals, and, in its opinion, the highest respectability is of much -less value than the possession of a good _chef_. And, after all, it is -a very poor consolation to be told that the man who has given one a bad -dinner, or poor wine, is irreproachable in his private life. Even the -cardinal virtues cannot atone for half-cold _entrées_, as Lord Henry -remarked once, in a discussion on the subject, and there is possibly a -good deal to be said for his view. For the canons of good society are, -or should be, the same as the canons of art. Form is absolutely -essential to it. It should have the dignity of a ceremony, as well as -its unreality, and should combine the insincere character of a romantic -play with the wit and beauty that make such plays delightful to us. Is -insincerity such a terrible thing? I think not. It is merely a method -by which we can multiply our personalities. - -Such, at any rate, was Dorian Gray’s opinion. He used to wonder at the -shallow psychology of those who conceive the ego in man as a thing -simple, permanent, reliable, and of one essence. To him, man was a -being with myriad lives and myriad sensations, a complex multiform -creature that bore within itself strange legacies of thought and -passion, and whose very flesh was tainted with the monstrous maladies -of the dead. He loved to stroll through the gaunt cold picture-gallery -of his country house and look at the various portraits of those whose -blood flowed in his veins. Here was Philip Herbert, described by -Francis Osborne, in his Memoires on the Reigns of Queen Elizabeth and -King James, as one who was “caressed by the Court for his handsome -face, which kept him not long company.” Was it young Herbert’s life -that he sometimes led? Had some strange poisonous germ crept from body -to body till it had reached his own? Was it some dim sense of that -ruined grace that had made him so suddenly, and almost without cause, -give utterance, in Basil Hallward’s studio, to the mad prayer that had -so changed his life? Here, in gold-embroidered red doublet, jewelled -surcoat, and gilt-edged ruff and wristbands, stood Sir Anthony Sherard, -with his silver-and-black armour piled at his feet. What had this man’s -legacy been? Had the lover of Giovanna of Naples bequeathed him some -inheritance of sin and shame? Were his own actions merely the dreams -that the dead man had not dared to realize? Here, from the fading -canvas, smiled Lady Elizabeth Devereux, in her gauze hood, pearl -stomacher, and pink slashed sleeves. A flower was in her right hand, -and her left clasped an enamelled collar of white and damask roses. On -a table by her side lay a mandolin and an apple. There were large green -rosettes upon her little pointed shoes. He knew her life, and the -strange stories that were told about her lovers. Had he something of -her temperament in him? These oval, heavy-lidded eyes seemed to look -curiously at him. What of George Willoughby, with his powdered hair and -fantastic patches? How evil he looked! The face was saturnine and -swarthy, and the sensual lips seemed to be twisted with disdain. -Delicate lace ruffles fell over the lean yellow hands that were so -overladen with rings. He had been a macaroni of the eighteenth century, -and the friend, in his youth, of Lord Ferrars. What of the second Lord -Beckenham, the companion of the Prince Regent in his wildest days, and -one of the witnesses at the secret marriage with Mrs. Fitzherbert? How -proud and handsome he was, with his chestnut curls and insolent pose! -What passions had he bequeathed? The world had looked upon him as -infamous. He had led the orgies at Carlton House. The star of the -Garter glittered upon his breast. Beside him hung the portrait of his -wife, a pallid, thin-lipped woman in black. Her blood, also, stirred -within him. How curious it all seemed! And his mother with her Lady -Hamilton face and her moist, wine-dashed lips—he knew what he had got -from her. He had got from her his beauty, and his passion for the -beauty of others. She laughed at him in her loose Bacchante dress. -There were vine leaves in her hair. The purple spilled from the cup she -was holding. The carnations of the painting had withered, but the eyes -were still wonderful in their depth and brilliancy of colour. They -seemed to follow him wherever he went. - -Yet one had ancestors in literature as well as in one’s own race, -nearer perhaps in type and temperament, many of them, and certainly -with an influence of which one was more absolutely conscious. There -were times when it appeared to Dorian Gray that the whole of history -was merely the record of his own life, not as he had lived it in act -and circumstance, but as his imagination had created it for him, as it -had been in his brain and in his passions. He felt that he had known -them all, those strange terrible figures that had passed across the -stage of the world and made sin so marvellous and evil so full of -subtlety. It seemed to him that in some mysterious way their lives had -been his own. - -The hero of the wonderful novel that had so influenced his life had -himself known this curious fancy. In the seventh chapter he tells how, -crowned with laurel, lest lightning might strike him, he had sat, as -Tiberius, in a garden at Capri, reading the shameful books of -Elephantis, while dwarfs and peacocks strutted round him and the -flute-player mocked the swinger of the censer; and, as Caligula, had -caroused with the green-shirted jockeys in their stables and supped in -an ivory manger with a jewel-frontleted horse; and, as Domitian, had -wandered through a corridor lined with marble mirrors, looking round -with haggard eyes for the reflection of the dagger that was to end his -days, and sick with that ennui, that terrible _tædium vitæ_, that comes -on those to whom life denies nothing; and had peered through a clear -emerald at the red shambles of the circus and then, in a litter of -pearl and purple drawn by silver-shod mules, been carried through the -Street of Pomegranates to a House of Gold and heard men cry on Nero -Caesar as he passed by; and, as Elagabalus, had painted his face with -colours, and plied the distaff among the women, and brought the Moon -from Carthage and given her in mystic marriage to the Sun. - -Over and over again Dorian used to read this fantastic chapter, and the -two chapters immediately following, in which, as in some curious -tapestries or cunningly wrought enamels, were pictured the awful and -beautiful forms of those whom vice and blood and weariness had made -monstrous or mad: Filippo, Duke of Milan, who slew his wife and painted -her lips with a scarlet poison that her lover might suck death from the -dead thing he fondled; Pietro Barbi, the Venetian, known as Paul the -Second, who sought in his vanity to assume the title of Formosus, and -whose tiara, valued at two hundred thousand florins, was bought at the -price of a terrible sin; Gian Maria Visconti, who used hounds to chase -living men and whose murdered body was covered with roses by a harlot -who had loved him; the Borgia on his white horse, with Fratricide -riding beside him and his mantle stained with the blood of Perotto; -Pietro Riario, the young Cardinal Archbishop of Florence, child and -minion of Sixtus IV., whose beauty was equalled only by his debauchery, -and who received Leonora of Aragon in a pavilion of white and crimson -silk, filled with nymphs and centaurs, and gilded a boy that he might -serve at the feast as Ganymede or Hylas; Ezzelin, whose melancholy -could be cured only by the spectacle of death, and who had a passion -for red blood, as other men have for red wine—the son of the Fiend, as -was reported, and one who had cheated his father at dice when gambling -with him for his own soul; Giambattista Cibo, who in mockery took the -name of Innocent and into whose torpid veins the blood of three lads -was infused by a Jewish doctor; Sigismondo Malatesta, the lover of -Isotta and the lord of Rimini, whose effigy was burned at Rome as the -enemy of God and man, who strangled Polyssena with a napkin, and gave -poison to Ginevra d’Este in a cup of emerald, and in honour of a -shameful passion built a pagan church for Christian worship; Charles -VI., who had so wildly adored his brother’s wife that a leper had -warned him of the insanity that was coming on him, and who, when his -brain had sickened and grown strange, could only be soothed by Saracen -cards painted with the images of love and death and madness; and, in -his trimmed jerkin and jewelled cap and acanthuslike curls, Grifonetto -Baglioni, who slew Astorre with his bride, and Simonetto with his page, -and whose comeliness was such that, as he lay dying in the yellow -piazza of Perugia, those who had hated him could not choose but weep, -and Atalanta, who had cursed him, blessed him. - -There was a horrible fascination in them all. He saw them at night, and -they troubled his imagination in the day. The Renaissance knew of -strange manners of poisoning—poisoning by a helmet and a lighted torch, -by an embroidered glove and a jewelled fan, by a gilded pomander and by -an amber chain. Dorian Gray had been poisoned by a book. There were -moments when he looked on evil simply as a mode through which he could -realize his conception of the beautiful. - - - - -CHAPTER XII. - - -It was on the ninth of November, the eve of his own thirty-eighth -birthday, as he often remembered afterwards. - -He was walking home about eleven o’clock from Lord Henry’s, where he -had been dining, and was wrapped in heavy furs, as the night was cold -and foggy. At the corner of Grosvenor Square and South Audley Street, a -man passed him in the mist, walking very fast and with the collar of -his grey ulster turned up. He had a bag in his hand. Dorian recognized -him. It was Basil Hallward. A strange sense of fear, for which he could -not account, came over him. He made no sign of recognition and went on -quickly in the direction of his own house. - -But Hallward had seen him. Dorian heard him first stopping on the -pavement and then hurrying after him. In a few moments, his hand was on -his arm. - -“Dorian! What an extraordinary piece of luck! I have been waiting for -you in your library ever since nine o’clock. Finally I took pity on -your tired servant and told him to go to bed, as he let me out. I am -off to Paris by the midnight train, and I particularly wanted to see -you before I left. I thought it was you, or rather your fur coat, as -you passed me. But I wasn’t quite sure. Didn’t you recognize me?” - -“In this fog, my dear Basil? Why, I can’t even recognize Grosvenor -Square. I believe my house is somewhere about here, but I don’t feel at -all certain about it. I am sorry you are going away, as I have not seen -you for ages. But I suppose you will be back soon?” - -“No: I am going to be out of England for six months. I intend to take a -studio in Paris and shut myself up till I have finished a great picture -I have in my head. However, it wasn’t about myself I wanted to talk. -Here we are at your door. Let me come in for a moment. I have something -to say to you.” - -“I shall be charmed. But won’t you miss your train?” said Dorian Gray -languidly as he passed up the steps and opened the door with his -latch-key. - -The lamplight struggled out through the fog, and Hallward looked at his -watch. “I have heaps of time,” he answered. “The train doesn’t go till -twelve-fifteen, and it is only just eleven. In fact, I was on my way to -the club to look for you, when I met you. You see, I shan’t have any -delay about luggage, as I have sent on my heavy things. All I have with -me is in this bag, and I can easily get to Victoria in twenty minutes.” - -Dorian looked at him and smiled. “What a way for a fashionable painter -to travel! A Gladstone bag and an ulster! Come in, or the fog will get -into the house. And mind you don’t talk about anything serious. Nothing -is serious nowadays. At least nothing should be.” - -Hallward shook his head, as he entered, and followed Dorian into the -library. There was a bright wood fire blazing in the large open hearth. -The lamps were lit, and an open Dutch silver spirit-case stood, with -some siphons of soda-water and large cut-glass tumblers, on a little -marqueterie table. - -“You see your servant made me quite at home, Dorian. He gave me -everything I wanted, including your best gold-tipped cigarettes. He is -a most hospitable creature. I like him much better than the Frenchman -you used to have. What has become of the Frenchman, by the bye?” - -Dorian shrugged his shoulders. “I believe he married Lady Radley’s -maid, and has established her in Paris as an English dressmaker. -_Anglomanie_ is very fashionable over there now, I hear. It seems silly -of the French, doesn’t it? But—do you know?—he was not at all a bad -servant. I never liked him, but I had nothing to complain about. One -often imagines things that are quite absurd. He was really very devoted -to me and seemed quite sorry when he went away. Have another -brandy-and-soda? Or would you like hock-and-seltzer? I always take -hock-and-seltzer myself. There is sure to be some in the next room.” - -“Thanks, I won’t have anything more,” said the painter, taking his cap -and coat off and throwing them on the bag that he had placed in the -corner. “And now, my dear fellow, I want to speak to you seriously. -Don’t frown like that. You make it so much more difficult for me.” - -“What is it all about?” cried Dorian in his petulant way, flinging -himself down on the sofa. “I hope it is not about myself. I am tired of -myself to-night. I should like to be somebody else.” - -“It is about yourself,” answered Hallward in his grave deep voice, “and -I must say it to you. I shall only keep you half an hour.” - -Dorian sighed and lit a cigarette. “Half an hour!” he murmured. - -“It is not much to ask of you, Dorian, and it is entirely for your own -sake that I am speaking. I think it right that you should know that the -most dreadful things are being said against you in London.” - -“I don’t wish to know anything about them. I love scandals about other -people, but scandals about myself don’t interest me. They have not got -the charm of novelty.” - -“They must interest you, Dorian. Every gentleman is interested in his -good name. You don’t want people to talk of you as something vile and -degraded. Of course, you have your position, and your wealth, and all -that kind of thing. But position and wealth are not everything. Mind -you, I don’t believe these rumours at all. At least, I can’t believe -them when I see you. Sin is a thing that writes itself across a man’s -face. It cannot be concealed. People talk sometimes of secret vices. -There are no such things. If a wretched man has a vice, it shows itself -in the lines of his mouth, the droop of his eyelids, the moulding of -his hands even. Somebody—I won’t mention his name, but you know -him—came to me last year to have his portrait done. I had never seen -him before, and had never heard anything about him at the time, though -I have heard a good deal since. He offered an extravagant price. I -refused him. There was something in the shape of his fingers that I -hated. I know now that I was quite right in what I fancied about him. -His life is dreadful. But you, Dorian, with your pure, bright, innocent -face, and your marvellous untroubled youth—I can’t believe anything -against you. And yet I see you very seldom, and you never come down to -the studio now, and when I am away from you, and I hear all these -hideous things that people are whispering about you, I don’t know what -to say. Why is it, Dorian, that a man like the Duke of Berwick leaves -the room of a club when you enter it? Why is it that so many gentlemen -in London will neither go to your house or invite you to theirs? You -used to be a friend of Lord Staveley. I met him at dinner last week. -Your name happened to come up in conversation, in connection with the -miniatures you have lent to the exhibition at the Dudley. Staveley -curled his lip and said that you might have the most artistic tastes, -but that you were a man whom no pure-minded girl should be allowed to -know, and whom no chaste woman should sit in the same room with. I -reminded him that I was a friend of yours, and asked him what he meant. -He told me. He told me right out before everybody. It was horrible! Why -is your friendship so fatal to young men? There was that wretched boy -in the Guards who committed suicide. You were his great friend. There -was Sir Henry Ashton, who had to leave England with a tarnished name. -You and he were inseparable. What about Adrian Singleton and his -dreadful end? What about Lord Kent’s only son and his career? I met his -father yesterday in St. James’s Street. He seemed broken with shame and -sorrow. What about the young Duke of Perth? What sort of life has he -got now? What gentleman would associate with him?” - -“Stop, Basil. You are talking about things of which you know nothing,” -said Dorian Gray, biting his lip, and with a note of infinite contempt -in his voice. “You ask me why Berwick leaves a room when I enter it. It -is because I know everything about his life, not because he knows -anything about mine. With such blood as he has in his veins, how could -his record be clean? You ask me about Henry Ashton and young Perth. Did -I teach the one his vices, and the other his debauchery? If Kent’s -silly son takes his wife from the streets, what is that to me? If -Adrian Singleton writes his friend’s name across a bill, am I his -keeper? I know how people chatter in England. The middle classes air -their moral prejudices over their gross dinner-tables, and whisper -about what they call the profligacies of their betters in order to try -and pretend that they are in smart society and on intimate terms with -the people they slander. In this country, it is enough for a man to -have distinction and brains for every common tongue to wag against him. -And what sort of lives do these people, who pose as being moral, lead -themselves? My dear fellow, you forget that we are in the native land -of the hypocrite.” - -“Dorian,” cried Hallward, “that is not the question. England is bad -enough I know, and English society is all wrong. That is the reason why -I want you to be fine. You have not been fine. One has a right to judge -of a man by the effect he has over his friends. Yours seem to lose all -sense of honour, of goodness, of purity. You have filled them with a -madness for pleasure. They have gone down into the depths. You led them -there. Yes: you led them there, and yet you can smile, as you are -smiling now. And there is worse behind. I know you and Harry are -inseparable. Surely for that reason, if for none other, you should not -have made his sister’s name a by-word.” - -“Take care, Basil. You go too far.” - -“I must speak, and you must listen. You shall listen. When you met Lady -Gwendolen, not a breath of scandal had ever touched her. Is there a -single decent woman in London now who would drive with her in the park? -Why, even her children are not allowed to live with her. Then there are -other stories—stories that you have been seen creeping at dawn out of -dreadful houses and slinking in disguise into the foulest dens in -London. Are they true? Can they be true? When I first heard them, I -laughed. I hear them now, and they make me shudder. What about your -country-house and the life that is led there? Dorian, you don’t know -what is said about you. I won’t tell you that I don’t want to preach to -you. I remember Harry saying once that every man who turned himself -into an amateur curate for the moment always began by saying that, and -then proceeded to break his word. I do want to preach to you. I want -you to lead such a life as will make the world respect you. I want you -to have a clean name and a fair record. I want you to get rid of the -dreadful people you associate with. Don’t shrug your shoulders like -that. Don’t be so indifferent. You have a wonderful influence. Let it -be for good, not for evil. They say that you corrupt every one with -whom you become intimate, and that it is quite sufficient for you to -enter a house for shame of some kind to follow after. I don’t know -whether it is so or not. How should I know? But it is said of you. I am -told things that it seems impossible to doubt. Lord Gloucester was one -of my greatest friends at Oxford. He showed me a letter that his wife -had written to him when she was dying alone in her villa at Mentone. -Your name was implicated in the most terrible confession I ever read. I -told him that it was absurd—that I knew you thoroughly and that you -were incapable of anything of the kind. Know you? I wonder do I know -you? Before I could answer that, I should have to see your soul.” - -“To see my soul!” muttered Dorian Gray, starting up from the sofa and -turning almost white from fear. - -“Yes,” answered Hallward gravely, and with deep-toned sorrow in his -voice, “to see your soul. But only God can do that.” - -A bitter laugh of mockery broke from the lips of the younger man. “You -shall see it yourself, to-night!” he cried, seizing a lamp from the -table. “Come: it is your own handiwork. Why shouldn’t you look at it? -You can tell the world all about it afterwards, if you choose. Nobody -would believe you. If they did believe you, they would like me all the -better for it. I know the age better than you do, though you will prate -about it so tediously. Come, I tell you. You have chattered enough -about corruption. Now you shall look on it face to face.” - -There was the madness of pride in every word he uttered. He stamped his -foot upon the ground in his boyish insolent manner. He felt a terrible -joy at the thought that some one else was to share his secret, and that -the man who had painted the portrait that was the origin of all his -shame was to be burdened for the rest of his life with the hideous -memory of what he had done. - -“Yes,” he continued, coming closer to him and looking steadfastly into -his stern eyes, “I shall show you my soul. You shall see the thing that -you fancy only God can see.” - -Hallward started back. “This is blasphemy, Dorian!” he cried. “You must -not say things like that. They are horrible, and they don’t mean -anything.” - -“You think so?” He laughed again. - -“I know so. As for what I said to you to-night, I said it for your -good. You know I have been always a stanch friend to you.” - -“Don’t touch me. Finish what you have to say.” - -A twisted flash of pain shot across the painter’s face. He paused for a -moment, and a wild feeling of pity came over him. After all, what right -had he to pry into the life of Dorian Gray? If he had done a tithe of -what was rumoured about him, how much he must have suffered! Then he -straightened himself up, and walked over to the fire-place, and stood -there, looking at the burning logs with their frostlike ashes and their -throbbing cores of flame. - -“I am waiting, Basil,” said the young man in a hard clear voice. - -He turned round. “What I have to say is this,” he cried. “You must give -me some answer to these horrible charges that are made against you. If -you tell me that they are absolutely untrue from beginning to end, I -shall believe you. Deny them, Dorian, deny them! Can’t you see what I -am going through? My God! don’t tell me that you are bad, and corrupt, -and shameful.” - -Dorian Gray smiled. There was a curl of contempt in his lips. “Come -upstairs, Basil,” he said quietly. “I keep a diary of my life from day -to day, and it never leaves the room in which it is written. I shall -show it to you if you come with me.” - -“I shall come with you, Dorian, if you wish it. I see I have missed my -train. That makes no matter. I can go to-morrow. But don’t ask me to -read anything to-night. All I want is a plain answer to my question.” - -“That shall be given to you upstairs. I could not give it here. You -will not have to read long.” - - - - -CHAPTER XIII. - - -He passed out of the room and began the ascent, Basil Hallward -following close behind. They walked softly, as men do instinctively at -night. The lamp cast fantastic shadows on the wall and staircase. A -rising wind made some of the windows rattle. - -When they reached the top landing, Dorian set the lamp down on the -floor, and taking out the key, turned it in the lock. “You insist on -knowing, Basil?” he asked in a low voice. - -“Yes.” - -“I am delighted,” he answered, smiling. Then he added, somewhat -harshly, “You are the one man in the world who is entitled to know -everything about me. You have had more to do with my life than you -think”; and, taking up the lamp, he opened the door and went in. A cold -current of air passed them, and the light shot up for a moment in a -flame of murky orange. He shuddered. “Shut the door behind you,” he -whispered, as he placed the lamp on the table. - -Hallward glanced round him with a puzzled expression. The room looked -as if it had not been lived in for years. A faded Flemish tapestry, a -curtained picture, an old Italian _cassone_, and an almost empty -book-case—that was all that it seemed to contain, besides a chair and a -table. As Dorian Gray was lighting a half-burned candle that was -standing on the mantelshelf, he saw that the whole place was covered -with dust and that the carpet was in holes. A mouse ran scuffling -behind the wainscoting. There was a damp odour of mildew. - -“So you think that it is only God who sees the soul, Basil? Draw that -curtain back, and you will see mine.” - -The voice that spoke was cold and cruel. “You are mad, Dorian, or -playing a part,” muttered Hallward, frowning. - -“You won’t? Then I must do it myself,” said the young man, and he tore -the curtain from its rod and flung it on the ground. - -An exclamation of horror broke from the painter’s lips as he saw in the -dim light the hideous face on the canvas grinning at him. There was -something in its expression that filled him with disgust and loathing. -Good heavens! it was Dorian Gray’s own face that he was looking at! The -horror, whatever it was, had not yet entirely spoiled that marvellous -beauty. There was still some gold in the thinning hair and some scarlet -on the sensual mouth. The sodden eyes had kept something of the -loveliness of their blue, the noble curves had not yet completely -passed away from chiselled nostrils and from plastic throat. Yes, it -was Dorian himself. But who had done it? He seemed to recognize his own -brushwork, and the frame was his own design. The idea was monstrous, -yet he felt afraid. He seized the lighted candle, and held it to the -picture. In the left-hand corner was his own name, traced in long -letters of bright vermilion. - -It was some foul parody, some infamous ignoble satire. He had never -done that. Still, it was his own picture. He knew it, and he felt as if -his blood had changed in a moment from fire to sluggish ice. His own -picture! What did it mean? Why had it altered? He turned and looked at -Dorian Gray with the eyes of a sick man. His mouth twitched, and his -parched tongue seemed unable to articulate. He passed his hand across -his forehead. It was dank with clammy sweat. - -The young man was leaning against the mantelshelf, watching him with -that strange expression that one sees on the faces of those who are -absorbed in a play when some great artist is acting. There was neither -real sorrow in it nor real joy. There was simply the passion of the -spectator, with perhaps a flicker of triumph in his eyes. He had taken -the flower out of his coat, and was smelling it, or pretending to do -so. - -“What does this mean?” cried Hallward, at last. His own voice sounded -shrill and curious in his ears. - -“Years ago, when I was a boy,” said Dorian Gray, crushing the flower in -his hand, “you met me, flattered me, and taught me to be vain of my -good looks. One day you introduced me to a friend of yours, who -explained to me the wonder of youth, and you finished a portrait of me -that revealed to me the wonder of beauty. In a mad moment that, even -now, I don’t know whether I regret or not, I made a wish, perhaps you -would call it a prayer....” - -“I remember it! Oh, how well I remember it! No! the thing is -impossible. The room is damp. Mildew has got into the canvas. The -paints I used had some wretched mineral poison in them. I tell you the -thing is impossible.” - -“Ah, what is impossible?” murmured the young man, going over to the -window and leaning his forehead against the cold, mist-stained glass. - -“You told me you had destroyed it.” - -“I was wrong. It has destroyed me.” - -“I don’t believe it is my picture.” - -“Can’t you see your ideal in it?” said Dorian bitterly. - -“My ideal, as you call it...” - -“As you called it.” - -“There was nothing evil in it, nothing shameful. You were to me such an -ideal as I shall never meet again. This is the face of a satyr.” - -“It is the face of my soul.” - -“Christ! what a thing I must have worshipped! It has the eyes of a -devil.” - -“Each of us has heaven and hell in him, Basil,” cried Dorian with a -wild gesture of despair. - -Hallward turned again to the portrait and gazed at it. “My God! If it -is true,” he exclaimed, “and this is what you have done with your life, -why, you must be worse even than those who talk against you fancy you -to be!” He held the light up again to the canvas and examined it. The -surface seemed to be quite undisturbed and as he had left it. It was -from within, apparently, that the foulness and horror had come. Through -some strange quickening of inner life the leprosies of sin were slowly -eating the thing away. The rotting of a corpse in a watery grave was -not so fearful. - -His hand shook, and the candle fell from its socket on the floor and -lay there sputtering. He placed his foot on it and put it out. Then he -flung himself into the rickety chair that was standing by the table and -buried his face in his hands. - -“Good God, Dorian, what a lesson! What an awful lesson!” There was no -answer, but he could hear the young man sobbing at the window. “Pray, -Dorian, pray,” he murmured. “What is it that one was taught to say in -one’s boyhood? ‘Lead us not into temptation. Forgive us our sins. Wash -away our iniquities.’ Let us say that together. The prayer of your -pride has been answered. The prayer of your repentance will be answered -also. I worshipped you too much. I am punished for it. You worshipped -yourself too much. We are both punished.” - -Dorian Gray turned slowly around and looked at him with tear-dimmed -eyes. “It is too late, Basil,” he faltered. - -“It is never too late, Dorian. Let us kneel down and try if we cannot -remember a prayer. Isn’t there a verse somewhere, ‘Though your sins be -as scarlet, yet I will make them as white as snow’?” - -“Those words mean nothing to me now.” - -“Hush! Don’t say that. You have done enough evil in your life. My God! -Don’t you see that accursed thing leering at us?” - -Dorian Gray glanced at the picture, and suddenly an uncontrollable -feeling of hatred for Basil Hallward came over him, as though it had -been suggested to him by the image on the canvas, whispered into his -ear by those grinning lips. The mad passions of a hunted animal stirred -within him, and he loathed the man who was seated at the table, more -than in his whole life he had ever loathed anything. He glanced wildly -around. Something glimmered on the top of the painted chest that faced -him. His eye fell on it. He knew what it was. It was a knife that he -had brought up, some days before, to cut a piece of cord, and had -forgotten to take away with him. He moved slowly towards it, passing -Hallward as he did so. As soon as he got behind him, he seized it and -turned round. Hallward stirred in his chair as if he was going to rise. -He rushed at him and dug the knife into the great vein that is behind -the ear, crushing the man’s head down on the table and stabbing again -and again. - -There was a stifled groan and the horrible sound of some one choking -with blood. Three times the outstretched arms shot up convulsively, -waving grotesque, stiff-fingered hands in the air. He stabbed him twice -more, but the man did not move. Something began to trickle on the -floor. He waited for a moment, still pressing the head down. Then he -threw the knife on the table, and listened. - -He could hear nothing, but the drip, drip on the threadbare carpet. He -opened the door and went out on the landing. The house was absolutely -quiet. No one was about. For a few seconds he stood bending over the -balustrade and peering down into the black seething well of darkness. -Then he took out the key and returned to the room, locking himself in -as he did so. - -The thing was still seated in the chair, straining over the table with -bowed head, and humped back, and long fantastic arms. Had it not been -for the red jagged tear in the neck and the clotted black pool that was -slowly widening on the table, one would have said that the man was -simply asleep. - -How quickly it had all been done! He felt strangely calm, and walking -over to the window, opened it and stepped out on the balcony. The wind -had blown the fog away, and the sky was like a monstrous peacock’s -tail, starred with myriads of golden eyes. He looked down and saw the -policeman going his rounds and flashing the long beam of his lantern on -the doors of the silent houses. The crimson spot of a prowling hansom -gleamed at the corner and then vanished. A woman in a fluttering shawl -was creeping slowly by the railings, staggering as she went. Now and -then she stopped and peered back. Once, she began to sing in a hoarse -voice. The policeman strolled over and said something to her. She -stumbled away, laughing. A bitter blast swept across the square. The -gas-lamps flickered and became blue, and the leafless trees shook their -black iron branches to and fro. He shivered and went back, closing the -window behind him. - -Having reached the door, he turned the key and opened it. He did not -even glance at the murdered man. He felt that the secret of the whole -thing was not to realize the situation. The friend who had painted the -fatal portrait to which all his misery had been due had gone out of his -life. That was enough. - -Then he remembered the lamp. It was a rather curious one of Moorish -workmanship, made of dull silver inlaid with arabesques of burnished -steel, and studded with coarse turquoises. Perhaps it might be missed -by his servant, and questions would be asked. He hesitated for a -moment, then he turned back and took it from the table. He could not -help seeing the dead thing. How still it was! How horribly white the -long hands looked! It was like a dreadful wax image. - -Having locked the door behind him, he crept quietly downstairs. The -woodwork creaked and seemed to cry out as if in pain. He stopped -several times and waited. No: everything was still. It was merely the -sound of his own footsteps. - -When he reached the library, he saw the bag and coat in the corner. -They must be hidden away somewhere. He unlocked a secret press that was -in the wainscoting, a press in which he kept his own curious disguises, -and put them into it. He could easily burn them afterwards. Then he -pulled out his watch. It was twenty minutes to two. - -He sat down and began to think. Every year—every month, almost—men were -strangled in England for what he had done. There had been a madness of -murder in the air. Some red star had come too close to the earth.... -And yet, what evidence was there against him? Basil Hallward had left -the house at eleven. No one had seen him come in again. Most of the -servants were at Selby Royal. His valet had gone to bed.... Paris! Yes. -It was to Paris that Basil had gone, and by the midnight train, as he -had intended. With his curious reserved habits, it would be months -before any suspicions would be roused. Months! Everything could be -destroyed long before then. - -A sudden thought struck him. He put on his fur coat and hat and went -out into the hall. There he paused, hearing the slow heavy tread of the -policeman on the pavement outside and seeing the flash of the -bull’s-eye reflected in the window. He waited and held his breath. - -After a few moments he drew back the latch and slipped out, shutting -the door very gently behind him. Then he began ringing the bell. In -about five minutes his valet appeared, half-dressed and looking very -drowsy. - -“I am sorry to have had to wake you up, Francis,” he said, stepping in; -“but I had forgotten my latch-key. What time is it?” - -“Ten minutes past two, sir,” answered the man, looking at the clock and -blinking. - -“Ten minutes past two? How horribly late! You must wake me at nine -to-morrow. I have some work to do.” - -“All right, sir.” - -“Did any one call this evening?” - -“Mr. Hallward, sir. He stayed here till eleven, and then he went away -to catch his train.” - -“Oh! I am sorry I didn’t see him. Did he leave any message?” - -“No, sir, except that he would write to you from Paris, if he did not -find you at the club.” - -“That will do, Francis. Don’t forget to call me at nine to-morrow.” - -“No, sir.” - -The man shambled down the passage in his slippers. - -Dorian Gray threw his hat and coat upon the table and passed into the -library. For a quarter of an hour he walked up and down the room, -biting his lip and thinking. Then he took down the Blue Book from one -of the shelves and began to turn over the leaves. “Alan Campbell, 152, -Hertford Street, Mayfair.” Yes; that was the man he wanted. - - - - -CHAPTER XIV. - - -At nine o’clock the next morning his servant came in with a cup of -chocolate on a tray and opened the shutters. Dorian was sleeping quite -peacefully, lying on his right side, with one hand underneath his -cheek. He looked like a boy who had been tired out with play, or study. - -The man had to touch him twice on the shoulder before he woke, and as -he opened his eyes a faint smile passed across his lips, as though he -had been lost in some delightful dream. Yet he had not dreamed at all. -His night had been untroubled by any images of pleasure or of pain. But -youth smiles without any reason. It is one of its chiefest charms. - -He turned round, and leaning upon his elbow, began to sip his -chocolate. The mellow November sun came streaming into the room. The -sky was bright, and there was a genial warmth in the air. It was almost -like a morning in May. - -Gradually the events of the preceding night crept with silent, -blood-stained feet into his brain and reconstructed themselves there -with terrible distinctness. He winced at the memory of all that he had -suffered, and for a moment the same curious feeling of loathing for -Basil Hallward that had made him kill him as he sat in the chair came -back to him, and he grew cold with passion. The dead man was still -sitting there, too, and in the sunlight now. How horrible that was! -Such hideous things were for the darkness, not for the day. - -He felt that if he brooded on what he had gone through he would sicken -or grow mad. There were sins whose fascination was more in the memory -than in the doing of them, strange triumphs that gratified the pride -more than the passions, and gave to the intellect a quickened sense of -joy, greater than any joy they brought, or could ever bring, to the -senses. But this was not one of them. It was a thing to be driven out -of the mind, to be drugged with poppies, to be strangled lest it might -strangle one itself. - -When the half-hour struck, he passed his hand across his forehead, and -then got up hastily and dressed himself with even more than his usual -care, giving a good deal of attention to the choice of his necktie and -scarf-pin and changing his rings more than once. He spent a long time -also over breakfast, tasting the various dishes, talking to his valet -about some new liveries that he was thinking of getting made for the -servants at Selby, and going through his correspondence. At some of the -letters, he smiled. Three of them bored him. One he read several times -over and then tore up with a slight look of annoyance in his face. -“That awful thing, a woman’s memory!” as Lord Henry had once said. - -After he had drunk his cup of black coffee, he wiped his lips slowly -with a napkin, motioned to his servant to wait, and going over to the -table, sat down and wrote two letters. One he put in his pocket, the -other he handed to the valet. - -“Take this round to 152, Hertford Street, Francis, and if Mr. Campbell -is out of town, get his address.” - -As soon as he was alone, he lit a cigarette and began sketching upon a -piece of paper, drawing first flowers and bits of architecture, and -then human faces. Suddenly he remarked that every face that he drew -seemed to have a fantastic likeness to Basil Hallward. He frowned, and -getting up, went over to the book-case and took out a volume at hazard. -He was determined that he would not think about what had happened until -it became absolutely necessary that he should do so. - -When he had stretched himself on the sofa, he looked at the title-page -of the book. It was Gautier’s “Émaux et Camées”, Charpentier’s -Japanese-paper edition, with the Jacquemart etching. The binding was of -citron-green leather, with a design of gilt trellis-work and dotted -pomegranates. It had been given to him by Adrian Singleton. As he -turned over the pages, his eye fell on the poem about the hand of -Lacenaire, the cold yellow hand “_du supplice encore mal lavée_,” with -its downy red hairs and its “_doigts de faune_.” He glanced at his own -white taper fingers, shuddering slightly in spite of himself, and -passed on, till he came to those lovely stanzas upon Venice: - -Sur une gamme chromatique, - Le sein de perles ruisselant, -La Vénus de l’Adriatique - Sort de l’eau son corps rose et blanc. - -Les dômes, sur l’azur des ondes - Suivant la phrase au pur contour, -S’enflent comme des gorges rondes - Que soulève un soupir d’amour. - -L’esquif aborde et me dépose, - Jetant son amarre au pilier, -Devant une façade rose, - Sur le marbre d’un escalier. - - -How exquisite they were! As one read them, one seemed to be floating -down the green water-ways of the pink and pearl city, seated in a black -gondola with silver prow and trailing curtains. The mere lines looked -to him like those straight lines of turquoise-blue that follow one as -one pushes out to the Lido. The sudden flashes of colour reminded him -of the gleam of the opal-and-iris-throated birds that flutter round the -tall honeycombed Campanile, or stalk, with such stately grace, through -the dim, dust-stained arcades. Leaning back with half-closed eyes, he -kept saying over and over to himself: - -“Devant une façade rose, -Sur le marbre d’un escalier.” - - -The whole of Venice was in those two lines. He remembered the autumn -that he had passed there, and a wonderful love that had stirred him to -mad delightful follies. There was romance in every place. But Venice, -like Oxford, had kept the background for romance, and, to the true -romantic, background was everything, or almost everything. Basil had -been with him part of the time, and had gone wild over Tintoret. Poor -Basil! What a horrible way for a man to die! - -He sighed, and took up the volume again, and tried to forget. He read -of the swallows that fly in and out of the little _café_ at Smyrna -where the Hadjis sit counting their amber beads and the turbaned -merchants smoke their long tasselled pipes and talk gravely to each -other; he read of the Obelisk in the Place de la Concorde that weeps -tears of granite in its lonely sunless exile and longs to be back by -the hot, lotus-covered Nile, where there are Sphinxes, and rose-red -ibises, and white vultures with gilded claws, and crocodiles with small -beryl eyes that crawl over the green steaming mud; he began to brood -over those verses which, drawing music from kiss-stained marble, tell -of that curious statue that Gautier compares to a contralto voice, the -“_monstre charmant_” that couches in the porphyry-room of the Louvre. -But after a time the book fell from his hand. He grew nervous, and a -horrible fit of terror came over him. What if Alan Campbell should be -out of England? Days would elapse before he could come back. Perhaps he -might refuse to come. What could he do then? Every moment was of vital -importance. - -They had been great friends once, five years before—almost inseparable, -indeed. Then the intimacy had come suddenly to an end. When they met in -society now, it was only Dorian Gray who smiled: Alan Campbell never -did. - -He was an extremely clever young man, though he had no real -appreciation of the visible arts, and whatever little sense of the -beauty of poetry he possessed he had gained entirely from Dorian. His -dominant intellectual passion was for science. At Cambridge he had -spent a great deal of his time working in the laboratory, and had taken -a good class in the Natural Science Tripos of his year. Indeed, he was -still devoted to the study of chemistry, and had a laboratory of his -own in which he used to shut himself up all day long, greatly to the -annoyance of his mother, who had set her heart on his standing for -Parliament and had a vague idea that a chemist was a person who made up -prescriptions. He was an excellent musician, however, as well, and -played both the violin and the piano better than most amateurs. In -fact, it was music that had first brought him and Dorian Gray -together—music and that indefinable attraction that Dorian seemed to be -able to exercise whenever he wished—and, indeed, exercised often -without being conscious of it. They had met at Lady Berkshire’s the -night that Rubinstein played there, and after that used to be always -seen together at the opera and wherever good music was going on. For -eighteen months their intimacy lasted. Campbell was always either at -Selby Royal or in Grosvenor Square. To him, as to many others, Dorian -Gray was the type of everything that is wonderful and fascinating in -life. Whether or not a quarrel had taken place between them no one ever -knew. But suddenly people remarked that they scarcely spoke when they -met and that Campbell seemed always to go away early from any party at -which Dorian Gray was present. He had changed, too—was strangely -melancholy at times, appeared almost to dislike hearing music, and -would never himself play, giving as his excuse, when he was called -upon, that he was so absorbed in science that he had no time left in -which to practise. And this was certainly true. Every day he seemed to -become more interested in biology, and his name appeared once or twice -in some of the scientific reviews in connection with certain curious -experiments. - -This was the man Dorian Gray was waiting for. Every second he kept -glancing at the clock. As the minutes went by he became horribly -agitated. At last he got up and began to pace up and down the room, -looking like a beautiful caged thing. He took long stealthy strides. -His hands were curiously cold. - -The suspense became unbearable. Time seemed to him to be crawling with -feet of lead, while he by monstrous winds was being swept towards the -jagged edge of some black cleft of precipice. He knew what was waiting -for him there; saw it, indeed, and, shuddering, crushed with dank hands -his burning lids as though he would have robbed the very brain of sight -and driven the eyeballs back into their cave. It was useless. The brain -had its own food on which it battened, and the imagination, made -grotesque by terror, twisted and distorted as a living thing by pain, -danced like some foul puppet on a stand and grinned through moving -masks. Then, suddenly, time stopped for him. Yes: that blind, -slow-breathing thing crawled no more, and horrible thoughts, time being -dead, raced nimbly on in front, and dragged a hideous future from its -grave, and showed it to him. He stared at it. Its very horror made him -stone. - -At last the door opened and his servant entered. He turned glazed eyes -upon him. - -“Mr. Campbell, sir,” said the man. - -A sigh of relief broke from his parched lips, and the colour came back -to his cheeks. - -“Ask him to come in at once, Francis.” He felt that he was himself -again. His mood of cowardice had passed away. - -The man bowed and retired. In a few moments, Alan Campbell walked in, -looking very stern and rather pale, his pallor being intensified by his -coal-black hair and dark eyebrows. - -“Alan! This is kind of you. I thank you for coming.” - -“I had intended never to enter your house again, Gray. But you said it -was a matter of life and death.” His voice was hard and cold. He spoke -with slow deliberation. There was a look of contempt in the steady -searching gaze that he turned on Dorian. He kept his hands in the -pockets of his Astrakhan coat, and seemed not to have noticed the -gesture with which he had been greeted. - -“Yes: it is a matter of life and death, Alan, and to more than one -person. Sit down.” - -Campbell took a chair by the table, and Dorian sat opposite to him. The -two men’s eyes met. In Dorian’s there was infinite pity. He knew that -what he was going to do was dreadful. - -After a strained moment of silence, he leaned across and said, very -quietly, but watching the effect of each word upon the face of him he -had sent for, “Alan, in a locked room at the top of this house, a room -to which nobody but myself has access, a dead man is seated at a table. -He has been dead ten hours now. Don’t stir, and don’t look at me like -that. Who the man is, why he died, how he died, are matters that do not -concern you. What you have to do is this—” - -“Stop, Gray. I don’t want to know anything further. Whether what you -have told me is true or not true doesn’t concern me. I entirely decline -to be mixed up in your life. Keep your horrible secrets to yourself. -They don’t interest me any more.” - -“Alan, they will have to interest you. This one will have to interest -you. I am awfully sorry for you, Alan. But I can’t help myself. You are -the one man who is able to save me. I am forced to bring you into the -matter. I have no option. Alan, you are scientific. You know about -chemistry and things of that kind. You have made experiments. What you -have got to do is to destroy the thing that is upstairs—to destroy it -so that not a vestige of it will be left. Nobody saw this person come -into the house. Indeed, at the present moment he is supposed to be in -Paris. He will not be missed for months. When he is missed, there must -be no trace of him found here. You, Alan, you must change him, and -everything that belongs to him, into a handful of ashes that I may -scatter in the air.” - -“You are mad, Dorian.” - -“Ah! I was waiting for you to call me Dorian.” - -“You are mad, I tell you—mad to imagine that I would raise a finger to -help you, mad to make this monstrous confession. I will have nothing to -do with this matter, whatever it is. Do you think I am going to peril -my reputation for you? What is it to me what devil’s work you are up -to?” - -“It was suicide, Alan.” - -“I am glad of that. But who drove him to it? You, I should fancy.” - -“Do you still refuse to do this for me?” - -“Of course I refuse. I will have absolutely nothing to do with it. I -don’t care what shame comes on you. You deserve it all. I should not be -sorry to see you disgraced, publicly disgraced. How dare you ask me, of -all men in the world, to mix myself up in this horror? I should have -thought you knew more about people’s characters. Your friend Lord Henry -Wotton can’t have taught you much about psychology, whatever else he -has taught you. Nothing will induce me to stir a step to help you. You -have come to the wrong man. Go to some of your friends. Don’t come to -me.” - -“Alan, it was murder. I killed him. You don’t know what he had made me -suffer. Whatever my life is, he had more to do with the making or the -marring of it than poor Harry has had. He may not have intended it, the -result was the same.” - -“Murder! Good God, Dorian, is that what you have come to? I shall not -inform upon you. It is not my business. Besides, without my stirring in -the matter, you are certain to be arrested. Nobody ever commits a crime -without doing something stupid. But I will have nothing to do with it.” - -“You must have something to do with it. Wait, wait a moment; listen to -me. Only listen, Alan. All I ask of you is to perform a certain -scientific experiment. You go to hospitals and dead-houses, and the -horrors that you do there don’t affect you. If in some hideous -dissecting-room or fetid laboratory you found this man lying on a -leaden table with red gutters scooped out in it for the blood to flow -through, you would simply look upon him as an admirable subject. You -would not turn a hair. You would not believe that you were doing -anything wrong. On the contrary, you would probably feel that you were -benefiting the human race, or increasing the sum of knowledge in the -world, or gratifying intellectual curiosity, or something of that kind. -What I want you to do is merely what you have often done before. -Indeed, to destroy a body must be far less horrible than what you are -accustomed to work at. And, remember, it is the only piece of evidence -against me. If it is discovered, I am lost; and it is sure to be -discovered unless you help me.” - -“I have no desire to help you. You forget that. I am simply indifferent -to the whole thing. It has nothing to do with me.” - -“Alan, I entreat you. Think of the position I am in. Just before you -came I almost fainted with terror. You may know terror yourself some -day. No! don’t think of that. Look at the matter purely from the -scientific point of view. You don’t inquire where the dead things on -which you experiment come from. Don’t inquire now. I have told you too -much as it is. But I beg of you to do this. We were friends once, -Alan.” - -“Don’t speak about those days, Dorian—they are dead.” - -“The dead linger sometimes. The man upstairs will not go away. He is -sitting at the table with bowed head and outstretched arms. Alan! Alan! -If you don’t come to my assistance, I am ruined. Why, they will hang -me, Alan! Don’t you understand? They will hang me for what I have -done.” - -“There is no good in prolonging this scene. I absolutely refuse to do -anything in the matter. It is insane of you to ask me.” - -“You refuse?” - -“Yes.” - -“I entreat you, Alan.” - -“It is useless.” - -The same look of pity came into Dorian Gray’s eyes. Then he stretched -out his hand, took a piece of paper, and wrote something on it. He read -it over twice, folded it carefully, and pushed it across the table. -Having done this, he got up and went over to the window. - -Campbell looked at him in surprise, and then took up the paper, and -opened it. As he read it, his face became ghastly pale and he fell back -in his chair. A horrible sense of sickness came over him. He felt as if -his heart was beating itself to death in some empty hollow. - -After two or three minutes of terrible silence, Dorian turned round and -came and stood behind him, putting his hand upon his shoulder. - -“I am so sorry for you, Alan,” he murmured, “but you leave me no -alternative. I have a letter written already. Here it is. You see the -address. If you don’t help me, I must send it. If you don’t help me, I -will send it. You know what the result will be. But you are going to -help me. It is impossible for you to refuse now. I tried to spare you. -You will do me the justice to admit that. You were stern, harsh, -offensive. You treated me as no man has ever dared to treat me—no -living man, at any rate. I bore it all. Now it is for me to dictate -terms.” - -Campbell buried his face in his hands, and a shudder passed through -him. - -“Yes, it is my turn to dictate terms, Alan. You know what they are. The -thing is quite simple. Come, don’t work yourself into this fever. The -thing has to be done. Face it, and do it.” - -A groan broke from Campbell’s lips and he shivered all over. The -ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece seemed to him to be dividing -time into separate atoms of agony, each of which was too terrible to be -borne. He felt as if an iron ring was being slowly tightened round his -forehead, as if the disgrace with which he was threatened had already -come upon him. The hand upon his shoulder weighed like a hand of lead. -It was intolerable. It seemed to crush him. - -“Come, Alan, you must decide at once.” - -“I cannot do it,” he said, mechanically, as though words could alter -things. - -“You must. You have no choice. Don’t delay.” - -He hesitated a moment. “Is there a fire in the room upstairs?” - -“Yes, there is a gas-fire with asbestos.” - -“I shall have to go home and get some things from the laboratory.” - -“No, Alan, you must not leave the house. Write out on a sheet of -notepaper what you want and my servant will take a cab and bring the -things back to you.” - -Campbell scrawled a few lines, blotted them, and addressed an envelope -to his assistant. Dorian took the note up and read it carefully. Then -he rang the bell and gave it to his valet, with orders to return as -soon as possible and to bring the things with him. - -As the hall door shut, Campbell started nervously, and having got up -from the chair, went over to the chimney-piece. He was shivering with a -kind of ague. For nearly twenty minutes, neither of the men spoke. A -fly buzzed noisily about the room, and the ticking of the clock was -like the beat of a hammer. - -As the chime struck one, Campbell turned round, and looking at Dorian -Gray, saw that his eyes were filled with tears. There was something in -the purity and refinement of that sad face that seemed to enrage him. -“You are infamous, absolutely infamous!” he muttered. - -“Hush, Alan. You have saved my life,” said Dorian. - -“Your life? Good heavens! what a life that is! You have gone from -corruption to corruption, and now you have culminated in crime. In -doing what I am going to do—what you force me to do—it is not of your -life that I am thinking.” - -“Ah, Alan,” murmured Dorian with a sigh, “I wish you had a thousandth -part of the pity for me that I have for you.” He turned away as he -spoke and stood looking out at the garden. Campbell made no answer. - -After about ten minutes a knock came to the door, and the servant -entered, carrying a large mahogany chest of chemicals, with a long coil -of steel and platinum wire and two rather curiously shaped iron clamps. - -“Shall I leave the things here, sir?” he asked Campbell. - -“Yes,” said Dorian. “And I am afraid, Francis, that I have another -errand for you. What is the name of the man at Richmond who supplies -Selby with orchids?” - -“Harden, sir.” - -“Yes—Harden. You must go down to Richmond at once, see Harden -personally, and tell him to send twice as many orchids as I ordered, -and to have as few white ones as possible. In fact, I don’t want any -white ones. It is a lovely day, Francis, and Richmond is a very pretty -place—otherwise I wouldn’t bother you about it.” - -“No trouble, sir. At what time shall I be back?” - -Dorian looked at Campbell. “How long will your experiment take, Alan?” -he said in a calm indifferent voice. The presence of a third person in -the room seemed to give him extraordinary courage. - -Campbell frowned and bit his lip. “It will take about five hours,” he -answered. - -“It will be time enough, then, if you are back at half-past seven, -Francis. Or stay: just leave my things out for dressing. You can have -the evening to yourself. I am not dining at home, so I shall not want -you.” - -“Thank you, sir,” said the man, leaving the room. - -“Now, Alan, there is not a moment to be lost. How heavy this chest is! -I’ll take it for you. You bring the other things.” He spoke rapidly and -in an authoritative manner. Campbell felt dominated by him. They left -the room together. - -When they reached the top landing, Dorian took out the key and turned -it in the lock. Then he stopped, and a troubled look came into his -eyes. He shuddered. “I don’t think I can go in, Alan,” he murmured. - -“It is nothing to me. I don’t require you,” said Campbell coldly. - -Dorian half opened the door. As he did so, he saw the face of his -portrait leering in the sunlight. On the floor in front of it the torn -curtain was lying. He remembered that the night before he had -forgotten, for the first time in his life, to hide the fatal canvas, -and was about to rush forward, when he drew back with a shudder. - -What was that loathsome red dew that gleamed, wet and glistening, on -one of the hands, as though the canvas had sweated blood? How horrible -it was!—more horrible, it seemed to him for the moment, than the silent -thing that he knew was stretched across the table, the thing whose -grotesque misshapen shadow on the spotted carpet showed him that it had -not stirred, but was still there, as he had left it. - -He heaved a deep breath, opened the door a little wider, and with -half-closed eyes and averted head, walked quickly in, determined that -he would not look even once upon the dead man. Then, stooping down and -taking up the gold-and-purple hanging, he flung it right over the -picture. - -There he stopped, feeling afraid to turn round, and his eyes fixed -themselves on the intricacies of the pattern before him. He heard -Campbell bringing in the heavy chest, and the irons, and the other -things that he had required for his dreadful work. He began to wonder -if he and Basil Hallward had ever met, and, if so, what they had -thought of each other. - -“Leave me now,” said a stern voice behind him. - -He turned and hurried out, just conscious that the dead man had been -thrust back into the chair and that Campbell was gazing into a -glistening yellow face. As he was going downstairs, he heard the key -being turned in the lock. - -It was long after seven when Campbell came back into the library. He -was pale, but absolutely calm. “I have done what you asked me to do,” -he muttered. “And now, good-bye. Let us never see each other again.” - -“You have saved me from ruin, Alan. I cannot forget that,” said Dorian -simply. - -As soon as Campbell had left, he went upstairs. There was a horrible -smell of nitric acid in the room. But the thing that had been sitting -at the table was gone. - - - - -CHAPTER XV. - - -That evening, at eight-thirty, exquisitely dressed and wearing a large -button-hole of Parma violets, Dorian Gray was ushered into Lady -Narborough’s drawing-room by bowing servants. His forehead was -throbbing with maddened nerves, and he felt wildly excited, but his -manner as he bent over his hostess’s hand was as easy and graceful as -ever. Perhaps one never seems so much at one’s ease as when one has to -play a part. Certainly no one looking at Dorian Gray that night could -have believed that he had passed through a tragedy as horrible as any -tragedy of our age. Those finely shaped fingers could never have -clutched a knife for sin, nor those smiling lips have cried out on God -and goodness. He himself could not help wondering at the calm of his -demeanour, and for a moment felt keenly the terrible pleasure of a -double life. - -It was a small party, got up rather in a hurry by Lady Narborough, who -was a very clever woman with what Lord Henry used to describe as the -remains of really remarkable ugliness. She had proved an excellent wife -to one of our most tedious ambassadors, and having buried her husband -properly in a marble mausoleum, which she had herself designed, and -married off her daughters to some rich, rather elderly men, she devoted -herself now to the pleasures of French fiction, French cookery, and -French _esprit_ when she could get it. - -Dorian was one of her especial favourites, and she always told him that -she was extremely glad she had not met him in early life. “I know, my -dear, I should have fallen madly in love with you,” she used to say, -“and thrown my bonnet right over the mills for your sake. It is most -fortunate that you were not thought of at the time. As it was, our -bonnets were so unbecoming, and the mills were so occupied in trying to -raise the wind, that I never had even a flirtation with anybody. -However, that was all Narborough’s fault. He was dreadfully -short-sighted, and there is no pleasure in taking in a husband who -never sees anything.” - -Her guests this evening were rather tedious. The fact was, as she -explained to Dorian, behind a very shabby fan, one of her married -daughters had come up quite suddenly to stay with her, and, to make -matters worse, had actually brought her husband with her. “I think it -is most unkind of her, my dear,” she whispered. “Of course I go and -stay with them every summer after I come from Homburg, but then an old -woman like me must have fresh air sometimes, and besides, I really wake -them up. You don’t know what an existence they lead down there. It is -pure unadulterated country life. They get up early, because they have -so much to do, and go to bed early, because they have so little to -think about. There has not been a scandal in the neighbourhood since -the time of Queen Elizabeth, and consequently they all fall asleep -after dinner. You shan’t sit next either of them. You shall sit by me -and amuse me.” - -Dorian murmured a graceful compliment and looked round the room. Yes: -it was certainly a tedious party. Two of the people he had never seen -before, and the others consisted of Ernest Harrowden, one of those -middle-aged mediocrities so common in London clubs who have no enemies, -but are thoroughly disliked by their friends; Lady Ruxton, an -overdressed woman of forty-seven, with a hooked nose, who was always -trying to get herself compromised, but was so peculiarly plain that to -her great disappointment no one would ever believe anything against -her; Mrs. Erlynne, a pushing nobody, with a delightful lisp and -Venetian-red hair; Lady Alice Chapman, his hostess’s daughter, a dowdy -dull girl, with one of those characteristic British faces that, once -seen, are never remembered; and her husband, a red-cheeked, -white-whiskered creature who, like so many of his class, was under the -impression that inordinate joviality can atone for an entire lack of -ideas. - -He was rather sorry he had come, till Lady Narborough, looking at the -great ormolu gilt clock that sprawled in gaudy curves on the -mauve-draped mantelshelf, exclaimed: “How horrid of Henry Wotton to be -so late! I sent round to him this morning on chance and he promised -faithfully not to disappoint me.” - -It was some consolation that Harry was to be there, and when the door -opened and he heard his slow musical voice lending charm to some -insincere apology, he ceased to feel bored. - -But at dinner he could not eat anything. Plate after plate went away -untasted. Lady Narborough kept scolding him for what she called “an -insult to poor Adolphe, who invented the _menu_ specially for you,” and -now and then Lord Henry looked across at him, wondering at his silence -and abstracted manner. From time to time the butler filled his glass -with champagne. He drank eagerly, and his thirst seemed to increase. - -“Dorian,” said Lord Henry at last, as the _chaud-froid_ was being -handed round, “what is the matter with you to-night? You are quite out -of sorts.” - -“I believe he is in love,” cried Lady Narborough, “and that he is -afraid to tell me for fear I should be jealous. He is quite right. I -certainly should.” - -“Dear Lady Narborough,” murmured Dorian, smiling, “I have not been in -love for a whole week—not, in fact, since Madame de Ferrol left town.” - -“How you men can fall in love with that woman!” exclaimed the old lady. -“I really cannot understand it.” - -“It is simply because she remembers you when you were a little girl, -Lady Narborough,” said Lord Henry. “She is the one link between us and -your short frocks.” - -“She does not remember my short frocks at all, Lord Henry. But I -remember her very well at Vienna thirty years ago, and how _décolletée_ -she was then.” - -“She is still _décolletée_,” he answered, taking an olive in his long -fingers; “and when she is in a very smart gown she looks like an -_édition de luxe_ of a bad French novel. She is really wonderful, and -full of surprises. Her capacity for family affection is extraordinary. -When her third husband died, her hair turned quite gold from grief.” - -“How can you, Harry!” cried Dorian. - -“It is a most romantic explanation,” laughed the hostess. “But her -third husband, Lord Henry! You don’t mean to say Ferrol is the fourth?” - -“Certainly, Lady Narborough.” - -“I don’t believe a word of it.” - -“Well, ask Mr. Gray. He is one of her most intimate friends.” - -“Is it true, Mr. Gray?” - -“She assures me so, Lady Narborough,” said Dorian. “I asked her -whether, like Marguerite de Navarre, she had their hearts embalmed and -hung at her girdle. She told me she didn’t, because none of them had -had any hearts at all.” - -“Four husbands! Upon my word that is _trop de zêle_.” - -“_Trop d’audace_, I tell her,” said Dorian. - -“Oh! she is audacious enough for anything, my dear. And what is Ferrol -like? I don’t know him.” - -“The husbands of very beautiful women belong to the criminal classes,” -said Lord Henry, sipping his wine. - -Lady Narborough hit him with her fan. “Lord Henry, I am not at all -surprised that the world says that you are extremely wicked.” - -“But what world says that?” asked Lord Henry, elevating his eyebrows. -“It can only be the next world. This world and I are on excellent -terms.” - -“Everybody I know says you are very wicked,” cried the old lady, -shaking her head. - -Lord Henry looked serious for some moments. “It is perfectly -monstrous,” he said, at last, “the way people go about nowadays saying -things against one behind one’s back that are absolutely and entirely -true.” - -“Isn’t he incorrigible?” cried Dorian, leaning forward in his chair. - -“I hope so,” said his hostess, laughing. “But really, if you all -worship Madame de Ferrol in this ridiculous way, I shall have to marry -again so as to be in the fashion.” - -“You will never marry again, Lady Narborough,” broke in Lord Henry. -“You were far too happy. When a woman marries again, it is because she -detested her first husband. When a man marries again, it is because he -adored his first wife. Women try their luck; men risk theirs.” - -“Narborough wasn’t perfect,” cried the old lady. - -“If he had been, you would not have loved him, my dear lady,” was the -rejoinder. “Women love us for our defects. If we have enough of them, -they will forgive us everything, even our intellects. You will never -ask me to dinner again after saying this, I am afraid, Lady Narborough, -but it is quite true.” - -“Of course it is true, Lord Henry. If we women did not love you for -your defects, where would you all be? Not one of you would ever be -married. You would be a set of unfortunate bachelors. Not, however, -that that would alter you much. Nowadays all the married men live like -bachelors, and all the bachelors like married men.” - -“_Fin de siêcle_,” murmured Lord Henry. - -“_Fin du globe_,” answered his hostess. - -“I wish it were _fin du globe_,” said Dorian with a sigh. “Life is a -great disappointment.” - -“Ah, my dear,” cried Lady Narborough, putting on her gloves, “don’t -tell me that you have exhausted life. When a man says that one knows -that life has exhausted him. Lord Henry is very wicked, and I sometimes -wish that I had been; but you are made to be good—you look so good. I -must find you a nice wife. Lord Henry, don’t you think that Mr. Gray -should get married?” - -“I am always telling him so, Lady Narborough,” said Lord Henry with a -bow. - -“Well, we must look out for a suitable match for him. I shall go -through Debrett carefully to-night and draw out a list of all the -eligible young ladies.” - -“With their ages, Lady Narborough?” asked Dorian. - -“Of course, with their ages, slightly edited. But nothing must be done -in a hurry. I want it to be what _The Morning Post_ calls a suitable -alliance, and I want you both to be happy.” - -“What nonsense people talk about happy marriages!” exclaimed Lord -Henry. “A man can be happy with any woman, as long as he does not love -her.” - -“Ah! what a cynic you are!” cried the old lady, pushing back her chair -and nodding to Lady Ruxton. “You must come and dine with me soon again. -You are really an admirable tonic, much better than what Sir Andrew -prescribes for me. You must tell me what people you would like to meet, -though. I want it to be a delightful gathering.” - -“I like men who have a future and women who have a past,” he answered. -“Or do you think that would make it a petticoat party?” - -“I fear so,” she said, laughing, as she stood up. “A thousand pardons, -my dear Lady Ruxton,” she added, “I didn’t see you hadn’t finished your -cigarette.” - -“Never mind, Lady Narborough. I smoke a great deal too much. I am going -to limit myself, for the future.” - -“Pray don’t, Lady Ruxton,” said Lord Henry. “Moderation is a fatal -thing. Enough is as bad as a meal. More than enough is as good as a -feast.” - -Lady Ruxton glanced at him curiously. “You must come and explain that -to me some afternoon, Lord Henry. It sounds a fascinating theory,” she -murmured, as she swept out of the room. - -“Now, mind you don’t stay too long over your politics and scandal,” -cried Lady Narborough from the door. “If you do, we are sure to -squabble upstairs.” - -The men laughed, and Mr. Chapman got up solemnly from the foot of the -table and came up to the top. Dorian Gray changed his seat and went and -sat by Lord Henry. Mr. Chapman began to talk in a loud voice about the -situation in the House of Commons. He guffawed at his adversaries. The -word _doctrinaire_—word full of terror to the British mind—reappeared -from time to time between his explosions. An alliterative prefix served -as an ornament of oratory. He hoisted the Union Jack on the pinnacles -of thought. The inherited stupidity of the race—sound English common -sense he jovially termed it—was shown to be the proper bulwark for -society. - -A smile curved Lord Henry’s lips, and he turned round and looked at -Dorian. - -“Are you better, my dear fellow?” he asked. “You seemed rather out of -sorts at dinner.” - -“I am quite well, Harry. I am tired. That is all.” - -“You were charming last night. The little duchess is quite devoted to -you. She tells me she is going down to Selby.” - -“She has promised to come on the twentieth.” - -“Is Monmouth to be there, too?” - -“Oh, yes, Harry.” - -“He bores me dreadfully, almost as much as he bores her. She is very -clever, too clever for a woman. She lacks the indefinable charm of -weakness. It is the feet of clay that make the gold of the image -precious. Her feet are very pretty, but they are not feet of clay. -White porcelain feet, if you like. They have been through the fire, and -what fire does not destroy, it hardens. She has had experiences.” - -“How long has she been married?” asked Dorian. - -“An eternity, she tells me. I believe, according to the peerage, it is -ten years, but ten years with Monmouth must have been like eternity, -with time thrown in. Who else is coming?” - -“Oh, the Willoughbys, Lord Rugby and his wife, our hostess, Geoffrey -Clouston, the usual set. I have asked Lord Grotrian.” - -“I like him,” said Lord Henry. “A great many people don’t, but I find -him charming. He atones for being occasionally somewhat overdressed by -being always absolutely over-educated. He is a very modern type.” - -“I don’t know if he will be able to come, Harry. He may have to go to -Monte Carlo with his father.” - -“Ah! what a nuisance people’s people are! Try and make him come. By the -way, Dorian, you ran off very early last night. You left before eleven. -What did you do afterwards? Did you go straight home?” - -Dorian glanced at him hurriedly and frowned. - -“No, Harry,” he said at last, “I did not get home till nearly three.” - -“Did you go to the club?” - -“Yes,” he answered. Then he bit his lip. “No, I don’t mean that. I -didn’t go to the club. I walked about. I forget what I did.... How -inquisitive you are, Harry! You always want to know what one has been -doing. I always want to forget what I have been doing. I came in at -half-past two, if you wish to know the exact time. I had left my -latch-key at home, and my servant had to let me in. If you want any -corroborative evidence on the subject, you can ask him.” - -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. “My dear fellow, as if I cared! Let -us go up to the drawing-room. No sherry, thank you, Mr. Chapman. -Something has happened to you, Dorian. Tell me what it is. You are not -yourself to-night.” - -“Don’t mind me, Harry. I am irritable, and out of temper. I shall come -round and see you to-morrow, or next day. Make my excuses to Lady -Narborough. I shan’t go upstairs. I shall go home. I must go home.” - -“All right, Dorian. I dare say I shall see you to-morrow at tea-time. -The duchess is coming.” - -“I will try to be there, Harry,” he said, leaving the room. As he drove -back to his own house, he was conscious that the sense of terror he -thought he had strangled had come back to him. Lord Henry’s casual -questioning had made him lose his nerve for the moment, and he wanted -his nerve still. Things that were dangerous had to be destroyed. He -winced. He hated the idea of even touching them. - -Yet it had to be done. He realized that, and when he had locked the -door of his library, he opened the secret press into which he had -thrust Basil Hallward’s coat and bag. A huge fire was blazing. He piled -another log on it. The smell of the singeing clothes and burning -leather was horrible. It took him three-quarters of an hour to consume -everything. At the end he felt faint and sick, and having lit some -Algerian pastilles in a pierced copper brazier, he bathed his hands and -forehead with a cool musk-scented vinegar. - -Suddenly he started. His eyes grew strangely bright, and he gnawed -nervously at his underlip. Between two of the windows stood a large -Florentine cabinet, made out of ebony and inlaid with ivory and blue -lapis. He watched it as though it were a thing that could fascinate and -make afraid, as though it held something that he longed for and yet -almost loathed. His breath quickened. A mad craving came over him. He -lit a cigarette and then threw it away. His eyelids drooped till the -long fringed lashes almost touched his cheek. But he still watched the -cabinet. At last he got up from the sofa on which he had been lying, -went over to it, and having unlocked it, touched some hidden spring. A -triangular drawer passed slowly out. His fingers moved instinctively -towards it, dipped in, and closed on something. It was a small Chinese -box of black and gold-dust lacquer, elaborately wrought, the sides -patterned with curved waves, and the silken cords hung with round -crystals and tasselled in plaited metal threads. He opened it. Inside -was a green paste, waxy in lustre, the odour curiously heavy and -persistent. - -He hesitated for some moments, with a strangely immobile smile upon his -face. Then shivering, though the atmosphere of the room was terribly -hot, he drew himself up and glanced at the clock. It was twenty minutes -to twelve. He put the box back, shutting the cabinet doors as he did -so, and went into his bedroom. - -As midnight was striking bronze blows upon the dusky air, Dorian Gray, -dressed commonly, and with a muffler wrapped round his throat, crept -quietly out of his house. In Bond Street he found a hansom with a good -horse. He hailed it and in a low voice gave the driver an address. - -The man shook his head. “It is too far for me,” he muttered. - -“Here is a sovereign for you,” said Dorian. “You shall have another if -you drive fast.” - -“All right, sir,” answered the man, “you will be there in an hour,” and -after his fare had got in he turned his horse round and drove rapidly -towards the river. - - - - -CHAPTER XVI. - - -A cold rain began to fall, and the blurred street-lamps looked ghastly -in the dripping mist. The public-houses were just closing, and dim men -and women were clustering in broken groups round their doors. From some -of the bars came the sound of horrible laughter. In others, drunkards -brawled and screamed. - -Lying back in the hansom, with his hat pulled over his forehead, Dorian -Gray watched with listless eyes the sordid shame of the great city, and -now and then he repeated to himself the words that Lord Henry had said -to him on the first day they had met, “To cure the soul by means of the -senses, and the senses by means of the soul.” Yes, that was the secret. -He had often tried it, and would try it again now. There were opium -dens where one could buy oblivion, dens of horror where the memory of -old sins could be destroyed by the madness of sins that were new. - -The moon hung low in the sky like a yellow skull. From time to time a -huge misshapen cloud stretched a long arm across and hid it. The -gas-lamps grew fewer, and the streets more narrow and gloomy. Once the -man lost his way and had to drive back half a mile. A steam rose from -the horse as it splashed up the puddles. The sidewindows of the hansom -were clogged with a grey-flannel mist. - -“To cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses by means of -the soul!” How the words rang in his ears! His soul, certainly, was -sick to death. Was it true that the senses could cure it? Innocent -blood had been spilled. What could atone for that? Ah! for that there -was no atonement; but though forgiveness was impossible, forgetfulness -was possible still, and he was determined to forget, to stamp the thing -out, to crush it as one would crush the adder that had stung one. -Indeed, what right had Basil to have spoken to him as he had done? Who -had made him a judge over others? He had said things that were -dreadful, horrible, not to be endured. - -On and on plodded the hansom, going slower, it seemed to him, at each -step. He thrust up the trap and called to the man to drive faster. The -hideous hunger for opium began to gnaw at him. His throat burned and -his delicate hands twitched nervously together. He struck at the horse -madly with his stick. The driver laughed and whipped up. He laughed in -answer, and the man was silent. - -The way seemed interminable, and the streets like the black web of some -sprawling spider. The monotony became unbearable, and as the mist -thickened, he felt afraid. - -Then they passed by lonely brickfields. The fog was lighter here, and -he could see the strange, bottle-shaped kilns with their orange, -fanlike tongues of fire. A dog barked as they went by, and far away in -the darkness some wandering sea-gull screamed. The horse stumbled in a -rut, then swerved aside and broke into a gallop. - -After some time they left the clay road and rattled again over -rough-paven streets. Most of the windows were dark, but now and then -fantastic shadows were silhouetted against some lamplit blind. He -watched them curiously. They moved like monstrous marionettes and made -gestures like live things. He hated them. A dull rage was in his heart. -As they turned a corner, a woman yelled something at them from an open -door, and two men ran after the hansom for about a hundred yards. The -driver beat at them with his whip. - -It is said that passion makes one think in a circle. Certainly with -hideous iteration the bitten lips of Dorian Gray shaped and reshaped -those subtle words that dealt with soul and sense, till he had found in -them the full expression, as it were, of his mood, and justified, by -intellectual approval, passions that without such justification would -still have dominated his temper. From cell to cell of his brain crept -the one thought; and the wild desire to live, most terrible of all -man’s appetites, quickened into force each trembling nerve and fibre. -Ugliness that had once been hateful to him because it made things real, -became dear to him now for that very reason. Ugliness was the one -reality. The coarse brawl, the loathsome den, the crude violence of -disordered life, the very vileness of thief and outcast, were more -vivid, in their intense actuality of impression, than all the gracious -shapes of art, the dreamy shadows of song. They were what he needed for -forgetfulness. In three days he would be free. - -Suddenly the man drew up with a jerk at the top of a dark lane. Over -the low roofs and jagged chimney-stacks of the houses rose the black -masts of ships. Wreaths of white mist clung like ghostly sails to the -yards. - -“Somewhere about here, sir, ain’t it?” he asked huskily through the -trap. - -Dorian started and peered round. “This will do,” he answered, and -having got out hastily and given the driver the extra fare he had -promised him, he walked quickly in the direction of the quay. Here and -there a lantern gleamed at the stern of some huge merchantman. The -light shook and splintered in the puddles. A red glare came from an -outward-bound steamer that was coaling. The slimy pavement looked like -a wet mackintosh. - -He hurried on towards the left, glancing back now and then to see if he -was being followed. In about seven or eight minutes he reached a small -shabby house that was wedged in between two gaunt factories. In one of -the top-windows stood a lamp. He stopped and gave a peculiar knock. - -After a little time he heard steps in the passage and the chain being -unhooked. The door opened quietly, and he went in without saying a word -to the squat misshapen figure that flattened itself into the shadow as -he passed. At the end of the hall hung a tattered green curtain that -swayed and shook in the gusty wind which had followed him in from the -street. He dragged it aside and entered a long low room which looked as -if it had once been a third-rate dancing-saloon. Shrill flaring -gas-jets, dulled and distorted in the fly-blown mirrors that faced -them, were ranged round the walls. Greasy reflectors of ribbed tin -backed them, making quivering disks of light. The floor was covered -with ochre-coloured sawdust, trampled here and there into mud, and -stained with dark rings of spilled liquor. Some Malays were crouching -by a little charcoal stove, playing with bone counters and showing -their white teeth as they chattered. In one corner, with his head -buried in his arms, a sailor sprawled over a table, and by the tawdrily -painted bar that ran across one complete side stood two haggard women, -mocking an old man who was brushing the sleeves of his coat with an -expression of disgust. “He thinks he’s got red ants on him,” laughed -one of them, as Dorian passed by. The man looked at her in terror and -began to whimper. - -At the end of the room there was a little staircase, leading to a -darkened chamber. As Dorian hurried up its three rickety steps, the -heavy odour of opium met him. He heaved a deep breath, and his nostrils -quivered with pleasure. When he entered, a young man with smooth yellow -hair, who was bending over a lamp lighting a long thin pipe, looked up -at him and nodded in a hesitating manner. - -“You here, Adrian?” muttered Dorian. - -“Where else should I be?” he answered, listlessly. “None of the chaps -will speak to me now.” - -“I thought you had left England.” - -“Darlington is not going to do anything. My brother paid the bill at -last. George doesn’t speak to me either.... I don’t care,” he added -with a sigh. “As long as one has this stuff, one doesn’t want friends. -I think I have had too many friends.” - -Dorian winced and looked round at the grotesque things that lay in such -fantastic postures on the ragged mattresses. The twisted limbs, the -gaping mouths, the staring lustreless eyes, fascinated him. He knew in -what strange heavens they were suffering, and what dull hells were -teaching them the secret of some new joy. They were better off than he -was. He was prisoned in thought. Memory, like a horrible malady, was -eating his soul away. From time to time he seemed to see the eyes of -Basil Hallward looking at him. Yet he felt he could not stay. The -presence of Adrian Singleton troubled him. He wanted to be where no one -would know who he was. He wanted to escape from himself. - -“I am going on to the other place,” he said after a pause. - -“On the wharf?” - -“Yes.” - -“That mad-cat is sure to be there. They won’t have her in this place -now.” - -Dorian shrugged his shoulders. “I am sick of women who love one. Women -who hate one are much more interesting. Besides, the stuff is better.” - -“Much the same.” - -“I like it better. Come and have something to drink. I must have -something.” - -“I don’t want anything,” murmured the young man. - -“Never mind.” - -Adrian Singleton rose up wearily and followed Dorian to the bar. A -half-caste, in a ragged turban and a shabby ulster, grinned a hideous -greeting as he thrust a bottle of brandy and two tumblers in front of -them. The women sidled up and began to chatter. Dorian turned his back -on them and said something in a low voice to Adrian Singleton. - -A crooked smile, like a Malay crease, writhed across the face of one of -the women. “We are very proud to-night,” she sneered. - -“For God’s sake don’t talk to me,” cried Dorian, stamping his foot on -the ground. “What do you want? Money? Here it is. Don’t ever talk to me -again.” - -Two red sparks flashed for a moment in the woman’s sodden eyes, then -flickered out and left them dull and glazed. She tossed her head and -raked the coins off the counter with greedy fingers. Her companion -watched her enviously. - -“It’s no use,” sighed Adrian Singleton. “I don’t care to go back. What -does it matter? I am quite happy here.” - -“You will write to me if you want anything, won’t you?” said Dorian, -after a pause. - -“Perhaps.” - -“Good night, then.” - -“Good night,” answered the young man, passing up the steps and wiping -his parched mouth with a handkerchief. - -Dorian walked to the door with a look of pain in his face. As he drew -the curtain aside, a hideous laugh broke from the painted lips of the -woman who had taken his money. “There goes the devil’s bargain!” she -hiccoughed, in a hoarse voice. - -“Curse you!” he answered, “don’t call me that.” - -She snapped her fingers. “Prince Charming is what you like to be -called, ain’t it?” she yelled after him. - -The drowsy sailor leaped to his feet as she spoke, and looked wildly -round. The sound of the shutting of the hall door fell on his ear. He -rushed out as if in pursuit. - -Dorian Gray hurried along the quay through the drizzling rain. His -meeting with Adrian Singleton had strangely moved him, and he wondered -if the ruin of that young life was really to be laid at his door, as -Basil Hallward had said to him with such infamy of insult. He bit his -lip, and for a few seconds his eyes grew sad. Yet, after all, what did -it matter to him? One’s days were too brief to take the burden of -another’s errors on one’s shoulders. Each man lived his own life and -paid his own price for living it. The only pity was one had to pay so -often for a single fault. One had to pay over and over again, indeed. -In her dealings with man, destiny never closed her accounts. - -There are moments, psychologists tell us, when the passion for sin, or -for what the world calls sin, so dominates a nature that every fibre of -the body, as every cell of the brain, seems to be instinct with fearful -impulses. Men and women at such moments lose the freedom of their will. -They move to their terrible end as automatons move. Choice is taken -from them, and conscience is either killed, or, if it lives at all, -lives but to give rebellion its fascination and disobedience its charm. -For all sins, as theologians weary not of reminding us, are sins of -disobedience. When that high spirit, that morning star of evil, fell -from heaven, it was as a rebel that he fell. - -Callous, concentrated on evil, with stained mind, and soul hungry for -rebellion, Dorian Gray hastened on, quickening his step as he went, but -as he darted aside into a dim archway, that had served him often as a -short cut to the ill-famed place where he was going, he felt himself -suddenly seized from behind, and before he had time to defend himself, -he was thrust back against the wall, with a brutal hand round his -throat. - -He struggled madly for life, and by a terrible effort wrenched the -tightening fingers away. In a second he heard the click of a revolver, -and saw the gleam of a polished barrel, pointing straight at his head, -and the dusky form of a short, thick-set man facing him. - -“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 to-night 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 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. - - - - -CHAPTER XVII. - - -A week later Dorian Gray was sitting in the conservatory at Selby -Royal, talking to the pretty Duchess of Monmouth, who with her husband, -a jaded-looking man of sixty, was amongst his guests. It was tea-time, -and the mellow light of the huge, lace-covered lamp that stood on the -table lit up the delicate china and hammered silver of the service at -which the duchess was presiding. Her white hands were moving daintily -among the cups, and her full red lips were smiling at something that -Dorian had whispered to her. Lord Henry was lying back in a silk-draped -wicker chair, looking at them. On a peach-coloured divan sat Lady -Narborough, pretending to listen to the duke’s description of the last -Brazilian beetle that he had added to his collection. Three young men -in elaborate smoking-suits were handing tea-cakes to some of the women. -The house-party consisted of twelve people, and there were more -expected to arrive on the next day. - -“What are you two talking about?” said Lord Henry, strolling over to -the table and putting his cup down. “I hope Dorian has told you about -my plan for rechristening everything, Gladys. It is a delightful idea.” - -“But I don’t want to be rechristened, Harry,” rejoined the duchess, -looking up at him with her wonderful eyes. “I am quite satisfied with -my own name, and I am sure Mr. Gray should be satisfied with his.” - -“My dear Gladys, I would not alter either name for the world. They are -both perfect. I was thinking chiefly of flowers. Yesterday I cut an -orchid, for my button-hole. It was a marvellous spotted thing, as -effective as the seven deadly sins. In a thoughtless moment I asked one -of the gardeners what it was called. He told me it was a fine specimen -of _Robinsoniana_, or something dreadful of that kind. It is a sad -truth, but we have lost the faculty of giving lovely names to things. -Names are everything. I never quarrel with actions. My one quarrel is -with words. That is the reason I hate vulgar realism in literature. The -man who could call a spade a spade should be compelled to use one. It -is the only thing he is fit for.” - -“Then what should we call you, Harry?” she asked. - -“His name is Prince Paradox,” said Dorian. - -“I recognize him in a flash,” exclaimed the duchess. - -“I won’t hear of it,” laughed Lord Henry, sinking into a chair. “From a -label there is no escape! I refuse the title.” - -“Royalties may not abdicate,” fell as a warning from pretty lips. - -“You wish me to defend my throne, then?” - -“Yes.” - -“I give the truths of to-morrow.” - -“I prefer the mistakes of to-day,” she answered. - -“You disarm me, Gladys,” he cried, catching the wilfulness of her mood. - -“Of your shield, Harry, not of your spear.” - -“I never tilt against beauty,” he said, with a wave of his hand. - -“That is your error, Harry, believe me. You value beauty far too much.” - -“How can you say that? I admit that I think that it is better to be -beautiful than to be good. But on the other hand, no one is more ready -than I am to acknowledge that it is better to be good than to be ugly.” - -“Ugliness is one of the seven deadly sins, then?” cried the duchess. -“What becomes of your simile about the orchid?” - -“Ugliness is one of the seven deadly virtues, Gladys. You, as a good -Tory, must not underrate them. Beer, the Bible, and the seven deadly -virtues have made our England what she is.” - -“You don’t like your country, then?” she asked. - -“I live in it.” - -“That you may censure it the better.” - -“Would you have me take the verdict of Europe on it?” he inquired. - -“What do they say of us?” - -“That Tartuffe has emigrated to England and opened a shop.” - -“Is that yours, Harry?” - -“I give it to you.” - -“I could not use it. It is too true.” - -“You need not be afraid. Our countrymen never recognize a description.” - -“They are practical.” - -“They are more cunning than practical. When they make up their ledger, -they balance stupidity by wealth, and vice by hypocrisy.” - -“Still, we have done great things.” - -“Great things have been thrust on us, Gladys.” - -“We have carried their burden.” - -“Only as far as the Stock Exchange.” - -She shook her head. “I believe in the race,” she cried. - -“It represents the survival of the pushing.” - -“It has development.” - -“Decay fascinates me more.” - -“What of art?” she asked. - -“It is a malady.” - -“Love?” - -“An illusion.” - -“Religion?” - -“The fashionable substitute for belief.” - -“You are a sceptic.” - -“Never! Scepticism is the beginning of faith.” - -“What are you?” - -“To define is to limit.” - -“Give me a clue.” - -“Threads snap. You would lose your way in the labyrinth.” - -“You bewilder me. Let us talk of some one else.” - -“Our host is a delightful topic. Years ago he was christened Prince -Charming.” - -“Ah! don’t remind me of that,” cried Dorian Gray. - -“Our host is rather horrid this evening,” answered the duchess, -colouring. “I believe he thinks that Monmouth married me on purely -scientific principles as the best specimen he could find of a modern -butterfly.” - -“Well, I hope he won’t stick pins into you, Duchess,” laughed Dorian. - -“Oh! my maid does that already, Mr. Gray, when she is annoyed with me.” - -“And what does she get annoyed with you about, Duchess?” - -“For the most trivial things, Mr. Gray, I assure you. Usually because I -come in at ten minutes to nine and tell her that I must be dressed by -half-past eight.” - -“How unreasonable of her! You should give her warning.” - -“I daren’t, Mr. Gray. Why, she invents hats for me. You remember the -one I wore at Lady Hilstone’s garden-party? You don’t, but it is nice -of you to pretend that you do. Well, she made it out of nothing. All -good hats are made out of nothing.” - -“Like all good reputations, Gladys,” interrupted Lord Henry. “Every -effect that one produces gives one an enemy. To be popular one must be -a mediocrity.” - -“Not with women,” said the duchess, shaking her head; “and women rule -the world. I assure you we can’t bear mediocrities. We women, as some -one says, love with our ears, just as you men love with your eyes, if -you ever love at all.” - -“It seems to me that we never do anything else,” murmured Dorian. - -“Ah! then, you never really love, Mr. Gray,” answered the duchess with -mock sadness. - -“My dear Gladys!” cried Lord Henry. “How can you say that? Romance -lives by repetition, and repetition converts an appetite into an art. -Besides, each time that one loves is the only time one has ever loved. -Difference of object does not alter singleness of passion. It merely -intensifies it. We can have in life but one great experience at best, -and the secret of life is to reproduce that experience as often as -possible.” - -“Even when one has been wounded by it, Harry?” asked the duchess after -a pause. - -“Especially when one has been wounded by it,” answered Lord Henry. - -The duchess turned and looked at Dorian Gray with a curious expression -in her eyes. “What do you say to that, Mr. Gray?” she inquired. - -Dorian hesitated for a moment. Then he threw his head back and laughed. -“I always agree with Harry, Duchess.” - -“Even when he is wrong?” - -“Harry is never wrong, Duchess.” - -“And does his philosophy make you happy?” - -“I have never searched for happiness. Who wants happiness? I have -searched for pleasure.” - -“And found it, Mr. Gray?” - -“Often. Too often.” - -The duchess sighed. “I am searching for peace,” she said, “and if I -don’t go and dress, I shall have none this evening.” - -“Let me get you some orchids, Duchess,” cried Dorian, starting to his -feet and walking down the conservatory. - -“You are flirting disgracefully with him,” said Lord Henry to his -cousin. “You had better take care. He is very fascinating.” - -“If he were not, there would be no battle.” - -“Greek meets Greek, then?” - -“I am on the side of the Trojans. They fought for a woman.” - -“They were defeated.” - -“There are worse things than capture,” she answered. - -“You gallop with a loose rein.” - -“Pace gives life,” was the _riposte_. - -“I shall write it in my diary to-night.” - -“What?” - -“That a burnt child loves the fire.” - -“I am not even singed. My wings are untouched.” - -“You use them for everything, except flight.” - -“Courage has passed from men to women. It is a new experience for us.” - -“You have a rival.” - -“Who?” - -He laughed. “Lady Narborough,” he whispered. “She perfectly adores -him.” - -“You fill me with apprehension. The appeal to antiquity is fatal to us -who are romanticists.” - -“Romanticists! You have all the methods of science.” - -“Men have educated us.” - -“But not explained you.” - -“Describe us as a sex,” was her challenge. - -“Sphinxes without secrets.” - -She looked at him, smiling. “How long Mr. Gray is!” she said. “Let us -go and help him. I have not yet told him the colour of my frock.” - -“Ah! you must suit your frock to his flowers, Gladys.” - -“That would be a premature surrender.” - -“Romantic art begins with its climax.” - -“I must keep an opportunity for retreat.” - -“In the Parthian manner?” - -“They found safety in the desert. I could not do that.” - -“Women are not always allowed a choice,” he answered, but hardly had he -finished the sentence before from the far end of the conservatory came -a stifled groan, followed by the dull sound of a heavy fall. Everybody -started up. The duchess stood motionless in horror. And with fear in -his eyes, Lord Henry rushed through the flapping palms to find Dorian -Gray lying face downwards on the tiled floor in a deathlike swoon. - -He was carried at once into the blue drawing-room and laid upon one of -the sofas. After a short time, he came to himself and looked round with -a dazed expression. - -“What has happened?” he asked. “Oh! I remember. Am I safe here, Harry?” -He began to tremble. - -“My dear Dorian,” answered Lord Henry, “you merely fainted. That was -all. You must have overtired yourself. You had better not come down to -dinner. I will take your place.” - -“No, I will come down,” he said, struggling to his feet. “I would -rather come down. I must not be alone.” - -He went to his room and dressed. There was a wild recklessness of -gaiety in his manner as he sat at table, but now and then a thrill of -terror ran through him when he remembered that, pressed against the -window of the conservatory, like a white handkerchief, he had seen the -face of James Vane watching him. - - - - -CHAPTER XVIII. - - -The next day he did not leave the house, and, indeed, spent most of the -time in his own room, sick with a wild terror of dying, and yet -indifferent to life itself. The consciousness of being hunted, snared, -tracked down, had begun to dominate him. If the tapestry did but -tremble in the wind, he shook. The dead leaves that were blown against -the leaded panes seemed to him like his own wasted resolutions and wild -regrets. When he closed his eyes, he saw again the sailor’s face -peering through the mist-stained glass, and horror seemed once more to -lay its hand upon his heart. - -But perhaps it had been only his fancy that had called vengeance out of -the night and set the hideous shapes of punishment before him. Actual -life was chaos, but there was something terribly logical in the -imagination. It was the imagination that set remorse to dog the feet of -sin. It was the imagination that made each crime bear its misshapen -brood. In the common world of fact the wicked were not punished, nor -the good rewarded. Success was given to the strong, failure thrust upon -the weak. That was all. Besides, had any stranger been prowling round -the house, he would have been seen by the servants or the keepers. Had -any foot-marks been found on the flower-beds, the gardeners would have -reported it. Yes, it had been merely fancy. Sibyl Vane’s brother had -not come back to kill him. He had sailed away in his ship to founder in -some winter sea. From him, at any rate, he was safe. Why, the man did -not know who he was, could not know who he was. The mask of youth had -saved him. - -And yet if it had been merely an illusion, how terrible it was to think -that conscience could raise such fearful phantoms, and give them -visible form, and make them move before one! What sort of life would -his be if, day and night, shadows of his crime were to peer at him from -silent corners, to mock him from secret places, to whisper in his ear -as he sat at the feast, to wake him with icy fingers as he lay asleep! -As the thought crept through his brain, he grew pale with terror, and -the air seemed to him to have become suddenly colder. Oh! in what a -wild hour of madness he had killed his friend! How ghastly the mere -memory of the scene! He saw it all again. Each hideous detail came back -to him with added horror. Out of the black cave of time, terrible and -swathed in scarlet, rose the image of his sin. When Lord Henry came in -at six o’clock, he found him crying as one whose heart will break. - -It was not till the third day that he ventured to go out. There was -something in the clear, pine-scented air of that winter morning that -seemed to bring him back his joyousness and his ardour for life. But it -was not merely the physical conditions of environment that had caused -the change. His own nature had revolted against the excess of anguish -that had sought to maim and mar the perfection of its calm. With subtle -and finely wrought temperaments it is always so. Their strong passions -must either bruise or bend. They either slay the man, or themselves -die. Shallow sorrows and shallow loves live on. The loves and sorrows -that are great are destroyed by their own plenitude. Besides, he had -convinced himself that he had been the victim of a terror-stricken -imagination, and looked back now on his fears with something of pity -and not a little of contempt. - -After breakfast, he walked with the duchess for an hour in the garden -and then drove across the park to join the shooting-party. The crisp -frost lay like salt upon the grass. The sky was an inverted cup of blue -metal. A thin film of ice bordered the flat, reed-grown lake. - -At the corner of the pine-wood he caught sight of Sir Geoffrey -Clouston, the duchess’s brother, jerking two spent cartridges out of -his gun. He jumped from the cart, and having told the groom to take the -mare home, made his way towards his guest through the withered bracken -and rough undergrowth. - -“Have you had good sport, Geoffrey?” he asked. - -“Not very good, Dorian. I think most of the birds have gone to the -open. I dare say it will be better after lunch, when we get to new -ground.” - -Dorian strolled along by his side. The keen aromatic air, the brown and -red lights that glimmered in the wood, the hoarse cries of the beaters -ringing out from time to time, and the sharp snaps of the guns that -followed, fascinated him and filled him with a sense of delightful -freedom. He was dominated by the carelessness of happiness, by the high -indifference of joy. - -Suddenly from a lumpy tussock of old grass some twenty yards in front -of them, with black-tipped ears erect and long hinder limbs throwing it -forward, started a hare. It bolted for a thicket of alders. Sir -Geoffrey put his gun to his shoulder, but there was something in the -animal’s grace of movement that strangely charmed Dorian Gray, and he -cried out at once, “Don’t shoot it, Geoffrey. Let it live.” - -“What nonsense, Dorian!” laughed his companion, and as the hare bounded -into the thicket, he fired. There were two cries heard, the cry of a -hare in pain, which is dreadful, the cry of a man in agony, which is -worse. - -“Good heavens! I have hit a beater!” exclaimed Sir Geoffrey. “What an -ass the man was to get in front of the guns! Stop shooting there!” he -called out at the top of his voice. “A man is hurt.” - -The head-keeper came running up with a stick in his hand. - -“Where, sir? Where is he?” he shouted. At the same time, the firing -ceased along the line. - -“Here,” answered Sir Geoffrey angrily, hurrying towards the thicket. -“Why on earth don’t you keep your men back? Spoiled my shooting for the -day.” - -Dorian watched them as they plunged into the alder-clump, brushing the -lithe swinging branches aside. In a few moments they emerged, dragging -a body after them into the sunlight. He turned away in horror. It -seemed to him that misfortune followed wherever he went. He heard Sir -Geoffrey ask if the man was really dead, and the affirmative answer of -the keeper. The wood seemed to him to have become suddenly alive with -faces. There was the trampling of myriad feet and the low buzz of -voices. A great copper-breasted pheasant came beating through the -boughs overhead. - -After a few moments—that were to him, in his perturbed state, like -endless hours of pain—he felt a hand laid on his shoulder. He started -and looked round. - -“Dorian,” said Lord Henry, “I had better tell them that the shooting is -stopped for to-day. It would not look well to go on.” - -“I wish it were stopped for ever, Harry,” he answered bitterly. “The -whole thing is hideous and cruel. Is the man ...?” - -He could not finish the sentence. - -“I am afraid so,” rejoined Lord Henry. “He got the whole charge of shot -in his chest. He must have died almost instantaneously. Come; let us go -home.” - -They walked side by side in the direction of the avenue for nearly -fifty yards without speaking. Then Dorian looked at Lord Henry and -said, with a heavy sigh, “It is a bad omen, Harry, a very bad omen.” - -“What is?” asked Lord Henry. “Oh! this accident, I suppose. My dear -fellow, it can’t be helped. It was the man’s own fault. Why did he get -in front of the guns? Besides, it is nothing to us. It is rather -awkward for Geoffrey, of course. It does not do to pepper beaters. It -makes people think that one is a wild shot. And Geoffrey is not; he -shoots very straight. But there is no use talking about the matter.” - -Dorian shook his head. “It is a bad omen, Harry. I feel as if something -horrible were going to happen to some of us. To myself, perhaps,” he -added, passing his hand over his eyes, with a gesture of pain. - -The elder man laughed. “The only horrible thing in the world is -_ennui_, Dorian. That is the one sin for which there is no forgiveness. -But we are not likely to suffer from it unless these fellows keep -chattering about this thing at dinner. I must tell them that the -subject is to be tabooed. As for omens, there is no such thing as an -omen. Destiny does not send us heralds. She is too wise or too cruel -for that. Besides, what on earth could happen to you, Dorian? You have -everything in the world that a man can want. There is no one who would -not be delighted to change places with you.” - -“There is no one with whom I would not change places, Harry. Don’t -laugh like that. I am telling you the truth. The wretched peasant who -has just died is better off than I am. I have no terror of death. It is -the coming of death that terrifies me. Its monstrous wings seem to -wheel in the leaden air around me. Good heavens! don’t you see a man -moving behind the trees there, watching me, waiting for me?” - -Lord Henry looked in the direction in which the trembling gloved hand -was pointing. “Yes,” he said, smiling, “I see the gardener waiting for -you. I suppose he wants to ask you what flowers you wish to have on the -table to-night. How absurdly nervous you are, my dear fellow! You must -come and see my doctor, when we get back to town.” - -Dorian heaved a sigh of relief as he saw the gardener approaching. The -man touched his hat, glanced for a moment at Lord Henry in a hesitating -manner, and then produced a letter, which he handed to his master. “Her -Grace told me to wait for an answer,” he murmured. - -Dorian put the letter into his pocket. “Tell her Grace that I am coming -in,” he said, coldly. The man turned round and went rapidly in the -direction of the house. - -“How fond women are of doing dangerous things!” laughed Lord Henry. “It -is one of the qualities in them that I admire most. A woman will flirt -with anybody in the world as long as other people are looking on.” - -“How fond you are of saying dangerous things, Harry! In the present -instance, you are quite astray. I like the duchess very much, but I -don’t love her.” - -“And the duchess loves you very much, but she likes you less, so you -are excellently matched.” - -“You are talking scandal, Harry, and there is never any basis for -scandal.” - -“The basis of every scandal is an immoral certainty,” said Lord Henry, -lighting a cigarette. - -“You would sacrifice anybody, Harry, for the sake of an epigram.” - -“The world goes to the altar of its own accord,” was the answer. - -“I wish I could love,” cried Dorian Gray with a deep note of pathos in -his voice. “But I seem to have lost the passion and forgotten the -desire. I am too much concentrated on myself. My own personality has -become a burden to me. I want to escape, to go away, to forget. It was -silly of me to come down here at all. I think I shall send a wire to -Harvey to have the yacht got ready. On a yacht one is safe.” - -“Safe from what, Dorian? You are in some trouble. Why not tell me what -it is? You know I would help you.” - -“I can’t tell you, Harry,” he answered sadly. “And I dare say it is -only a fancy of mine. This unfortunate accident has upset me. I have a -horrible presentiment that something of the kind may happen to me.” - -“What nonsense!” - -“I hope it is, but I can’t help feeling it. Ah! here is the duchess, -looking like Artemis in a tailor-made gown. You see we have come back, -Duchess.” - -“I have heard all about it, Mr. Gray,” she answered. “Poor Geoffrey is -terribly upset. And it seems that you asked him not to shoot the hare. -How curious!” - -“Yes, it was very curious. I don’t know what made me say it. Some whim, -I suppose. It looked the loveliest of little live things. But I am -sorry they told you about the man. It is a hideous subject.” - -“It is an annoying subject,” broke in Lord Henry. “It has no -psychological value at all. Now if Geoffrey had done the thing on -purpose, how interesting he would be! I should like to know some one -who had committed a real murder.” - -“How horrid of you, Harry!” cried the duchess. “Isn’t it, Mr. Gray? -Harry, Mr. Gray is ill again. He is going to faint.” - -Dorian drew himself up with an effort and smiled. “It is nothing, -Duchess,” he murmured; “my nerves are dreadfully out of order. That is -all. I am afraid I walked too far this morning. I didn’t hear what -Harry said. Was it very bad? You must tell me some other time. I think -I must go and lie down. You will excuse me, won’t you?” - -They had reached the great flight of steps that led from the -conservatory on to the terrace. As the glass door closed behind Dorian, -Lord Henry turned and looked at the duchess with his slumberous eyes. -“Are you very much in love with him?” he asked. - -She did not answer for some time, but stood gazing at the landscape. “I -wish I knew,” she said at last. - -He shook his head. “Knowledge would be fatal. It is the uncertainty -that charms one. A mist makes things wonderful.” - -“One may lose one’s way.” - -“All ways end at the same point, my dear Gladys.” - -“What is that?” - -“Disillusion.” - -“It was my _début_ in life,” she sighed. - -“It came to you crowned.” - -“I am tired of strawberry leaves.” - -“They become you.” - -“Only in public.” - -“You would miss them,” said Lord Henry. - -“I will not part with a petal.” - -“Monmouth has ears.” - -“Old age is dull of hearing.” - -“Has he never been jealous?” - -“I wish he had been.” - -He glanced about as if in search of something. “What are you looking -for?” she inquired. - -“The button from your foil,” he answered. “You have dropped it.” - -She laughed. “I have still the mask.” - -“It makes your eyes lovelier,” was his reply. - -She laughed again. Her teeth showed like white seeds in a scarlet -fruit. - -Upstairs, in his own room, Dorian Gray was lying on a sofa, with terror -in every tingling fibre of his body. Life had suddenly become too -hideous a burden for him to bear. The dreadful death of the unlucky -beater, shot in the thicket like a wild animal, had seemed to him to -pre-figure death for himself also. He had nearly swooned at what Lord -Henry had said in a chance mood of cynical jesting. - -At five o’clock he rang his bell for his servant and gave him orders to -pack his things for the night-express to town, and to have the brougham -at the door by eight-thirty. He was determined not to sleep another -night at Selby Royal. It was an ill-omened place. Death walked there in -the sunlight. The grass of the forest had been spotted with blood. - -Then he wrote a note to Lord Henry, telling him that he was going up to -town to consult his doctor and asking him to entertain his guests in -his absence. As he was putting it into the envelope, a knock came to -the door, and his valet informed him that the head-keeper wished to see -him. He frowned and bit his lip. “Send him in,” he muttered, after some -moments’ hesitation. - -As soon as the man entered, Dorian pulled his chequebook out of a -drawer and spread it out before him. - -“I suppose you have come about the unfortunate accident of this -morning, Thornton?” he said, taking up a pen. - -“Yes, sir,” answered the gamekeeper. - -“Was the poor fellow married? Had he any people dependent on him?” -asked Dorian, looking bored. “If so, I should not like them to be left -in want, and will send them any sum of money you may think necessary.” - -“We don’t know who he is, sir. That is what I took the liberty of -coming to you about.” - -“Don’t know who he is?” said Dorian, listlessly. “What do you mean? -Wasn’t he one of your men?” - -“No, sir. Never saw him before. Seems like a sailor, sir.” - -The pen dropped from Dorian Gray’s hand, and he felt as if his heart -had suddenly stopped beating. “A sailor?” he cried out. “Did you say a -sailor?” - -“Yes, sir. He looks as if he had been a sort of sailor; tattooed on -both arms, and that kind of thing.” - -“Was there anything found on him?” said Dorian, leaning forward and -looking at the man with startled eyes. “Anything that would tell his -name?” - -“Some money, sir—not much, and a six-shooter. There was no name of any -kind. A decent-looking man, sir, but rough-like. A sort of sailor we -think.” - -Dorian started to his feet. A terrible hope fluttered past him. He -clutched at it madly. “Where is the body?” he exclaimed. “Quick! I must -see it at once.” - -“It is in an empty stable in the Home Farm, sir. The folk don’t like to -have that sort of thing in their houses. They say a corpse brings bad -luck.” - -“The Home Farm! Go there at once and meet me. Tell one of the grooms to -bring my horse round. No. Never mind. I’ll go to the stables myself. It -will save time.” - -In less than a quarter of an hour, Dorian Gray was galloping down the -long avenue as hard as he could go. The trees seemed to sweep past him -in spectral procession, and wild shadows to fling themselves across his -path. Once the mare swerved at a white gate-post and nearly threw him. -He lashed her across the neck with his crop. She cleft the dusky air -like an arrow. The stones flew from her hoofs. - -At last he reached the Home Farm. Two men were loitering in the yard. -He leaped from the saddle and threw the reins to one of them. In the -farthest stable a light was glimmering. Something seemed to tell him -that the body was there, and he hurried to the door and put his hand -upon the latch. - -There he paused for a moment, feeling that he was on the brink of a -discovery that would either make or mar his life. Then he thrust the -door open and entered. - -On a heap of sacking in the far corner was lying the dead body of a man -dressed in a coarse shirt and a pair of blue trousers. A spotted -handkerchief had been placed over the face. A coarse candle, stuck in a -bottle, sputtered beside it. - -Dorian Gray shuddered. He felt that his could not be the hand to take -the handkerchief away, and called out to one of the farm-servants to -come to him. - -“Take that thing off the face. I wish to see it,” he said, clutching at -the door-post for support. - -When the farm-servant had done so, he stepped forward. A cry of joy -broke from his lips. The man who had been shot in the thicket was James -Vane. - -He stood there for some minutes looking at the dead body. As he rode -home, his eyes were full of tears, for he knew he was safe. - - - - -CHAPTER XIX. - - -“There is no use your telling me that you are going to be good,” cried -Lord Henry, dipping his white fingers into a red copper bowl filled -with rose-water. “You are quite perfect. Pray, don’t change.” - -Dorian Gray shook his head. “No, Harry, I have done too many dreadful -things in my life. I am not going to do any more. I began my good -actions yesterday.” - -“Where were you yesterday?” - -“In the country, Harry. I was staying at a little inn by myself.” - -“My dear boy,” said Lord Henry, smiling, “anybody can be good in the -country. There are no temptations there. That is the reason why people -who live out of town are so absolutely uncivilized. Civilization is not -by any means an easy thing to attain to. There are only two ways by -which man can reach it. One is by being cultured, the other by being -corrupt. Country people have no opportunity of being either, so they -stagnate.” - -“Culture and corruption,” echoed Dorian. “I have known something of -both. It seems terrible to me now that they should ever be found -together. For I have a new ideal, Harry. I am going to alter. I think I -have altered.” - -“You have not yet told me what your good action was. Or did you say you -had done more than one?” asked his companion as he spilled into his -plate a little crimson pyramid of seeded strawberries and, through a -perforated, shell-shaped spoon, snowed white sugar upon them. - -“I can tell you, Harry. It is not a story I could tell to any one else. -I spared somebody. It sounds vain, but you understand what I mean. She -was quite beautiful and wonderfully like Sibyl Vane. I think it was -that which first attracted me to her. You remember Sibyl, don’t you? -How long ago that seems! Well, Hetty was not one of our own class, of -course. She was simply a girl in a village. But I really loved her. I -am quite sure that I loved her. All during this wonderful May that we -have been having, I used to run down and see her two or three times a -week. Yesterday she met me in a little orchard. The apple-blossoms kept -tumbling down on her hair, and she was laughing. We were to have gone -away together this morning at dawn. Suddenly I determined to leave her -as flowerlike as I had found her.” - -“I should think the novelty of the emotion must have given you a thrill -of real pleasure, Dorian,” interrupted Lord Henry. “But I can finish -your idyll for you. You gave her good advice and broke her heart. That -was the beginning of your reformation.” - -“Harry, you are horrible! You mustn’t say these dreadful things. -Hetty’s heart is not broken. Of course, she cried and all that. But -there is no disgrace upon her. She can live, like Perdita, in her -garden of mint and marigold.” - -“And weep over a faithless Florizel,” said Lord Henry, laughing, as he -leaned back in his chair. “My dear Dorian, you have the most curiously -boyish moods. Do you think this girl will ever be really content now -with any one of her own rank? I suppose she will be married some day to -a rough carter or a grinning ploughman. Well, the fact of having met -you, and loved you, will teach her to despise her husband, and she will -be wretched. From a moral point of view, I cannot say that I think much -of your great renunciation. Even as a beginning, it is poor. Besides, -how do you know that Hetty isn’t floating at the present moment in some -starlit mill-pond, with lovely water-lilies round her, like Ophelia?” - -“I can’t bear this, Harry! You mock at everything, and then suggest the -most serious tragedies. I am sorry I told you now. I don’t care what -you say to me. I know I was right in acting as I did. Poor Hetty! As I -rode past the farm this morning, I saw her white face at the window, -like a spray of jasmine. Don’t let us talk about it any more, and don’t -try to persuade me that the first good action I have done for years, -the first little bit of self-sacrifice I have ever known, is really a -sort of sin. I want to be better. I am going to be better. Tell me -something about yourself. What is going on in town? I have not been to -the club for days.” - -“The people are still discussing poor Basil’s disappearance.” - -“I should have thought they had got tired of that by this time,” said -Dorian, pouring himself out some wine and frowning slightly. - -“My dear boy, they have only been talking about it for six weeks, and -the British public are really not equal to the mental strain of having -more than one topic every three months. They have been very fortunate -lately, however. They have had my own divorce-case and Alan Campbell’s -suicide. Now they have got the mysterious disappearance of an artist. -Scotland Yard still insists that the man in the grey ulster who left -for Paris by the midnight train on the ninth of November was poor -Basil, and the French police declare that Basil never arrived in Paris -at all. I suppose in about a fortnight we shall be told that he has -been seen in San Francisco. It is an odd thing, but every one who -disappears is said to be seen at San Francisco. It must be a delightful -city, and possess all the attractions of the next world.” - -“What do you think has happened to Basil?” asked Dorian, holding up his -Burgundy against the light and wondering how it was that he could -discuss the matter so calmly. - -“I have not the slightest idea. If Basil chooses to hide himself, it is -no business of mine. If he is dead, I don’t want to think about him. -Death is the only thing that ever terrifies me. I hate it.” - -“Why?” said the younger man wearily. - -“Because,” said Lord Henry, passing beneath his nostrils the gilt -trellis of an open vinaigrette box, “one can survive everything -nowadays except that. Death and vulgarity are the only two facts in the -nineteenth century that one cannot explain away. Let us have our coffee -in the music-room, Dorian. You must play Chopin to me. The man with -whom my wife ran away played Chopin exquisitely. Poor Victoria! I was -very fond of her. The house is rather lonely without her. Of course, -married life is merely a habit, a bad habit. But then one regrets the -loss even of one’s worst habits. Perhaps one regrets them the most. -They are such an essential part of one’s personality.” - -Dorian said nothing, but rose from the table, and passing into the next -room, sat down to the piano and let his fingers stray across the white -and black ivory of the keys. After the coffee had been brought in, he -stopped, and looking over at Lord Henry, said, “Harry, did it ever -occur to you that Basil was murdered?” - -Lord Henry yawned. “Basil was very popular, and always wore a Waterbury -watch. Why should he have been murdered? He was not clever enough to -have enemies. Of course, he had a wonderful genius for painting. But a -man can paint like Velasquez and yet be as dull as possible. Basil was -really rather dull. He only interested me once, and that was when he -told me, years ago, that he had a wild adoration for you and that you -were the dominant motive of his art.” - -“I was very fond of Basil,” said Dorian with a note of sadness in his -voice. “But don’t people say that he was murdered?” - -“Oh, some of the papers do. It does not seem to me to be at all -probable. I know there are dreadful places in Paris, but Basil was not -the sort of man to have gone to them. He had no curiosity. It was his -chief defect.” - -“What would you say, Harry, if I told you that I had murdered Basil?” -said the younger man. He watched him intently after he had spoken. - -“I would say, my dear fellow, that you were posing for a character that -doesn’t suit you. All crime is vulgar, just as all vulgarity is crime. -It is not in you, Dorian, to commit a murder. I am sorry if I hurt your -vanity by saying so, but I assure you it is true. Crime belongs -exclusively to the lower orders. I don’t blame them in the smallest -degree. I should fancy that crime was to them what art is to us, simply -a method of procuring extraordinary sensations.” - -“A method of procuring sensations? Do you think, then, that a man who -has once committed a murder could possibly do the same crime again? -Don’t tell me that.” - -“Oh! anything becomes a pleasure if one does it too often,” cried Lord -Henry, laughing. “That is one of the most important secrets of life. I -should fancy, however, that murder is always a mistake. One should -never do anything that one cannot talk about after dinner. But let us -pass from poor Basil. I wish I could believe that he had come to such a -really romantic end as you suggest, but I can’t. I dare say he fell -into the Seine off an omnibus and that the conductor hushed up the -scandal. Yes: I should fancy that was his end. I see him lying now on -his back under those dull-green waters, with the heavy barges floating -over him and long weeds catching in his hair. Do you know, I don’t -think he would have done much more good work. During the last ten years -his painting had gone off very much.” - -Dorian heaved a sigh, and Lord Henry strolled across the room and began -to stroke the head of a curious Java parrot, a large, grey-plumaged -bird with pink crest and tail, that was balancing itself upon a bamboo -perch. As his pointed fingers touched it, it dropped the white scurf of -crinkled lids over black, glasslike eyes and began to sway backwards -and forwards. - -“Yes,” he continued, turning round and taking his handkerchief out of -his pocket; “his painting had quite gone off. It seemed to me to have -lost something. It had lost an ideal. When you and he ceased to be -great friends, he ceased to be a great artist. What was it separated -you? I suppose he bored you. If so, he never forgave you. It’s a habit -bores have. By the way, what has become of that wonderful portrait he -did of you? I don’t think I have ever seen it since he finished it. Oh! -I remember your telling me years ago that you had sent it down to -Selby, and that it had got mislaid or stolen on the way. You never got -it back? What a pity! it was really a masterpiece. I remember I wanted -to buy it. I wish I had now. It belonged to Basil’s best period. Since -then, his work was that curious mixture of bad painting and good -intentions that always entitles a man to be called a representative -British artist. Did you advertise for it? You should.” - -“I forget,” said Dorian. “I suppose I did. But I never really liked it. -I am sorry I sat for it. The memory of the thing is hateful to me. Why -do you talk of it? It used to remind me of those curious lines in some -play—Hamlet, I think—how do they run?— - -“Like the painting of a sorrow, -A face without a heart.” - - -Yes: that is what it was like.” - -Lord Henry laughed. “If a man treats life artistically, his brain is -his heart,” he answered, sinking into an arm-chair. - -Dorian Gray shook his head and struck some soft chords on the piano. -“‘Like the painting of a sorrow,’” he repeated, “‘a face without a -heart.’” - -The elder man lay back and looked at him with half-closed eyes. “By the -way, Dorian,” he said after a pause, “‘what does it profit a man if he -gain the whole world and lose—how does the quotation run?—his own -soul’?” - -The music jarred, and Dorian Gray started and stared at his friend. -“Why do you ask me that, Harry?” - -“My dear fellow,” said Lord Henry, elevating his eyebrows in surprise, -“I asked you because I thought you might be able to give me an answer. -That is all. I was going through the park last Sunday, and close by the -Marble Arch there stood a little crowd of shabby-looking people -listening to some vulgar street-preacher. As I passed by, I heard the -man yelling out that question to his audience. It struck me as being -rather dramatic. London is very rich in curious effects of that kind. A -wet Sunday, an uncouth Christian in a mackintosh, a ring of sickly -white faces under a broken roof of dripping umbrellas, and a wonderful -phrase flung into the air by shrill hysterical lips—it was really very -good in its way, quite a suggestion. I thought of telling the prophet -that art had a soul, but that man had not. I am afraid, however, he -would not have understood me.” - -“Don’t, Harry. The soul is a terrible reality. It can be bought, and -sold, and bartered away. It can be poisoned, or made perfect. There is -a soul in each one of us. I know it.” - -“Do you feel quite sure of that, Dorian?” - -“Quite sure.” - -“Ah! then it must be an illusion. The things one feels absolutely -certain about are never true. That is the fatality of faith, and the -lesson of romance. How grave you are! Don’t be so serious. What have -you or I to do with the superstitions of our age? No: we have given up -our belief in the soul. Play me something. Play me a nocturne, Dorian, -and, as you play, tell me, in a low voice, how you have kept your -youth. You must have some secret. I am only ten years older than you -are, and I am wrinkled, and worn, and yellow. You are really wonderful, -Dorian. You have never looked more charming than you do to-night. You -remind me of the day I saw you first. You were rather cheeky, very shy, -and absolutely extraordinary. You have changed, of course, but not in -appearance. I wish you would tell me your secret. To get back my youth -I would do anything in the world, except take exercise, get up early, -or be respectable. Youth! There is nothing like it. It’s absurd to talk -of the ignorance of youth. The only people to whose opinions I listen -now with any respect are people much younger than myself. They seem in -front of me. Life has revealed to them her latest wonder. As for the -aged, I always contradict the aged. I do it on principle. If you ask -them their opinion on something that happened yesterday, they solemnly -give you the opinions current in 1820, when people wore high stocks, -believed in everything, and knew absolutely nothing. How lovely that -thing you are playing is! I wonder, did Chopin write it at Majorca, -with the sea weeping round the villa and the salt spray dashing against -the panes? It is marvellously romantic. What a blessing it is that -there is one art left to us that is not imitative! Don’t stop. I want -music to-night. It seems to me that you are the young Apollo and that I -am Marsyas listening to you. I have sorrows, Dorian, of my own, that -even you know nothing of. The tragedy of old age is not that one is -old, but that one is young. I am amazed sometimes at my own sincerity. -Ah, Dorian, how happy you are! What an exquisite life you have had! You -have drunk deeply of everything. You have crushed the grapes against -your palate. Nothing has been hidden from you. And it has all been to -you no more than the sound of music. It has not marred you. You are -still the same.” - -“I am not the same, Harry.” - -“Yes, you are the same. I wonder what the rest of your life will be. -Don’t spoil it by renunciations. At present you are a perfect type. -Don’t make yourself incomplete. You are quite flawless now. You need -not shake your head: you know you are. Besides, Dorian, don’t deceive -yourself. Life is not governed by will or intention. Life is a question -of nerves, and fibres, and slowly built-up cells in which thought hides -itself and passion has its dreams. You may fancy yourself safe and -think yourself strong. But a chance tone of colour in a room or a -morning sky, a particular perfume that you had once loved and that -brings subtle memories with it, a line from a forgotten poem that you -had come across again, a cadence from a piece of music that you had -ceased to play—I tell you, Dorian, that it is on things like these that -our lives depend. Browning writes about that somewhere; but our own -senses will imagine them for us. There are moments when the odour of -_lilas blanc_ passes suddenly across me, and I have to live the -strangest month of my life over again. I wish I could change places -with you, Dorian. The world has cried out against us both, but it has -always worshipped you. It always will worship you. You are the type of -what the age is searching for, and what it is afraid it has found. I am -so glad that you have never done anything, never carved a statue, or -painted a picture, or produced anything outside of yourself! Life has -been your art. You have set yourself to music. Your days are your -sonnets.” - -Dorian rose up from the piano and passed his hand through his hair. -“Yes, life has been exquisite,” he murmured, “but I am not going to -have the same life, Harry. And you must not say these extravagant -things to me. You don’t know everything about me. I think that if you -did, even you would turn from me. You laugh. Don’t laugh.” - -“Why have you stopped playing, Dorian? Go back and give me the nocturne -over again. Look at that great, honey-coloured moon that hangs in the -dusky air. She is waiting for you to charm her, and if you play she -will come closer to the earth. You won’t? Let us go to the club, then. -It has been a charming evening, and we must end it charmingly. There is -some one at White’s who wants immensely to know you—young Lord Poole, -Bournemouth’s eldest son. He has already copied your neckties, and has -begged me to introduce him to you. He is quite delightful and rather -reminds me of you.” - -“I hope not,” said Dorian with a sad look in his eyes. “But I am tired -to-night, Harry. I shan’t go to the club. It is nearly eleven, and I -want to go to bed early.” - -“Do stay. You have never played so well as to-night. There was -something in your touch that was wonderful. It had more expression than -I had ever heard from it before.” - -“It is because I am going to be good,” he answered, smiling. “I am a -little changed already.” - -“You cannot change to me, Dorian,” said Lord Henry. “You and I will -always be friends.” - -“Yet you poisoned me with a book once. I should not forgive that. -Harry, promise me that you will never lend that book to any one. It -does harm.” - -“My dear boy, you are really beginning to moralize. You will soon be -going about like the converted, and the revivalist, warning people -against all the sins of which you have grown tired. You are much too -delightful to do that. Besides, it is no use. You and I are what we -are, and will be what we will be. As for being poisoned by a book, -there is no such thing as that. Art has no influence upon action. It -annihilates the desire to act. It is superbly sterile. The books that -the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame. -That is all. But we won’t discuss literature. Come round to-morrow. I -am going to ride at eleven. We might go together, and I will take you -to lunch afterwards with Lady Branksome. She is a charming woman, and -wants to consult you about some tapestries she is thinking of buying. -Mind you come. Or shall we lunch with our little duchess? She says she -never sees you now. Perhaps you are tired of Gladys? I thought you -would be. Her clever tongue gets on one’s nerves. Well, in any case, be -here at eleven.” - -“Must I really come, Harry?” - -“Certainly. The park is quite lovely now. I don’t think there have been -such lilacs since the year I met you.” - -“Very well. I shall be here at eleven,” said Dorian. “Good night, -Harry.” As he reached the door, he hesitated for a moment, as if he had -something more to say. Then he sighed and went out. - - - - -CHAPTER XX. - - -It was a lovely night, so warm that he threw his coat over his arm and -did not even put his silk scarf round his throat. As he strolled home, -smoking his cigarette, two young men in evening dress passed him. He -heard one of them whisper to the other, “That is Dorian Gray.” He -remembered how pleased he used to be when he was pointed out, or stared -at, or talked about. He was tired of hearing his own name now. Half the -charm of the little village where he had been so often lately was that -no one knew who he was. He had often told the girl whom he had lured to -love him that he was poor, and she had believed him. He had told her -once that he was wicked, and she had laughed at him and answered that -wicked people were always very old and very ugly. What a laugh she -had!—just like a thrush singing. And how pretty she had been in her -cotton dresses and her large hats! She knew nothing, but she had -everything that he had lost. - -When he reached home, he found his servant waiting up for him. He sent -him to bed, and threw himself down on the sofa in the library, and -began to think over some of the things that Lord Henry had said to him. - -Was it really true that one could never change? He felt a wild longing -for the unstained purity of his boyhood—his rose-white boyhood, as Lord -Henry had once called it. He knew that he had tarnished himself, filled -his mind with corruption and given horror to his fancy; that he had -been an evil influence to others, and had experienced a terrible joy in -being so; and that of the lives that had crossed his own, it had been -the fairest and the most full of promise that he had brought to shame. -But was it all irretrievable? Was there no hope for him? - -Ah! in what a monstrous moment of pride and passion he had prayed that -the portrait should bear the burden of his days, and he keep the -unsullied splendour of eternal youth! All his failure had been due to -that. Better for him that each sin of his life had brought its sure -swift penalty along with it. There was purification in punishment. Not -“Forgive us our sins” but “Smite us for our iniquities” should be the -prayer of man to a most just God. - -The curiously carved mirror that Lord Henry had given to him, so many -years ago now, was standing on the table, and the white-limbed Cupids -laughed round it as of old. He took it up, as he had done on that night -of horror when he had first noted the change in the fatal picture, and -with wild, tear-dimmed eyes looked into its polished shield. Once, some -one who had terribly loved him had written to him a mad letter, ending -with these idolatrous words: “The world is changed because you are made -of ivory and gold. The curves of your lips rewrite history.” The -phrases came back to his memory, and he repeated them over and over to -himself. Then he loathed his own beauty, and flinging the mirror on the -floor, crushed it into silver splinters beneath his heel. It was his -beauty that had ruined him, his beauty and the youth that he had prayed -for. But for those two things, his life might have been free from -stain. His beauty had been to him but a mask, his youth but a mockery. -What was youth at best? A green, an unripe time, a time of shallow -moods, and sickly thoughts. Why had he worn its livery? Youth had -spoiled him. - -It was better not to think of the past. Nothing could alter that. It -was of himself, and of his own future, that he had to think. James Vane -was hidden in a nameless grave in Selby churchyard. Alan Campbell had -shot himself one night in his laboratory, but had not revealed the -secret that he had been forced to know. The excitement, such as it was, -over Basil Hallward’s disappearance would soon pass away. It was -already waning. He was perfectly safe there. Nor, indeed, was it the -death of Basil Hallward that weighed most upon his mind. It was the -living death of his own soul that troubled him. Basil had painted the -portrait that had marred his life. He could not forgive him that. It -was the portrait that had done everything. Basil had said things to him -that were unbearable, and that he had yet borne with patience. The -murder had been simply the madness of a moment. As for Alan Campbell, -his suicide had been his own act. He had chosen to do it. It was -nothing to him. - -A new life! That was what he wanted. That was what he was waiting for. -Surely he had begun it already. He had spared one innocent thing, at -any rate. He would never again tempt innocence. He would be good. - -As he thought of Hetty Merton, he began to wonder if the portrait in -the locked room had changed. Surely it was not still so horrible as it -had been? Perhaps if his life became pure, he would be able to expel -every sign of evil passion from the face. Perhaps the signs of evil had -already gone away. He would go and look. - -He took the lamp from the table and crept upstairs. As he unbarred the -door, a smile of joy flitted across his strangely young-looking face -and lingered for a moment about his lips. Yes, he would be good, and -the hideous thing that he had hidden away would no longer be a terror -to him. He felt as if the load had been lifted from him already. - -He went in quietly, locking the door behind him, as was his custom, and -dragged the purple hanging from the portrait. A cry of pain and -indignation broke from him. He could see no change, save that in the -eyes there was a look of cunning and in the mouth the curved wrinkle of -the hypocrite. The thing was still loathsome—more loathsome, if -possible, than before—and the scarlet dew that spotted the hand seemed -brighter, and more like blood newly spilled. Then he trembled. Had it -been merely vanity that had made him do his one good deed? Or the -desire for a new sensation, as Lord Henry had hinted, with his mocking -laugh? Or that passion to act a part that sometimes makes us do things -finer than we are ourselves? Or, perhaps, all these? And why was the -red stain larger than it had been? It seemed to have crept like a -horrible disease over the wrinkled fingers. There was blood on the -painted feet, as though the thing had dripped—blood even on the hand -that had not held the knife. Confess? Did it mean that he was to -confess? To give himself up and be put to death? He laughed. He felt -that the idea was monstrous. Besides, even if he did confess, who would -believe him? There was no trace of the murdered man anywhere. -Everything belonging to him had been destroyed. He himself had burned -what had been below-stairs. The world would simply say that he was mad. -They would shut him up if he persisted in his story.... Yet it was his -duty to confess, to suffer public shame, and to make public atonement. -There was a God who called upon men to tell their sins to earth as well -as to heaven. Nothing that he could do would cleanse him till he had -told his own sin. His sin? He shrugged his shoulders. The death of -Basil Hallward seemed very little to him. He was thinking of Hetty -Merton. For it was an unjust mirror, this mirror of his soul that he -was looking at. Vanity? Curiosity? Hypocrisy? Had there been nothing -more in his renunciation than that? There had been something more. At -least he thought so. But who could tell? ... No. There had been nothing -more. Through vanity he had spared her. In hypocrisy he had worn the -mask of goodness. For curiosity’s sake he had tried the denial of self. -He recognized that now. - -But this murder—was it to dog him all his life? Was he always to be -burdened by his past? Was he really to confess? Never. There was only -one bit of evidence left against him. The picture itself—that was -evidence. He would destroy it. Why had he kept it so long? Once it had -given him pleasure to watch it changing and growing old. Of late he had -felt no such pleasure. It had kept him awake at night. When he had been -away, he had been filled with terror lest other eyes should look upon -it. It had brought melancholy across his passions. Its mere memory had -marred many moments of joy. It had been like conscience to him. Yes, it -had been conscience. He would destroy it. - -He looked round and saw the knife that had stabbed Basil Hallward. He -had cleaned it many times, till there was no stain left upon it. It was -bright, and glistened. As it had killed the painter, so it would kill -the painter’s work, and all that that meant. It would kill the past, -and when that was dead, he would be free. It would kill this monstrous -soul-life, and without its hideous warnings, he would be at peace. He -seized the thing, and stabbed the picture with it. - -There was a cry heard, and a crash. The cry was so horrible in its -agony that the frightened servants woke and crept out of their rooms. -Two gentlemen, who were passing in the square below, stopped and looked -up at the great house. They walked on till they met a policeman and -brought him back. The man rang the bell several times, but there was no -answer. Except for a light in one of the top windows, the house was all -dark. After a time, he went away and stood in an adjoining portico and -watched. - -“Whose house is that, Constable?” asked the elder of the two gentlemen. - -“Mr. Dorian Gray’s, sir,” answered the policeman. - -They looked at each other, as they walked away, and sneered. One of -them was Sir Henry Ashton’s uncle. - -Inside, in the servants’ part of the house, the half-clad domestics -were talking in low whispers to each other. Old Mrs. Leaf was crying -and wringing her hands. Francis was as pale as death. - -After about a quarter of an hour, he got the coachman and one of the -footmen and crept upstairs. They knocked, but there was no reply. They -called out. Everything was still. Finally, after vainly trying to force -the door, they got on the roof and dropped down on to the balcony. The -windows yielded easily—their bolts were old. - -When they entered, they found hanging upon the wall a splendid portrait -of their master as they had last seen him, in all the wonder of his -exquisite youth and beauty. Lying on the floor was a dead man, in -evening dress, with a knife in his heart. He was withered, wrinkled, -and loathsome of visage. It was not till they had examined the rings -that they recognized who it was. - -THE END - - - - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY *** - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the -United States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, -and may not be used if you charge for an eBook, except by following -the terms of the trademark license, including paying royalties for use -of the Project Gutenberg trademark. 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You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online -at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> -<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: The Picture of Dorian Gray</div> -<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Oscar Wilde</div> -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: October, 1994 [eBook #174]<br /> -[Most recently updated: February 3, 2022]</div> -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> -<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Judith Boss. HTML version by Al Haines.</div> -<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY ***</div> - -<h1>The Picture of Dorian Gray</h1> - -<h2 class="no-break">by Oscar Wilde</h2> - -<hr /> - -<h2>Contents</h2> - -<table summary="" style=""> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap00">THE PREFACE</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap01">CHAPTER I.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap02">CHAPTER II.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap03">CHAPTER III.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap04">CHAPTER IV.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap05">CHAPTER V.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap06">CHAPTER VI.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap07">CHAPTER VII.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap08">CHAPTER VIII.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap09">CHAPTER IX.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap10">CHAPTER X.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap11">CHAPTER XI.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap12">CHAPTER XII.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap13">CHAPTER XIII.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap14">CHAPTER XIV.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap15">CHAPTER XV.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap16">CHAPTER XVI.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap17">CHAPTER XVII.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap18">CHAPTER XVIII.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap19">CHAPTER XIX.</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> <a href="#chap20">CHAPTER XX.</a></td> -</tr> - -</table> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap00"></a>THE PREFACE</h2> - -<p> -The artist is the creator of beautiful things. To reveal art and conceal the -artist is art’s aim. The critic is he who can translate into another -manner or a new material his impression of beautiful things. -</p> - -<p> -The highest as the lowest form of criticism is a mode of autobiography. Those -who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming. -This is a fault. -</p> - -<p> -Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. For -these there is hope. They are the elect to whom beautiful things mean only -beauty. -</p> - -<p> -There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, -or badly written. That is all. -</p> - -<p> -The nineteenth century dislike of realism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own -face in a glass. -</p> - -<p> -The nineteenth century dislike of romanticism is the rage of Caliban not seeing -his own face in a glass. The moral life of man forms part of the subject-matter -of the artist, but the morality of art consists in the perfect use of an -imperfect medium. No artist desires to prove anything. Even things that are -true can be proved. No artist has ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in an -artist is an unpardonable mannerism of style. No artist is ever morbid. The -artist can express everything. Thought and language are to the artist -instruments of an art. Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for an art. -From the point of view of form, the type of all the arts is the art of the -musician. From the point of view of feeling, the actor’s craft is the -type. All art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath the surface -do so at their peril. Those who read the symbol do so at their peril. It is the -spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors. Diversity of opinion about a -work of art shows that the work is new, complex, and vital. When critics -disagree, the artist is in accord with himself. We can forgive a man for making -a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a -useless thing is that one admires it intensely. -</p> - -<p> -All art is quite useless. -</p> - -<p class="right"> -OSCAR WILDE -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap01"></a>CHAPTER I.</h2> - -<p> -The studio was filled with the rich odour of roses, and when the light summer -wind stirred amidst the trees of the garden, there came through the open door -the heavy scent of the lilac, or the more delicate perfume of the -pink-flowering thorn. -</p> - -<p> -From the corner of the divan of Persian saddle-bags on which he was lying, -smoking, as was his custom, innumerable cigarettes, Lord Henry Wotton could -just catch the gleam of the honey-sweet and honey-coloured blossoms of a -laburnum, whose tremulous branches seemed hardly able to bear the burden of a -beauty so flamelike as theirs; and now and then the fantastic shadows of birds -in flight flitted across the long tussore-silk curtains that were stretched in -front of the huge window, producing a kind of momentary Japanese effect, and -making him think of those pallid, jade-faced painters of Tokyo who, through the -medium of an art that is necessarily immobile, seek to convey the sense of -swiftness and motion. The sullen murmur of the bees shouldering their way -through the long unmown grass, or circling with monotonous insistence round the -dusty gilt horns of the straggling woodbine, seemed to make the stillness more -oppressive. The dim roar of London was like the bourdon note of a distant -organ. -</p> - -<p> -In the centre of the room, clamped to an upright easel, stood the full-length -portrait of a young man of extraordinary personal beauty, and in front of it, -some little distance away, was sitting the artist himself, Basil Hallward, -whose sudden disappearance some years ago caused, at the time, such public -excitement and gave rise to so many strange conjectures. -</p> - -<p> -As the painter looked at the gracious and comely form he had so skilfully -mirrored in his art, a smile of pleasure passed across his face, and seemed -about to linger there. But he suddenly started up, and closing his eyes, placed -his fingers upon the lids, as though he sought to imprison within his brain -some curious dream from which he feared he might awake. -</p> - -<p> -“It is your best work, Basil, the best thing you have ever done,” -said Lord Henry languidly. “You must certainly send it next year to the -Grosvenor. The Academy is too large and too vulgar. Whenever I have gone there, -there have been either so many people that I have not been able to see the -pictures, which was dreadful, or so many pictures that I have not been able to -see the people, which was worse. The Grosvenor is really the only place.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t think I shall send it anywhere,” he answered, -tossing his head back in that odd way that used to make his friends laugh at -him at Oxford. “No, I won’t send it anywhere.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry elevated his eyebrows and looked at him in amazement through the -thin blue wreaths of smoke that curled up in such fanciful whorls from his -heavy, opium-tainted cigarette. “Not send it anywhere? My dear fellow, -why? Have you any reason? What odd chaps you painters are! You do anything in -the world to gain a reputation. As soon as you have one, you seem to want to -throw it away. It is silly of you, for there is only one thing in the world -worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about. A portrait -like this would set you far above all the young men in England, and make the -old men quite jealous, if old men are ever capable of any emotion.” -</p> - -<p> -“I know you will laugh at me,” he replied, “but I really -can’t exhibit it. I have put too much of myself into it.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry stretched himself out on the divan and laughed. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, I knew you would; but it is quite true, all the same.” -</p> - -<p> -“Too much of yourself in it! Upon my word, Basil, I didn’t know you -were so vain; and I really can’t see any resemblance between you, with -your rugged strong face and your coal-black hair, and this young Adonis, who -looks as if he was made out of ivory and rose-leaves. Why, my dear Basil, he is -a Narcissus, and you—well, of course you have an intellectual expression -and all that. But beauty, real beauty, ends where an intellectual expression -begins. Intellect is in itself a mode of exaggeration, and destroys the harmony -of any face. The moment one sits down to think, one becomes all nose, or all -forehead, or something horrid. Look at the successful men in any of the learned -professions. How perfectly hideous they are! Except, of course, in the Church. -But then in the Church they don’t think. A bishop keeps on saying at the -age of eighty what he was told to say when he was a boy of eighteen, and as a -natural consequence he always looks absolutely delightful. Your mysterious -young friend, whose name you have never told me, but whose picture really -fascinates me, never thinks. I feel quite sure of that. He is some brainless -beautiful creature who should be always here in winter when we have no flowers -to look at, and always here in summer when we want something to chill our -intelligence. Don’t flatter yourself, Basil: you are not in the least -like him.” -</p> - -<p> -“You don’t understand me, Harry,” answered the artist. -“Of course I am not like him. I know that perfectly well. Indeed, I -should be sorry to look like him. You shrug your shoulders? I am telling you -the truth. There is a fatality about all physical and intellectual distinction, -the sort of fatality that seems to dog through history the faltering steps of -kings. It is better not to be different from one’s fellows. The ugly and -the stupid have the best of it in this world. They can sit at their ease and -gape at the play. If they know nothing of victory, they are at least spared the -knowledge of defeat. They live as we all should live—undisturbed, -indifferent, and without disquiet. They neither bring ruin upon others, nor -ever receive it from alien hands. Your rank and wealth, Harry; my brains, such -as they are—my art, whatever it may be worth; Dorian Gray’s good -looks—we shall all suffer for what the gods have given us, suffer -terribly.” -</p> - -<p> -“Dorian Gray? Is that his name?” asked Lord Henry, walking across -the studio towards Basil Hallward. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, that is his name. I didn’t intend to tell it to you.” -</p> - -<p> -“But why not?” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, I can’t explain. When I like people immensely, I never tell -their names to any one. It is like surrendering a part of them. I have grown to -love secrecy. It seems to be the one thing that can make modern life mysterious -or marvellous to us. The commonest thing is delightful if one only hides it. -When I leave town now I never tell my people where I am going. If I did, I -would lose all my pleasure. It is a silly habit, I dare say, but somehow it -seems to bring a great deal of romance into one’s life. I suppose you -think me awfully foolish about it?” -</p> - -<p> -“Not at all,” answered Lord Henry, “not at all, my dear -Basil. You seem to forget that I am married, and the one charm of marriage is -that it makes a life of deception absolutely necessary for both parties. I -never know where my wife is, and my wife never knows what I am doing. When we -meet—we do meet occasionally, when we dine out together, or go down to -the Duke’s—we tell each other the most absurd stories with the most -serious faces. My wife is very good at it—much better, in fact, than I -am. She never gets confused over her dates, and I always do. But when she does -find me out, she makes no row at all. I sometimes wish she would; but she -merely laughs at me.” -</p> - -<p> -“I hate the way you talk about your married life, Harry,” said -Basil Hallward, strolling towards the door that led into the garden. “I -believe that you are really a very good husband, but that you are thoroughly -ashamed of your own virtues. You are an extraordinary fellow. You never say a -moral thing, and you never do a wrong thing. Your cynicism is simply a -pose.” -</p> - -<p> -“Being natural is simply a pose, and the most irritating pose I -know,” cried Lord Henry, laughing; and the two young men went out into -the garden together and ensconced themselves on a long bamboo seat that stood -in the shade of a tall laurel bush. The sunlight slipped over the polished -leaves. In the grass, white daisies were tremulous. -</p> - -<p> -After a pause, Lord Henry pulled out his watch. “I am afraid I must be -going, Basil,” he murmured, “and before I go, I insist on your -answering a question I put to you some time ago.” -</p> - -<p> -“What is that?” said the painter, keeping his eyes fixed on the -ground. -</p> - -<p> -“You know quite well.” -</p> - -<p> -“I do not, Harry.” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, I will tell you what it is. I want you to explain to me why you -won’t exhibit Dorian Gray’s picture. I want the real reason.” -</p> - -<p> -“I told you the real reason.” -</p> - -<p> -“No, you did not. You said it was because there was too much of yourself -in it. Now, that is childish.” -</p> - -<p> -“Harry,” said Basil Hallward, looking him straight in the face, -“every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, -not of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. It is not -he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on the -coloured canvas, reveals himself. The reason I will not exhibit this picture is -that I am afraid that I have shown in it the secret of my own soul.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry laughed. “And what is that?” he asked. -</p> - -<p> -“I will tell you,” said Hallward; but an expression of perplexity -came over his face. -</p> - -<p> -“I am all expectation, Basil,” continued his companion, glancing at -him. -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, there is really very little to tell, Harry,” answered the -painter; “and I am afraid you will hardly understand it. Perhaps you will -hardly believe it.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry smiled, and leaning down, plucked a pink-petalled daisy from the -grass and examined it. “I am quite sure I shall understand it,” he -replied, gazing intently at the little golden, white-feathered disk, “and -as for believing things, I can believe anything, provided that it is quite -incredible.” -</p> - -<p> -The wind shook some blossoms from the trees, and the heavy lilac-blooms, with -their clustering stars, moved to and fro in the languid air. A grasshopper -began to chirrup by the wall, and like a blue thread a long thin dragon-fly -floated past on its brown gauze wings. Lord Henry felt as if he could hear -Basil Hallward’s heart beating, and wondered what was coming. -</p> - -<p> -“The story is simply this,” said the painter after some time. -“Two months ago I went to a crush at Lady Brandon’s. You know we -poor artists have to show ourselves in society from time to time, just to -remind the public that we are not savages. With an evening coat and a white -tie, as you told me once, anybody, even a stock-broker, can gain a reputation -for being civilized. Well, after I had been in the room about ten minutes, -talking to huge overdressed dowagers and tedious academicians, I suddenly -became conscious that some one was looking at me. I turned half-way round and -saw Dorian Gray for the first time. When our eyes met, I felt that I was -growing pale. A curious sensation of terror came over me. I knew that I had -come face to face with some one whose mere personality was so fascinating that, -if I allowed it to do so, it would absorb my whole nature, my whole soul, my -very art itself. I did not want any external influence in my life. You know -yourself, Harry, how independent I am by nature. I have always been my own -master; had at least always been so, till I met Dorian Gray. Then—but I -don’t know how to explain it to you. Something seemed to tell me that I -was on the verge of a terrible crisis in my life. I had a strange feeling that -fate had in store for me exquisite joys and exquisite sorrows. I grew afraid -and turned to quit the room. It was not conscience that made me do so: it was a -sort of cowardice. I take no credit to myself for trying to escape.” -</p> - -<p> -“Conscience and cowardice are really the same things, Basil. Conscience -is the trade-name of the firm. That is all.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t believe that, Harry, and I don’t believe you do -either. However, whatever was my motive—and it may have been pride, for I -used to be very proud—I certainly struggled to the door. There, of -course, I stumbled against Lady Brandon. ‘You are not going to run away -so soon, Mr. Hallward?’ she screamed out. You know her curiously shrill -voice?” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes; she is a peacock in everything but beauty,” said Lord Henry, -pulling the daisy to bits with his long nervous fingers. -</p> - -<p> -“I could not get rid of her. She brought me up to royalties, and people -with stars and garters, and elderly ladies with gigantic tiaras and parrot -noses. She spoke of me as her dearest friend. I had only met her once before, -but she took it into her head to lionize me. I believe some picture of mine had -made a great success at the time, at least had been chattered about in the -penny newspapers, which is the nineteenth-century standard of immortality. -Suddenly I found myself face to face with the young man whose personality had -so strangely stirred me. We were quite close, almost touching. Our eyes met -again. It was reckless of me, but I asked Lady Brandon to introduce me to him. -Perhaps it was not so reckless, after all. It was simply inevitable. We would -have spoken to each other without any introduction. I am sure of that. Dorian -told me so afterwards. He, too, felt that we were destined to know each -other.” -</p> - -<p> -“And how did Lady Brandon describe this wonderful young man?” asked -his companion. “I know she goes in for giving a rapid <i>précis</i> of -all her guests. I remember her bringing me up to a truculent and red-faced old -gentleman covered all over with orders and ribbons, and hissing into my ear, in -a tragic whisper which must have been perfectly audible to everybody in the -room, the most astounding details. I simply fled. I like to find out people for -myself. But Lady Brandon treats her guests exactly as an auctioneer treats his -goods. She either explains them entirely away, or tells one everything about -them except what one wants to know.” -</p> - -<p> -“Poor Lady Brandon! You are hard on her, Harry!” said Hallward -listlessly. -</p> - -<p> -“My dear fellow, she tried to found a <i>salon</i>, and only succeeded in -opening a restaurant. How could I admire her? But tell me, what did she say -about Mr. Dorian Gray?” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, something like, ‘Charming boy—poor dear mother and I -absolutely inseparable. Quite forget what he does—afraid -he—doesn’t do anything—oh, yes, plays the piano—or is -it the violin, dear Mr. Gray?’ Neither of us could help laughing, and we -became friends at once.” -</p> - -<p> -“Laughter is not at all a bad beginning for a friendship, and it is far -the best ending for one,” said the young lord, plucking another daisy. -</p> - -<p> -Hallward shook his head. “You don’t understand what friendship is, -Harry,” he murmured—“or what enmity is, for that matter. You -like every one; that is to say, you are indifferent to every one.” -</p> - -<p> -“How horribly unjust of you!” cried Lord Henry, tilting his hat -back and looking up at the little clouds that, like ravelled skeins of glossy -white silk, were drifting across the hollowed turquoise of the summer sky. -“Yes; horribly unjust of you. I make a great difference between people. I -choose my friends for their good looks, my acquaintances for their good -characters, and my enemies for their good intellects. A man cannot be too -careful in the choice of his enemies. I have not got one who is a fool. They -are all men of some intellectual power, and consequently they all appreciate -me. Is that very vain of me? I think it is rather vain.” -</p> - -<p> -“I should think it was, Harry. But according to your category I must be -merely an acquaintance.” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear old Basil, you are much more than an acquaintance.” -</p> - -<p> -“And much less than a friend. A sort of brother, I suppose?” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, brothers! I don’t care for brothers. My elder brother -won’t die, and my younger brothers seem never to do anything else.” -</p> - -<p> -“Harry!” exclaimed Hallward, frowning. -</p> - -<p> -“My dear fellow, I am not quite serious. But I can’t help detesting -my relations. I suppose it comes from the fact that none of us can stand other -people having the same faults as ourselves. I quite sympathize with the rage of -the English democracy against what they call the vices of the upper orders. The -masses feel that drunkenness, stupidity, and immorality should be their own -special property, and that if any one of us makes an ass of himself, he is -poaching on their preserves. When poor Southwark got into the divorce court, -their indignation was quite magnificent. And yet I don’t suppose that ten -per cent of the proletariat live correctly.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t agree with a single word that you have said, and, what is -more, Harry, I feel sure you don’t either.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry stroked his pointed brown beard and tapped the toe of his -patent-leather boot with a tasselled ebony cane. “How English you are -Basil! That is the second time you have made that observation. If one puts -forward an idea to a true Englishman—always a rash thing to do—he -never dreams of considering whether the idea is right or wrong. The only thing -he considers of any importance is whether one believes it oneself. Now, the -value of an idea has nothing whatsoever to do with the sincerity of the man who -expresses it. Indeed, the probabilities are that the more insincere the man is, -the more purely intellectual will the idea be, as in that case it will not be -coloured by either his wants, his desires, or his prejudices. However, I -don’t propose to discuss politics, sociology, or metaphysics with you. I -like persons better than principles, and I like persons with no principles -better than anything else in the world. Tell me more about Mr. Dorian Gray. How -often do you see him?” -</p> - -<p> -“Every day. I couldn’t be happy if I didn’t see him every -day. He is absolutely necessary to me.” -</p> - -<p> -“How extraordinary! I thought you would never care for anything but your -art.” -</p> - -<p> -“He is all my art to me now,” said the painter gravely. “I -sometimes think, Harry, that there are only two eras of any importance in the -world’s history. The first is the appearance of a new medium for art, and -the second is the appearance of a new personality for art also. What the -invention of oil-painting was to the Venetians, the face of Antinous was to -late Greek sculpture, and the face of Dorian Gray will some day be to me. It is -not merely that I paint from him, draw from him, sketch from him. Of course, I -have done all that. But he is much more to me than a model or a sitter. I -won’t tell you that I am dissatisfied with what I have done of him, or -that his beauty is such that art cannot express it. There is nothing that art -cannot express, and I know that the work I have done, since I met Dorian Gray, -is good work, is the best work of my life. But in some curious way—I -wonder will you understand me?—his personality has suggested to me an -entirely new manner in art, an entirely new mode of style. I see things -differently, I think of them differently. I can now recreate life in a way that -was hidden from me before. ‘A dream of form in days of -thought’—who is it who says that? I forget; but it is what Dorian -Gray has been to me. The merely visible presence of this lad—for he seems -to me little more than a lad, though he is really over twenty—his merely -visible presence—ah! I wonder can you realize all that that means? -Unconsciously he defines for me the lines of a fresh school, a school that is -to have in it all the passion of the romantic spirit, all the perfection of the -spirit that is Greek. The harmony of soul and body—how much that is! We -in our madness have separated the two, and have invented a realism that is -vulgar, an ideality that is void. Harry! if you only knew what Dorian Gray is -to me! You remember that landscape of mine, for which Agnew offered me such a -huge price but which I would not part with? It is one of the best things I have -ever done. And why is it so? Because, while I was painting it, Dorian Gray sat -beside me. Some subtle influence passed from him to me, and for the first time -in my life I saw in the plain woodland the wonder I had always looked for and -always missed.” -</p> - -<p> -“Basil, this is extraordinary! I must see Dorian Gray.” -</p> - -<p> -Hallward got up from the seat and walked up and down the garden. After some -time he came back. “Harry,” he said, “Dorian Gray is to me -simply a motive in art. You might see nothing in him. I see everything in him. -He is never more present in my work than when no image of him is there. He is a -suggestion, as I have said, of a new manner. I find him in the curves of -certain lines, in the loveliness and subtleties of certain colours. That is -all.” -</p> - -<p> -“Then why won’t you exhibit his portrait?” asked Lord Henry. -</p> - -<p> -“Because, without intending it, I have put into it some expression of all -this curious artistic idolatry, of which, of course, I have never cared to -speak to him. He knows nothing about it. He shall never know anything about it. -But the world might guess it, and I will not bare my soul to their shallow -prying eyes. My heart shall never be put under their microscope. There is too -much of myself in the thing, Harry—too much of myself!” -</p> - -<p> -“Poets are not so scrupulous as you are. They know how useful passion is -for publication. Nowadays a broken heart will run to many editions.” -</p> - -<p> -“I hate them for it,” cried Hallward. “An artist should -create beautiful things, but should put nothing of his own life into them. We -live in an age when men treat art as if it were meant to be a form of -autobiography. We have lost the abstract sense of beauty. Some day I will show -the world what it is; and for that reason the world shall never see my portrait -of Dorian Gray.” -</p> - -<p> -“I think you are wrong, Basil, but I won’t argue with you. It is -only the intellectually lost who ever argue. Tell me, is Dorian Gray very fond -of you?” -</p> - -<p> -The painter considered for a few moments. “He likes me,” he -answered after a pause; “I know he likes me. Of course I flatter him -dreadfully. I find a strange pleasure in saying things to him that I know I -shall be sorry for having said. As a rule, he is charming to me, and we sit in -the studio and talk of a thousand things. Now and then, however, he is horribly -thoughtless, and seems to take a real delight in giving me pain. Then I feel, -Harry, that I have given away my whole soul to some one who treats it as if it -were a flower to put in his coat, a bit of decoration to charm his vanity, an -ornament for a summer’s day.” -</p> - -<p> -“Days in summer, Basil, are apt to linger,” murmured Lord Henry. -“Perhaps you will tire sooner than he will. It is a sad thing to think -of, but there is no doubt that genius lasts longer than beauty. That accounts -for the fact that we all take such pains to over-educate ourselves. In the wild -struggle for existence, we want to have something that endures, and so we fill -our minds with rubbish and facts, in the silly hope of keeping our place. The -thoroughly well-informed man—that is the modern ideal. And the mind of -the thoroughly well-informed man is a dreadful thing. It is like a -<i>bric-à-brac</i> shop, all monsters and dust, with everything priced above -its proper value. I think you will tire first, all the same. Some day you will -look at your friend, and he will seem to you to be a little out of drawing, or -you won’t like his tone of colour, or something. You will bitterly -reproach him in your own heart, and seriously think that he has behaved very -badly to you. The next time he calls, you will be perfectly cold and -indifferent. It will be a great pity, for it will alter you. What you have told -me is quite a romance, a romance of art one might call it, and the worst of -having a romance of any kind is that it leaves one so unromantic.” -</p> - -<p> -“Harry, don’t talk like that. As long as I live, the personality of -Dorian Gray will dominate me. You can’t feel what I feel. You change too -often.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah, my dear Basil, that is exactly why I can feel it. Those who are -faithful know only the trivial side of love: it is the faithless who know -love’s tragedies.” And Lord Henry struck a light on a dainty silver -case and began to smoke a cigarette with a self-conscious and satisfied air, as -if he had summed up the world in a phrase. There was a rustle of chirruping -sparrows in the green lacquer leaves of the ivy, and the blue cloud-shadows -chased themselves across the grass like swallows. How pleasant it was in the -garden! And how delightful other people’s emotions were!—much more -delightful than their ideas, it seemed to him. One’s own soul, and the -passions of one’s friends—those were the fascinating things in -life. He pictured to himself with silent amusement the tedious luncheon that he -had missed by staying so long with Basil Hallward. Had he gone to his -aunt’s, he would have been sure to have met Lord Goodbody there, and the -whole conversation would have been about the feeding of the poor and the -necessity for model lodging-houses. Each class would have preached the -importance of those virtues, for whose exercise there was no necessity in their -own lives. The rich would have spoken on the value of thrift, and the idle -grown eloquent over the dignity of labour. It was charming to have escaped all -that! As he thought of his aunt, an idea seemed to strike him. He turned to -Hallward and said, “My dear fellow, I have just remembered.” -</p> - -<p> -“Remembered what, Harry?” -</p> - -<p> -“Where I heard the name of Dorian Gray.” -</p> - -<p> -“Where was it?” asked Hallward, with a slight frown. -</p> - -<p> -“Don’t look so angry, Basil. It was at my aunt, Lady -Agatha’s. She told me she had discovered a wonderful young man who was -going to help her in the East End, and that his name was Dorian Gray. I am -bound to state that she never told me he was good-looking. Women have no -appreciation of good looks; at least, good women have not. She said that he was -very earnest and had a beautiful nature. I at once pictured to myself a -creature with spectacles and lank hair, horribly freckled, and tramping about -on huge feet. I wish I had known it was your friend.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am very glad you didn’t, Harry.” -</p> - -<p> -“Why?” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t want you to meet him.” -</p> - -<p> -“You don’t want me to meet him?” -</p> - -<p> -“No.” -</p> - -<p> -“Mr. Dorian Gray is in the studio, sir,” said the butler, coming -into the garden. -</p> - -<p> -“You must introduce me now,” cried Lord Henry, laughing. -</p> - -<p> -The painter turned to his servant, who stood blinking in the sunlight. -“Ask Mr. Gray to wait, Parker: I shall be in in a few moments.” The -man bowed and went up the walk. -</p> - -<p> -Then he looked at Lord Henry. “Dorian Gray is my dearest friend,” -he said. “He has a simple and a beautiful nature. Your aunt was quite -right in what she said of him. Don’t spoil him. Don’t try to -influence him. Your influence would be bad. The world is wide, and has many -marvellous people in it. Don’t take away from me the one person who gives -to my art whatever charm it possesses: my life as an artist depends on him. -Mind, Harry, I trust you.” He spoke very slowly, and the words seemed -wrung out of him almost against his will. -</p> - -<p> -“What nonsense you talk!” said Lord Henry, smiling, and taking -Hallward by the arm, he almost led him into the house. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap02"></a>CHAPTER II.</h2> - -<p> -As they entered they saw Dorian Gray. He was seated at the piano, with his back -to them, turning over the pages of a volume of Schumann’s “Forest -Scenes.” “You must lend me these, Basil,” he cried. “I -want to learn them. They are perfectly charming.” -</p> - -<p> -“That entirely depends on how you sit to-day, Dorian.” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, I am tired of sitting, and I don’t want a life-sized portrait -of myself,” answered the lad, swinging round on the music-stool in a -wilful, petulant manner. When he caught sight of Lord Henry, a faint blush -coloured his cheeks for a moment, and he started up. “I beg your pardon, -Basil, but I didn’t know you had any one with you.” -</p> - -<p> -“This is Lord Henry Wotton, Dorian, an old Oxford friend of mine. I have -just been telling him what a capital sitter you were, and now you have spoiled -everything.” -</p> - -<p> -“You have not spoiled my pleasure in meeting you, Mr. Gray,” said -Lord Henry, stepping forward and extending his hand. “My aunt has often -spoken to me about you. You are one of her favourites, and, I am afraid, one of -her victims also.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am in Lady Agatha’s black books at present,” answered -Dorian with a funny look of penitence. “I promised to go to a club in -Whitechapel with her last Tuesday, and I really forgot all about it. We were to -have played a duet together—three duets, I believe. I don’t know -what she will say to me. I am far too frightened to call.” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, I will make your peace with my aunt. She is quite devoted to you. -And I don’t think it really matters about your not being there. The -audience probably thought it was a duet. When Aunt Agatha sits down to the -piano, she makes quite enough noise for two people.” -</p> - -<p> -“That is very horrid to her, and not very nice to me,” answered -Dorian, laughing. -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry looked at him. Yes, he was certainly wonderfully handsome, with his -finely curved scarlet lips, his frank blue eyes, his crisp gold hair. There was -something in his face that made one trust him at once. All the candour of youth -was there, as well as all youth’s passionate purity. One felt that he had -kept himself unspotted from the world. No wonder Basil Hallward worshipped him. -</p> - -<p> -“You are too charming to go in for philanthropy, Mr. Gray—far too -charming.” And Lord Henry flung himself down on the divan and opened his -cigarette-case. -</p> - -<p> -The painter had been busy mixing his colours and getting his brushes ready. He -was looking worried, and when he heard Lord Henry’s last remark, he -glanced at him, hesitated for a moment, and then said, “Harry, I want to -finish this picture to-day. Would you think it awfully rude of me if I asked -you to go away?” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry smiled and looked at Dorian Gray. “Am I to go, Mr. -Gray?” he asked. -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, please don’t, Lord Henry. I see that Basil is in one of his -sulky moods, and I can’t bear him when he sulks. Besides, I want you to -tell me why I should not go in for philanthropy.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t know that I shall tell you that, Mr. Gray. It is so -tedious a subject that one would have to talk seriously about it. But I -certainly shall not run away, now that you have asked me to stop. You -don’t really mind, Basil, do you? You have often told me that you liked -your sitters to have some one to chat to.” -</p> - -<p> -Hallward bit his lip. “If Dorian wishes it, of course you must stay. -Dorian’s whims are laws to everybody, except himself.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry took up his hat and gloves. “You are very pressing, Basil, but -I am afraid I must go. I have promised to meet a man at the Orleans. Good-bye, -Mr. Gray. Come and see me some afternoon in Curzon Street. I am nearly always -at home at five o’clock. Write to me when you are coming. I should be -sorry to miss you.” -</p> - -<p> -“Basil,” cried Dorian Gray, “if Lord Henry Wotton goes, I -shall go, too. You never open your lips while you are painting, and it is -horribly dull standing on a platform and trying to look pleasant. Ask him to -stay. I insist upon it.” -</p> - -<p> -“Stay, Harry, to oblige Dorian, and to oblige me,” said Hallward, -gazing intently at his picture. “It is quite true, I never talk when I am -working, and never listen either, and it must be dreadfully tedious for my -unfortunate sitters. I beg you to stay.” -</p> - -<p> -“But what about my man at the Orleans?” -</p> - -<p> -The painter laughed. “I don’t think there will be any difficulty -about that. Sit down again, Harry. And now, Dorian, get up on the platform, and -don’t move about too much, or pay any attention to what Lord Henry says. -He has a very bad influence over all his friends, with the single exception of -myself.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray stepped up on the dais with the air of a young Greek martyr, and -made a little <i>moue</i> of discontent to Lord Henry, to whom he had rather -taken a fancy. He was so unlike Basil. They made a delightful contrast. And he -had such a beautiful voice. After a few moments he said to him, “Have you -really a very bad influence, Lord Henry? As bad as Basil says?” -</p> - -<p> -“There is no such thing as a good influence, Mr. Gray. All influence is -immoral—immoral from the scientific point of view.” -</p> - -<p> -“Why?” -</p> - -<p> -“Because to influence a person is to give him one’s own soul. He -does not think his natural thoughts, or burn with his natural passions. His -virtues are not real to him. His sins, if there are such things as sins, are -borrowed. He becomes an echo of some one else’s music, an actor of a part -that has not been written for him. The aim of life is self-development. To -realize one’s nature perfectly—that is what each of us is here for. -People are afraid of themselves, nowadays. They have forgotten the highest of -all duties, the duty that one owes to one’s self. Of course, they are -charitable. They feed the hungry and clothe the beggar. But their own souls -starve, and are naked. Courage has gone out of our race. Perhaps we never -really had it. The terror of society, which is the basis of morals, the terror -of God, which is the secret of religion—these are the two things that -govern us. And yet—” -</p> - -<p> -“Just turn your head a little more to the right, Dorian, like a good -boy,” said the painter, deep in his work and conscious only that a look -had come into the lad’s face that he had never seen there before. -</p> - -<p> -“And yet,” continued Lord Henry, in his low, musical voice, and -with that graceful wave of the hand that was always so characteristic of him, -and that he had even in his Eton days, “I believe that if one man were to -live out his life fully and completely, were to give form to every feeling, -expression to every thought, reality to every dream—I believe that the -world would gain such a fresh impulse of joy that we would forget all the -maladies of mediævalism, and return to the Hellenic ideal—to something -finer, richer than the Hellenic ideal, it may be. But the bravest man amongst -us is afraid of himself. The mutilation of the savage has its tragic survival -in the self-denial that mars our lives. We are punished for our refusals. Every -impulse that we strive to strangle broods in the mind and poisons us. The body -sins once, and has done with its sin, for action is a mode of purification. -Nothing remains then but the recollection of a pleasure, or the luxury of a -regret. The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. Resist it, -and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to -itself, with desire for what its monstrous laws have made monstrous and -unlawful. It has been said that the great events of the world take place in the -brain. It is in the brain, and the brain only, that the great sins of the world -take place also. You, Mr. Gray, you yourself, with your rose-red youth and your -rose-white boyhood, you have had passions that have made you afraid, thoughts -that have filled you with terror, day-dreams and sleeping dreams whose mere -memory might stain your cheek with shame—” -</p> - -<p> -“Stop!” faltered Dorian Gray, “stop! you bewilder me. I -don’t know what to say. There is some answer to you, but I cannot find -it. Don’t speak. Let me think. Or, rather, let me try not to -think.” -</p> - -<p> -For nearly ten minutes he stood there, motionless, with parted lips and eyes -strangely bright. He was dimly conscious that entirely fresh influences were at -work within him. Yet they seemed to him to have come really from himself. The -few words that Basil’s friend had said to him—words spoken by -chance, no doubt, and with wilful paradox in them—had touched some secret -chord that had never been touched before, but that he felt was now vibrating -and throbbing to curious pulses. -</p> - -<p> -Music had stirred him like that. Music had troubled him many times. But music -was not articulate. It was not a new world, but rather another chaos, that it -created in us. Words! Mere words! How terrible they were! How clear, and vivid, -and cruel! One could not escape from them. And yet what a subtle magic there -was in them! They seemed to be able to give a plastic form to formless things, -and to have a music of their own as sweet as that of viol or of lute. Mere -words! Was there anything so real as words? -</p> - -<p> -Yes; there had been things in his boyhood that he had not understood. He -understood them now. Life suddenly became fiery-coloured to him. It seemed to -him that he had been walking in fire. Why had he not known it? -</p> - -<p> -With his subtle smile, Lord Henry watched him. He knew the precise -psychological moment when to say nothing. He felt intensely interested. He was -amazed at the sudden impression that his words had produced, and, remembering a -book that he had read when he was sixteen, a book which had revealed to him -much that he had not known before, he wondered whether Dorian Gray was passing -through a similar experience. He had merely shot an arrow into the air. Had it -hit the mark? How fascinating the lad was! -</p> - -<p> -Hallward painted away with that marvellous bold touch of his, that had the true -refinement and perfect delicacy that in art, at any rate comes only from -strength. He was unconscious of the silence. -</p> - -<p> -“Basil, I am tired of standing,” cried Dorian Gray suddenly. -“I must go out and sit in the garden. The air is stifling here.” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear fellow, I am so sorry. When I am painting, I can’t think -of anything else. But you never sat better. You were perfectly still. And I -have caught the effect I wanted—the half-parted lips and the bright look -in the eyes. I don’t know what Harry has been saying to you, but he has -certainly made you have the most wonderful expression. I suppose he has been -paying you compliments. You mustn’t believe a word that he says.” -</p> - -<p> -“He has certainly not been paying me compliments. Perhaps that is the -reason that I don’t believe anything he has told me.” -</p> - -<p> -“You know you believe it all,” said Lord Henry, looking at him with -his dreamy languorous eyes. “I will go out to the garden with you. It is -horribly hot in the studio. Basil, let us have something iced to drink, -something with strawberries in it.” -</p> - -<p> -“Certainly, Harry. Just touch the bell, and when Parker comes I will tell -him what you want. I have got to work up this background, so I will join you -later on. Don’t keep Dorian too long. I have never been in better form -for painting than I am to-day. This is going to be my masterpiece. It is my -masterpiece as it stands.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry went out to the garden and found Dorian Gray burying his face in the -great cool lilac-blossoms, feverishly drinking in their perfume as if it had -been wine. He came close to him and put his hand upon his shoulder. “You -are quite right to do that,” he murmured. “Nothing can cure the -soul but the senses, just as nothing can cure the senses but the soul.” -</p> - -<p> -The lad started and drew back. He was bareheaded, and the leaves had tossed his -rebellious curls and tangled all their gilded threads. There was a look of fear -in his eyes, such as people have when they are suddenly awakened. His finely -chiselled nostrils quivered, and some hidden nerve shook the scarlet of his -lips and left them trembling. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes,” continued Lord Henry, “that is one of the great -secrets of life—to cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses -by means of the soul. You are a wonderful creation. You know more than you -think you know, just as you know less than you want to know.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray frowned and turned his head away. He could not help liking the -tall, graceful young man who was standing by him. His romantic, olive-coloured -face and worn expression interested him. There was something in his low languid -voice that was absolutely fascinating. His cool, white, flowerlike hands, even, -had a curious charm. They moved, as he spoke, like music, and seemed to have a -language of their own. But he felt afraid of him, and ashamed of being afraid. -Why had it been left for a stranger to reveal him to himself? He had known -Basil Hallward for months, but the friendship between them had never altered -him. Suddenly there had come some one across his life who seemed to have -disclosed to him life’s mystery. And, yet, what was there to be afraid -of? He was not a schoolboy or a girl. It was absurd to be frightened. -</p> - -<p> -“Let us go and sit in the shade,” said Lord Henry. “Parker -has brought out the drinks, and if you stay any longer in this glare, you will -be quite spoiled, and Basil will never paint you again. You really must not -allow yourself to become sunburnt. It would be unbecoming.” -</p> - -<p> -“What can it matter?” cried Dorian Gray, laughing, as he sat down -on the seat at the end of the garden. -</p> - -<p> -“It should matter everything to you, Mr. Gray.” -</p> - -<p> -“Why?” -</p> - -<p> -“Because you have the most marvellous youth, and youth is the one thing -worth having.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t feel that, Lord Henry.” -</p> - -<p> -“No, you don’t feel it now. Some day, when you are old and wrinkled -and ugly, when thought has seared your forehead with its lines, and passion -branded your lips with its hideous fires, you will feel it, you will feel it -terribly. Now, wherever you go, you charm the world. Will it always be so? ... -You have a wonderfully beautiful face, Mr. Gray. Don’t frown. You have. -And beauty is a form of genius—is higher, indeed, than genius, as it -needs no explanation. It is of the great facts of the world, like sunlight, or -spring-time, or the reflection in dark waters of that silver shell we call the -moon. It cannot be questioned. It has its divine right of sovereignty. It makes -princes of those who have it. You smile? Ah! when you have lost it you -won’t smile.... People say sometimes that beauty is only superficial. -That may be so, but at least it is not so superficial as thought is. To me, -beauty is the wonder of wonders. It is only shallow people who do not judge by -appearances. The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the -invisible.... Yes, Mr. Gray, the gods have been good to you. But what the gods -give they quickly take away. You have only a few years in which to live really, -perfectly, and fully. When your youth goes, your beauty will go with it, and -then you will suddenly discover that there are no triumphs left for you, or -have to content yourself with those mean triumphs that the memory of your past -will make more bitter than defeats. Every month as it wanes brings you nearer -to something dreadful. Time is jealous of you, and wars against your lilies and -your roses. You will become sallow, and hollow-cheeked, and dull-eyed. You will -suffer horribly.... Ah! realize your youth while you have it. Don’t -squander the gold of your days, listening to the tedious, trying to improve the -hopeless failure, or giving away your life to the ignorant, the common, and the -vulgar. These are the sickly aims, the false ideals, of our age. Live! Live the -wonderful life that is in you! Let nothing be lost upon you. Be always -searching for new sensations. Be afraid of nothing.... A new -Hedonism—that is what our century wants. You might be its visible symbol. -With your personality there is nothing you could not do. The world belongs to -you for a season.... The moment I met you I saw that you were quite unconscious -of what you really are, of what you really might be. There was so much in you -that charmed me that I felt I must tell you something about yourself. I thought -how tragic it would be if you were wasted. For there is such a little time that -your youth will last—such a little time. The common hill-flowers wither, -but they blossom again. The laburnum will be as yellow next June as it is now. -In a month there will be purple stars on the clematis, and year after year the -green night of its leaves will hold its purple stars. But we never get back our -youth. The pulse of joy that beats in us at twenty becomes sluggish. Our limbs -fail, our senses rot. We degenerate into hideous puppets, haunted by the memory -of the passions of which we were too much afraid, and the exquisite temptations -that we had not the courage to yield to. Youth! Youth! There is absolutely -nothing in the world but youth!” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray listened, open-eyed and wondering. The spray of lilac fell from his -hand upon the gravel. A furry bee came and buzzed round it for a moment. Then -it began to scramble all over the oval stellated globe of the tiny blossoms. He -watched it with that strange interest in trivial things that we try to develop -when things of high import make us afraid, or when we are stirred by some new -emotion for which we cannot find expression, or when some thought that -terrifies us lays sudden siege to the brain and calls on us to yield. After a -time the bee flew away. He saw it creeping into the stained trumpet of a Tyrian -convolvulus. The flower seemed to quiver, and then swayed gently to and fro. -</p> - -<p> -Suddenly the painter appeared at the door of the studio and made staccato signs -for them to come in. They turned to each other and smiled. -</p> - -<p> -“I am waiting,” he cried. “Do come in. The light is quite -perfect, and you can bring your drinks.” -</p> - -<p> -They rose up and sauntered down the walk together. Two green-and-white -butterflies fluttered past them, and in the pear-tree at the corner of the -garden a thrush began to sing. -</p> - -<p> -“You are glad you have met me, Mr. Gray,” said Lord Henry, looking -at him. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, I am glad now. I wonder shall I always be glad?” -</p> - -<p> -“Always! That is a dreadful word. It makes me shudder when I hear it. -Women are so fond of using it. They spoil every romance by trying to make it -last for ever. It is a meaningless word, too. The only difference between a -caprice and a lifelong passion is that the caprice lasts a little -longer.” -</p> - -<p> -As they entered the studio, Dorian Gray put his hand upon Lord Henry’s -arm. “In that case, let our friendship be a caprice,” he murmured, -flushing at his own boldness, then stepped up on the platform and resumed his -pose. -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry flung himself into a large wicker arm-chair and watched him. The -sweep and dash of the brush on the canvas made the only sound that broke the -stillness, except when, now and then, Hallward stepped back to look at his work -from a distance. In the slanting beams that streamed through the open doorway -the dust danced and was golden. The heavy scent of the roses seemed to brood -over everything. -</p> - -<p> -After about a quarter of an hour Hallward stopped painting, looked for a long -time at Dorian Gray, and then for a long time at the picture, biting the end of -one of his huge brushes and frowning. “It is quite finished,” he -cried at last, and stooping down he wrote his name in long vermilion letters on -the left-hand corner of the canvas. -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry came over and examined the picture. It was certainly a wonderful -work of art, and a wonderful likeness as well. -</p> - -<p> -“My dear fellow, I congratulate you most warmly,” he said. -“It is the finest portrait of modern times. Mr. Gray, come over and look -at yourself.” -</p> - -<p> -The lad started, as if awakened from some dream. -</p> - -<p> -“Is it really finished?” he murmured, stepping down from the -platform. -</p> - -<p> -“Quite finished,” said the painter. “And you have sat -splendidly to-day. I am awfully obliged to you.” -</p> - -<p> -“That is entirely due to me,” broke in Lord Henry. -“Isn’t it, Mr. Gray?” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian made no answer, but passed listlessly in front of his picture and turned -towards it. When he saw it he drew back, and his cheeks flushed for a moment -with pleasure. A look of joy came into his eyes, as if he had recognized -himself for the first time. He stood there motionless and in wonder, dimly -conscious that Hallward was speaking to him, but not catching the meaning of -his words. The sense of his own beauty came on him like a revelation. He had -never felt it before. Basil Hallward’s compliments had seemed to him to -be merely the charming exaggeration of friendship. He had listened to them, -laughed at them, forgotten them. They had not influenced his nature. Then had -come Lord Henry Wotton with his strange panegyric on youth, his terrible -warning of its brevity. That had stirred him at the time, and now, as he stood -gazing at the shadow of his own loveliness, the full reality of the description -flashed across him. Yes, there would be a day when his face would be wrinkled -and wizen, his eyes dim and colourless, the grace of his figure broken and -deformed. The scarlet would pass away from his lips and the gold steal from his -hair. The life that was to make his soul would mar his body. He would become -dreadful, hideous, and uncouth. -</p> - -<p> -As he thought of it, a sharp pang of pain struck through him like a knife and -made each delicate fibre of his nature quiver. His eyes deepened into amethyst, -and across them came a mist of tears. He felt as if a hand of ice had been laid -upon his heart. -</p> - -<p> -“Don’t you like it?” cried Hallward at last, stung a little -by the lad’s silence, not understanding what it meant. -</p> - -<p> -“Of course he likes it,” said Lord Henry. “Who wouldn’t -like it? It is one of the greatest things in modern art. I will give you -anything you like to ask for it. I must have it.” -</p> - -<p> -“It is not my property, Harry.” -</p> - -<p> -“Whose property is it?” -</p> - -<p> -“Dorian’s, of course,” answered the painter. -</p> - -<p> -“He is a very lucky fellow.” -</p> - -<p> -“How sad it is!” murmured Dorian Gray with his eyes still fixed -upon his own portrait. “How sad it is! I shall grow old, and horrible, -and dreadful. But this picture will remain always young. It will never be older -than this particular day of June.... If it were only the other way! If it were -I who was to be always young, and the picture that was to grow old! For -that—for that—I would give everything! Yes, there is nothing in the -whole world I would not give! I would give my soul for that!” -</p> - -<p> -“You would hardly care for such an arrangement, Basil,” cried Lord -Henry, laughing. “It would be rather hard lines on your work.” -</p> - -<p> -“I should object very strongly, Harry,” said Hallward. -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray turned and looked at him. “I believe you would, Basil. You -like your art better than your friends. I am no more to you than a green bronze -figure. Hardly as much, I dare say.” -</p> - -<p> -The painter stared in amazement. It was so unlike Dorian to speak like that. -What had happened? He seemed quite angry. His face was flushed and his cheeks -burning. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes,” he continued, “I am less to you than your ivory Hermes -or your silver Faun. You will like them always. How long will you like me? Till -I have my first wrinkle, I suppose. I know, now, that when one loses -one’s good looks, whatever they may be, one loses everything. Your -picture has taught me that. Lord Henry Wotton is perfectly right. Youth is the -only thing worth having. When I find that I am growing old, I shall kill -myself.” -</p> - -<p> -Hallward turned pale and caught his hand. “Dorian! Dorian!” he -cried, “don’t talk like that. I have never had such a friend as -you, and I shall never have such another. You are not jealous of material -things, are you?—you who are finer than any of them!” -</p> - -<p> -“I am jealous of everything whose beauty does not die. I am jealous of -the portrait you have painted of me. Why should it keep what I must lose? Every -moment that passes takes something from me and gives something to it. Oh, if it -were only the other way! If the picture could change, and I could be always -what I am now! Why did you paint it? It will mock me some day—mock me -horribly!” The hot tears welled into his eyes; he tore his hand away and, -flinging himself on the divan, he buried his face in the cushions, as though he -was praying. -</p> - -<p> -“This is your doing, Harry,” said the painter bitterly. -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. “It is the real Dorian Gray—that -is all.” -</p> - -<p> -“It is not.” -</p> - -<p> -“If it is not, what have I to do with it?” -</p> - -<p> -“You should have gone away when I asked you,” he muttered. -</p> - -<p> -“I stayed when you asked me,” was Lord Henry’s answer. -</p> - -<p> -“Harry, I can’t quarrel with my two best friends at once, but -between you both you have made me hate the finest piece of work I have ever -done, and I will destroy it. What is it but canvas and colour? I will not let -it come across our three lives and mar them.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray lifted his golden head from the pillow, and with pallid face and -tear-stained eyes, looked at him as he walked over to the deal painting-table -that was set beneath the high curtained window. What was he doing there? His -fingers were straying about among the litter of tin tubes and dry brushes, -seeking for something. Yes, it was for the long palette-knife, with its thin -blade of lithe steel. He had found it at last. He was going to rip up the -canvas. -</p> - -<p> -With a stifled sob the lad leaped from the couch, and, rushing over to -Hallward, tore the knife out of his hand, and flung it to the end of the -studio. “Don’t, Basil, don’t!” he cried. “It -would be murder!” -</p> - -<p> -“I am glad you appreciate my work at last, Dorian,” said the -painter coldly when he had recovered from his surprise. “I never thought -you would.” -</p> - -<p> -“Appreciate it? I am in love with it, Basil. It is part of myself. I feel -that.” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, as soon as you are dry, you shall be varnished, and framed, and -sent home. Then you can do what you like with yourself.” And he walked -across the room and rang the bell for tea. “You will have tea, of course, -Dorian? And so will you, Harry? Or do you object to such simple -pleasures?” -</p> - -<p> -“I adore simple pleasures,” said Lord Henry. “They are the -last refuge of the complex. But I don’t like scenes, except on the stage. -What absurd fellows you are, both of you! I wonder who it was defined man as a -rational animal. It was the most premature definition ever given. Man is many -things, but he is not rational. I am glad he is not, after all—though I -wish you chaps would not squabble over the picture. You had much better let me -have it, Basil. This silly boy doesn’t really want it, and I really -do.” -</p> - -<p> -“If you let any one have it but me, Basil, I shall never forgive -you!” cried Dorian Gray; “and I don’t allow people to call me -a silly boy.” -</p> - -<p> -“You know the picture is yours, Dorian. I gave it to you before it -existed.” -</p> - -<p> -“And you know you have been a little silly, Mr. Gray, and that you -don’t really object to being reminded that you are extremely -young.” -</p> - -<p> -“I should have objected very strongly this morning, Lord Henry.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! this morning! You have lived since then.” -</p> - -<p> -There came a knock at the door, and the butler entered with a laden tea-tray -and set it down upon a small Japanese table. There was a rattle of cups and -saucers and the hissing of a fluted Georgian urn. Two globe-shaped china dishes -were brought in by a page. Dorian Gray went over and poured out the tea. The -two men sauntered languidly to the table and examined what was under the -covers. -</p> - -<p> -“Let us go to the theatre to-night,” said Lord Henry. “There -is sure to be something on, somewhere. I have promised to dine at -White’s, but it is only with an old friend, so I can send him a wire to -say that I am ill, or that I am prevented from coming in consequence of a -subsequent engagement. I think that would be a rather nice excuse: it would -have all the surprise of candour.” -</p> - -<p> -“It is such a bore putting on one’s dress-clothes,” muttered -Hallward. “And, when one has them on, they are so horrid.” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes,” answered Lord Henry dreamily, “the costume of the -nineteenth century is detestable. It is so sombre, so depressing. Sin is the -only real colour-element left in modern life.” -</p> - -<p> -“You really must not say things like that before Dorian, Harry.” -</p> - -<p> -“Before which Dorian? The one who is pouring out tea for us, or the one -in the picture?” -</p> - -<p> -“Before either.” -</p> - -<p> -“I should like to come to the theatre with you, Lord Henry,” said -the lad. -</p> - -<p> -“Then you shall come; and you will come, too, Basil, won’t -you?” -</p> - -<p> -“I can’t, really. I would sooner not. I have a lot of work to -do.” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, then, you and I will go alone, Mr. Gray.” -</p> - -<p> -“I should like that awfully.” -</p> - -<p> -The painter bit his lip and walked over, cup in hand, to the picture. “I -shall stay with the real Dorian,” he said, sadly. -</p> - -<p> -“Is it the real Dorian?” cried the original of the portrait, -strolling across to him. “Am I really like that?” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes; you are just like that.” -</p> - -<p> -“How wonderful, Basil!” -</p> - -<p> -“At least you are like it in appearance. But it will never alter,” -sighed Hallward. “That is something.” -</p> - -<p> -“What a fuss people make about fidelity!” exclaimed Lord Henry. -“Why, even in love it is purely a question for physiology. It has nothing -to do with our own will. Young men want to be faithful, and are not; old men -want to be faithless, and cannot: that is all one can say.” -</p> - -<p> -“Don’t go to the theatre to-night, Dorian,” said Hallward. -“Stop and dine with me.” -</p> - -<p> -“I can’t, Basil.” -</p> - -<p> -“Why?” -</p> - -<p> -“Because I have promised Lord Henry Wotton to go with him.” -</p> - -<p> -“He won’t like you the better for keeping your promises. He always -breaks his own. I beg you not to go.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray laughed and shook his head. -</p> - -<p> -“I entreat you.” -</p> - -<p> -The lad hesitated, and looked over at Lord Henry, who was watching them from -the tea-table with an amused smile. -</p> - -<p> -“I must go, Basil,” he answered. -</p> - -<p> -“Very well,” said Hallward, and he went over and laid down his cup -on the tray. “It is rather late, and, as you have to dress, you had -better lose no time. Good-bye, Harry. Good-bye, Dorian. Come and see me soon. -Come to-morrow.” -</p> - -<p> -“Certainly.” -</p> - -<p> -“You won’t forget?” -</p> - -<p> -“No, of course not,” cried Dorian. -</p> - -<p> -“And ... Harry!” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, Basil?” -</p> - -<p> -“Remember what I asked you, when we were in the garden this -morning.” -</p> - -<p> -“I have forgotten it.” -</p> - -<p> -“I trust you.” -</p> - -<p> -“I wish I could trust myself,” said Lord Henry, laughing. -“Come, Mr. Gray, my hansom is outside, and I can drop you at your own -place. Good-bye, Basil. It has been a most interesting afternoon.” -</p> - -<p> -As the door closed behind them, the painter flung himself down on a sofa, and a -look of pain came into his face. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap03"></a>CHAPTER III.</h2> - -<p> -At half-past twelve next day Lord Henry Wotton strolled from Curzon Street over -to the Albany to call on his uncle, Lord Fermor, a genial if somewhat -rough-mannered old bachelor, whom the outside world called selfish because it -derived no particular benefit from him, but who was considered generous by -Society as he fed the people who amused him. His father had been our ambassador -at Madrid when Isabella was young and Prim unthought of, but had retired from -the diplomatic service in a capricious moment of annoyance on not being offered -the Embassy at Paris, a post to which he considered that he was fully entitled -by reason of his birth, his indolence, the good English of his dispatches, and -his inordinate passion for pleasure. The son, who had been his father’s -secretary, had resigned along with his chief, somewhat foolishly as was thought -at the time, and on succeeding some months later to the title, had set himself -to the serious study of the great aristocratic art of doing absolutely nothing. -He had two large town houses, but preferred to live in chambers as it was less -trouble, and took most of his meals at his club. He paid some attention to the -management of his collieries in the Midland counties, excusing himself for this -taint of industry on the ground that the one advantage of having coal was that -it enabled a gentleman to afford the decency of burning wood on his own hearth. -In politics he was a Tory, except when the Tories were in office, during which -period he roundly abused them for being a pack of Radicals. He was a hero to -his valet, who bullied him, and a terror to most of his relations, whom he -bullied in turn. Only England could have produced him, and he always said that -the country was going to the dogs. His principles were out of date, but there -was a good deal to be said for his prejudices. -</p> - -<p> -When Lord Henry entered the room, he found his uncle sitting in a rough -shooting-coat, smoking a cheroot and grumbling over <i>The Times</i>. -“Well, Harry,” said the old gentleman, “what brings you out -so early? I thought you dandies never got up till two, and were not visible -till five.” -</p> - -<p> -“Pure family affection, I assure you, Uncle George. I want to get -something out of you.” -</p> - -<p> -“Money, I suppose,” said Lord Fermor, making a wry face. -“Well, sit down and tell me all about it. Young people, nowadays, imagine -that money is everything.” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes,” murmured Lord Henry, settling his button-hole in his coat; -“and when they grow older they know it. But I don’t want money. It -is only people who pay their bills who want that, Uncle George, and I never pay -mine. Credit is the capital of a younger son, and one lives charmingly upon it. -Besides, I always deal with Dartmoor’s tradesmen, and consequently they -never bother me. What I want is information: not useful information, of course; -useless information.” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, I can tell you anything that is in an English Blue Book, Harry, -although those fellows nowadays write a lot of nonsense. When I was in the -Diplomatic, things were much better. But I hear they let them in now by -examination. What can you expect? Examinations, sir, are pure humbug from -beginning to end. If a man is a gentleman, he knows quite enough, and if he is -not a gentleman, whatever he knows is bad for him.” -</p> - -<p> -“Mr. Dorian Gray does not belong to Blue Books, Uncle George,” said -Lord Henry languidly. -</p> - -<p> -“Mr. Dorian Gray? Who is he?” asked Lord Fermor, knitting his bushy -white eyebrows. -</p> - -<p> -“That is what I have come to learn, Uncle George. Or rather, I know who -he is. He is the last Lord Kelso’s grandson. His mother was a Devereux, -Lady Margaret Devereux. I want you to tell me about his mother. What was she -like? Whom did she marry? You have known nearly everybody in your time, so you -might have known her. I am very much interested in Mr. Gray at present. I have -only just met him.” -</p> - -<p> -“Kelso’s grandson!” echoed the old gentleman. -“Kelso’s grandson! ... Of course.... I knew his mother intimately. -I believe I was at her christening. She was an extraordinarily beautiful girl, -Margaret Devereux, and made all the men frantic by running away with a -penniless young fellow—a mere nobody, sir, a subaltern in a foot -regiment, or something of that kind. Certainly. I remember the whole thing as -if it happened yesterday. The poor chap was killed in a duel at Spa a few -months after the marriage. There was an ugly story about it. They said Kelso -got some rascally adventurer, some Belgian brute, to insult his son-in-law in -public—paid him, sir, to do it, paid him—and that the fellow -spitted his man as if he had been a pigeon. The thing was hushed up, but, egad, -Kelso ate his chop alone at the club for some time afterwards. He brought his -daughter back with him, I was told, and she never spoke to him again. Oh, yes; -it was a bad business. The girl died, too, died within a year. So she left a -son, did she? I had forgotten that. What sort of boy is he? If he is like his -mother, he must be a good-looking chap.” -</p> - -<p> -“He is very good-looking,” assented Lord Henry. -</p> - -<p> -“I hope he will fall into proper hands,” continued the old man. -“He should have a pot of money waiting for him if Kelso did the right -thing by him. His mother had money, too. All the Selby property came to her, -through her grandfather. Her grandfather hated Kelso, thought him a mean dog. -He was, too. Came to Madrid once when I was there. Egad, I was ashamed of him. -The Queen used to ask me about the English noble who was always quarrelling -with the cabmen about their fares. They made quite a story of it. I -didn’t dare show my face at Court for a month. I hope he treated his -grandson better than he did the jarvies.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t know,” answered Lord Henry. “I fancy that the -boy will be well off. He is not of age yet. He has Selby, I know. He told me -so. And ... his mother was very beautiful?” -</p> - -<p> -“Margaret Devereux was one of the loveliest creatures I ever saw, Harry. -What on earth induced her to behave as she did, I never could understand. She -could have married anybody she chose. Carlington was mad after her. She was -romantic, though. All the women of that family were. The men were a poor lot, -but, egad! the women were wonderful. Carlington went on his knees to her. Told -me so himself. She laughed at him, and there wasn’t a girl in London at -the time who wasn’t after him. And by the way, Harry, talking about silly -marriages, what is this humbug your father tells me about Dartmoor wanting to -marry an American? Ain’t English girls good enough for him?” -</p> - -<p> -“It is rather fashionable to marry Americans just now, Uncle -George.” -</p> - -<p> -“I’ll back English women against the world, Harry,” said Lord -Fermor, striking the table with his fist. -</p> - -<p> -“The betting is on the Americans.” -</p> - -<p> -“They don’t last, I am told,” muttered his uncle. -</p> - -<p> -“A long engagement exhausts them, but they are capital at a steeplechase. -They take things flying. I don’t think Dartmoor has a chance.” -</p> - -<p> -“Who are her people?” grumbled the old gentleman. “Has she -got any?” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry shook his head. “American girls are as clever at concealing -their parents, as English women are at concealing their past,” he said, -rising to go. -</p> - -<p> -“They are pork-packers, I suppose?” -</p> - -<p> -“I hope so, Uncle George, for Dartmoor’s sake. I am told that -pork-packing is the most lucrative profession in America, after -politics.” -</p> - -<p> -“Is she pretty?” -</p> - -<p> -“She behaves as if she was beautiful. Most American women do. It is the -secret of their charm.” -</p> - -<p> -“Why can’t these American women stay in their own country? They are -always telling us that it is the paradise for women.” -</p> - -<p> -“It is. That is the reason why, like Eve, they are so excessively anxious -to get out of it,” said Lord Henry. “Good-bye, Uncle George. I -shall be late for lunch, if I stop any longer. Thanks for giving me the -information I wanted. I always like to know everything about my new friends, -and nothing about my old ones.” -</p> - -<p> -“Where are you lunching, Harry?” -</p> - -<p> -“At Aunt Agatha’s. I have asked myself and Mr. Gray. He is her -latest <i>protégé</i>.” -</p> - -<p> -“Humph! tell your Aunt Agatha, Harry, not to bother me any more with her -charity appeals. I am sick of them. Why, the good woman thinks that I have -nothing to do but to write cheques for her silly fads.” -</p> - -<p> -“All right, Uncle George, I’ll tell her, but it won’t have -any effect. Philanthropic people lose all sense of humanity. It is their -distinguishing characteristic.” -</p> - -<p> -The old gentleman growled approvingly and rang the bell for his servant. Lord -Henry passed up the low arcade into Burlington Street and turned his steps in -the direction of Berkeley Square. -</p> - -<p> -So that was the story of Dorian Gray’s parentage. Crudely as it had been -told to him, it had yet stirred him by its suggestion of a strange, almost -modern romance. A beautiful woman risking everything for a mad passion. A few -wild weeks of happiness cut short by a hideous, treacherous crime. Months of -voiceless agony, and then a child born in pain. The mother snatched away by -death, the boy left to solitude and the tyranny of an old and loveless man. -Yes; it was an interesting background. It posed the lad, made him more perfect, -as it were. Behind every exquisite thing that existed, there was something -tragic. Worlds had to be in travail, that the meanest flower might blow.... And -how charming he had been at dinner the night before, as with startled eyes and -lips parted in frightened pleasure he had sat opposite to him at the club, the -red candleshades staining to a richer rose the wakening wonder of his face. -Talking to him was like playing upon an exquisite violin. He answered to every -touch and thrill of the bow.... There was something terribly enthralling in the -exercise of influence. No other activity was like it. To project one’s -soul into some gracious form, and let it tarry there for a moment; to hear -one’s own intellectual views echoed back to one with all the added music -of passion and youth; to convey one’s temperament into another as though -it were a subtle fluid or a strange perfume: there was a real joy in -that—perhaps the most satisfying joy left to us in an age so limited and -vulgar as our own, an age grossly carnal in its pleasures, and grossly common -in its aims.... He was a marvellous type, too, this lad, whom by so curious a -chance he had met in Basil’s studio, or could be fashioned into a -marvellous type, at any rate. Grace was his, and the white purity of boyhood, -and beauty such as old Greek marbles kept for us. There was nothing that one -could not do with him. He could be made a Titan or a toy. What a pity it was -that such beauty was destined to fade! ... And Basil? From a psychological -point of view, how interesting he was! The new manner in art, the fresh mode of -looking at life, suggested so strangely by the merely visible presence of one -who was unconscious of it all; the silent spirit that dwelt in dim woodland, -and walked unseen in open field, suddenly showing herself, Dryadlike and not -afraid, because in his soul who sought for her there had been wakened that -wonderful vision to which alone are wonderful things revealed; the mere shapes -and patterns of things becoming, as it were, refined, and gaining a kind of -symbolical value, as though they were themselves patterns of some other and -more perfect form whose shadow they made real: how strange it all was! He -remembered something like it in history. Was it not Plato, that artist in -thought, who had first analyzed it? Was it not Buonarotti who had carved it in -the coloured marbles of a sonnet-sequence? But in our own century it was -strange.... Yes; he would try to be to Dorian Gray what, without knowing it, -the lad was to the painter who had fashioned the wonderful portrait. He would -seek to dominate him—had already, indeed, half done so. He would make -that wonderful spirit his own. There was something fascinating in this son of -love and death. -</p> - -<p> -Suddenly he stopped and glanced up at the houses. He found that he had passed -his aunt’s some distance, and, smiling to himself, turned back. When he -entered the somewhat sombre hall, the butler told him that they had gone in to -lunch. He gave one of the footmen his hat and stick and passed into the -dining-room. -</p> - -<p> -“Late as usual, Harry,” cried his aunt, shaking her head at him. -</p> - -<p> -He invented a facile excuse, and having taken the vacant seat next to her, -looked round to see who was there. Dorian bowed to him shyly from the end of -the table, a flush of pleasure stealing into his cheek. Opposite was the -Duchess of Harley, a lady of admirable good-nature and good temper, much liked -by every one who knew her, and of those ample architectural proportions that in -women who are not duchesses are described by contemporary historians as -stoutness. Next to her sat, on her right, Sir Thomas Burdon, a Radical member -of Parliament, who followed his leader in public life and in private life -followed the best cooks, dining with the Tories and thinking with the Liberals, -in accordance with a wise and well-known rule. The post on her left was -occupied by Mr. Erskine of Treadley, an old gentleman of considerable charm and -culture, who had fallen, however, into bad habits of silence, having, as he -explained once to Lady Agatha, said everything that he had to say before he was -thirty. His own neighbour was Mrs. Vandeleur, one of his aunt’s oldest -friends, a perfect saint amongst women, but so dreadfully dowdy that she -reminded one of a badly bound hymn-book. Fortunately for him she had on the -other side Lord Faudel, a most intelligent middle-aged mediocrity, as bald as a -ministerial statement in the House of Commons, with whom she was conversing in -that intensely earnest manner which is the one unpardonable error, as he -remarked once himself, that all really good people fall into, and from which -none of them ever quite escape. -</p> - -<p> -“We are talking about poor Dartmoor, Lord Henry,” cried the -duchess, nodding pleasantly to him across the table. “Do you think he -will really marry this fascinating young person?” -</p> - -<p> -“I believe she has made up her mind to propose to him, Duchess.” -</p> - -<p> -“How dreadful!” exclaimed Lady Agatha. “Really, some one -should interfere.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am told, on excellent authority, that her father keeps an American -dry-goods store,” said Sir Thomas Burdon, looking supercilious. -</p> - -<p> -“My uncle has already suggested pork-packing, Sir Thomas.” -</p> - -<p> -“Dry-goods! What are American dry-goods?” asked the duchess, -raising her large hands in wonder and accentuating the verb. -</p> - -<p> -“American novels,” answered Lord Henry, helping himself to some -quail. -</p> - -<p> -The duchess looked puzzled. -</p> - -<p> -“Don’t mind him, my dear,” whispered Lady Agatha. “He -never means anything that he says.” -</p> - -<p> -“When America was discovered,” said the Radical member—and he -began to give some wearisome facts. Like all people who try to exhaust a -subject, he exhausted his listeners. The duchess sighed and exercised her -privilege of interruption. “I wish to goodness it never had been -discovered at all!” she exclaimed. “Really, our girls have no -chance nowadays. It is most unfair.” -</p> - -<p> -“Perhaps, after all, America never has been discovered,” said Mr. -Erskine; “I myself would say that it had merely been detected.” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh! but I have seen specimens of the inhabitants,” answered the -duchess vaguely. “I must confess that most of them are extremely pretty. -And they dress well, too. They get all their dresses in Paris. I wish I could -afford to do the same.” -</p> - -<p> -“They say that when good Americans die they go to Paris,” chuckled -Sir Thomas, who had a large wardrobe of Humour’s cast-off clothes. -</p> - -<p> -“Really! And where do bad Americans go to when they die?” inquired -the duchess. -</p> - -<p> -“They go to America,” murmured Lord Henry. -</p> - -<p> -Sir Thomas frowned. “I am afraid that your nephew is prejudiced against -that great country,” he said to Lady Agatha. “I have travelled all -over it in cars provided by the directors, who, in such matters, are extremely -civil. I assure you that it is an education to visit it.” -</p> - -<p> -“But must we really see Chicago in order to be educated?” asked Mr. -Erskine plaintively. “I don’t feel up to the journey.” -</p> - -<p> -Sir Thomas waved his hand. “Mr. Erskine of Treadley has the world on his -shelves. We practical men like to see things, not to read about them. The -Americans are an extremely interesting people. They are absolutely reasonable. -I think that is their distinguishing characteristic. Yes, Mr. Erskine, an -absolutely reasonable people. I assure you there is no nonsense about the -Americans.” -</p> - -<p> -“How dreadful!” cried Lord Henry. “I can stand brute force, -but brute reason is quite unbearable. There is something unfair about its use. -It is hitting below the intellect.” -</p> - -<p> -“I do not understand you,” said Sir Thomas, growing rather red. -</p> - -<p> -“I do, Lord Henry,” murmured Mr. Erskine, with a smile. -</p> - -<p> -“Paradoxes are all very well in their way....” rejoined the -baronet. -</p> - -<p> -“Was that a paradox?” asked Mr. Erskine. “I did not think so. -Perhaps it was. Well, the way of paradoxes is the way of truth. To test reality -we must see it on the tight rope. When the verities become acrobats, we can -judge them.” -</p> - -<p> -“Dear me!” said Lady Agatha, “how you men argue! I am sure I -never can make out what you are talking about. Oh! Harry, I am quite vexed with -you. Why do you try to persuade our nice Mr. Dorian Gray to give up the East -End? I assure you he would be quite invaluable. They would love his -playing.” -</p> - -<p> -“I want him to play to me,” cried Lord Henry, smiling, and he -looked down the table and caught a bright answering glance. -</p> - -<p> -“But they are so unhappy in Whitechapel,” continued Lady Agatha. -</p> - -<p> -“I can sympathize with everything except suffering,” said Lord -Henry, shrugging his shoulders. “I cannot sympathize with that. It is too -ugly, too horrible, too distressing. There is something terribly morbid in the -modern sympathy with pain. One should sympathize with the colour, the beauty, -the joy of life. The less said about life’s sores, the better.” -</p> - -<p> -“Still, the East End is a very important problem,” remarked Sir -Thomas with a grave shake of the head. -</p> - -<p> -“Quite so,” answered the young lord. “It is the problem of -slavery, and we try to solve it by amusing the slaves.” -</p> - -<p> -The politician looked at him keenly. “What change do you propose, -then?” he asked. -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry laughed. “I don’t desire to change anything in England -except the weather,” he answered. “I am quite content with -philosophic contemplation. But, as the nineteenth century has gone bankrupt -through an over-expenditure of sympathy, I would suggest that we should appeal -to science to put us straight. The advantage of the emotions is that they lead -us astray, and the advantage of science is that it is not emotional.” -</p> - -<p> -“But we have such grave responsibilities,” ventured Mrs. Vandeleur -timidly. -</p> - -<p> -“Terribly grave,” echoed Lady Agatha. -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry looked over at Mr. Erskine. “Humanity takes itself too -seriously. It is the world’s original sin. If the caveman had known how -to laugh, history would have been different.” -</p> - -<p> -“You are really very comforting,” warbled the duchess. “I -have always felt rather guilty when I came to see your dear aunt, for I take no -interest at all in the East End. For the future I shall be able to look her in -the face without a blush.” -</p> - -<p> -“A blush is very becoming, Duchess,” remarked Lord Henry. -</p> - -<p> -“Only when one is young,” she answered. “When an old woman -like myself blushes, it is a very bad sign. Ah! Lord Henry, I wish you would -tell me how to become young again.” -</p> - -<p> -He thought for a moment. “Can you remember any great error that you -committed in your early days, Duchess?” he asked, looking at her across -the table. -</p> - -<p> -“A great many, I fear,” she cried. -</p> - -<p> -“Then commit them over again,” he said gravely. “To get back -one’s youth, one has merely to repeat one’s follies.” -</p> - -<p> -“A delightful theory!” she exclaimed. “I must put it into -practice.” -</p> - -<p> -“A dangerous theory!” came from Sir Thomas’s tight lips. Lady -Agatha shook her head, but could not help being amused. Mr. Erskine listened. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes,” he continued, “that is one of the great secrets of -life. Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover -when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one’s -mistakes.” -</p> - -<p> -A laugh ran round the table. -</p> - -<p> -He played with the idea and grew wilful; tossed it into the air and transformed -it; let it escape and recaptured it; made it iridescent with fancy and winged -it with paradox. The praise of folly, as he went on, soared into a philosophy, -and philosophy herself became young, and catching the mad music of pleasure, -wearing, one might fancy, her wine-stained robe and wreath of ivy, danced like -a Bacchante over the hills of life, and mocked the slow Silenus for being -sober. Facts fled before her like frightened forest things. Her white feet trod -the huge press at which wise Omar sits, till the seething grape-juice rose -round her bare limbs in waves of purple bubbles, or crawled in red foam over -the vat’s black, dripping, sloping sides. It was an extraordinary -improvisation. He felt that the eyes of Dorian Gray were fixed on him, and the -consciousness that amongst his audience there was one whose temperament he -wished to fascinate seemed to give his wit keenness and to lend colour to his -imagination. He was brilliant, fantastic, irresponsible. He charmed his -listeners out of themselves, and they followed his pipe, laughing. Dorian Gray -never took his gaze off him, but sat like one under a spell, smiles chasing -each other over his lips and wonder growing grave in his darkening eyes. -</p> - -<p> -At last, liveried in the costume of the age, reality entered the room in the -shape of a servant to tell the duchess that her carriage was waiting. She wrung -her hands in mock despair. “How annoying!” she cried. “I must -go. I have to call for my husband at the club, to take him to some absurd -meeting at Willis’s Rooms, where he is going to be in the chair. If I am -late he is sure to be furious, and I couldn’t have a scene in this -bonnet. It is far too fragile. A harsh word would ruin it. No, I must go, dear -Agatha. Good-bye, Lord Henry, you are quite delightful and dreadfully -demoralizing. I am sure I don’t know what to say about your views. You -must come and dine with us some night. Tuesday? Are you disengaged -Tuesday?” -</p> - -<p> -“For you I would throw over anybody, Duchess,” said Lord Henry with -a bow. -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! that is very nice, and very wrong of you,” she cried; -“so mind you come”; and she swept out of the room, followed by Lady -Agatha and the other ladies. -</p> - -<p> -When Lord Henry had sat down again, Mr. Erskine moved round, and taking a chair -close to him, placed his hand upon his arm. -</p> - -<p> -“You talk books away,” he said; “why don’t you write -one?” -</p> - -<p> -“I am too fond of reading books to care to write them, Mr. Erskine. I -should like to write a novel certainly, a novel that would be as lovely as a -Persian carpet and as unreal. But there is no literary public in England for -anything except newspapers, primers, and encyclopaedias. Of all people in the -world the English have the least sense of the beauty of literature.” -</p> - -<p> -“I fear you are right,” answered Mr. Erskine. “I myself used -to have literary ambitions, but I gave them up long ago. And now, my dear young -friend, if you will allow me to call you so, may I ask if you really meant all -that you said to us at lunch?” -</p> - -<p> -“I quite forget what I said,” smiled Lord Henry. “Was it all -very bad?” -</p> - -<p> -“Very bad indeed. In fact I consider you extremely dangerous, and if -anything happens to our good duchess, we shall all look on you as being -primarily responsible. But I should like to talk to you about life. The -generation into which I was born was tedious. Some day, when you are tired of -London, come down to Treadley and expound to me your philosophy of pleasure -over some admirable Burgundy I am fortunate enough to possess.” -</p> - -<p> -“I shall be charmed. A visit to Treadley would be a great privilege. It -has a perfect host, and a perfect library.” -</p> - -<p> -“You will complete it,” answered the old gentleman with a courteous -bow. “And now I must bid good-bye to your excellent aunt. I am due at the -Athenaeum. It is the hour when we sleep there.” -</p> - -<p> -“All of you, Mr. Erskine?” -</p> - -<p> -“Forty of us, in forty arm-chairs. We are practising for an English -Academy of Letters.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry laughed and rose. “I am going to the park,” he cried. -</p> - -<p> -As he was passing out of the door, Dorian Gray touched him on the arm. -“Let me come with you,” he murmured. -</p> - -<p> -“But I thought you had promised Basil Hallward to go and see him,” -answered Lord Henry. -</p> - -<p> -“I would sooner come with you; yes, I feel I must come with you. Do let -me. And you will promise to talk to me all the time? No one talks so -wonderfully as you do.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! I have talked quite enough for to-day,” said Lord Henry, -smiling. “All I want now is to look at life. You may come and look at it -with me, if you care to.” -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap04"></a>CHAPTER IV.</h2> - -<p> -One afternoon, a month later, Dorian Gray was reclining in a luxurious -arm-chair, in the little library of Lord Henry’s house in Mayfair. It -was, in its way, a very charming room, with its high panelled wainscoting of -olive-stained oak, its cream-coloured frieze and ceiling of raised plasterwork, -and its brickdust felt carpet strewn with silk, long-fringed Persian rugs. On a -tiny satinwood table stood a statuette by Clodion, and beside it lay a copy of -Les Cent Nouvelles, bound for Margaret of Valois by Clovis Eve and powdered -with the gilt daisies that Queen had selected for her device. Some large blue -china jars and parrot-tulips were ranged on the mantelshelf, and through the -small leaded panes of the window streamed the apricot-coloured light of a -summer day in London. -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry had not yet come in. He was always late on principle, his principle -being that punctuality is the thief of time. So the lad was looking rather -sulky, as with listless fingers he turned over the pages of an elaborately -illustrated edition of Manon Lescaut that he had found in one of the -book-cases. The formal monotonous ticking of the Louis Quatorze clock annoyed -him. Once or twice he thought of going away. -</p> - -<p> -At last he heard a step outside, and the door opened. “How late you are, -Harry!” he murmured. -</p> - -<p> -“I am afraid it is not Harry, Mr. Gray,” answered a shrill voice. -</p> - -<p> -He glanced quickly round and rose to his feet. “I beg your pardon. I -thought—” -</p> - -<p> -“You thought it was my husband. It is only his wife. You must let me -introduce myself. I know you quite well by your photographs. I think my husband -has got seventeen of them.” -</p> - -<p> -“Not seventeen, Lady Henry?” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, eighteen, then. And I saw you with him the other night at the -opera.” She laughed nervously as she spoke, and watched him with her -vague forget-me-not eyes. She was a curious woman, whose dresses always looked -as if they had been designed in a rage and put on in a tempest. She was usually -in love with somebody, and, as her passion was never returned, she had kept all -her illusions. She tried to look picturesque, but only succeeded in being -untidy. Her name was Victoria, and she had a perfect mania for going to church. -</p> - -<p> -“That was at Lohengrin, Lady Henry, I think?” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes; it was at dear Lohengrin. I like Wagner’s music better than -anybody’s. It is so loud that one can talk the whole time without other -people hearing what one says. That is a great advantage, don’t you think -so, Mr. Gray?” -</p> - -<p> -The same nervous staccato laugh broke from her thin lips, and her fingers began -to play with a long tortoise-shell paper-knife. -</p> - -<p> -Dorian smiled and shook his head: “I am afraid I don’t think so, -Lady Henry. I never talk during music—at least, during good music. If one -hears bad music, it is one’s duty to drown it in conversation.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! that is one of Harry’s views, isn’t it, Mr. Gray? I -always hear Harry’s views from his friends. It is the only way I get to -know of them. But you must not think I don’t like good music. I adore it, -but I am afraid of it. It makes me too romantic. I have simply worshipped -pianists—two at a time, sometimes, Harry tells me. I don’t know -what it is about them. Perhaps it is that they are foreigners. They all are, -ain’t they? Even those that are born in England become foreigners after a -time, don’t they? It is so clever of them, and such a compliment to art. -Makes it quite cosmopolitan, doesn’t it? You have never been to any of my -parties, have you, Mr. Gray? You must come. I can’t afford orchids, but I -spare no expense in foreigners. They make one’s rooms look so -picturesque. But here is Harry! Harry, I came in to look for you, to ask you -something—I forget what it was—and I found Mr. Gray here. We have -had such a pleasant chat about music. We have quite the same ideas. No; I think -our ideas are quite different. But he has been most pleasant. I am so glad -I’ve seen him.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am charmed, my love, quite charmed,” said Lord Henry, elevating -his dark, crescent-shaped eyebrows and looking at them both with an amused -smile. “So sorry I am late, Dorian. I went to look after a piece of old -brocade in Wardour Street and had to bargain for hours for it. Nowadays people -know the price of everything and the value of nothing.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am afraid I must be going,” exclaimed Lady Henry, breaking an -awkward silence with her silly sudden laugh. “I have promised to drive -with the duchess. Good-bye, Mr. Gray. Good-bye, Harry. You are dining out, I -suppose? So am I. Perhaps I shall see you at Lady Thornbury’s.” -</p> - -<p> -“I dare say, my dear,” said Lord Henry, shutting the door behind -her as, looking like a bird of paradise that had been out all night in the -rain, she flitted out of the room, leaving a faint odour of frangipanni. Then -he lit a cigarette and flung himself down on the sofa. -</p> - -<p> -“Never marry a woman with straw-coloured hair, Dorian,” he said -after a few puffs. -</p> - -<p> -“Why, Harry?” -</p> - -<p> -“Because they are so sentimental.” -</p> - -<p> -“But I like sentimental people.” -</p> - -<p> -“Never marry at all, Dorian. Men marry because they are tired; women, -because they are curious: both are disappointed.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t think I am likely to marry, Harry. I am too much in love. -That is one of your aphorisms. I am putting it into practice, as I do -everything that you say.” -</p> - -<p> -“Who are you in love with?” asked Lord Henry after a pause. -</p> - -<p> -“With an actress,” said Dorian Gray, blushing. -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. “That is a rather commonplace -<i>début</i>.” -</p> - -<p> -“You would not say so if you saw her, Harry.” -</p> - -<p> -“Who is she?” -</p> - -<p> -“Her name is Sibyl Vane.” -</p> - -<p> -“Never heard of her.” -</p> - -<p> -“No one has. People will some day, however. She is a genius.” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear boy, no woman is a genius. Women are a decorative sex. They -never have anything to say, but they say it charmingly. Women represent the -triumph of matter over mind, just as men represent the triumph of mind over -morals.” -</p> - -<p> -“Harry, how can you?” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear Dorian, it is quite true. I am analysing women at present, so I -ought to know. The subject is not so abstruse as I thought it was. I find that, -ultimately, there are only two kinds of women, the plain and the coloured. The -plain women are very useful. If you want to gain a reputation for -respectability, you have merely to take them down to supper. The other women -are very charming. They commit one mistake, however. They paint in order to try -and look young. Our grandmothers painted in order to try and talk brilliantly. -<i>Rouge</i> and <i>esprit</i> used to go together. That is all over now. As -long as a woman can look ten years younger than her own daughter, she is -perfectly satisfied. As for conversation, there are only five women in London -worth talking to, and two of these can’t be admitted into decent society. -However, tell me about your genius. How long have you known her?” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! Harry, your views terrify me.” -</p> - -<p> -“Never mind that. How long have you known her?” -</p> - -<p> -“About three weeks.” -</p> - -<p> -“And where did you come across her?” -</p> - -<p> -“I will tell you, Harry, but you mustn’t be unsympathetic about it. -After all, it never would have happened if I had not met you. You filled me -with a wild desire to know everything about life. For days after I met you, -something seemed to throb in my veins. As I lounged in the park, or strolled -down Piccadilly, I used to look at every one who passed me and wonder, with a -mad curiosity, what sort of lives they led. Some of them fascinated me. Others -filled me with terror. There was an exquisite poison in the air. I had a -passion for sensations.... Well, one evening about seven o’clock, I -determined to go out in search of some adventure. I felt that this grey -monstrous London of ours, with its myriads of people, its sordid sinners, and -its splendid sins, as you once phrased it, must have something in store for me. -I fancied a thousand things. The mere danger gave me a sense of delight. I -remembered what you had said to me on that wonderful evening when we first -dined together, about the search for beauty being the real secret of life. I -don’t know what I expected, but I went out and wandered eastward, soon -losing my way in a labyrinth of grimy streets and black grassless squares. -About half-past eight I passed by an absurd little theatre, with great flaring -gas-jets and gaudy play-bills. A hideous Jew, in the most amazing waistcoat I -ever beheld in my life, was standing at the entrance, smoking a vile cigar. He -had greasy ringlets, and an enormous diamond blazed in the centre of a soiled -shirt. ‘Have a box, my Lord?’ he said, when he saw me, and he took -off his hat with an air of gorgeous servility. There was something about him, -Harry, that amused me. He was such a monster. You will laugh at me, I know, but -I really went in and paid a whole guinea for the stage-box. To the present day -I can’t make out why I did so; and yet if I hadn’t—my dear -Harry, if I hadn’t—I should have missed the greatest romance of my -life. I see you are laughing. It is horrid of you!” -</p> - -<p> -“I am not laughing, Dorian; at least I am not laughing at you. But you -should not say the greatest romance of your life. You should say the first -romance of your life. You will always be loved, and you will always be in love -with love. A <i>grande passion</i> is the privilege of people who have nothing -to do. That is the one use of the idle classes of a country. Don’t be -afraid. There are exquisite things in store for you. This is merely the -beginning.” -</p> - -<p> -“Do you think my nature so shallow?” cried Dorian Gray angrily. -</p> - -<p> -“No; I think your nature so deep.” -</p> - -<p> -“How do you mean?” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear boy, the people who love only once in their lives are really the -shallow people. What they call their loyalty, and their fidelity, I call either -the lethargy of custom or their lack of imagination. Faithfulness is to the -emotional life what consistency is to the life of the intellect—simply a -confession of failure. Faithfulness! I must analyse it some day. The passion -for property is in it. There are many things that we would throw away if we -were not afraid that others might pick them up. But I don’t want to -interrupt you. Go on with your story.” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, I found myself seated in a horrid little private box, with a -vulgar drop-scene staring me in the face. I looked out from behind the curtain -and surveyed the house. It was a tawdry affair, all Cupids and cornucopias, -like a third-rate wedding-cake. The gallery and pit were fairly full, but the -two rows of dingy stalls were quite empty, and there was hardly a person in -what I suppose they called the dress-circle. Women went about with oranges and -ginger-beer, and there was a terrible consumption of nuts going on.” -</p> - -<p> -“It must have been just like the palmy days of the British drama.” -</p> - -<p> -“Just like, I should fancy, and very depressing. I began to wonder what -on earth I should do when I caught sight of the play-bill. What do you think -the play was, Harry?” -</p> - -<p> -“I should think ‘The Idiot Boy’, or ‘Dumb but -Innocent’. Our fathers used to like that sort of piece, I believe. The -longer I live, Dorian, the more keenly I feel that whatever was good enough for -our fathers is not good enough for us. In art, as in politics, <i>les -grandpères ont toujours tort</i>.” -</p> - -<p> -“This play was good enough for us, Harry. It was Romeo and Juliet. I must -admit that I was rather annoyed at the idea of seeing Shakespeare done in such -a wretched hole of a place. Still, I felt interested, in a sort of way. At any -rate, I determined to wait for the first act. There was a dreadful orchestra, -presided over by a young Hebrew who sat at a cracked piano, that nearly drove -me away, but at last the drop-scene was drawn up and the play began. Romeo was -a stout elderly gentleman, with corked eyebrows, a husky tragedy voice, and a -figure like a beer-barrel. Mercutio was almost as bad. He was played by the -low-comedian, who had introduced gags of his own and was on most friendly terms -with the pit. They were both as grotesque as the scenery, and that looked as if -it had come out of a country-booth. But Juliet! Harry, imagine a girl, hardly -seventeen years of age, with a little, flowerlike face, a small Greek head with -plaited coils of dark-brown hair, eyes that were violet wells of passion, lips -that were like the petals of a rose. She was the loveliest thing I had ever -seen in my life. You said to me once that pathos left you unmoved, but that -beauty, mere beauty, could fill your eyes with tears. I tell you, Harry, I -could hardly see this girl for the mist of tears that came across me. And her -voice—I never heard such a voice. It was very low at first, with deep -mellow notes that seemed to fall singly upon one’s ear. Then it became a -little louder, and sounded like a flute or a distant hautboy. In the -garden-scene it had all the tremulous ecstasy that one hears just before dawn -when nightingales are singing. There were moments, later on, when it had the -wild passion of violins. You know how a voice can stir one. Your voice and the -voice of Sibyl Vane are two things that I shall never forget. When I close my -eyes, I hear them, and each of them says something different. I don’t -know which to follow. Why should I not love her? Harry, I do love her. She is -everything to me in life. Night after night I go to see her play. One evening -she is Rosalind, and the next evening she is Imogen. I have seen her die in the -gloom of an Italian tomb, sucking the poison from her lover’s lips. I -have watched her wandering through the forest of Arden, disguised as a pretty -boy in hose and doublet and dainty cap. She has been mad, and has come into the -presence of a guilty king, and given him rue to wear and bitter herbs to taste -of. She has been innocent, and the black hands of jealousy have crushed her -reedlike throat. I have seen her in every age and in every costume. Ordinary -women never appeal to one’s imagination. They are limited to their -century. No glamour ever transfigures them. One knows their minds as easily as -one knows their bonnets. One can always find them. There is no mystery in any -of them. They ride in the park in the morning and chatter at tea-parties in the -afternoon. They have their stereotyped smile and their fashionable manner. They -are quite obvious. But an actress! How different an actress is! Harry! why -didn’t you tell me that the only thing worth loving is an actress?” -</p> - -<p> -“Because I have loved so many of them, Dorian.” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, yes, horrid people with dyed hair and painted faces.” -</p> - -<p> -“Don’t run down dyed hair and painted faces. There is an -extraordinary charm in them, sometimes,” said Lord Henry. -</p> - -<p> -“I wish now I had not told you about Sibyl Vane.” -</p> - -<p> -“You could not have helped telling me, Dorian. All through your life you -will tell me everything you do.” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, Harry, I believe that is true. I cannot help telling you things. -You have a curious influence over me. If I ever did a crime, I would come and -confess it to you. You would understand me.” -</p> - -<p> -“People like you—the wilful sunbeams of life—don’t -commit crimes, Dorian. But I am much obliged for the compliment, all the same. -And now tell me—reach me the matches, like a good -boy—thanks—what are your actual relations with Sibyl Vane?” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray leaped to his feet, with flushed cheeks and burning eyes. -“Harry! Sibyl Vane is sacred!” -</p> - -<p> -“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?” -</p> - -<p> -“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.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am not surprised.” -</p> - -<p> -“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.” -</p> - -<p> -“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.” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, he seemed to think they were beyond his means,” laughed -Dorian. “By this time, however, the lights were being put out in the -theatre, and I had to go. He wanted me to try some cigars that he strongly -recommended. I declined. The next night, of course, I arrived at the place -again. When he saw me, he made me a low bow and assured me that I was a -munificent patron of art. He was a most offensive brute, though he had an -extraordinary passion for Shakespeare. He told me once, with an air of pride, -that his five bankruptcies were entirely due to ‘The Bard,’ as he -insisted on calling him. He seemed to think it a distinction.” -</p> - -<p> -“It was a distinction, my dear Dorian—a great distinction. Most -people become bankrupt through having invested too heavily in the prose of -life. To have ruined one’s self over poetry is an honour. But when did -you first speak to Miss Sibyl Vane?” -</p> - -<p> -“The third night. She had been playing Rosalind. I could not help going -round. I had thrown her some flowers, and she had looked at me—at least I -fancied that she had. The old Jew was persistent. He seemed determined to take -me behind, so I consented. It was curious my not wanting to know her, -wasn’t it?” -</p> - -<p> -“No; I don’t think so.” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear Harry, why?” -</p> - -<p> -“I will tell you some other time. Now I want to know about the -girl.” -</p> - -<p> -“Sibyl? Oh, she was so shy and so gentle. There is something of a child -about her. Her eyes opened wide in exquisite wonder when I told her what I -thought of her performance, and she seemed quite unconscious of her power. I -think we were both rather nervous. The old Jew stood grinning at the doorway of -the dusty greenroom, making elaborate speeches about us both, while we stood -looking at each other like children. He would insist on calling me ‘My -Lord,’ so I had to assure Sibyl that I was not anything of the kind. She -said quite simply to me, ‘You look more like a prince. I must call you -Prince Charming.’” -</p> - -<p> -“Upon my word, Dorian, Miss Sibyl knows how to pay compliments.” -</p> - -<p> -“You don’t understand her, Harry. She regarded me merely as a -person in a play. She knows nothing of life. She lives with her mother, a faded -tired woman who played Lady Capulet in a sort of magenta dressing-wrapper on -the first night, and looks as if she had seen better days.” -</p> - -<p> -“I know that look. It depresses me,” murmured Lord Henry, examining -his rings. -</p> - -<p> -“The Jew wanted to tell me her history, but I said it did not interest -me.” -</p> - -<p> -“You were quite right. There is always something infinitely mean about -other people’s tragedies.” -</p> - -<p> -“Sibyl is the only thing I care about. What is it to me where she came -from? From her little head to her little feet, she is absolutely and entirely -divine. Every night of my life I go to see her act, and every night she is more -marvellous.” -</p> - -<p> -“That is the reason, I suppose, that you never dine with me now. I -thought you must have some curious romance on hand. You have; but it is not -quite what I expected.” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear Harry, we either lunch or sup together every day, and I have -been to the opera with you several times,” said Dorian, opening his blue -eyes in wonder. -</p> - -<p> -“You always come dreadfully late.” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, I can’t help going to see Sibyl play,” he cried, -“even if it is only for a single act. I get hungry for her presence; and -when I think of the wonderful soul that is hidden away in that little ivory -body, I am filled with awe.” -</p> - -<p> -“You can dine with me to-night, Dorian, can’t you?” -</p> - -<p> -He shook his head. “To-night she is Imogen,” he answered, -“and to-morrow night she will be Juliet.” -</p> - -<p> -“When is she Sibyl Vane?” -</p> - -<p> -“Never.” -</p> - -<p> -“I congratulate you.” -</p> - -<p> -“How horrid you are! She is all the great heroines of the world in one. -She is more than an individual. You laugh, but I tell you she has genius. I -love her, and I must make her love me. You, who know all the secrets of life, -tell me how to charm Sibyl Vane to love me! I want to make Romeo jealous. I -want the dead lovers of the world to hear our laughter and grow sad. I want a -breath of our passion to stir their dust into consciousness, to wake their -ashes into pain. My God, Harry, how I worship her!” He was walking up and -down the room as he spoke. Hectic spots of red burned on his cheeks. He was -terribly excited. -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry watched him with a subtle sense of pleasure. How different he was -now from the shy frightened boy he had met in Basil Hallward’s studio! -His nature had developed like a flower, had borne blossoms of scarlet flame. -Out of its secret hiding-place had crept his soul, and desire had come to meet -it on the way. -</p> - -<p> -“And what do you propose to do?” said Lord Henry at last. -</p> - -<p> -“I want you and Basil to come with me some night and see her act. I have -not the slightest fear of the result. You are certain to acknowledge her -genius. Then we must get her out of the Jew’s hands. She is bound to him -for three years—at least for two years and eight months—from the -present time. I shall have to pay him something, of course. When all that is -settled, I shall take a West End theatre and bring her out properly. She will -make the world as mad as she has made me.” -</p> - -<p> -“That would be impossible, my dear boy.” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, she will. She has not merely art, consummate art-instinct, in her, -but she has personality also; and you have often told me that it is -personalities, not principles, that move the age.” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, what night shall we go?” -</p> - -<p> -“Let me see. To-day is Tuesday. Let us fix to-morrow. She plays Juliet -to-morrow.” -</p> - -<p> -“All right. The Bristol at eight o’clock; and I will get -Basil.” -</p> - -<p> -“Not eight, Harry, please. Half-past six. We must be there before the -curtain rises. You must see her in the first act, where she meets Romeo.” -</p> - -<p> -“Half-past six! What an hour! It will be like having a meat-tea, or -reading an English novel. It must be seven. No gentleman dines before seven. -Shall you see Basil between this and then? Or shall I write to him?” -</p> - -<p> -“Dear Basil! I have not laid eyes on him for a week. It is rather horrid -of me, as he has sent me my portrait in the most wonderful frame, specially -designed by himself, and, though I am a little jealous of the picture for being -a whole month younger than I am, I must admit that I delight in it. Perhaps you -had better write to him. I don’t want to see him alone. He says things -that annoy me. He gives me good advice.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry smiled. “People are very fond of giving away what they need -most themselves. It is what I call the depth of generosity.” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, Basil is the best of fellows, but he seems to me to be just a bit of -a Philistine. Since I have known you, Harry, I have discovered that.” -</p> - -<p> -“Basil, my dear boy, puts everything that is charming in him into his -work. The consequence is that he has nothing left for life but his prejudices, -his principles, and his common sense. The only artists I have ever known who -are personally delightful are bad artists. Good artists exist simply in what -they make, and consequently are perfectly uninteresting in what they are. A -great poet, a really great poet, is the most unpoetical of all creatures. But -inferior poets are absolutely fascinating. The worse their rhymes are, the more -picturesque they look. The mere fact of having published a book of second-rate -sonnets makes a man quite irresistible. He lives the poetry that he cannot -write. The others write the poetry that they dare not realize.” -</p> - -<p> -“I wonder is that really so, Harry?” said Dorian Gray, putting some -perfume on his handkerchief out of a large, gold-topped bottle that stood on -the table. “It must be, if you say it. And now I am off. Imogen is -waiting for me. Don’t forget about to-morrow. Good-bye.” -</p> - -<p> -As he left the room, Lord Henry’s heavy eyelids drooped, and he began to -think. Certainly few people had ever interested him so much as Dorian Gray, and -yet the lad’s mad adoration of some one else caused him not the slightest -pang of annoyance or jealousy. He was pleased by it. It made him a more -interesting study. He had been always enthralled by the methods of natural -science, but the ordinary subject-matter of that science had seemed to him -trivial and of no import. And so he had begun by vivisecting himself, as he had -ended by vivisecting others. Human life—that appeared to him the one -thing worth investigating. Compared to it there was nothing else of any value. -It was true that as one watched life in its curious crucible of pain and -pleasure, one could not wear over one’s face a mask of glass, nor keep -the sulphurous fumes from troubling the brain and making the imagination turbid -with monstrous fancies and misshapen dreams. There were poisons so subtle that -to know their properties one had to sicken of them. There were maladies so -strange that one had to pass through them if one sought to understand their -nature. And, yet, what a great reward one received! How wonderful the whole -world became to one! To note the curious hard logic of passion, and the -emotional coloured life of the intellect—to observe where they met, and -where they separated, at what point they were in unison, and at what point they -were at discord—there was a delight in that! What matter what the cost -was? One could never pay too high a price for any sensation. -</p> - -<p> -He was conscious—and the thought brought a gleam of pleasure into his -brown agate eyes—that it was through certain words of his, musical words -said with musical utterance, that Dorian Gray’s soul had turned to this -white girl and bowed in worship before her. To a large extent the lad was his -own creation. He had made him premature. That was something. Ordinary people -waited till life disclosed to them its secrets, but to the few, to the elect, -the mysteries of life were revealed before the veil was drawn away. Sometimes -this was the effect of art, and chiefly of the art of literature, which dealt -immediately with the passions and the intellect. But now and then a complex -personality took the place and assumed the office of art, was indeed, in its -way, a real work of art, life having its elaborate masterpieces, just as poetry -has, or sculpture, or painting. -</p> - -<p> -Yes, the lad was premature. He was gathering his harvest while it was yet -spring. The pulse and passion of youth were in him, but he was becoming -self-conscious. It was delightful to watch him. With his beautiful face, and -his beautiful soul, he was a thing to wonder at. It was no matter how it all -ended, or was destined to end. He was like one of those gracious figures in a -pageant or a play, whose joys seem to be remote from one, but whose sorrows -stir one’s sense of beauty, and whose wounds are like red roses. -</p> - -<p> -Soul and body, body and soul—how mysterious they were! There was -animalism in the soul, and the body had its moments of spirituality. The senses -could refine, and the intellect could degrade. Who could say where the fleshly -impulse ceased, or the psychical impulse began? How shallow were the arbitrary -definitions of ordinary psychologists! And yet how difficult to decide between -the claims of the various schools! Was the soul a shadow seated in the house of -sin? Or was the body really in the soul, as Giordano Bruno thought? The -separation of spirit from matter was a mystery, and the union of spirit with -matter was a mystery also. -</p> - -<p> -He began to wonder whether we could ever make psychology so absolute a science -that each little spring of life would be revealed to us. As it was, we always -misunderstood ourselves and rarely understood others. Experience was of no -ethical value. It was merely the name men gave to their mistakes. Moralists -had, as a rule, regarded it as a mode of warning, had claimed for it a certain -ethical efficacy in the formation of character, had praised it as something -that taught us what to follow and showed us what to avoid. But there was no -motive power in experience. It was as little of an active cause as conscience -itself. All that it really demonstrated was that our future would be the same -as our past, and that the sin we had done once, and with loathing, we would do -many times, and with joy. -</p> - -<p> -It was clear to him that the experimental method was the only method by which -one could arrive at any scientific analysis of the passions; and certainly -Dorian Gray was a subject made to his hand, and seemed to promise rich and -fruitful results. His sudden mad love for Sibyl Vane was a psychological -phenomenon of no small interest. There was no doubt that curiosity had much to -do with it, curiosity and the desire for new experiences, yet it was not a -simple, but rather a very complex passion. What there was in it of the purely -sensuous instinct of boyhood had been transformed by the workings of the -imagination, changed into something that seemed to the lad himself to be remote -from sense, and was for that very reason all the more dangerous. It was the -passions about whose origin we deceived ourselves that tyrannized most strongly -over us. Our weakest motives were those of whose nature we were conscious. It -often happened that when we thought we were experimenting on others we were -really experimenting on ourselves. -</p> - -<p> -While Lord Henry sat dreaming on these things, a knock came to the door, and -his valet entered and reminded him it was time to dress for dinner. He got up -and looked out into the street. The sunset had smitten into scarlet gold the -upper windows of the houses opposite. The panes glowed like plates of heated -metal. The sky above was like a faded rose. He thought of his friend’s -young fiery-coloured life and wondered how it was all going to end. -</p> - -<p> -When he arrived home, about half-past twelve o’clock, he saw a telegram -lying on the hall table. He opened it and found it was from Dorian Gray. It was -to tell him that he was engaged to be married to Sibyl Vane. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap05"></a>CHAPTER V.</h2> - -<p> -“Mother, Mother, I am so happy!” whispered the girl, burying her -face in the lap of the faded, tired-looking woman who, with back turned to the -shrill intrusive light, was sitting in the one arm-chair that their dingy -sitting-room contained. “I am so happy!” she repeated, “and -you must be happy, too!” -</p> - -<p> -Mrs. Vane winced and put her thin, bismuth-whitened hands on her -daughter’s head. “Happy!” she echoed, “I am only happy, -Sibyl, when I see you act. You must not think of anything but your acting. Mr. -Isaacs has been very good to us, and we owe him money.” -</p> - -<p> -The girl looked up and pouted. “Money, Mother?” she cried, -“what does money matter? Love is more than money.” -</p> - -<p> -“Mr. Isaacs has advanced us fifty pounds to pay off our debts and to get -a proper outfit for James. You must not forget that, Sibyl. Fifty pounds is a -very large sum. Mr. Isaacs has been most considerate.” -</p> - -<p> -“He is not a gentleman, Mother, and I hate the way he talks to me,” -said the girl, rising to her feet and going over to the window. -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t know how we could manage without him,” answered the -elder woman querulously. -</p> - -<p> -Sibyl Vane tossed her head and laughed. “We don’t want him any -more, Mother. Prince Charming rules life for us now.” Then she paused. A -rose shook in her blood and shadowed her cheeks. Quick breath parted the petals -of her lips. They trembled. Some southern wind of passion swept over her and -stirred the dainty folds of her dress. “I love him,” she said -simply. -</p> - -<p> -“Foolish child! foolish child!” was the parrot-phrase flung in -answer. The waving of crooked, false-jewelled fingers gave grotesqueness to the -words. -</p> - -<p> -The girl laughed again. The joy of a caged bird was in her voice. Her eyes -caught the melody and echoed it in radiance, then closed for a moment, as -though to hide their secret. When they opened, the mist of a dream had passed -across them. -</p> - -<p> -Thin-lipped wisdom spoke at her from the worn chair, hinted at prudence, quoted -from that book of cowardice whose author apes the name of common sense. She did -not listen. She was free in her prison of passion. Her prince, Prince Charming, -was with her. She had called on memory to remake him. She had sent her soul to -search for him, and it had brought him back. His kiss burned again upon her -mouth. Her eyelids were warm with his breath. -</p> - -<p> -Then wisdom altered its method and spoke of espial and discovery. This young -man might be rich. If so, marriage should be thought of. Against the shell of -her ear broke the waves of worldly cunning. The arrows of craft shot by her. -She saw the thin lips moving, and smiled. -</p> - -<p> -Suddenly she felt the need to speak. The wordy silence troubled her. -“Mother, Mother,” she cried, “why does he love me so much? I -know why I love him. I love him because he is like what love himself should be. -But what does he see in me? I am not worthy of him. And yet—why, I cannot -tell—though I feel so much beneath him, I don’t feel humble. I feel -proud, terribly proud. Mother, did you love my father as I love Prince -Charming?” -</p> - -<p> -The elder woman grew pale beneath the coarse powder that daubed her cheeks, and -her dry lips twitched with a spasm of pain. Sybil rushed to her, flung her arms -round her neck, and kissed her. “Forgive me, Mother. I know it pains you -to talk about our father. But it only pains you because you loved him so much. -Don’t look so sad. I am as happy to-day as you were twenty years ago. Ah! -let me be happy for ever!” -</p> - -<p> -“My child, you are far too young to think of falling in love. Besides, -what do you know of this young man? You don’t even know his name. The -whole thing is most inconvenient, and really, when James is going away to -Australia, and I have so much to think of, I must say that you should have -shown more consideration. However, as I said before, if he is rich ...” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! Mother, Mother, let me be happy!” -</p> - -<p> -Mrs. Vane glanced at her, and with one of those false theatrical gestures that -so often become a mode of second nature to a stage-player, clasped her in her -arms. At this moment, the door opened and a young lad with rough brown hair -came into the room. He was thick-set of figure, and his hands and feet were -large and somewhat clumsy in movement. He was not so finely bred as his sister. -One would hardly have guessed the close relationship that existed between them. -Mrs. Vane fixed her eyes on him and intensified her smile. She mentally -elevated her son to the dignity of an audience. She felt sure that the -<i>tableau</i> was interesting. -</p> - -<p> -“You might keep some of your kisses for me, Sibyl, I think,” said -the lad with a good-natured grumble. -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! but you don’t like being kissed, Jim,” she cried. -“You are a dreadful old bear.” And she ran across the room and -hugged him. -</p> - -<p> -James Vane looked into his sister’s face with tenderness. “I want -you to come out with me for a walk, Sibyl. I don’t suppose I shall ever -see this horrid London again. I am sure I don’t want to.” -</p> - -<p> -“My son, don’t say such dreadful things,” murmured Mrs. Vane, -taking up a tawdry theatrical dress, with a sigh, and beginning to patch it. -She felt a little disappointed that he had not joined the group. It would have -increased the theatrical picturesqueness of the situation. -</p> - -<p> -“Why not, Mother? I mean it.” -</p> - -<p> -“You pain me, my son. I trust you will return from Australia in a -position of affluence. I believe there is no society of any kind in the -Colonies—nothing that I would call society—so when you have made -your fortune, you must come back and assert yourself in London.” -</p> - -<p> -“Society!” muttered the lad. “I don’t want to know -anything about that. I should like to make some money to take you and Sibyl off -the stage. I hate it.” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, Jim!” said Sibyl, laughing, “how unkind of you! But are -you really going for a walk with me? That will be nice! I was afraid you were -going to say good-bye to some of your friends—to Tom Hardy, who gave you -that hideous pipe, or Ned Langton, who makes fun of you for smoking it. It is -very sweet of you to let me have your last afternoon. Where shall we go? Let us -go to the park.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am too shabby,” he answered, frowning. “Only swell people -go to the park.” -</p> - -<p> -“Nonsense, Jim,” she whispered, stroking the sleeve of his coat. -</p> - -<p> -He hesitated for a moment. “Very well,” he said at last, “but -don’t be too long dressing.” She danced out of the door. One could -hear her singing as she ran upstairs. Her little feet pattered overhead. -</p> - -<p> -He walked up and down the room two or three times. Then he turned to the still -figure in the chair. “Mother, are my things ready?” he asked. -</p> - -<p> -“Quite ready, James,” she answered, keeping her eyes on her work. -For some months past she had felt ill at ease when she was alone with this -rough stern son of hers. Her shallow secret nature was troubled when their eyes -met. She used to wonder if he suspected anything. The silence, for he made no -other observation, became intolerable to her. She began to complain. Women -defend themselves by attacking, just as they attack by sudden and strange -surrenders. “I hope you will be contented, James, with your sea-faring -life,” she said. “You must remember that it is your own choice. You -might have entered a solicitor’s office. Solicitors are a very -respectable class, and in the country often dine with the best families.” -</p> - -<p> -“I hate offices, and I hate clerks,” he replied. “But you are -quite right. I have chosen my own life. All I say is, watch over Sibyl. -Don’t let her come to any harm. Mother, you must watch over her.” -</p> - -<p> -“James, you really talk very strangely. Of course I watch over -Sibyl.” -</p> - -<p> -“I hear a gentleman comes every night to the theatre and goes behind to -talk to her. Is that right? What about that?” -</p> - -<p> -“You are speaking about things you don’t understand, James. In the -profession we are accustomed to receive a great deal of most gratifying -attention. I myself used to receive many bouquets at one time. That was when -acting was really understood. As for Sibyl, I do not know at present whether -her attachment is serious or not. But there is no doubt that the young man in -question is a perfect gentleman. He is always most polite to me. Besides, he -has the appearance of being rich, and the flowers he sends are lovely.” -</p> - -<p> -“You don’t know his name, though,” said the lad harshly. -</p> - -<p> -“No,” answered his mother with a placid expression in her face. -“He has not yet revealed his real name. I think it is quite romantic of -him. He is probably a member of the aristocracy.” -</p> - -<p> -James Vane bit his lip. “Watch over Sibyl, Mother,” he cried, -“watch over her.” -</p> - -<p> -“My son, you distress me very much. Sibyl is always under my special -care. Of course, if this gentleman is wealthy, there is no reason why she -should not contract an alliance with him. I trust he is one of the aristocracy. -He has all the appearance of it, I must say. It might be a most brilliant -marriage for Sibyl. They would make a charming couple. His good looks are -really quite remarkable; everybody notices them.” -</p> - -<p> -The lad muttered something to himself and drummed on the window-pane with his -coarse fingers. He had just turned round to say something when the door opened -and Sibyl ran in. -</p> - -<p> -“How serious you both are!” she cried. “What is the -matter?” -</p> - -<p> -“Nothing,” he answered. “I suppose one must be serious -sometimes. Good-bye, Mother; I will have my dinner at five o’clock. -Everything is packed, except my shirts, so you need not trouble.” -</p> - -<p> -“Good-bye, my son,” she answered with a bow of strained -stateliness. -</p> - -<p> -She was extremely annoyed at the tone he had adopted with her, and there was -something in his look that had made her feel afraid. -</p> - -<p> -“Kiss me, Mother,” said the girl. Her flowerlike lips touched the -withered cheek and warmed its frost. -</p> - -<p> -“My child! my child!” cried Mrs. Vane, looking up to the ceiling in -search of an imaginary gallery. -</p> - -<p> -“Come, Sibyl,” said her brother impatiently. He hated his -mother’s affectations. -</p> - -<p> -They went out into the flickering, wind-blown sunlight and strolled down the -dreary Euston Road. The passersby glanced in wonder at the sullen heavy youth -who, in coarse, ill-fitting clothes, was in the company of such a graceful, -refined-looking girl. He was like a common gardener walking with a rose. -</p> - -<p> -Jim frowned from time to time when he caught the inquisitive glance of some -stranger. He had that dislike of being stared at, which comes on geniuses late -in life and never leaves the commonplace. Sibyl, however, was quite unconscious -of the effect she was producing. Her love was trembling in laughter on her -lips. She was thinking of Prince Charming, and, that she might think of him all -the more, she did not talk of him, but prattled on about the ship in which Jim -was going to sail, about the gold he was certain to find, about the wonderful -heiress whose life he was to save from the wicked, red-shirted bushrangers. For -he was not to remain a sailor, or a supercargo, or whatever he was going to be. -Oh, no! A sailor’s existence was dreadful. Fancy being cooped up in a -horrid ship, with the hoarse, hump-backed waves trying to get in, and a black -wind blowing the masts down and tearing the sails into long screaming ribands! -He was to leave the vessel at Melbourne, bid a polite good-bye to the captain, -and go off at once to the gold-fields. Before a week was over he was to come -across a large nugget of pure gold, the largest nugget that had ever been -discovered, and bring it down to the coast in a waggon guarded by six mounted -policemen. The bushrangers were to attack them three times, and be defeated -with immense slaughter. Or, no. He was not to go to the gold-fields at all. -They were horrid places, where men got intoxicated, and shot each other in -bar-rooms, and used bad language. He was to be a nice sheep-farmer, and one -evening, as he was riding home, he was to see the beautiful heiress being -carried off by a robber on a black horse, and give chase, and rescue her. Of -course, she would fall in love with him, and he with her, and they would get -married, and come home, and live in an immense house in London. Yes, there were -delightful things in store for him. But he must be very good, and not lose his -temper, or spend his money foolishly. She was only a year older than he was, -but she knew so much more of life. He must be sure, also, to write to her by -every mail, and to say his prayers each night before he went to sleep. God was -very good, and would watch over him. She would pray for him, too, and in a few -years he would come back quite rich and happy. -</p> - -<p> -The lad listened sulkily to her and made no answer. He was heart-sick at -leaving home. -</p> - -<p> -Yet it was not this alone that made him gloomy and morose. Inexperienced though -he was, he had still a strong sense of the danger of Sibyl’s position. -This young dandy who was making love to her could mean her no good. He was a -gentleman, and he hated him for that, hated him through some curious -race-instinct for which he could not account, and which for that reason was all -the more dominant within him. He was conscious also of the shallowness and -vanity of his mother’s nature, and in that saw infinite peril for Sibyl -and Sibyl’s happiness. Children begin by loving their parents; as they -grow older they judge them; sometimes they forgive them. -</p> - -<p> -His mother! He had something on his mind to ask of her, something that he had -brooded on for many months of silence. A chance phrase that he had heard at the -theatre, a whispered sneer that had reached his ears one night as he waited at -the stage-door, had set loose a train of horrible thoughts. He remembered it as -if it had been the lash of a hunting-crop across his face. His brows knit -together into a wedge-like furrow, and with a twitch of pain he bit his -underlip. -</p> - -<p> -“You are not listening to a word I am saying, Jim,” cried Sibyl, -“and I am making the most delightful plans for your future. Do say -something.” -</p> - -<p> -“What do you want me to say?” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh! that you will be a good boy and not forget us,” she answered, -smiling at him. -</p> - -<p> -He shrugged his shoulders. “You are more likely to forget me than I am to -forget you, Sibyl.” -</p> - -<p> -She flushed. “What do you mean, Jim?” she asked. -</p> - -<p> -“You have a new friend, I hear. Who is he? Why have you not told me about -him? He means you no good.” -</p> - -<p> -“Stop, Jim!” she exclaimed. “You must not say anything -against him. I love him.” -</p> - -<p> -“Why, you don’t even know his name,” answered the lad. -“Who is he? I have a right to know.” -</p> - -<p> -“He is called Prince Charming. Don’t you like the name. Oh! you -silly boy! you should never forget it. If you only saw him, you would think him -the most wonderful person in the world. Some day you will meet him—when -you come back from Australia. You will like him so much. Everybody likes him, -and I ... love him. I wish you could come to the theatre to-night. He is going -to be there, and I am to play Juliet. Oh! how I shall play it! Fancy, Jim, to -be in love and play Juliet! To have him sitting there! To play for his delight! -I am afraid I may frighten the company, frighten or enthrall them. To be in -love is to surpass one’s self. Poor dreadful Mr. Isaacs will be shouting -‘genius’ to his loafers at the bar. He has preached me as a dogma; -to-night he will announce me as a revelation. I feel it. And it is all his, his -only, Prince Charming, my wonderful lover, my god of graces. But I am poor -beside him. Poor? What does that matter? When poverty creeps in at the door, -love flies in through the window. Our proverbs want rewriting. They were made -in winter, and it is summer now; spring-time for me, I think, a very dance of -blossoms in blue skies.” -</p> - -<p> -“He is a gentleman,” said the lad sullenly. -</p> - -<p> -“A prince!” she cried musically. “What more do you -want?” -</p> - -<p> -“He wants to enslave you.” -</p> - -<p> -“I shudder at the thought of being free.” -</p> - -<p> -“I want you to beware of him.” -</p> - -<p> -“To see him is to worship him; to know him is to trust him.” -</p> - -<p> -“Sibyl, you are mad about him.” -</p> - -<p> -She laughed and took his arm. “You dear old Jim, you talk as if you were -a hundred. Some day you will be in love yourself. Then you will know what it -is. Don’t look so sulky. Surely you should be glad to think that, though -you are going away, you leave me happier than I have ever been before. Life has -been hard for us both, terribly hard and difficult. But it will be different -now. You are going to a new world, and I have found one. Here are two chairs; -let us sit down and see the smart people go by.” -</p> - -<p> -They took their seats amidst a crowd of watchers. The tulip-beds across the -road flamed like throbbing rings of fire. A white dust—tremulous cloud of -orris-root it seemed—hung in the panting air. The brightly coloured -parasols danced and dipped like monstrous butterflies. -</p> - -<p> -She made her brother talk of himself, his hopes, his prospects. He spoke slowly -and with effort. They passed words to each other as players at a game pass -counters. Sibyl felt oppressed. She could not communicate her joy. A faint -smile curving that sullen mouth was all the echo she could win. After some time -she became silent. Suddenly she caught a glimpse of golden hair and laughing -lips, and in an open carriage with two ladies Dorian Gray drove past. -</p> - -<p> -She started to her feet. “There he is!” she cried. -</p> - -<p> -“Who?” said Jim Vane. -</p> - -<p> -“Prince Charming,” she answered, looking after the victoria. -</p> - -<p> -He jumped up and seized her roughly by the arm. “Show him to me. Which is -he? Point him out. I must see him!” he exclaimed; but at that moment the -Duke of Berwick’s four-in-hand came between, and when it had left the -space clear, the carriage had swept out of the park. -</p> - -<p> -“He is gone,” murmured Sibyl sadly. “I wish you had seen -him.” -</p> - -<p> -“I wish I had, for as sure as there is a God in heaven, if he ever does -you any wrong, I shall kill him.” -</p> - -<p> -She looked at him in horror. He repeated his words. They cut the air like a -dagger. The people round began to gape. A lady standing close to her tittered. -</p> - -<p> -“Come away, Jim; come away,” she whispered. He followed her -doggedly as she passed through the crowd. He felt glad at what he had said. -</p> - -<p> -When they reached the Achilles Statue, she turned round. There was pity in her -eyes that became laughter on her lips. She shook her head at him. “You -are foolish, Jim, utterly foolish; a bad-tempered boy, that is all. How can you -say such horrible things? You don’t know what you are talking about. You -are simply jealous and unkind. Ah! I wish you would fall in love. Love makes -people good, and what you said was wicked.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am sixteen,” he answered, “and I know what I am about. -Mother is no help to you. She doesn’t understand how to look after you. I -wish now that I was not going to Australia at all. I have a great mind to chuck -the whole thing up. I would, if my articles hadn’t been signed.” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, don’t be so serious, Jim. You are like one of the heroes of -those silly melodramas Mother used to be so fond of acting in. I am not going -to quarrel with you. I have seen him, and oh! to see him is perfect happiness. -We won’t quarrel. I know you would never harm any one I love, would -you?” -</p> - -<p> -“Not as long as you love him, I suppose,” was the sullen answer. -</p> - -<p> -“I shall love him for ever!” she cried. -</p> - -<p> -“And he?” -</p> - -<p> -“For ever, too!” -</p> - -<p> -“He had better.” -</p> - -<p> -She shrank from him. Then she laughed and put her hand on his arm. He was -merely a boy. -</p> - -<p> -At the Marble Arch they hailed an omnibus, which left them close to their -shabby home in the Euston Road. It was after five o’clock, and Sibyl had -to lie down for a couple of hours before acting. Jim insisted that she should -do so. He said that he would sooner part with her when their mother was not -present. She would be sure to make a scene, and he detested scenes of every -kind. -</p> - -<p> -In Sybil’s own room they parted. There was jealousy in the lad’s -heart, and a fierce murderous hatred of the stranger who, as it seemed to him, -had come between them. Yet, when her arms were flung round his neck, and her -fingers strayed through his hair, he softened and kissed her with real -affection. There were tears in his eyes as he went downstairs. -</p> - -<p> -His mother was waiting for him below. She grumbled at his unpunctuality, as he -entered. He made no answer, but sat down to his meagre meal. The flies buzzed -round the table and crawled over the stained cloth. Through the rumble of -omnibuses, and the clatter of street-cabs, he could hear the droning voice -devouring each minute that was left to him. -</p> - -<p> -After some time, he thrust away his plate and put his head in his hands. He -felt that he had a right to know. It should have been told to him before, if it -was as he suspected. Leaden with fear, his mother watched him. Words dropped -mechanically from her lips. A tattered lace handkerchief twitched in her -fingers. When the clock struck six, he got up and went to the door. Then he -turned back and looked at her. Their eyes met. In hers he saw a wild appeal for -mercy. It enraged him. -</p> - -<p> -“Mother, I have something to ask you,” he said. Her eyes wandered -vaguely about the room. She made no answer. “Tell me the truth. I have a -right to know. Were you married to my father?” -</p> - -<p> -She heaved a deep sigh. It was a sigh of relief. The terrible moment, the -moment that night and day, for weeks and months, she had dreaded, had come at -last, and yet she felt no terror. Indeed, in some measure it was a -disappointment to her. The vulgar directness of the question called for a -direct answer. The situation had not been gradually led up to. It was crude. It -reminded her of a bad rehearsal. -</p> - -<p> -“No,” she answered, wondering at the harsh simplicity of life. -</p> - -<p> -“My father was a scoundrel then!” cried the lad, clenching his -fists. -</p> - -<p> -She shook her head. “I knew he was not free. We loved each other very -much. If he had lived, he would have made provision for us. Don’t speak -against him, my son. He was your father, and a gentleman. Indeed, he was highly -connected.” -</p> - -<p> -An oath broke from his lips. “I don’t care for myself,” he -exclaimed, “but don’t let Sibyl.... It is a gentleman, isn’t -it, who is in love with her, or says he is? Highly connected, too, I -suppose.” -</p> - -<p> -For a moment a hideous sense of humiliation came over the woman. Her head -drooped. She wiped her eyes with shaking hands. “Sibyl has a -mother,” she murmured; “I had none.” -</p> - -<p> -The lad was touched. He went towards her, and stooping down, he kissed her. -“I am sorry if I have pained you by asking about my father,” he -said, “but I could not help it. I must go now. Good-bye. Don’t -forget that you will have only one child now to look after, and believe me that -if this man wrongs my sister, I will find out who he is, track him down, and -kill him like a dog. I swear it.” -</p> - -<p> -The exaggerated folly of the threat, the passionate gesture that accompanied -it, the mad melodramatic words, made life seem more vivid to her. She was -familiar with the atmosphere. She breathed more freely, and for the first time -for many months she really admired her son. She would have liked to have -continued the scene on the same emotional scale, but he cut her short. Trunks -had to be carried down and mufflers looked for. The lodging-house drudge -bustled in and out. There was the bargaining with the cabman. The moment was -lost in vulgar details. It was with a renewed feeling of disappointment that -she waved the tattered lace handkerchief from the window, as her son drove -away. She was conscious that a great opportunity had been wasted. She consoled -herself by telling Sibyl how desolate she felt her life would be, now that she -had only one child to look after. She remembered the phrase. It had pleased -her. Of the threat she said nothing. It was vividly and dramatically expressed. -She felt that they would all laugh at it some day. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap06"></a>CHAPTER VI.</h2> - -<p> -“I suppose you have heard the news, Basil?” said Lord Henry that -evening as Hallward was shown into a little private room at the Bristol where -dinner had been laid for three. -</p> - -<p> -“No, Harry,” answered the artist, giving his hat and coat to the -bowing waiter. “What is it? Nothing about politics, I hope! They -don’t interest me. There is hardly a single person in the House of -Commons worth painting, though many of them would be the better for a little -whitewashing.” -</p> - -<p> -“Dorian Gray is engaged to be married,” said Lord Henry, watching -him as he spoke. -</p> - -<p> -Hallward started and then frowned. “Dorian engaged to be married!” -he cried. “Impossible!” -</p> - -<p> -“It is perfectly true.” -</p> - -<p> -“To whom?” -</p> - -<p> -“To some little actress or other.” -</p> - -<p> -“I can’t believe it. Dorian is far too sensible.” -</p> - -<p> -“Dorian is far too wise not to do foolish things now and then, my dear -Basil.” -</p> - -<p> -“Marriage is hardly a thing that one can do now and then, Harry.” -</p> - -<p> -“Except in America,” rejoined Lord Henry languidly. “But I -didn’t say he was married. I said he was engaged to be married. There is -a great difference. I have a distinct remembrance of being married, but I have -no recollection at all of being engaged. I am inclined to think that I never -was engaged.” -</p> - -<p> -“But think of Dorian’s birth, and position, and wealth. It would be -absurd for him to marry so much beneath him.” -</p> - -<p> -“If you want to make him marry this girl, tell him that, Basil. He is -sure to do it, then. Whenever a man does a thoroughly stupid thing, it is -always from the noblest motives.” -</p> - -<p> -“I hope the girl is good, Harry. I don’t want to see Dorian tied to -some vile creature, who might degrade his nature and ruin his intellect.” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, she is better than good—she is beautiful,” murmured Lord -Henry, sipping a glass of vermouth and orange-bitters. “Dorian says she -is beautiful, and he is not often wrong about things of that kind. Your -portrait of him has quickened his appreciation of the personal appearance of -other people. It has had that excellent effect, amongst others. We are to see -her to-night, if that boy doesn’t forget his appointment.” -</p> - -<p> -“Are you serious?” -</p> - -<p> -“Quite serious, Basil. I should be miserable if I thought I should ever -be more serious than I am at the present moment.” -</p> - -<p> -“But do you approve of it, Harry?” asked the painter, walking up -and down the room and biting his lip. “You can’t approve of it, -possibly. It is some silly infatuation.” -</p> - -<p> -“I never approve, or disapprove, of anything now. It is an absurd -attitude to take towards life. We are not sent into the world to air our moral -prejudices. I never take any notice of what common people say, and I never -interfere with what charming people do. If a personality fascinates me, -whatever mode of expression that personality selects is absolutely delightful -to me. Dorian Gray falls in love with a beautiful girl who acts Juliet, and -proposes to marry her. Why not? If he wedded Messalina, he would be none the -less interesting. You know I am not a champion of marriage. The real drawback -to marriage is that it makes one unselfish. And unselfish people are -colourless. They lack individuality. Still, there are certain temperaments that -marriage makes more complex. They retain their egotism, and add to it many -other egos. They are forced to have more than one life. They become more highly -organized, and to be highly organized is, I should fancy, the object of -man’s existence. Besides, every experience is of value, and whatever one -may say against marriage, it is certainly an experience. I hope that Dorian -Gray will make this girl his wife, passionately adore her for six months, and -then suddenly become fascinated by some one else. He would be a wonderful -study.” -</p> - -<p> -“You don’t mean a single word of all that, Harry; you know you -don’t. If Dorian Gray’s life were spoiled, no one would be sorrier -than yourself. You are much better than you pretend to be.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry laughed. “The reason we all like to think so well of others is -that we are all afraid for ourselves. The basis of optimism is sheer terror. We -think that we are generous because we credit our neighbour with the possession -of those virtues that are likely to be a benefit to us. We praise the banker -that we may overdraw our account, and find good qualities in the highwayman in -the hope that he may spare our pockets. I mean everything that I have said. I -have the greatest contempt for optimism. As for a spoiled life, no life is -spoiled but one whose growth is arrested. If you want to mar a nature, you have -merely to reform it. As for marriage, of course that would be silly, but there -are other and more interesting bonds between men and women. I will certainly -encourage them. They have the charm of being fashionable. But here is Dorian -himself. He will tell you more than I can.” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear Harry, my dear Basil, you must both congratulate me!” said -the lad, throwing off his evening cape with its satin-lined wings and shaking -each of his friends by the hand in turn. “I have never been so happy. Of -course, it is sudden—all really delightful things are. And yet it seems -to me to be the one thing I have been looking for all my life.” He was -flushed with excitement and pleasure, and looked extraordinarily handsome. -</p> - -<p> -“I hope you will always be very happy, Dorian,” said Hallward, -“but I don’t quite forgive you for not having let me know of your -engagement. You let Harry know.” -</p> - -<p> -“And I don’t forgive you for being late for dinner,” broke in -Lord Henry, putting his hand on the lad’s shoulder and smiling as he -spoke. “Come, let us sit down and try what the new <i>chef</i> here is -like, and then you will tell us how it all came about.” -</p> - -<p> -“There is really not much to tell,” cried Dorian as they took their -seats at the small round table. “What happened was simply this. After I -left you yesterday evening, Harry, I dressed, had some dinner at that little -Italian restaurant in Rupert Street you introduced me to, and went down at -eight o’clock to the theatre. Sibyl was playing Rosalind. Of course, the -scenery was dreadful and the Orlando absurd. But Sibyl! You should have seen -her! When she came on in her boy’s clothes, she was perfectly wonderful. -She wore a moss-coloured velvet jerkin with cinnamon sleeves, slim, brown, -cross-gartered hose, a dainty little green cap with a hawk’s feather -caught in a jewel, and a hooded cloak lined with dull red. She had never seemed -to me more exquisite. She had all the delicate grace of that Tanagra figurine -that you have in your studio, Basil. Her hair clustered round her face like -dark leaves round a pale rose. As for her acting—well, you shall see her -to-night. She is simply a born artist. I sat in the dingy box absolutely -enthralled. I forgot that I was in London and in the nineteenth century. I was -away with my love in a forest that no man had ever seen. After the performance -was over, I went behind and spoke to her. As we were sitting together, suddenly -there came into her eyes a look that I had never seen there before. My lips -moved towards hers. We kissed each other. I can’t describe to you what I -felt at that moment. It seemed to me that all my life had been narrowed to one -perfect point of rose-coloured joy. She trembled all over and shook like a -white narcissus. Then she flung herself on her knees and kissed my hands. I -feel that I should not tell you all this, but I can’t help it. Of course, -our engagement is a dead secret. She has not even told her own mother. I -don’t know what my guardians will say. Lord Radley is sure to be furious. -I don’t care. I shall be of age in less than a year, and then I can do -what I like. I have been right, Basil, haven’t I, to take my love out of -poetry and to find my wife in Shakespeare’s plays? Lips that Shakespeare -taught to speak have whispered their secret in my ear. I have had the arms of -Rosalind around me, and kissed Juliet on the mouth.” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, Dorian, I suppose you were right,” said Hallward slowly. -</p> - -<p> -“Have you seen her to-day?” asked Lord Henry. -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray shook his head. “I left her in the forest of Arden; I shall -find her in an orchard in Verona.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry sipped his champagne in a meditative manner. “At what -particular point did you mention the word marriage, Dorian? And what did she -say in answer? Perhaps you forgot all about it.” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear Harry, I did not treat it as a business transaction, and I did -not make any formal proposal. I told her that I loved her, and she said she was -not worthy to be my wife. Not worthy! Why, the whole world is nothing to me -compared with her.” -</p> - -<p> -“Women are wonderfully practical,” murmured Lord Henry, “much -more practical than we are. In situations of that kind we often forget to say -anything about marriage, and they always remind us.” -</p> - -<p> -Hallward laid his hand upon his arm. “Don’t, Harry. You have -annoyed Dorian. He is not like other men. He would never bring misery upon any -one. His nature is too fine for that.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry looked across the table. “Dorian is never annoyed with -me,” he answered. “I asked the question for the best reason -possible, for the only reason, indeed, that excuses one for asking any -question—simple curiosity. I have a theory that it is always the women -who propose to us, and not we who propose to the women. Except, of course, in -middle-class life. But then the middle classes are not modern.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray laughed, and tossed his head. “You are quite incorrigible, -Harry; but I don’t mind. It is impossible to be angry with you. When you -see Sibyl Vane, you will feel that the man who could wrong her would be a -beast, a beast without a heart. I cannot understand how any one can wish to -shame the thing he loves. I love Sibyl Vane. I want to place her on a pedestal -of gold and to see the world worship the woman who is mine. What is marriage? -An irrevocable vow. You mock at it for that. Ah! don’t mock. It is an -irrevocable vow that I want to take. Her trust makes me faithful, her belief -makes me good. When I am with her, I regret all that you have taught me. I -become different from what you have known me to be. I am changed, and the mere -touch of Sibyl Vane’s hand makes me forget you and all your wrong, -fascinating, poisonous, delightful theories.” -</p> - -<p> -“And those are ...?” asked Lord Henry, helping himself to some -salad. -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, your theories about life, your theories about love, your theories -about pleasure. All your theories, in fact, Harry.” -</p> - -<p> -“Pleasure is the only thing worth having a theory about,” he -answered in his slow melodious voice. “But I am afraid I cannot claim my -theory as my own. It belongs to Nature, not to me. Pleasure is Nature’s -test, her sign of approval. When we are happy, we are always good, but when we -are good, we are not always happy.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! but what do you mean by good?” cried Basil Hallward. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes,” echoed Dorian, leaning back in his chair and looking at Lord -Henry over the heavy clusters of purple-lipped irises that stood in the centre -of the table, “what do you mean by good, Harry?” -</p> - -<p> -“To be good is to be in harmony with one’s self,” he replied, -touching the thin stem of his glass with his pale, fine-pointed fingers. -“Discord is to be forced to be in harmony with others. One’s own -life—that is the important thing. As for the lives of one’s -neighbours, if one wishes to be a prig or a Puritan, one can flaunt one’s -moral views about them, but they are not one’s concern. Besides, -individualism has really the higher aim. Modern morality consists in accepting -the standard of one’s age. I consider that for any man of culture to -accept the standard of his age is a form of the grossest immorality.” -</p> - -<p> -“But, surely, if one lives merely for one’s self, Harry, one pays a -terrible price for doing so?” suggested the painter. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, we are overcharged for everything nowadays. I should fancy that the -real tragedy of the poor is that they can afford nothing but self-denial. -Beautiful sins, like beautiful things, are the privilege of the rich.” -</p> - -<p> -“One has to pay in other ways but money.” -</p> - -<p> -“What sort of ways, Basil?” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh! I should fancy in remorse, in suffering, in ... well, in the -consciousness of degradation.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. “My dear fellow, mediæval art is -charming, but mediæval emotions are out of date. One can use them in fiction, -of course. But then the only things that one can use in fiction are the things -that one has ceased to use in fact. Believe me, no civilized man ever regrets a -pleasure, and no uncivilized man ever knows what a pleasure is.” -</p> - -<p> -“I know what pleasure is,” cried Dorian Gray. “It is to adore -some one.” -</p> - -<p> -“That is certainly better than being adored,” he answered, toying -with some fruits. “Being adored is a nuisance. Women treat us just as -humanity treats its gods. They worship us, and are always bothering us to do -something for them.” -</p> - -<p> -“I should have said that whatever they ask for they had first given to -us,” murmured the lad gravely. “They create love in our natures. -They have a right to demand it back.” -</p> - -<p> -“That is quite true, Dorian,” cried Hallward. -</p> - -<p> -“Nothing is ever quite true,” said Lord Henry. -</p> - -<p> -“This is,” interrupted Dorian. “You must admit, Harry, that -women give to men the very gold of their lives.” -</p> - -<p> -“Possibly,” he sighed, “but they invariably want it back in -such very small change. That is the worry. Women, as some witty Frenchman once -put it, inspire us with the desire to do masterpieces and always prevent us -from carrying them out.” -</p> - -<p> -“Harry, you are dreadful! I don’t know why I like you so -much.” -</p> - -<p> -“You will always like me, Dorian,” he replied. “Will you have -some coffee, you fellows? Waiter, bring coffee, and <i>fine-champagne</i>, and -some cigarettes. No, don’t mind the cigarettes—I have some. Basil, -I can’t allow you to smoke cigars. You must have a cigarette. A cigarette -is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one -unsatisfied. What more can one want? Yes, Dorian, you will always be fond of -me. I represent to you all the sins you have never had the courage to -commit.” -</p> - -<p> -“What nonsense you talk, Harry!” cried the lad, taking a light from -a fire-breathing silver dragon that the waiter had placed on the table. -“Let us go down to the theatre. When Sibyl comes on the stage you will -have a new ideal of life. She will represent something to you that you have -never known.” -</p> - -<p> -“I have known everything,” said Lord Henry, with a tired look in -his eyes, “but I am always ready for a new emotion. I am afraid, however, -that, for me at any rate, there is no such thing. Still, your wonderful girl -may thrill me. I love acting. It is so much more real than life. Let us go. -Dorian, you will come with me. I am so sorry, Basil, but there is only room for -two in the brougham. You must follow us in a hansom.” -</p> - -<p> -They got up and put on their coats, sipping their coffee standing. The painter -was silent and preoccupied. There was a gloom over him. He could not bear this -marriage, and yet it seemed to him to be better than many other things that -might have happened. After a few minutes, they all passed downstairs. He drove -off by himself, as had been arranged, and watched the flashing lights of the -little brougham in front of him. A strange sense of loss came over him. He felt -that Dorian Gray would never again be to him all that he had been in the past. -Life had come between them.... His eyes darkened, and the crowded flaring -streets became blurred to his eyes. When the cab drew up at the theatre, it -seemed to him that he had grown years older. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap07"></a>CHAPTER VII.</h2> - -<p> -For some reason or other, the house was crowded that night, and the fat Jew -manager who met them at the door was beaming from ear to ear with an oily -tremulous smile. He escorted them to their box with a sort of pompous humility, -waving his fat jewelled hands and talking at the top of his voice. Dorian Gray -loathed him more than ever. He felt as if he had come to look for Miranda and -had been met by Caliban. Lord Henry, upon the other hand, rather liked him. At -least he declared he did, and insisted on shaking him by the hand and assuring -him that he was proud to meet a man who had discovered a real genius and gone -bankrupt over a poet. Hallward amused himself with watching the faces in the -pit. The heat was terribly oppressive, and the huge sunlight flamed like a -monstrous dahlia with petals of yellow fire. The youths in the gallery had -taken off their coats and waistcoats and hung them over the side. They talked -to each other across the theatre and shared their oranges with the tawdry girls -who sat beside them. Some women were laughing in the pit. Their voices were -horribly shrill and discordant. The sound of the popping of corks came from the -bar. -</p> - -<p> -“What a place to find one’s divinity in!” said Lord Henry. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes!” answered Dorian Gray. “It was here I found her, and -she is divine beyond all living things. When she acts, you will forget -everything. These common rough people, with their coarse faces and brutal -gestures, become quite different when she is on the stage. They sit silently -and watch her. They weep and laugh as she wills them to do. She makes them as -responsive as a violin. She spiritualizes them, and one feels that they are of -the same flesh and blood as one’s self.” -</p> - -<p> -“The same flesh and blood as one’s self! Oh, I hope not!” -exclaimed Lord Henry, who was scanning the occupants of the gallery through his -opera-glass. -</p> - -<p> -“Don’t pay any attention to him, Dorian,” said the painter. -“I understand what you mean, and I believe in this girl. Any one you love -must be marvellous, and any girl who has the effect you describe must be fine -and noble. To spiritualize one’s age—that is something worth doing. -If this girl can give a soul to those who have lived without one, if she can -create the sense of beauty in people whose lives have been sordid and ugly, if -she can strip them of their selfishness and lend them tears for sorrows that -are not their own, she is worthy of all your adoration, worthy of the adoration -of the world. This marriage is quite right. I did not think so at first, but I -admit it now. The gods made Sibyl Vane for you. Without her you would have been -incomplete.” -</p> - -<p> -“Thanks, Basil,” answered Dorian Gray, pressing his hand. “I -knew that you would understand me. Harry is so cynical, he terrifies me. But -here is the orchestra. It is quite dreadful, but it only lasts for about five -minutes. Then the curtain rises, and you will see the girl to whom I am going -to give all my life, to whom I have given everything that is good in me.” -</p> - -<p> -A quarter of an hour afterwards, amidst an extraordinary turmoil of applause, -Sibyl Vane stepped on to the stage. Yes, she was certainly lovely to look -at—one of the loveliest creatures, Lord Henry thought, that he had ever -seen. There was something of the fawn in her shy grace and startled eyes. A -faint blush, like the shadow of a rose in a mirror of silver, came to her -cheeks as she glanced at the crowded enthusiastic house. She stepped back a few -paces and her lips seemed to tremble. Basil Hallward leaped to his feet and -began to applaud. Motionless, and as one in a dream, sat Dorian Gray, gazing at -her. Lord Henry peered through his glasses, murmuring, “Charming! -charming!” -</p> - -<p> -The scene was the hall of Capulet’s house, and Romeo in his -pilgrim’s dress had entered with Mercutio and his other friends. The -band, such as it was, struck up a few bars of music, and the dance began. -Through the crowd of ungainly, shabbily dressed actors, Sibyl Vane moved like a -creature from a finer world. Her body swayed, while she danced, as a plant -sways in the water. The curves of her throat were the curves of a white lily. -Her hands seemed to be made of cool ivory. -</p> - -<p> -Yet she was curiously listless. She showed no sign of joy when her eyes rested -on Romeo. The few words she had to speak— -</p> - -<p class="poem"> -Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,<br /> - Which mannerly devotion shows in this;<br /> -For saints have hands that pilgrims’ hands do touch,<br /> - And palm to palm is holy palmers’ kiss— -</p> - -<p class="noindent"> -with the brief dialogue that follows, were spoken in a thoroughly artificial -manner. The voice was exquisite, but from the point of view of tone it was -absolutely false. It was wrong in colour. It took away all the life from the -verse. It made the passion unreal. -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray grew pale as he watched her. He was puzzled and anxious. Neither of -his friends dared to say anything to him. She seemed to them to be absolutely -incompetent. They were horribly disappointed. -</p> - -<p> -Yet they felt that the true test of any Juliet is the balcony scene of the -second act. They waited for that. If she failed there, there was nothing in -her. -</p> - -<p> -She looked charming as she came out in the moonlight. That could not be denied. -But the staginess of her acting was unbearable, and grew worse as she went on. -Her gestures became absurdly artificial. She overemphasized everything that she -had to say. The beautiful passage— -</p> - -<p class="poem"> -Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face,<br /> -Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek<br /> -For that which thou hast heard me speak to-night— -</p> - -<p class="noindent"> -was declaimed with the painful precision of a schoolgirl who has been taught to -recite by some second-rate professor of elocution. When she leaned over the -balcony and came to those wonderful lines— -</p> - -<p class="poem"> -Although I joy in thee,<br /> -I have no joy of this contract to-night:<br /> -It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden;<br /> -Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be<br /> -Ere one can say, “It lightens.” Sweet, good-night!<br /> -This bud of love by summer’s ripening breath<br /> -May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet— -</p> - -<p class="noindent"> -she spoke the words as though they conveyed no meaning to her. It was not -nervousness. Indeed, so far from being nervous, she was absolutely -self-contained. It was simply bad art. She was a complete failure. -</p> - -<p> -Even the common uneducated audience of the pit and gallery lost their interest -in the play. They got restless, and began to talk loudly and to whistle. The -Jew manager, who was standing at the back of the dress-circle, stamped and -swore with rage. The only person unmoved was the girl herself. -</p> - -<p> -When the second act was over, there came a storm of hisses, and Lord Henry got -up from his chair and put on his coat. “She is quite beautiful, -Dorian,” he said, “but she can’t act. Let us go.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am going to see the play through,” answered the lad, in a hard -bitter voice. “I am awfully sorry that I have made you waste an evening, -Harry. I apologize to you both.” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear Dorian, I should think Miss Vane was ill,” interrupted -Hallward. “We will come some other night.” -</p> - -<p> -“I wish she were ill,” he rejoined. “But she seems to me to -be simply callous and cold. She has entirely altered. Last night she was a -great artist. This evening she is merely a commonplace mediocre actress.” -</p> - -<p> -“Don’t talk like that about any one you love, Dorian. Love is a -more wonderful thing than art.” -</p> - -<p> -“They are both simply forms of imitation,” remarked Lord Henry. -“But do let us go. Dorian, you must not stay here any longer. It is not -good for one’s morals to see bad acting. Besides, I don’t suppose -you will want your wife to act, so what does it matter if she plays Juliet like -a wooden doll? She is very lovely, and if she knows as little about life as she -does about acting, she will be a delightful experience. There are only two -kinds of people who are really fascinating—people who know absolutely -everything, and people who know absolutely nothing. Good heavens, my dear boy, -don’t look so tragic! The secret of remaining young is never to have an -emotion that is unbecoming. Come to the club with Basil and myself. We will -smoke cigarettes and drink to the beauty of Sibyl Vane. She is beautiful. What -more can you want?” -</p> - -<p> -“Go away, Harry,” cried the lad. “I want to be alone. Basil, -you must go. Ah! can’t you see that my heart is breaking?” The hot -tears came to his eyes. His lips trembled, and rushing to the back of the box, -he leaned up against the wall, hiding his face in his hands. -</p> - -<p> -“Let us go, Basil,” said Lord Henry with a strange tenderness in -his voice, and the two young men passed out together. -</p> - -<p> -A few moments afterwards the footlights flared up and the curtain rose on the -third act. Dorian Gray went back to his seat. He looked pale, and proud, and -indifferent. The play dragged on, and seemed interminable. Half of the audience -went out, tramping in heavy boots and laughing. The whole thing was a -<i>fiasco</i>. The last act was played to almost empty benches. The curtain -went down on a titter and some groans. -</p> - -<p> -As soon as it was over, Dorian Gray rushed behind the scenes into the -greenroom. The girl was standing there alone, with a look of triumph on her -face. Her eyes were lit with an exquisite fire. There was a radiance about her. -Her parted lips were smiling over some secret of their own. -</p> - -<p> -When he entered, she looked at him, and an expression of infinite joy came over -her. “How badly I acted to-night, Dorian!” she cried. -</p> - -<p> -“Horribly!” he answered, gazing at her in amazement. -“Horribly! It was dreadful. Are you ill? You have no idea what it was. -You have no idea what I suffered.” -</p> - -<p> -The girl smiled. “Dorian,” she answered, lingering over his name -with long-drawn music in her voice, as though it were sweeter than honey to the -red petals of her mouth. “Dorian, you should have understood. But you -understand now, don’t you?” -</p> - -<p> -“Understand what?” he asked, angrily. -</p> - -<p> -“Why I was so bad to-night. Why I shall always be bad. Why I shall never -act well again.” -</p> - -<p> -He shrugged his shoulders. “You are ill, I suppose. When you are ill you -shouldn’t act. You make yourself ridiculous. My friends were bored. I was -bored.” -</p> - -<p> -She seemed not to listen to him. She was transfigured with joy. An ecstasy of -happiness dominated her. -</p> - -<p> -“Dorian, Dorian,” she cried, “before I knew you, acting was -the one reality of my life. It was only in the theatre that I lived. I thought -that it was all true. I was Rosalind one night and Portia the other. The joy of -Beatrice was my joy, and the sorrows of Cordelia were mine also. I believed in -everything. The common people who acted with me seemed to me to be godlike. The -painted scenes were my world. I knew nothing but shadows, and I thought them -real. You came—oh, my beautiful love!—and you freed my soul from -prison. You taught me what reality really is. To-night, for the first time in -my life, I saw through the hollowness, the sham, the silliness of the empty -pageant in which I had always played. To-night, for the first time, I became -conscious that the Romeo was hideous, and old, and painted, that the moonlight -in the orchard was false, that the scenery was vulgar, and that the words I had -to speak were unreal, were not my words, were not what I wanted to say. You had -brought me something higher, something of which all art is but a reflection. -You had made me understand what love really is. My love! My love! Prince -Charming! Prince of life! I have grown sick of shadows. You are more to me than -all art can ever be. What have I to do with the puppets of a play? When I came -on to-night, I could not understand how it was that everything had gone from -me. I thought that I was going to be wonderful. I found that I could do -nothing. Suddenly it dawned on my soul what it all meant. The knowledge was -exquisite to me. I heard them hissing, and I smiled. What could they know of -love such as ours? Take me away, Dorian—take me away with you, where we -can be quite alone. I hate the stage. I might mimic a passion that I do not -feel, but I cannot mimic one that burns me like fire. Oh, Dorian, Dorian, you -understand now what it signifies? Even if I could do it, it would be -profanation for me to play at being in love. You have made me see that.” -</p> - -<p> -He flung himself down on the sofa and turned away his face. “You have -killed my love,” he muttered. -</p> - -<p> -She looked at him in wonder and laughed. He made no answer. She came across to -him, and with her little fingers stroked his hair. She knelt down and pressed -his hands to her lips. He drew them away, and a shudder ran through him. -</p> - -<p> -Then he leaped up and went to the door. “Yes,” he cried, “you -have killed my love. You used to stir my imagination. Now you don’t even -stir my curiosity. You simply produce no effect. I loved you because you were -marvellous, because you had genius and intellect, because you realized the -dreams of great poets and gave shape and substance to the shadows of art. You -have thrown it all away. You are shallow and stupid. My God! how mad I was to -love you! What a fool I have been! You are nothing to me now. I will never see -you again. I will never think of you. I will never mention your name. You -don’t know what you were to me, once. Why, once ... Oh, I can’t -bear to think of it! I wish I had never laid eyes upon you! You have spoiled -the romance of my life. How little you can know of love, if you say it mars -your art! Without your art, you are nothing. I would have made you famous, -splendid, magnificent. The world would have worshipped you, and you would have -borne my name. What are you now? A third-rate actress with a pretty -face.” -</p> - -<p> -The girl grew white, and trembled. She clenched her hands together, and her -voice seemed to catch in her throat. “You are not serious, Dorian?” -she murmured. “You are acting.” -</p> - -<p> -“Acting! I leave that to you. You do it so well,” he answered -bitterly. -</p> - -<p> -She rose from her knees and, with a piteous expression of pain in her face, -came across the room to him. She put her hand upon his arm and looked into his -eyes. He thrust her back. “Don’t touch me!” he cried. -</p> - -<p> -A low moan broke from her, and she flung herself at his feet and lay there like -a trampled flower. “Dorian, Dorian, don’t leave me!” she -whispered. “I am so sorry I didn’t act well. I was thinking of you -all the time. But I will try—indeed, I will try. It came so suddenly -across me, my love for you. I think I should never have known it if you had not -kissed me—if we had not kissed each other. Kiss me again, my love. -Don’t go away from me. I couldn’t bear it. Oh! don’t go away -from me. My brother ... No; never mind. He didn’t mean it. He was in -jest.... But you, oh! can’t you forgive me for to-night? I will work so -hard and try to improve. Don’t be cruel to me, because I love you better -than anything in the world. After all, it is only once that I have not pleased -you. But you are quite right, Dorian. I should have shown myself more of an -artist. It was foolish of me, and yet I couldn’t help it. Oh, don’t -leave me, don’t leave me.” A fit of passionate sobbing choked her. -She crouched on the floor like a wounded thing, and Dorian Gray, with his -beautiful eyes, looked down at her, and his chiselled lips curled in exquisite -disdain. There is always something ridiculous about the emotions of people whom -one has ceased to love. Sibyl Vane seemed to him to be absurdly melodramatic. -Her tears and sobs annoyed him. -</p> - -<p> -“I am going,” he said at last in his calm clear voice. “I -don’t wish to be unkind, but I can’t see you again. You have -disappointed me.” -</p> - -<p> -She wept silently, and made no answer, but crept nearer. Her little hands -stretched blindly out, and appeared to be seeking for him. He turned on his -heel and left the room. In a few moments he was out of the theatre. -</p> - -<p> -Where he went to he hardly knew. He remembered wandering through dimly lit -streets, past gaunt, black-shadowed archways and evil-looking houses. Women -with hoarse voices and harsh laughter had called after him. Drunkards had -reeled by, cursing and chattering to themselves like monstrous apes. He had -seen grotesque children huddled upon door-steps, and heard shrieks and oaths -from gloomy courts. -</p> - -<p> -As the dawn was just breaking, he found himself close to Covent Garden. The -darkness lifted, and, flushed with faint fires, the sky hollowed itself into a -perfect pearl. Huge carts filled with nodding lilies rumbled slowly down the -polished empty street. The air was heavy with the perfume of the flowers, and -their beauty seemed to bring him an anodyne for his pain. He followed into the -market and watched the men unloading their waggons. A white-smocked carter -offered him some cherries. He thanked him, wondered why he refused to accept -any money for them, and began to eat them listlessly. They had been plucked at -midnight, and the coldness of the moon had entered into them. A long line of -boys carrying crates of striped tulips, and of yellow and red roses, defiled in -front of him, threading their way through the huge, jade-green piles of -vegetables. Under the portico, with its grey, sun-bleached pillars, loitered a -troop of draggled bareheaded girls, waiting for the auction to be over. Others -crowded round the swinging doors of the coffee-house in the piazza. The heavy -cart-horses slipped and stamped upon the rough stones, shaking their bells and -trappings. Some of the drivers were lying asleep on a pile of sacks. -Iris-necked and pink-footed, the pigeons ran about picking up seeds. -</p> - -<p> -After a little while, he hailed a hansom and drove home. For a few moments he -loitered upon the doorstep, looking round at the silent square, with its blank, -close-shuttered windows and its staring blinds. The sky was pure opal now, and -the roofs of the houses glistened like silver against it. From some chimney -opposite a thin wreath of smoke was rising. It curled, a violet riband, through -the nacre-coloured air. -</p> - -<p> -In the huge gilt Venetian lantern, spoil of some Doge’s barge, that hung -from the ceiling of the great, oak-panelled hall of entrance, lights were still -burning from three flickering jets: thin blue petals of flame they seemed, -rimmed with white fire. He turned them out and, having thrown his hat and cape -on the table, passed through the library towards the door of his bedroom, a -large octagonal chamber on the ground floor that, in his new-born feeling for -luxury, he had just had decorated for himself and hung with some curious -Renaissance tapestries that had been discovered stored in a disused attic at -Selby Royal. As he was turning the handle of the door, his eye fell upon the -portrait Basil Hallward had painted of him. He started back as if in surprise. -Then he went on into his own room, looking somewhat puzzled. After he had taken -the button-hole out of his coat, he seemed to hesitate. Finally, he came back, -went over to the picture, and examined it. In the dim arrested light that -struggled through the cream-coloured silk blinds, the face appeared to him to -be a little changed. The expression looked different. One would have said that -there was a touch of cruelty in the mouth. It was certainly strange. -</p> - -<p> -He turned round and, walking to the window, drew up the blind. The bright dawn -flooded the room and swept the fantastic shadows into dusky corners, where they -lay shuddering. But the strange expression that he had noticed in the face of -the portrait seemed to linger there, to be more intensified even. The quivering -ardent sunlight showed him the lines of cruelty round the mouth as clearly as -if he had been looking into a mirror after he had done some dreadful thing. -</p> - -<p> -He winced and, taking up from the table an oval glass framed in ivory Cupids, -one of Lord Henry’s many presents to him, glanced hurriedly into its -polished depths. No line like that warped his red lips. What did it mean? -</p> - -<p> -He rubbed his eyes, and came close to the picture, and examined it again. There -were no signs of any change when he looked into the actual painting, and yet -there was no doubt that the whole expression had altered. It was not a mere -fancy of his own. The thing was horribly apparent. -</p> - -<p> -He threw himself into a chair and began to think. Suddenly there flashed across -his mind what he had said in Basil Hallward’s studio the day the picture -had been finished. Yes, he remembered it perfectly. He had uttered a mad wish -that he himself might remain young, and the portrait grow old; that his own -beauty might be untarnished, and the face on the canvas bear the burden of his -passions and his sins; that the painted image might be seared with the lines of -suffering and thought, and that he might keep all the delicate bloom and -loveliness of his then just conscious boyhood. Surely his wish had not been -fulfilled? Such things were impossible. It seemed monstrous even to think of -them. And, yet, there was the picture before him, with the touch of cruelty in -the mouth. -</p> - -<p> -Cruelty! Had he been cruel? It was the girl’s fault, not his. He had -dreamed of her as a great artist, had given his love to her because he had -thought her great. Then she had disappointed him. She had been shallow and -unworthy. And, yet, a feeling of infinite regret came over him, as he thought -of her lying at his feet sobbing like a little child. He remembered with what -callousness he had watched her. Why had he been made like that? Why had such a -soul been given to him? But he had suffered also. During the three terrible -hours that the play had lasted, he had lived centuries of pain, aeon upon aeon -of torture. His life was well worth hers. She had marred him for a moment, if -he had wounded her for an age. Besides, women were better suited to bear sorrow -than men. They lived on their emotions. They only thought of their emotions. -When they took lovers, it was merely to have some one with whom they could have -scenes. Lord Henry had told him that, and Lord Henry knew what women were. Why -should he trouble about Sibyl Vane? She was nothing to him now. -</p> - -<p> -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? -</p> - -<p> -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. -</p> - -<p> -Yet it was watching him, with its beautiful marred face and its cruel smile. -Its bright hair gleamed in the early sunlight. Its blue eyes met his own. A -sense of infinite pity, not for himself, but for the painted image of himself, -came over him. It had altered already, and would alter more. Its gold would -wither into grey. Its red and white roses would die. For every sin that he -committed, a stain would fleck and wreck its fairness. But he would not sin. -The picture, changed or unchanged, would be to him the visible emblem of -conscience. He would resist temptation. He would not see Lord Henry any -more—would not, at any rate, listen to those subtle poisonous theories -that in Basil Hallward’s garden had first stirred within him the passion -for impossible things. He would go back to Sibyl Vane, make her amends, marry -her, try to love her again. Yes, it was his duty to do so. She must have -suffered more than he had. Poor child! He had been selfish and cruel to her. -The fascination that she had exercised over him would return. They would be -happy together. His life with her would be beautiful and pure. -</p> - -<p> -He got up from his chair and drew a large screen right in front of the -portrait, shuddering as he glanced at it. “How horrible!” he -murmured to himself, and he walked across to the window and opened it. When he -stepped out on to the grass, he drew a deep breath. The fresh morning air -seemed to drive away all his sombre passions. He thought only of Sibyl. A faint -echo of his love came back to him. He repeated her name over and over again. -The birds that were singing in the dew-drenched garden seemed to be telling the -flowers about her. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap08"></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h2> - -<p> -It was long past noon when he awoke. His valet had crept several times on -tiptoe into the room to see if he was stirring, and had wondered what made his -young master sleep so late. Finally his bell sounded, and Victor came in softly -with a cup of tea, and a pile of letters, on a small tray of old Sevres china, -and drew back the olive-satin curtains, with their shimmering blue lining, that -hung in front of the three tall windows. -</p> - -<p> -“Monsieur has well slept this morning,” he said, smiling. -</p> - -<p> -“What o’clock is it, Victor?” asked Dorian Gray drowsily. -</p> - -<p> -“One hour and a quarter, Monsieur.” -</p> - -<p> -How late it was! He sat up, and having sipped some tea, turned over his -letters. One of them was from Lord Henry, and had been brought by hand that -morning. He hesitated for a moment, and then put it aside. The others he opened -listlessly. They contained the usual collection of cards, invitations to -dinner, tickets for private views, programmes of charity concerts, and the like -that are showered on fashionable young men every morning during the season. -There was a rather heavy bill for a chased silver Louis-Quinze toilet-set that -he had not yet had the courage to send on to his guardians, who were extremely -old-fashioned people and did not realize that we live in an age when -unnecessary things are our only necessities; and there were several very -courteously worded communications from Jermyn Street money-lenders offering to -advance any sum of money at a moment’s notice and at the most reasonable -rates of interest. -</p> - -<p> -After about ten minutes he got up, and throwing on an elaborate dressing-gown -of silk-embroidered cashmere wool, passed into the onyx-paved bathroom. The -cool water refreshed him after his long sleep. He seemed to have forgotten all -that he had gone through. A dim sense of having taken part in some strange -tragedy came to him once or twice, but there was the unreality of a dream about -it. -</p> - -<p> -As soon as he was dressed, he went into the library and sat down to a light -French breakfast that had been laid out for him on a small round table close to -the open window. It was an exquisite day. The warm air seemed laden with -spices. A bee flew in and buzzed round the blue-dragon bowl that, filled with -sulphur-yellow roses, stood before him. He felt perfectly happy. -</p> - -<p> -Suddenly his eye fell on the screen that he had placed in front of the -portrait, and he started. -</p> - -<p> -“Too cold for Monsieur?” asked his valet, putting an omelette on -the table. “I shut the window?” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian shook his head. “I am not cold,” he murmured. -</p> - -<p> -Was it all true? Had the portrait really changed? Or had it been simply his own -imagination that had made him see a look of evil where there had been a look of -joy? Surely a painted canvas could not alter? The thing was absurd. It would -serve as a tale to tell Basil some day. It would make him smile. -</p> - -<p> -And, yet, how vivid was his recollection of the whole thing! First in the dim -twilight, and then in the bright dawn, he had seen the touch of cruelty round -the warped lips. He almost dreaded his valet leaving the room. He knew that -when he was alone he would have to examine the portrait. He was afraid of -certainty. When the coffee and cigarettes had been brought and the man turned -to go, he felt a wild desire to tell him to remain. As the door was closing -behind him, he called him back. The man stood waiting for his orders. Dorian -looked at him for a moment. “I am not at home to any one, Victor,” -he said with a sigh. The man bowed and retired. -</p> - -<p> -Then he rose from the table, lit a cigarette, and flung himself down on a -luxuriously cushioned couch that stood facing the screen. The screen was an old -one, of gilt Spanish leather, stamped and wrought with a rather florid -Louis-Quatorze pattern. He scanned it curiously, wondering if ever before it -had concealed the secret of a man’s life. -</p> - -<p> -Should he move it aside, after all? Why not let it stay there? What was the use -of knowing? If the thing was true, it was terrible. If it was not true, why -trouble about it? But what if, by some fate or deadlier chance, eyes other than -his spied behind and saw the horrible change? What should he do if Basil -Hallward came and asked to look at his own picture? Basil would be sure to do -that. No; the thing had to be examined, and at once. Anything would be better -than this dreadful state of doubt. -</p> - -<p> -He got up and locked both doors. At least he would be alone when he looked upon -the mask of his shame. Then he drew the screen aside and saw himself face to -face. It was perfectly true. The portrait had altered. -</p> - -<p> -As he often remembered afterwards, and always with no small wonder, he found -himself at first gazing at the portrait with a feeling of almost scientific -interest. That such a change should have taken place was incredible to him. And -yet it was a fact. Was there some subtle affinity between the chemical atoms -that shaped themselves into form and colour on the canvas and the soul that was -within him? Could it be that what that soul thought, they realized?—that -what it dreamed, they made true? Or was there some other, more terrible reason? -He shuddered, and felt afraid, and, going back to the couch, lay there, gazing -at the picture in sickened horror. -</p> - -<p> -One thing, however, he felt that it had done for him. It had made him conscious -how unjust, how cruel, he had been to Sibyl Vane. It was not too late to make -reparation for that. She could still be his wife. His unreal and selfish love -would yield to some higher influence, would be transformed into some nobler -passion, and the portrait that Basil Hallward had painted of him would be a -guide to him through life, would be to him what holiness is to some, and -conscience to others, and the fear of God to us all. There were opiates for -remorse, drugs that could lull the moral sense to sleep. But here was a visible -symbol of the degradation of sin. Here was an ever-present sign of the ruin men -brought upon their souls. -</p> - -<p> -Three o’clock struck, and four, and the half-hour rang its double chime, -but Dorian Gray did not stir. He was trying to gather up the scarlet threads of -life and to weave them into a pattern; to find his way through the sanguine -labyrinth of passion through which he was wandering. He did not know what to -do, or what to think. Finally, he went over to the table and wrote a passionate -letter to the girl he had loved, imploring her forgiveness and accusing himself -of madness. He covered page after page with wild words of sorrow and wilder -words of pain. There is a luxury in self-reproach. When we blame ourselves, we -feel that no one else has a right to blame us. It is the confession, not the -priest, that gives us absolution. When Dorian had finished the letter, he felt -that he had been forgiven. -</p> - -<p> -Suddenly there came a knock to the door, and he heard Lord Henry’s voice -outside. “My dear boy, I must see you. Let me in at once. I can’t -bear your shutting yourself up like this.” -</p> - -<p> -He made no answer at first, but remained quite still. The knocking still -continued and grew louder. Yes, it was better to let Lord Henry in, and to -explain to him the new life he was going to lead, to quarrel with him if it -became necessary to quarrel, to part if parting was inevitable. He jumped up, -drew the screen hastily across the picture, and unlocked the door. -</p> - -<p> -“I am so sorry for it all, Dorian,” said Lord Henry as he entered. -“But you must not think too much about it.” -</p> - -<p> -“Do you mean about Sibyl Vane?” asked the lad. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, of course,” answered Lord Henry, sinking into a chair and -slowly pulling off his yellow gloves. “It is dreadful, from one point of -view, but it was not your fault. Tell me, did you go behind and see her, after -the play was over?” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes.” -</p> - -<p> -“I felt sure you had. Did you make a scene with her?” -</p> - -<p> -“I was brutal, Harry—perfectly brutal. But it is all right now. I -am not sorry for anything that has happened. It has taught me to know myself -better.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah, Dorian, I am so glad you take it in that way! I was afraid I would -find you plunged in remorse and tearing that nice curly hair of yours.” -</p> - -<p> -“I have got through all that,” said Dorian, shaking his head and -smiling. “I am perfectly happy now. I know what conscience is, to begin -with. It is not what you told me it was. It is the divinest thing in us. -Don’t sneer at it, Harry, any more—at least not before me. I want -to be good. I can’t bear the idea of my soul being hideous.” -</p> - -<p> -“A very charming artistic basis for ethics, Dorian! I congratulate you on -it. But how are you going to begin?” -</p> - -<p> -“By marrying Sibyl Vane.” -</p> - -<p> -“Marrying Sibyl Vane!” cried Lord Henry, standing up and looking at -him in perplexed amazement. “But, my dear Dorian—” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, Harry, I know what you are going to say. Something dreadful about -marriage. Don’t say it. Don’t ever say things of that kind to me -again. Two days ago I asked Sibyl to marry me. I am not going to break my word -to her. She is to be my wife.” -</p> - -<p> -“Your wife! Dorian! ... Didn’t you get my letter? I wrote to you -this morning, and sent the note down by my own man.” -</p> - -<p> -“Your letter? Oh, yes, I remember. I have not read it yet, Harry. I was -afraid there might be something in it that I wouldn’t like. You cut life -to pieces with your epigrams.” -</p> - -<p> -“You know nothing then?” -</p> - -<p> -“What do you mean?” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry walked across the room, and sitting down by Dorian Gray, took both -his hands in his own and held them tightly. “Dorian,” he said, -“my letter—don’t be frightened—was to tell you that -Sibyl Vane is dead.” -</p> - -<p> -A cry of pain broke from the lad’s lips, and he leaped to his feet, -tearing his hands away from Lord Henry’s grasp. “Dead! Sibyl dead! -It is not true! It is a horrible lie! How dare you say it?” -</p> - -<p> -“It is quite true, Dorian,” said Lord Henry, gravely. “It is -in all the morning papers. I wrote down to you to ask you not to see any one -till I came. There will have to be an inquest, of course, and you must not be -mixed up in it. Things like that make a man fashionable in Paris. But in London -people are so prejudiced. Here, one should never make one’s <i>début</i> -with a scandal. One should reserve that to give an interest to one’s old -age. I suppose they don’t know your name at the theatre? If they -don’t, it is all right. Did any one see you going round to her room? That -is an important point.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian did not answer for a few moments. He was dazed with horror. Finally he -stammered, in a stifled voice, “Harry, did you say an inquest? What did -you mean by that? Did Sibyl—? Oh, Harry, I can’t bear it! But be -quick. Tell me everything at once.” -</p> - -<p> -“I have no doubt it was not an accident, Dorian, though it must be put in -that way to the public. It seems that as she was leaving the theatre with her -mother, about half-past twelve or so, she said she had forgotten something -upstairs. They waited some time for her, but she did not come down again. They -ultimately found her lying dead on the floor of her dressing-room. She had -swallowed something by mistake, some dreadful thing they use at theatres. I -don’t know what it was, but it had either prussic acid or white lead in -it. I should fancy it was prussic acid, as she seems to have died -instantaneously.” -</p> - -<p> -“Harry, Harry, it is terrible!” cried the lad. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes; it is very tragic, of course, but you must not get yourself mixed -up in it. I see by <i>The Standard</i> that she was seventeen. I should have -thought she was almost younger than that. She looked such a child, and seemed -to know so little about acting. Dorian, you mustn’t let this thing get on -your nerves. You must come and dine with me, and afterwards we will look in at -the opera. It is a Patti night, and everybody will be there. You can come to my -sister’s box. She has got some smart women with her.” -</p> - -<p> -“So I have murdered Sibyl Vane,” said Dorian Gray, half to himself, -“murdered her as surely as if I had cut her little throat with a knife. -Yet the roses are not less lovely for all that. The birds sing just as happily -in my garden. And to-night I am to dine with you, and then go on to the opera, -and sup somewhere, I suppose, afterwards. How extraordinarily dramatic life is! -If I had read all this in a book, Harry, I think I would have wept over it. -Somehow, now that it has happened actually, and to me, it seems far too -wonderful for tears. Here is the first passionate love-letter I have ever -written in my life. Strange, that my first passionate love-letter should have -been addressed to a dead girl. Can they feel, I wonder, those white silent -people we call the dead? Sibyl! Can she feel, or know, or listen? Oh, Harry, -how I loved her once! It seems years ago to me now. She was everything to me. -Then came that dreadful night—was it really only last night?—when -she played so badly, and my heart almost broke. She explained it all to me. It -was terribly pathetic. But I was not moved a bit. I thought her shallow. -Suddenly something happened that made me afraid. I can’t tell you what it -was, but it was terrible. I said I would go back to her. I felt I had done -wrong. And now she is dead. My God! My God! Harry, what shall I do? You -don’t know the danger I am in, and there is nothing to keep me straight. -She would have done that for me. She had no right to kill herself. It was -selfish of her.” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear Dorian,” answered Lord Henry, taking a cigarette from his -case and producing a gold-latten matchbox, “the only way a woman can ever -reform a man is by boring him so completely that he loses all possible interest -in life. If you had married this girl, you would have been wretched. Of course, -you would have treated her kindly. One can always be kind to people about whom -one cares nothing. But she would have soon found out that you were absolutely -indifferent to her. And when a woman finds that out about her husband, she -either becomes dreadfully dowdy, or wears very smart bonnets that some other -woman’s husband has to pay for. I say nothing about the social mistake, -which would have been abject—which, of course, I would not have -allowed—but I assure you that in any case the whole thing would have been -an absolute failure.” -</p> - -<p> -“I suppose it would,” muttered the lad, walking up and down the -room and looking horribly pale. “But I thought it was my duty. It is not -my fault that this terrible tragedy has prevented my doing what was right. I -remember your saying once that there is a fatality about good -resolutions—that they are always made too late. Mine certainly -were.” -</p> - -<p> -“Good resolutions are useless attempts to interfere with scientific laws. -Their origin is pure vanity. Their result is absolutely <i>nil</i>. They give -us, now and then, some of those luxurious sterile emotions that have a certain -charm for the weak. That is all that can be said for them. They are simply -cheques that men draw on a bank where they have no account.” -</p> - -<p> -“Harry,” cried Dorian Gray, coming over and sitting down beside -him, “why is it that I cannot feel this tragedy as much as I want to? I -don’t think I am heartless. Do you?” -</p> - -<p> -“You have done too many foolish things during the last fortnight to be -entitled to give yourself that name, Dorian,” answered Lord Henry with -his sweet melancholy smile. -</p> - -<p> -The lad frowned. “I don’t like that explanation, Harry,” he -rejoined, “but I am glad you don’t think I am heartless. I am -nothing of the kind. I know I am not. And yet I must admit that this thing that -has happened does not affect me as it should. It seems to me to be simply like -a wonderful ending to a wonderful play. It has all the terrible beauty of a -Greek tragedy, a tragedy in which I took a great part, but by which I have not -been wounded.” -</p> - -<p> -“It is an interesting question,” said Lord Henry, who found an -exquisite pleasure in playing on the lad’s unconscious egotism, “an -extremely interesting question. I fancy that the true explanation is this: It -often happens that the real tragedies of life occur in such an inartistic -manner that they hurt us by their crude violence, their absolute incoherence, -their absurd want of meaning, their entire lack of style. They affect us just -as vulgarity affects us. They give us an impression of sheer brute force, and -we revolt against that. Sometimes, however, a tragedy that possesses artistic -elements of beauty crosses our lives. If these elements of beauty are real, the -whole thing simply appeals to our sense of dramatic effect. Suddenly we find -that we are no longer the actors, but the spectators of the play. Or rather we -are both. We watch ourselves, and the mere wonder of the spectacle enthralls -us. In the present case, what is it that has really happened? Some one has -killed herself for love of you. I wish that I had ever had such an experience. -It would have made me in love with love for the rest of my life. The people who -have adored me—there have not been very many, but there have been -some—have always insisted on living on, long after I had ceased to care -for them, or they to care for me. They have become stout and tedious, and when -I meet them, they go in at once for reminiscences. That awful memory of woman! -What a fearful thing it is! And what an utter intellectual stagnation it -reveals! One should absorb the colour of life, but one should never remember -its details. Details are always vulgar.” -</p> - -<p> -“I must sow poppies in my garden,” sighed Dorian. -</p> - -<p> -“There is no necessity,” rejoined his companion. “Life has -always poppies in her hands. Of course, now and then things linger. I once wore -nothing but violets all through one season, as a form of artistic mourning for -a romance that would not die. Ultimately, however, it did die. I forget what -killed it. I think it was her proposing to sacrifice the whole world for me. -That is always a dreadful moment. It fills one with the terror of eternity. -Well—would you believe it?—a week ago, at Lady Hampshire’s, I -found myself seated at dinner next the lady in question, and she insisted on -going over the whole thing again, and digging up the past, and raking up the -future. I had buried my romance in a bed of asphodel. She dragged it out again -and assured me that I had spoiled her life. I am bound to state that she ate an -enormous dinner, so I did not feel any anxiety. But what a lack of taste she -showed! The one charm of the past is that it is the past. But women never know -when the curtain has fallen. They always want a sixth act, and as soon as the -interest of the play is entirely over, they propose to continue it. If they -were allowed their own way, every comedy would have a tragic ending, and every -tragedy would culminate in a farce. They are charmingly artificial, but they -have no sense of art. You are more fortunate than I am. I assure you, Dorian, -that not one of the women I have known would have done for me what Sibyl Vane -did for you. Ordinary women always console themselves. Some of them do it by -going in for sentimental colours. Never trust a woman who wears mauve, whatever -her age may be, or a woman over thirty-five who is fond of pink ribbons. It -always means that they have a history. Others find a great consolation in -suddenly discovering the good qualities of their husbands. They flaunt their -conjugal felicity in one’s face, as if it were the most fascinating of -sins. Religion consoles some. Its mysteries have all the charm of a flirtation, -a woman once told me, and I can quite understand it. Besides, nothing makes one -so vain as being told that one is a sinner. Conscience makes egotists of us -all. Yes; there is really no end to the consolations that women find in modern -life. Indeed, I have not mentioned the most important one.” -</p> - -<p> -“What is that, Harry?” said the lad listlessly. -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, the obvious consolation. Taking some one else’s admirer when -one loses one’s own. In good society that always whitewashes a woman. But -really, Dorian, how different Sibyl Vane must have been from all the women one -meets! There is something to me quite beautiful about her death. I am glad I am -living in a century when such wonders happen. They make one believe in the -reality of the things we all play with, such as romance, passion, and -love.” -</p> - -<p> -“I was terribly cruel to her. You forget that.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am afraid that women appreciate cruelty, downright cruelty, more than -anything else. They have wonderfully primitive instincts. We have emancipated -them, but they remain slaves looking for their masters, all the same. They love -being dominated. I am sure you were splendid. I have never seen you really and -absolutely angry, but I can fancy how delightful you looked. And, after all, -you said something to me the day before yesterday that seemed to me at the time -to be merely fanciful, but that I see now was absolutely true, and it holds the -key to everything.” -</p> - -<p> -“What was that, Harry?” -</p> - -<p> -“You said to me that Sibyl Vane represented to you all the heroines of -romance—that she was Desdemona one night, and Ophelia the other; that if -she died as Juliet, she came to life as Imogen.” -</p> - -<p> -“She will never come to life again now,” muttered the lad, burying -his face in his hands. -</p> - -<p> -“No, she will never come to life. She has played her last part. But you -must think of that lonely death in the tawdry dressing-room simply as a strange -lurid fragment from some Jacobean tragedy, as a wonderful scene from Webster, -or Ford, or Cyril Tourneur. The girl never really lived, and so she has never -really died. To you at least she was always a dream, a phantom that flitted -through Shakespeare’s plays and left them lovelier for its presence, a -reed through which Shakespeare’s music sounded richer and more full of -joy. The moment she touched actual life, she marred it, and it marred her, and -so she passed away. Mourn for Ophelia, if you like. Put ashes on your head -because Cordelia was strangled. Cry out against Heaven because the daughter of -Brabantio died. But don’t waste your tears over Sibyl Vane. She was less -real than they are.” -</p> - -<p> -There was a silence. The evening darkened in the room. Noiselessly, and with -silver feet, the shadows crept in from the garden. The colours faded wearily -out of things. -</p> - -<p> -After some time Dorian Gray looked up. “You have explained me to myself, -Harry,” he murmured with something of a sigh of relief. “I felt all -that you have said, but somehow I was afraid of it, and I could not express it -to myself. How well you know me! But we will not talk again of what has -happened. It has been a marvellous experience. That is all. I wonder if life -has still in store for me anything as marvellous.” -</p> - -<p> -“Life has everything in store for you, Dorian. There is nothing that you, -with your extraordinary good looks, will not be able to do.” -</p> - -<p> -“But suppose, Harry, I became haggard, and old, and wrinkled? What -then?” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah, then,” said Lord Henry, rising to go, “then, my dear -Dorian, you would have to fight for your victories. As it is, they are brought -to you. No, you must keep your good looks. We live in an age that reads too -much to be wise, and that thinks too much to be beautiful. We cannot spare you. -And now you had better dress and drive down to the club. We are rather late, as -it is.” -</p> - -<p> -“I think I shall join you at the opera, Harry. I feel too tired to eat -anything. What is the number of your sister’s box?” -</p> - -<p> -“Twenty-seven, I believe. It is on the grand tier. You will see her name -on the door. But I am sorry you won’t come and dine.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t feel up to it,” said Dorian listlessly. “But I -am awfully obliged to you for all that you have said to me. You are certainly -my best friend. No one has ever understood me as you have.” -</p> - -<p> -“We are only at the beginning of our friendship, Dorian,” answered -Lord Henry, shaking him by the hand. “Good-bye. I shall see you before -nine-thirty, I hope. Remember, Patti is singing.” -</p> - -<p> -As he closed the door behind him, Dorian Gray touched the bell, and in a few -minutes Victor appeared with the lamps and drew the blinds down. He waited -impatiently for him to go. The man seemed to take an interminable time over -everything. -</p> - -<p> -As soon as he had left, he rushed to the screen and drew it back. No; there was -no further change in the picture. It had received the news of Sibyl -Vane’s death before he had known of it himself. It was conscious of the -events of life as they occurred. The vicious cruelty that marred the fine lines -of the mouth had, no doubt, appeared at the very moment that the girl had drunk -the poison, whatever it was. Or was it indifferent to results? Did it merely -take cognizance of what passed within the soul? He wondered, and hoped that -some day he would see the change taking place before his very eyes, shuddering -as he hoped it. -</p> - -<p> -Poor Sibyl! What a romance it had all been! She had often mimicked death on the -stage. Then Death himself had touched her and taken her with him. How had she -played that dreadful last scene? Had she cursed him, as she died? No; she had -died for love of him, and love would always be a sacrament to him now. She had -atoned for everything by the sacrifice she had made of her life. He would not -think any more of what she had made him go through, on that horrible night at -the theatre. When he thought of her, it would be as a wonderful tragic figure -sent on to the world’s stage to show the supreme reality of love. A -wonderful tragic figure? Tears came to his eyes as he remembered her childlike -look, and winsome fanciful ways, and shy tremulous grace. He brushed them away -hastily and looked again at the picture. -</p> - -<p> -He felt that the time had really come for making his choice. Or had his choice -already been made? Yes, life had decided that for him—life, and his own -infinite curiosity about life. Eternal youth, infinite passion, pleasures -subtle and secret, wild joys and wilder sins—he was to have all these -things. The portrait was to bear the burden of his shame: that was all. -</p> - -<p> -A feeling of pain crept over him as he thought of the desecration that was in -store for the fair face on the canvas. Once, in boyish mockery of Narcissus, he -had kissed, or feigned to kiss, those painted lips that now smiled so cruelly -at him. Morning after morning he had sat before the portrait wondering at its -beauty, almost enamoured of it, as it seemed to him at times. Was it to alter -now with every mood to which he yielded? Was it to become a monstrous and -loathsome thing, to be hidden away in a locked room, to be shut out from the -sunlight that had so often touched to brighter gold the waving wonder of its -hair? The pity of it! the pity of it! -</p> - -<p> -For a moment, he thought of praying that the horrible sympathy that existed -between him and the picture might cease. It had changed in answer to a prayer; -perhaps in answer to a prayer it might remain unchanged. And yet, who, that -knew anything about life, would surrender the chance of remaining always young, -however fantastic that chance might be, or with what fateful consequences it -might be fraught? Besides, was it really under his control? Had it indeed been -prayer that had produced the substitution? Might there not be some curious -scientific reason for it all? If thought could exercise its influence upon a -living organism, might not thought exercise an influence upon dead and -inorganic things? Nay, without thought or conscious desire, might not things -external to ourselves vibrate in unison with our moods and passions, atom -calling to atom in secret love or strange affinity? But the reason was of no -importance. He would never again tempt by a prayer any terrible power. If the -picture was to alter, it was to alter. That was all. Why inquire too closely -into it? -</p> - -<p> -For there would be a real pleasure in watching it. He would be able to follow -his mind into its secret places. This portrait would be to him the most magical -of mirrors. As it had revealed to him his own body, so it would reveal to him -his own soul. And when winter came upon it, he would still be standing where -spring trembles on the verge of summer. When the blood crept from its face, and -left behind a pallid mask of chalk with leaden eyes, he would keep the glamour -of boyhood. Not one blossom of his loveliness would ever fade. Not one pulse of -his life would ever weaken. Like the gods of the Greeks, he would be strong, -and fleet, and joyous. What did it matter what happened to the coloured image -on the canvas? He would be safe. That was everything. -</p> - -<p> -He drew the screen back into its former place in front of the picture, smiling -as he did so, and passed into his bedroom, where his valet was already waiting -for him. An hour later he was at the opera, and Lord Henry was leaning over his -chair. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap09"></a>CHAPTER IX.</h2> - -<p> -As he was sitting at breakfast next morning, Basil Hallward was shown into the -room. -</p> - -<p> -“I am so glad I have found you, Dorian,” he said gravely. “I -called last night, and they told me you were at the opera. Of course, I knew -that was impossible. But I wish you had left word where you had really gone to. -I passed a dreadful evening, half afraid that one tragedy might be followed by -another. I think you might have telegraphed for me when you heard of it first. -I read of it quite by chance in a late edition of <i>The Globe</i> that I -picked up at the club. I came here at once and was miserable at not finding -you. I can’t tell you how heart-broken I am about the whole thing. I know -what you must suffer. But where were you? Did you go down and see the -girl’s mother? For a moment I thought of following you there. They gave -the address in the paper. Somewhere in the Euston Road, isn’t it? But I -was afraid of intruding upon a sorrow that I could not lighten. Poor woman! -What a state she must be in! And her only child, too! What did she say about it -all?” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear Basil, how do I know?” murmured Dorian Gray, sipping some -pale-yellow wine from a delicate, gold-beaded bubble of Venetian glass and -looking dreadfully bored. “I was at the opera. You should have come on -there. I met Lady Gwendolen, Harry’s sister, for the first time. We were -in her box. She is perfectly charming; and Patti sang divinely. Don’t -talk about horrid subjects. If one doesn’t talk about a thing, it has -never happened. It is simply expression, as Harry says, that gives reality to -things. I may mention that she was not the woman’s only child. There is a -son, a charming fellow, I believe. But he is not on the stage. He is a sailor, -or something. And now, tell me about yourself and what you are painting.” -</p> - -<p> -“You went to the opera?” said Hallward, speaking very slowly and -with a strained touch of pain in his voice. “You went to the opera while -Sibyl Vane was lying dead in some sordid lodging? You can talk to me of other -women being charming, and of Patti singing divinely, before the girl you loved -has even the quiet of a grave to sleep in? Why, man, there are horrors in store -for that little white body of hers!” -</p> - -<p> -“Stop, Basil! I won’t hear it!” cried Dorian, leaping to his -feet. “You must not tell me about things. What is done is done. What is -past is past.” -</p> - -<p> -“You call yesterday the past?” -</p> - -<p> -“What has the actual lapse of time got to do with it? It is only shallow -people who require years to get rid of an emotion. A man who is master of -himself can end a sorrow as easily as he can invent a pleasure. I don’t -want to be at the mercy of my emotions. I want to use them, to enjoy them, and -to dominate them.” -</p> - -<p> -“Dorian, this is horrible! Something has changed you completely. You look -exactly the same wonderful boy who, day after day, used to come down to my -studio to sit for his picture. But you were simple, natural, and affectionate -then. You were the most unspoiled creature in the whole world. Now, I -don’t know what has come over you. You talk as if you had no heart, no -pity in you. It is all Harry’s influence. I see that.” -</p> - -<p> -The lad flushed up and, going to the window, looked out for a few moments on -the green, flickering, sun-lashed garden. “I owe a great deal to Harry, -Basil,” he said at last, “more than I owe to you. You only taught -me to be vain.” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, I am punished for that, Dorian—or shall be some day.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t know what you mean, Basil,” he exclaimed, turning -round. “I don’t know what you want. What do you want?” -</p> - -<p> -“I want the Dorian Gray I used to paint,” said the artist sadly. -</p> - -<p> -“Basil,” said the lad, going over to him and putting his hand on -his shoulder, “you have come too late. Yesterday, when I heard that Sibyl -Vane had killed herself—” -</p> - -<p> -“Killed herself! Good heavens! is there no doubt about that?” cried -Hallward, looking up at him with an expression of horror. -</p> - -<p> -“My dear Basil! Surely you don’t think it was a vulgar accident? Of -course she killed herself.” -</p> - -<p> -The elder man buried his face in his hands. “How fearful,” he -muttered, and a shudder ran through him. -</p> - -<p> -“No,” said Dorian Gray, “there is nothing fearful about it. -It is one of the great romantic tragedies of the age. As a rule, people who act -lead the most commonplace lives. They are good husbands, or faithful wives, or -something tedious. You know what I mean—middle-class virtue and all that -kind of thing. How different Sibyl was! She lived her finest tragedy. She was -always a heroine. The last night she played—the night you saw -her—she acted badly because she had known the reality of love. When she -knew its unreality, she died, as Juliet might have died. She passed again into -the sphere of art. There is something of the martyr about her. Her death has -all the pathetic uselessness of martyrdom, all its wasted beauty. But, as I was -saying, you must not think I have not suffered. If you had come in yesterday at -a particular moment—about half-past five, perhaps, or a quarter to -six—you would have found me in tears. Even Harry, who was here, who -brought me the news, in fact, had no idea what I was going through. I suffered -immensely. Then it passed away. I cannot repeat an emotion. No one can, except -sentimentalists. And you are awfully unjust, Basil. You come down here to -console me. That is charming of you. You find me consoled, and you are furious. -How like a sympathetic person! You remind me of a story Harry told me about a -certain philanthropist who spent twenty years of his life in trying to get some -grievance redressed, or some unjust law altered—I forget exactly what it -was. Finally he succeeded, and nothing could exceed his disappointment. He had -absolutely nothing to do, almost died of <i>ennui</i>, and became a confirmed -misanthrope. And besides, my dear old Basil, if you really want to console me, -teach me rather to forget what has happened, or to see it from a proper -artistic point of view. Was it not Gautier who used to write about <i>la -consolation des arts</i>? I remember picking up a little vellum-covered book in -your studio one day and chancing on that delightful phrase. Well, I am not like -that young man you told me of when we were down at Marlow together, the young -man who used to say that yellow satin could console one for all the miseries of -life. I love beautiful things that one can touch and handle. Old brocades, -green bronzes, lacquer-work, carved ivories, exquisite surroundings, luxury, -pomp—there is much to be got from all these. But the artistic temperament -that they create, or at any rate reveal, is still more to me. To become the -spectator of one’s own life, as Harry says, is to escape the suffering of -life. I know you are surprised at my talking to you like this. You have not -realized how I have developed. I was a schoolboy when you knew me. I am a man -now. I have new passions, new thoughts, new ideas. I am different, but you must -not like me less. I am changed, but you must always be my friend. Of course, I -am very fond of Harry. But I know that you are better than he is. You are not -stronger—you are too much afraid of life—but you are better. And -how happy we used to be together! Don’t leave me, Basil, and don’t -quarrel with me. I am what I am. There is nothing more to be said.” -</p> - -<p> -The painter felt strangely moved. The lad was infinitely dear to him, and his -personality had been the great turning point in his art. He could not bear the -idea of reproaching him any more. After all, his indifference was probably -merely a mood that would pass away. There was so much in him that was good, so -much in him that was noble. -</p> - -<p> -“Well, Dorian,” he said at length, with a sad smile, “I -won’t speak to you again about this horrible thing, after to-day. I only -trust your name won’t be mentioned in connection with it. The inquest is -to take place this afternoon. Have they summoned you?” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian shook his head, and a look of annoyance passed over his face at the -mention of the word “inquest.” There was something so crude and -vulgar about everything of the kind. “They don’t know my -name,” he answered. -</p> - -<p> -“But surely she did?” -</p> - -<p> -“Only my Christian name, and that I am quite sure she never mentioned to -any one. She told me once that they were all rather curious to learn who I was, -and that she invariably told them my name was Prince Charming. It was pretty of -her. You must do me a drawing of Sibyl, Basil. I should like to have something -more of her than the memory of a few kisses and some broken pathetic -words.” -</p> - -<p> -“I will try and do something, Dorian, if it would please you. But you -must come and sit to me yourself again. I can’t get on without -you.” -</p> - -<p> -“I can never sit to you again, Basil. It is impossible!” he -exclaimed, starting back. -</p> - -<p> -The painter stared at him. “My dear boy, what nonsense!” he cried. -“Do you mean to say you don’t like what I did of you? Where is it? -Why have you pulled the screen in front of it? Let me look at it. It is the -best thing I have ever done. Do take the screen away, Dorian. It is simply -disgraceful of your servant hiding my work like that. I felt the room looked -different as I came in.” -</p> - -<p> -“My servant has nothing to do with it, Basil. You don’t imagine I -let him arrange my room for me? He settles my flowers for me -sometimes—that is all. No; I did it myself. The light was too strong on -the portrait.” -</p> - -<p> -“Too strong! Surely not, my dear fellow? It is an admirable place for it. -Let me see it.” And Hallward walked towards the corner of the room. -</p> - -<p> -A cry of terror broke from Dorian Gray’s lips, and he rushed between the -painter and the screen. “Basil,” he said, looking very pale, -“you must not look at it. I don’t wish you to.” -</p> - -<p> -“Not look at my own work! You are not serious. Why shouldn’t I look -at it?” exclaimed Hallward, laughing. -</p> - -<p> -“If you try to look at it, Basil, on my word of honour I will never speak -to you again as long as I live. I am quite serious. I don’t offer any -explanation, and you are not to ask for any. But, remember, if you touch this -screen, everything is over between us.” -</p> - -<p> -Hallward was thunderstruck. He looked at Dorian Gray in absolute amazement. He -had never seen him like this before. The lad was actually pallid with rage. His -hands were clenched, and the pupils of his eyes were like disks of blue fire. -He was trembling all over. -</p> - -<p> -“Dorian!” -</p> - -<p> -“Don’t speak!” -</p> - -<p> -“But what is the matter? Of course I won’t look at it if you -don’t want me to,” he said, rather coldly, turning on his heel and -going over towards the window. “But, really, it seems rather absurd that -I shouldn’t see my own work, especially as I am going to exhibit it in -Paris in the autumn. I shall probably have to give it another coat of varnish -before that, so I must see it some day, and why not to-day?” -</p> - -<p> -“To exhibit it! You want to exhibit it?” exclaimed Dorian Gray, a -strange sense of terror creeping over him. Was the world going to be shown his -secret? Were people to gape at the mystery of his life? That was impossible. -Something—he did not know what—had to be done at once. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes; I don’t suppose you will object to that. Georges Petit is -going to collect all my best pictures for a special exhibition in the Rue de -Sèze, which will open the first week in October. The portrait will only be away -a month. I should think you could easily spare it for that time. In fact, you -are sure to be out of town. And if you keep it always behind a screen, you -can’t care much about it.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray passed his hand over his forehead. There were beads of perspiration -there. He felt that he was on the brink of a horrible danger. “You told -me a month ago that you would never exhibit it,” he cried. “Why -have you changed your mind? You people who go in for being consistent have just -as many moods as others have. The only difference is that your moods are rather -meaningless. You can’t have forgotten that you assured me most solemnly -that nothing in the world would induce you to send it to any exhibition. You -told Harry exactly the same thing.” He stopped suddenly, and a gleam of -light came into his eyes. He remembered that Lord Henry had said to him once, -half seriously and half in jest, “If you want to have a strange quarter -of an hour, get Basil to tell you why he won’t exhibit your picture. He -told me why he wouldn’t, and it was a revelation to me.” Yes, -perhaps Basil, too, had his secret. He would ask him and try. -</p> - -<p> -“Basil,” he said, coming over quite close and looking him straight -in the face, “we have each of us a secret. Let me know yours, and I shall -tell you mine. What was your reason for refusing to exhibit my picture?” -</p> - -<p> -The painter shuddered in spite of himself. “Dorian, if I told you, you -might like me less than you do, and you would certainly laugh at me. I could -not bear your doing either of those two things. If you wish me never to look at -your picture again, I am content. I have always you to look at. If you wish the -best work I have ever done to be hidden from the world, I am satisfied. Your -friendship is dearer to me than any fame or reputation.” -</p> - -<p> -“No, Basil, you must tell me,” insisted Dorian Gray. “I think -I have a right to know.” His feeling of terror had passed away, and -curiosity had taken its place. He was determined to find out Basil -Hallward’s mystery. -</p> - -<p> -“Let us sit down, Dorian,” said the painter, looking troubled. -“Let us sit down. And just answer me one question. Have you noticed in -the picture something curious?—something that probably at first did not -strike you, but that revealed itself to you suddenly?” -</p> - -<p> -“Basil!” cried the lad, clutching the arms of his chair with -trembling hands and gazing at him with wild startled eyes. -</p> - -<p> -“I see you did. Don’t speak. Wait till you hear what I have to say. -Dorian, from the moment I met you, your personality had the most extraordinary -influence over me. I was dominated, soul, brain, and power, by you. You became -to me the visible incarnation of that unseen ideal whose memory haunts us -artists like an exquisite dream. I worshipped you. I grew jealous of every one -to whom you spoke. I wanted to have you all to myself. I was only happy when I -was with you. When you were away from me, you were still present in my art.... -Of course, I never let you know anything about this. It would have been -impossible. You would not have understood it. I hardly understood it myself. I -only knew that I had seen perfection face to face, and that the world had -become wonderful to my eyes—too wonderful, perhaps, for in such mad -worships there is peril, the peril of losing them, no less than the peril of -keeping them.... Weeks and weeks went on, and I grew more and more absorbed in -you. Then came a new development. I had drawn you as Paris in dainty armour, -and as Adonis with huntsman’s cloak and polished boar-spear. Crowned with -heavy lotus-blossoms you had sat on the prow of Adrian’s barge, gazing -across the green turbid Nile. You had leaned over the still pool of some Greek -woodland and seen in the water’s silent silver the marvel of your own -face. And it had all been what art should be—unconscious, ideal, and -remote. One day, a fatal day I sometimes think, I determined to paint a -wonderful portrait of you as you actually are, not in the costume of dead ages, -but in your own dress and in your own time. Whether it was the realism of the -method, or the mere wonder of your own personality, thus directly presented to -me without mist or veil, I cannot tell. But I know that as I worked at it, -every flake and film of colour seemed to me to reveal my secret. I grew afraid -that others would know of my idolatry. I felt, Dorian, that I had told too -much, that I had put too much of myself into it. Then it was that I resolved -never to allow the picture to be exhibited. You were a little annoyed; but then -you did not realize all that it meant to me. Harry, to whom I talked about it, -laughed at me. But I did not mind that. When the picture was finished, and I -sat alone with it, I felt that I was right.... Well, after a few days the thing -left my studio, and as soon as I had got rid of the intolerable fascination of -its presence, it seemed to me that I had been foolish in imagining that I had -seen anything in it, more than that you were extremely good-looking and that I -could paint. Even now I cannot help feeling that it is a mistake to think that -the passion one feels in creation is ever really shown in the work one creates. -Art is always more abstract than we fancy. Form and colour tell us of form and -colour—that is all. It often seems to me that art conceals the artist far -more completely than it ever reveals him. And so when I got this offer from -Paris, I determined to make your portrait the principal thing in my exhibition. -It never occurred to me that you would refuse. I see now that you were right. -The picture cannot be shown. You must not be angry with me, Dorian, for what I -have told you. As I said to Harry, once, you are made to be worshipped.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray drew a long breath. The colour came back to his cheeks, and a smile -played about his lips. The peril was over. He was safe for the time. Yet he -could not help feeling infinite pity for the painter who had just made this -strange confession to him, and wondered if he himself would ever be so -dominated by the personality of a friend. Lord Henry had the charm of being -very dangerous. But that was all. He was too clever and too cynical to be -really fond of. Would there ever be some one who would fill him with a strange -idolatry? Was that one of the things that life had in store? -</p> - -<p> -“It is extraordinary to me, Dorian,” said Hallward, “that you -should have seen this in the portrait. Did you really see it?” -</p> - -<p> -“I saw something in it,” he answered, “something that seemed -to me very curious.” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, you don’t mind my looking at the thing now?” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian shook his head. “You must not ask me that, Basil. I could not -possibly let you stand in front of that picture.” -</p> - -<p> -“You will some day, surely?” -</p> - -<p> -“Never.” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, perhaps you are right. And now good-bye, Dorian. You have been the -one person in my life who has really influenced my art. Whatever I have done -that is good, I owe to you. Ah! you don’t know what it cost me to tell -you all that I have told you.” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear Basil,” said Dorian, “what have you told me? Simply -that you felt that you admired me too much. That is not even a -compliment.” -</p> - -<p> -“It was not intended as a compliment. It was a confession. Now that I -have made it, something seems to have gone out of me. Perhaps one should never -put one’s worship into words.” -</p> - -<p> -“It was a very disappointing confession.” -</p> - -<p> -“Why, what did you expect, Dorian? You didn’t see anything else in -the picture, did you? There was nothing else to see?” -</p> - -<p> -“No; there was nothing else to see. Why do you ask? But you mustn’t -talk about worship. It is foolish. You and I are friends, Basil, and we must -always remain so.” -</p> - -<p> -“You have got Harry,” said the painter sadly. -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, Harry!” cried the lad, with a ripple of laughter. “Harry -spends his days in saying what is incredible and his evenings in doing what is -improbable. Just the sort of life I would like to lead. But still I don’t -think I would go to Harry if I were in trouble. I would sooner go to you, -Basil.” -</p> - -<p> -“You will sit to me again?” -</p> - -<p> -“Impossible!” -</p> - -<p> -“You spoil my life as an artist by refusing, Dorian. No man comes across -two ideal things. Few come across one.” -</p> - -<p> -“I can’t explain it to you, Basil, but I must never sit to you -again. There is something fatal about a portrait. It has a life of its own. I -will come and have tea with you. That will be just as pleasant.” -</p> - -<p> -“Pleasanter for you, I am afraid,” murmured Hallward regretfully. -“And now good-bye. I am sorry you won’t let me look at the picture -once again. But that can’t be helped. I quite understand what you feel -about it.” -</p> - -<p> -As he left the room, Dorian Gray smiled to himself. Poor Basil! How little he -knew of the true reason! And how strange it was that, instead of having been -forced to reveal his own secret, he had succeeded, almost by chance, in -wresting a secret from his friend! How much that strange confession explained -to him! The painter’s absurd fits of jealousy, his wild devotion, his -extravagant panegyrics, his curious reticences—he understood them all -now, and he felt sorry. There seemed to him to be something tragic in a -friendship so coloured by romance. -</p> - -<p> -He sighed and touched the bell. The portrait must be hidden away at all costs. -He could not run such a risk of discovery again. It had been mad of him to have -allowed the thing to remain, even for an hour, in a room to which any of his -friends had access. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap10"></a>CHAPTER X.</h2> - -<p> -When his servant entered, he looked at him steadfastly and wondered if he had -thought of peering behind the screen. The man was quite impassive and waited -for his orders. Dorian lit a cigarette and walked over to the glass and glanced -into it. He could see the reflection of Victor’s face perfectly. It was -like a placid mask of servility. There was nothing to be afraid of, there. Yet -he thought it best to be on his guard. -</p> - -<p> -Speaking very slowly, he told him to tell the house-keeper that he wanted to -see her, and then to go to the frame-maker and ask him to send two of his men -round at once. It seemed to him that as the man left the room his eyes wandered -in the direction of the screen. Or was that merely his own fancy? -</p> - -<p> -After a few moments, in her black silk dress, with old-fashioned thread mittens -on her wrinkled hands, Mrs. Leaf bustled into the library. He asked her for the -key of the schoolroom. -</p> - -<p> -“The old schoolroom, Mr. Dorian?” she exclaimed. “Why, it is -full of dust. I must get it arranged and put straight before you go into it. It -is not fit for you to see, sir. It is not, indeed.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t want it put straight, Leaf. I only want the key.” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, sir, you’ll be covered with cobwebs if you go into it. Why, -it hasn’t been opened for nearly five years—not since his lordship -died.” -</p> - -<p> -He winced at the mention of his grandfather. He had hateful memories of him. -“That does not matter,” he answered. “I simply want to see -the place—that is all. Give me the key.” -</p> - -<p> -“And here is the key, sir,” said the old lady, going over the -contents of her bunch with tremulously uncertain hands. “Here is the key. -I’ll have it off the bunch in a moment. But you don’t think of -living up there, sir, and you so comfortable here?” -</p> - -<p> -“No, no,” he cried petulantly. “Thank you, Leaf. That will -do.” -</p> - -<p> -She lingered for a few moments, and was garrulous over some detail of the -household. He sighed and told her to manage things as she thought best. She -left the room, wreathed in smiles. -</p> - -<p> -As the door closed, Dorian put the key in his pocket and looked round the room. -His eye fell on a large, purple satin coverlet heavily embroidered with gold, a -splendid piece of late seventeenth-century Venetian work that his grandfather -had found in a convent near Bologna. Yes, that would serve to wrap the dreadful -thing in. It had perhaps served often as a pall for the dead. Now it was to -hide something that had a corruption of its own, worse than the corruption of -death itself—something that would breed horrors and yet would never die. -What the worm was to the corpse, his sins would be to the painted image on the -canvas. They would mar its beauty and eat away its grace. They would defile it -and make it shameful. And yet the thing would still live on. It would be always -alive. -</p> - -<p> -He shuddered, and for a moment he regretted that he had not told Basil the true -reason why he had wished to hide the picture away. Basil would have helped him -to resist Lord Henry’s influence, and the still more poisonous influences -that came from his own temperament. The love that he bore him—for it was -really love—had nothing in it that was not noble and intellectual. It was -not that mere physical admiration of beauty that is born of the senses and that -dies when the senses tire. It was such love as Michelangelo had known, and -Montaigne, and Winckelmann, and Shakespeare himself. Yes, Basil could have -saved him. But it was too late now. The past could always be annihilated. -Regret, denial, or forgetfulness could do that. But the future was inevitable. -There were passions in him that would find their terrible outlet, dreams that -would make the shadow of their evil real. -</p> - -<p> -He took up from the couch the great purple-and-gold texture that covered it, -and, holding it in his hands, passed behind the screen. Was the face on the -canvas viler than before? It seemed to him that it was unchanged, and yet his -loathing of it was intensified. Gold hair, blue eyes, and rose-red -lips—they all were there. It was simply the expression that had altered. -That was horrible in its cruelty. Compared to what he saw in it of censure or -rebuke, how shallow Basil’s reproaches about Sibyl Vane had -been!—how shallow, and of what little account! His own soul was looking -out at him from the canvas and calling him to judgement. A look of pain came -across him, and he flung the rich pall over the picture. As he did so, a knock -came to the door. He passed out as his servant entered. -</p> - -<p> -“The persons are here, Monsieur.” -</p> - -<p> -He felt that the man must be got rid of at once. He must not be allowed to know -where the picture was being taken to. There was something sly about him, and he -had thoughtful, treacherous eyes. Sitting down at the writing-table he -scribbled a note to Lord Henry, asking him to send him round something to read -and reminding him that they were to meet at eight-fifteen that evening. -</p> - -<p> -“Wait for an answer,” he said, handing it to him, “and show -the men in here.” -</p> - -<p> -In two or three minutes there was another knock, and Mr. Hubbard himself, the -celebrated frame-maker of South Audley Street, came in with a somewhat -rough-looking young assistant. Mr. Hubbard was a florid, red-whiskered little -man, whose admiration for art was considerably tempered by the inveterate -impecuniosity of most of the artists who dealt with him. As a rule, he never -left his shop. He waited for people to come to him. But he always made an -exception in favour of Dorian Gray. There was something about Dorian that -charmed everybody. It was a pleasure even to see him. -</p> - -<p> -“What can I do for you, Mr. Gray?” he said, rubbing his fat -freckled hands. “I thought I would do myself the honour of coming round -in person. I have just got a beauty of a frame, sir. Picked it up at a sale. -Old Florentine. Came from Fonthill, I believe. Admirably suited for a religious -subject, Mr. Gray.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am so sorry you have given yourself the trouble of coming round, Mr. -Hubbard. I shall certainly drop in and look at the frame—though I -don’t go in much at present for religious art—but to-day I only -want a picture carried to the top of the house for me. It is rather heavy, so I -thought I would ask you to lend me a couple of your men.” -</p> - -<p> -“No trouble at all, Mr. Gray. I am delighted to be of any service to you. -Which is the work of art, sir?” -</p> - -<p> -“This,” replied Dorian, moving the screen back. “Can you move -it, covering and all, just as it is? I don’t want it to get scratched -going upstairs.” -</p> - -<p> -“There will be no difficulty, sir,” said the genial frame-maker, -beginning, with the aid of his assistant, to unhook the picture from the long -brass chains by which it was suspended. “And, now, where shall we carry -it to, Mr. Gray?” -</p> - -<p> -“I will show you the way, Mr. Hubbard, if you will kindly follow me. Or -perhaps you had better go in front. I am afraid it is right at the top of the -house. We will go up by the front staircase, as it is wider.” -</p> - -<p> -He held the door open for them, and they passed out into the hall and began the -ascent. The elaborate character of the frame had made the picture extremely -bulky, and now and then, in spite of the obsequious protests of Mr. Hubbard, -who had the true tradesman’s spirited dislike of seeing a gentleman doing -anything useful, Dorian put his hand to it so as to help them. -</p> - -<p> -“Something of a load to carry, sir,” gasped the little man when -they reached the top landing. And he wiped his shiny forehead. -</p> - -<p> -“I am afraid it is rather heavy,” murmured Dorian as he unlocked -the door that opened into the room that was to keep for him the curious secret -of his life and hide his soul from the eyes of men. -</p> - -<p> -He had not entered the place for more than four years—not, indeed, since -he had used it first as a play-room when he was a child, and then as a study -when he grew somewhat older. It was a large, well-proportioned room, which had -been specially built by the last Lord Kelso for the use of the little grandson -whom, for his strange likeness to his mother, and also for other reasons, he -had always hated and desired to keep at a distance. It appeared to Dorian to -have but little changed. There was the huge Italian <i>cassone</i>, with its -fantastically painted panels and its tarnished gilt mouldings, in which he had -so often hidden himself as a boy. There the satinwood book-case filled with his -dog-eared schoolbooks. On the wall behind it was hanging the same ragged -Flemish tapestry where a faded king and queen were playing chess in a garden, -while a company of hawkers rode by, carrying hooded birds on their gauntleted -wrists. How well he remembered it all! Every moment of his lonely childhood -came back to him as he looked round. He recalled the stainless purity of his -boyish life, and it seemed horrible to him that it was here the fatal portrait -was to be hidden away. How little he had thought, in those dead days, of all -that was in store for him! -</p> - -<p> -But there was no other place in the house so secure from prying eyes as this. -He had the key, and no one else could enter it. Beneath its purple pall, the -face painted on the canvas could grow bestial, sodden, and unclean. What did it -matter? No one could see it. He himself would not see it. Why should he watch -the hideous corruption of his soul? He kept his youth—that was enough. -And, besides, might not his nature grow finer, after all? There was no reason -that the future should be so full of shame. Some love might come across his -life, and purify him, and shield him from those sins that seemed to be already -stirring in spirit and in flesh—those curious unpictured sins whose very -mystery lent them their subtlety and their charm. Perhaps, some day, the cruel -look would have passed away from the scarlet sensitive mouth, and he might show -to the world Basil Hallward’s masterpiece. -</p> - -<p> -No; that was impossible. Hour by hour, and week by week, the thing upon the -canvas was growing old. It might escape the hideousness of sin, but the -hideousness of age was in store for it. The cheeks would become hollow or -flaccid. Yellow crow’s feet would creep round the fading eyes and make -them horrible. The hair would lose its brightness, the mouth would gape or -droop, would be foolish or gross, as the mouths of old men are. There would be -the wrinkled throat, the cold, blue-veined hands, the twisted body, that he -remembered in the grandfather who had been so stern to him in his boyhood. The -picture had to be concealed. There was no help for it. -</p> - -<p> -“Bring it in, Mr. Hubbard, please,” he said, wearily, turning -round. “I am sorry I kept you so long. I was thinking of something -else.” -</p> - -<p> -“Always glad to have a rest, Mr. Gray,” answered the frame-maker, -who was still gasping for breath. “Where shall we put it, sir?” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, anywhere. Here: this will do. I don’t want to have it hung up. -Just lean it against the wall. Thanks.” -</p> - -<p> -“Might one look at the work of art, sir?” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian started. “It would not interest you, Mr. Hubbard,” he said, -keeping his eye on the man. He felt ready to leap upon him and fling him to the -ground if he dared to lift the gorgeous hanging that concealed the secret of -his life. “I shan’t trouble you any more now. I am much obliged for -your kindness in coming round.” -</p> - -<p> -“Not at all, not at all, Mr. Gray. Ever ready to do anything for you, -sir.” And Mr. Hubbard tramped downstairs, followed by the assistant, who -glanced back at Dorian with a look of shy wonder in his rough uncomely face. He -had never seen any one so marvellous. -</p> - -<p> -When the sound of their footsteps had died away, Dorian locked the door and put -the key in his pocket. He felt safe now. No one would ever look upon the -horrible thing. No eye but his would ever see his shame. -</p> - -<p> -On reaching the library, he found that it was just after five o’clock and -that the tea had been already brought up. On a little table of dark perfumed -wood thickly incrusted with nacre, a present from Lady Radley, his -guardian’s wife, a pretty professional invalid who had spent the -preceding winter in Cairo, was lying a note from Lord Henry, and beside it was -a book bound in yellow paper, the cover slightly torn and the edges soiled. A -copy of the third edition of <i>The St. James’s Gazette</i> had been -placed on the tea-tray. It was evident that Victor had returned. He wondered if -he had met the men in the hall as they were leaving the house and had wormed -out of them what they had been doing. He would be sure to miss the -picture—had no doubt missed it already, while he had been laying the -tea-things. The screen had not been set back, and a blank space was visible on -the wall. Perhaps some night he might find him creeping upstairs and trying to -force the door of the room. It was a horrible thing to have a spy in -one’s house. He had heard of rich men who had been blackmailed all their -lives by some servant who had read a letter, or overheard a conversation, or -picked up a card with an address, or found beneath a pillow a withered flower -or a shred of crumpled lace. -</p> - -<p> -He sighed, and having poured himself out some tea, opened Lord Henry’s -note. It was simply to say that he sent him round the evening paper, and a book -that might interest him, and that he would be at the club at eight-fifteen. He -opened <i>The St. James’s</i> languidly, and looked through it. A red -pencil-mark on the fifth page caught his eye. It drew attention to the -following paragraph: -</p> - -<p class="letter"> -I<small>NQUEST ON AN</small> A<small>CTRESS</small>.—An inquest was held -this morning at the Bell Tavern, Hoxton Road, by Mr. Danby, the District -Coroner, on the body of Sibyl Vane, a young actress recently engaged at the -Royal Theatre, Holborn. A verdict of death by misadventure was returned. -Considerable sympathy was expressed for the mother of the deceased, who was -greatly affected during the giving of her own evidence, and that of Dr. -Birrell, who had made the post-mortem examination of the deceased. -</p> - -<p> -He frowned, and tearing the paper in two, went across the room and flung the -pieces away. How ugly it all was! And how horribly real ugliness made things! -He felt a little annoyed with Lord Henry for having sent him the report. And it -was certainly stupid of him to have marked it with red pencil. Victor might -have read it. The man knew more than enough English for that. -</p> - -<p> -Perhaps he had read it and had begun to suspect something. And, yet, what did -it matter? What had Dorian Gray to do with Sibyl Vane’s death? There was -nothing to fear. Dorian Gray had not killed her. -</p> - -<p> -His eye fell on the yellow book that Lord Henry had sent him. What was it, he -wondered. He went towards the little, pearl-coloured octagonal stand that had -always looked to him like the work of some strange Egyptian bees that wrought -in silver, and taking up the volume, flung himself into an arm-chair and began -to turn over the leaves. After a few minutes he became absorbed. It was the -strangest book that he had ever read. It seemed to him that in exquisite -raiment, and to the delicate sound of flutes, the sins of the world were -passing in dumb show before him. Things that he had dimly dreamed of were -suddenly made real to him. Things of which he had never dreamed were gradually -revealed. -</p> - -<p> -It was a novel without a plot and with only one character, being, indeed, -simply a psychological study of a certain young Parisian who spent his life -trying to realize in the nineteenth century all the passions and modes of -thought that belonged to every century except his own, and to sum up, as it -were, in himself the various moods through which the world-spirit had ever -passed, loving for their mere artificiality those renunciations that men have -unwisely called virtue, as much as those natural rebellions that wise men still -call sin. The style in which it was written was that curious jewelled style, -vivid and obscure at once, full of <i>argot</i> and of archaisms, of technical -expressions and of elaborate paraphrases, that characterizes the work of some -of the finest artists of the French school of <i>Symbolistes</i>. There were in -it metaphors as monstrous as orchids and as subtle in colour. The life of the -senses was described in the terms of mystical philosophy. One hardly knew at -times whether one was reading the spiritual ecstasies of some mediæval saint -or the morbid confessions of a modern sinner. It was a poisonous book. The -heavy odour of incense seemed to cling about its pages and to trouble the -brain. The mere cadence of the sentences, the subtle monotony of their music, -so full as it was of complex refrains and movements elaborately repeated, -produced in the mind of the lad, as he passed from chapter to chapter, a form -of reverie, a malady of dreaming, that made him unconscious of the falling day -and creeping shadows. -</p> - -<p> -Cloudless, and pierced by one solitary star, a copper-green sky gleamed through -the windows. He read on by its wan light till he could read no more. Then, -after his valet had reminded him several times of the lateness of the hour, he -got up, and going into the next room, placed the book on the little Florentine -table that always stood at his bedside and began to dress for dinner. -</p> - -<p> -It was almost nine o’clock before he reached the club, where he found -Lord Henry sitting alone, in the morning-room, looking very much bored. -</p> - -<p> -“I am so sorry, Harry,” he cried, “but really it is entirely -your fault. That book you sent me so fascinated me that I forgot how the time -was going.” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, I thought you would like it,” replied his host, rising from -his chair. -</p> - -<p> -“I didn’t say I liked it, Harry. I said it fascinated me. There is -a great difference.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah, you have discovered that?” murmured Lord Henry. And they -passed into the dining-room. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap11"></a>CHAPTER XI.</h2> - -<p> -For years, Dorian Gray could not free himself from the influence of this book. -Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that he never sought to free -himself from it. He procured from Paris no less than nine large-paper copies of -the first edition, and had them bound in different colours, so that they might -suit his various moods and the changing fancies of a nature over which he -seemed, at times, to have almost entirely lost control. The hero, the wonderful -young Parisian in whom the romantic and the scientific temperaments were so -strangely blended, became to him a kind of prefiguring type of himself. And, -indeed, the whole book seemed to him to contain the story of his own life, -written before he had lived it. -</p> - -<p> -In one point he was more fortunate than the novel’s fantastic hero. He -never knew—never, indeed, had any cause to know—that somewhat -grotesque dread of mirrors, and polished metal surfaces, and still water which -came upon the young Parisian so early in his life, and was occasioned by the -sudden decay of a beau that had once, apparently, been so remarkable. It was -with an almost cruel joy—and perhaps in nearly every joy, as certainly in -every pleasure, cruelty has its place—that he used to read the latter -part of the book, with its really tragic, if somewhat overemphasized, account -of the sorrow and despair of one who had himself lost what in others, and the -world, he had most dearly valued. -</p> - -<p> -For the wonderful beauty that had so fascinated Basil Hallward, and many others -besides him, seemed never to leave him. Even those who had heard the most evil -things against him—and from time to time strange rumours about his mode -of life crept through London and became the chatter of the clubs—could -not believe anything to his dishonour when they saw him. He had always the look -of one who had kept himself unspotted from the world. Men who talked grossly -became silent when Dorian Gray entered the room. There was something in the -purity of his face that rebuked them. His mere presence seemed to recall to -them the memory of the innocence that they had tarnished. They wondered how one -so charming and graceful as he was could have escaped the stain of an age that -was at once sordid and sensual. -</p> - -<p> -Often, on returning home from one of those mysterious and prolonged absences -that gave rise to such strange conjecture among those who were his friends, or -thought that they were so, he himself would creep upstairs to the locked room, -open the door with the key that never left him now, and stand, with a mirror, -in front of the portrait that Basil Hallward had painted of him, looking now at -the evil and aging face on the canvas, and now at the fair young face that -laughed back at him from the polished glass. The very sharpness of the contrast -used to quicken his sense of pleasure. He grew more and more enamoured of his -own beauty, more and more interested in the corruption of his own soul. He -would examine with minute care, and sometimes with a monstrous and terrible -delight, the hideous lines that seared the wrinkling forehead or crawled around -the heavy sensual mouth, wondering sometimes which were the more horrible, the -signs of sin or the signs of age. He would place his white hands beside the -coarse bloated hands of the picture, and smile. He mocked the misshapen body -and the failing limbs. -</p> - -<p> -There were moments, indeed, at night, when, lying sleepless in his own -delicately scented chamber, or in the sordid room of the little ill-famed -tavern near the docks which, under an assumed name and in disguise, it was his -habit to frequent, he would think of the ruin he had brought upon his soul with -a pity that was all the more poignant because it was purely selfish. But -moments such as these were rare. That curiosity about life which Lord Henry had -first stirred in him, as they sat together in the garden of their friend, -seemed to increase with gratification. The more he knew, the more he desired to -know. He had mad hungers that grew more ravenous as he fed them. -</p> - -<p> -Yet he was not really reckless, at any rate in his relations to society. Once -or twice every month during the winter, and on each Wednesday evening while the -season lasted, he would throw open to the world his beautiful house and have -the most celebrated musicians of the day to charm his guests with the wonders -of their art. His little dinners, in the settling of which Lord Henry always -assisted him, were noted as much for the careful selection and placing of those -invited, as for the exquisite taste shown in the decoration of the table, with -its subtle symphonic arrangements of exotic flowers, and embroidered cloths, -and antique plate of gold and silver. Indeed, there were many, especially among -the very young men, who saw, or fancied that they saw, in Dorian Gray the true -realization of a type of which they had often dreamed in Eton or Oxford days, a -type that was to combine something of the real culture of the scholar with all -the grace and distinction and perfect manner of a citizen of the world. To them -he seemed to be of the company of those whom Dante describes as having sought -to “make themselves perfect by the worship of beauty.” Like -Gautier, he was one for whom “the visible world existed.” -</p> - -<p> -And, certainly, to him life itself was the first, the greatest, of the arts, -and for it all the other arts seemed to be but a preparation. Fashion, by which -what is really fantastic becomes for a moment universal, and dandyism, which, -in its own way, is an attempt to assert the absolute modernity of beauty, had, -of course, their fascination for him. His mode of dressing, and the particular -styles that from time to time he affected, had their marked influence on the -young exquisites of the Mayfair balls and Pall Mall club windows, who copied -him in everything that he did, and tried to reproduce the accidental charm of -his graceful, though to him only half-serious, fopperies. -</p> - -<p> -For, while he was but too ready to accept the position that was almost -immediately offered to him on his coming of age, and found, indeed, a subtle -pleasure in the thought that he might really become to the London of his own -day what to imperial Neronian Rome the author of the Satyricon once had been, -yet in his inmost heart he desired to be something more than a mere <i>arbiter -elegantiarum</i>, to be consulted on the wearing of a jewel, or the knotting of -a necktie, or the conduct of a cane. He sought to elaborate some new scheme of -life that would have its reasoned philosophy and its ordered principles, and -find in the spiritualizing of the senses its highest realization. -</p> - -<p> -The worship of the senses has often, and with much justice, been decried, men -feeling a natural instinct of terror about passions and sensations that seem -stronger than themselves, and that they are conscious of sharing with the less -highly organized forms of existence. But it appeared to Dorian Gray that the -true nature of the senses had never been understood, and that they had remained -savage and animal merely because the world had sought to starve them into -submission or to kill them by pain, instead of aiming at making them elements -of a new spirituality, of which a fine instinct for beauty was to be the -dominant characteristic. As he looked back upon man moving through history, he -was haunted by a feeling of loss. So much had been surrendered! and to such -little purpose! There had been mad wilful rejections, monstrous forms of -self-torture and self-denial, whose origin was fear and whose result was a -degradation infinitely more terrible than that fancied degradation from which, -in their ignorance, they had sought to escape; Nature, in her wonderful irony, -driving out the anchorite to feed with the wild animals of the desert and -giving to the hermit the beasts of the field as his companions. -</p> - -<p> -Yes: there was to be, as Lord Henry had prophesied, a new Hedonism that was to -recreate life and to save it from that harsh uncomely puritanism that is -having, in our own day, its curious revival. It was to have its service of the -intellect, certainly, yet it was never to accept any theory or system that -would involve the sacrifice of any mode of passionate experience. Its aim, -indeed, was to be experience itself, and not the fruits of experience, sweet or -bitter as they might be. Of the asceticism that deadens the senses, as of the -vulgar profligacy that dulls them, it was to know nothing. But it was to teach -man to concentrate himself upon the moments of a life that is itself but a -moment. -</p> - -<p> -There are few of us who have not sometimes wakened before dawn, either after -one of those dreamless nights that make us almost enamoured of death, or one of -those nights of horror and misshapen joy, when through the chambers of the -brain sweep phantoms more terrible than reality itself, and instinct with that -vivid life that lurks in all grotesques, and that lends to Gothic art its -enduring vitality, this art being, one might fancy, especially the art of those -whose minds have been troubled with the malady of reverie. Gradually white -fingers creep through the curtains, and they appear to tremble. In black -fantastic shapes, dumb shadows crawl into the corners of the room and crouch -there. Outside, there is the stirring of birds among the leaves, or the sound -of men going forth to their work, or the sigh and sob of the wind coming down -from the hills and wandering round the silent house, as though it feared to -wake the sleepers and yet must needs call forth sleep from her purple cave. -Veil after veil of thin dusky gauze is lifted, and by degrees the forms and -colours of things are restored to them, and we watch the dawn remaking the -world in its antique pattern. The wan mirrors get back their mimic life. The -flameless tapers stand where we had left them, and beside them lies the -half-cut book that we had been studying, or the wired flower that we had worn -at the ball, or the letter that we had been afraid to read, or that we had read -too often. Nothing seems to us changed. Out of the unreal shadows of the night -comes back the real life that we had known. We have to resume it where we had -left off, and there steals over us a terrible sense of the necessity for the -continuance of energy in the same wearisome round of stereotyped habits, or a -wild longing, it may be, that our eyelids might open some morning upon a world -that had been refashioned anew in the darkness for our pleasure, a world in -which things would have fresh shapes and colours, and be changed, or have other -secrets, a world in which the past would have little or no place, or survive, -at any rate, in no conscious form of obligation or regret, the remembrance even -of joy having its bitterness and the memories of pleasure their pain. -</p> - -<p> -It was the creation of such worlds as these that seemed to Dorian Gray to be -the true object, or amongst the true objects, of life; and in his search for -sensations that would be at once new and delightful, and possess that element -of strangeness that is so essential to romance, he would often adopt certain -modes of thought that he knew to be really alien to his nature, abandon himself -to their subtle influences, and then, having, as it were, caught their colour -and satisfied his intellectual curiosity, leave them with that curious -indifference that is not incompatible with a real ardour of temperament, and -that, indeed, according to certain modern psychologists, is often a condition -of it. -</p> - -<p> -It was rumoured of him once that he was about to join the Roman Catholic -communion, and certainly the Roman ritual had always a great attraction for -him. The daily sacrifice, more awful really than all the sacrifices of the -antique world, stirred him as much by its superb rejection of the evidence of -the senses as by the primitive simplicity of its elements and the eternal -pathos of the human tragedy that it sought to symbolize. He loved to kneel down -on the cold marble pavement and watch the priest, in his stiff flowered -dalmatic, slowly and with white hands moving aside the veil of the tabernacle, -or raising aloft the jewelled, lantern-shaped monstrance with that pallid wafer -that at times, one would fain think, is indeed the “<i>panis -cælestis</i>,” the bread of angels, or, robed in the garments of the -Passion of Christ, breaking the Host into the chalice and smiting his breast -for his sins. The fuming censers that the grave boys, in their lace and -scarlet, tossed into the air like great gilt flowers had their subtle -fascination for him. As he passed out, he used to look with wonder at the black -confessionals and long to sit in the dim shadow of one of them and listen to -men and women whispering through the worn grating the true story of their -lives. -</p> - -<p> -But he never fell into the error of arresting his intellectual development by -any formal acceptance of creed or system, or of mistaking, for a house in which -to live, an inn that is but suitable for the sojourn of a night, or for a few -hours of a night in which there are no stars and the moon is in travail. -Mysticism, with its marvellous power of making common things strange to us, and -the subtle antinomianism that always seems to accompany it, moved him for a -season; and for a season he inclined to the materialistic doctrines of the -<i>Darwinismus</i> movement in Germany, and found a curious pleasure in tracing -the thoughts and passions of men to some pearly cell in the brain, or some -white nerve in the body, delighting in the conception of the absolute -dependence of the spirit on certain physical conditions, morbid or healthy, -normal or diseased. Yet, as has been said of him before, no theory of life -seemed to him to be of any importance compared with life itself. He felt keenly -conscious of how barren all intellectual speculation is when separated from -action and experiment. He knew that the senses, no less than the soul, have -their spiritual mysteries to reveal. -</p> - -<p> -And so he would now study perfumes and the secrets of their manufacture, -distilling heavily scented oils and burning odorous gums from the East. He saw -that there was no mood of the mind that had not its counterpart in the sensuous -life, and set himself to discover their true relations, wondering what there -was in frankincense that made one mystical, and in ambergris that stirred -one’s passions, and in violets that woke the memory of dead romances, and -in musk that troubled the brain, and in champak that stained the imagination; -and seeking often to elaborate a real psychology of perfumes, and to estimate -the several influences of sweet-smelling roots and scented, pollen-laden -flowers; of aromatic balms and of dark and fragrant woods; of spikenard, that -sickens; of hovenia, that makes men mad; and of aloes, that are said to be able -to expel melancholy from the soul. -</p> - -<p> -At another time he devoted himself entirely to music, and in a long latticed -room, with a vermilion-and-gold ceiling and walls of olive-green lacquer, he -used to give curious concerts in which mad gipsies tore wild music from little -zithers, or grave, yellow-shawled Tunisians plucked at the strained strings of -monstrous lutes, while grinning Negroes beat monotonously upon copper drums -and, crouching upon scarlet mats, slim turbaned Indians blew through long pipes -of reed or brass and charmed—or feigned to charm—great hooded -snakes and horrible horned adders. The harsh intervals and shrill discords of -barbaric music stirred him at times when Schubert’s grace, and -Chopin’s beautiful sorrows, and the mighty harmonies of Beethoven -himself, fell unheeded on his ear. He collected together from all parts of the -world the strangest instruments that could be found, either in the tombs of -dead nations or among the few savage tribes that have survived contact with -Western civilizations, and loved to touch and try them. He had the mysterious -<i>juruparis</i> of the Rio Negro Indians, that women are not allowed to look -at and that even youths may not see till they have been subjected to fasting -and scourging, and the earthen jars of the Peruvians that have the shrill cries -of birds, and flutes of human bones such as Alfonso de Ovalle heard in Chile, -and the sonorous green jaspers that are found near Cuzco and give forth a note -of singular sweetness. He had painted gourds filled with pebbles that rattled -when they were shaken; the long <i>clarin</i> of the Mexicans, into which the -performer does not blow, but through which he inhales the air; the harsh -<i>ture</i> of the Amazon tribes, that is sounded by the sentinels who sit all -day long in high trees, and can be heard, it is said, at a distance of three -leagues; the <i>teponaztli</i>, that has two vibrating tongues of wood and is -beaten with sticks that are smeared with an elastic gum obtained from the milky -juice of plants; the <i>yotl</i>-bells of the Aztecs, that are hung in clusters -like grapes; and a huge cylindrical drum, covered with the skins of great -serpents, like the one that Bernal Diaz saw when he went with Cortes into the -Mexican temple, and of whose doleful sound he has left us so vivid a -description. The fantastic character of these instruments fascinated him, and -he felt a curious delight in the thought that art, like Nature, has her -monsters, things of bestial shape and with hideous voices. Yet, after some -time, he wearied of them, and would sit in his box at the opera, either alone -or with Lord Henry, listening in rapt pleasure to “Tannhauser” and -seeing in the prelude to that great work of art a presentation of the tragedy -of his own soul. -</p> - -<p> -On one occasion he took up the study of jewels, and appeared at a costume ball -as Anne de Joyeuse, Admiral of France, in a dress covered with five hundred and -sixty pearls. This taste enthralled him for years, and, indeed, may be said -never to have left him. He would often spend a whole day settling and -resettling in their cases the various stones that he had collected, such as the -olive-green chrysoberyl that turns red by lamplight, the cymophane with its -wirelike line of silver, the pistachio-coloured peridot, rose-pink and -wine-yellow topazes, carbuncles of fiery scarlet with tremulous, four-rayed -stars, flame-red cinnamon-stones, orange and violet spinels, and amethysts with -their alternate layers of ruby and sapphire. He loved the red gold of the -sunstone, and the moonstone’s pearly whiteness, and the broken rainbow of -the milky opal. He procured from Amsterdam three emeralds of extraordinary size -and richness of colour, and had a turquoise <i>de la vieille roche</i> that was -the envy of all the connoisseurs. -</p> - -<p> -He discovered wonderful stories, also, about jewels. In Alphonso’s -Clericalis Disciplina a serpent was mentioned with eyes of real jacinth, and in -the romantic history of Alexander, the Conqueror of Emathia was said to have -found in the vale of Jordan snakes “with collars of real emeralds growing -on their backs.” There was a gem in the brain of the dragon, Philostratus -told us, and “by the exhibition of golden letters and a scarlet -robe” the monster could be thrown into a magical sleep and slain. -According to the great alchemist, Pierre de Boniface, the diamond rendered a -man invisible, and the agate of India made him eloquent. The cornelian appeased -anger, and the hyacinth provoked sleep, and the amethyst drove away the fumes -of wine. The garnet cast out demons, and the hydropicus deprived the moon of -her colour. The selenite waxed and waned with the moon, and the meloceus, that -discovers thieves, could be affected only by the blood of kids. Leonardus -Camillus had seen a white stone taken from the brain of a newly killed toad, -that was a certain antidote against poison. The bezoar, that was found in the -heart of the Arabian deer, was a charm that could cure the plague. In the nests -of Arabian birds was the aspilates, that, according to Democritus, kept the -wearer from any danger by fire. -</p> - -<p> -The King of Ceilan rode through his city with a large ruby in his hand, as the -ceremony of his coronation. The gates of the palace of John the Priest were -“made of sardius, with the horn of the horned snake inwrought, so that no -man might bring poison within.” Over the gable were “two golden -apples, in which were two carbuncles,” so that the gold might shine by -day and the carbuncles by night. In Lodge’s strange romance ‘A -Margarite of America’, it was stated that in the chamber of the queen one -could behold “all the chaste ladies of the world, inchased out of silver, -looking through fair mirrours of chrysolites, carbuncles, sapphires, and greene -emeraults.” Marco Polo had seen the inhabitants of Zipangu place -rose-coloured pearls in the mouths of the dead. A sea-monster had been -enamoured of the pearl that the diver brought to King Perozes, and had slain -the thief, and mourned for seven moons over its loss. When the Huns lured the -king into the great pit, he flung it away—Procopius tells the -story—nor was it ever found again, though the Emperor Anastasius offered -five hundred-weight of gold pieces for it. The King of Malabar had shown to a -certain Venetian a rosary of three hundred and four pearls, one for every god -that he worshipped. -</p> - -<p> -When the Duke de Valentinois, son of Alexander VI., visited Louis XII. of -France, his horse was loaded with gold leaves, according to Brantome, and his -cap had double rows of rubies that threw out a great light. Charles of England -had ridden in stirrups hung with four hundred and twenty-one diamonds. Richard -II had a coat, valued at thirty thousand marks, which was covered with balas -rubies. Hall described Henry VIII., on his way to the Tower previous to his -coronation, as wearing “a jacket of raised gold, the placard embroidered -with diamonds and other rich stones, and a great bauderike about his neck of -large balasses.” The favourites of James I wore ear-rings of emeralds set -in gold filigrane. Edward II gave to Piers Gaveston a suit of red-gold armour -studded with jacinths, a collar of gold roses set with turquoise-stones, and a -skull-cap <i>parsemé</i> with pearls. Henry II. wore jewelled gloves reaching -to the elbow, and had a hawk-glove sewn with twelve rubies and fifty-two great -orients. The ducal hat of Charles the Rash, the last Duke of Burgundy of his -race, was hung with pear-shaped pearls and studded with sapphires. -</p> - -<p> -How exquisite life had once been! How gorgeous in its pomp and decoration! Even -to read of the luxury of the dead was wonderful. -</p> - -<p> -Then he turned his attention to embroideries and to the tapestries that -performed the office of frescoes in the chill rooms of the northern nations of -Europe. As he investigated the subject—and he always had an extraordinary -faculty of becoming absolutely absorbed for the moment in whatever he took -up—he was almost saddened by the reflection of the ruin that time brought -on beautiful and wonderful things. He, at any rate, had escaped that. Summer -followed summer, and the yellow jonquils bloomed and died many times, and -nights of horror repeated the story of their shame, but he was unchanged. No -winter marred his face or stained his flowerlike bloom. How different it was -with material things! Where had they passed to? Where was the great -crocus-coloured robe, on which the gods fought against the giants, that had -been worked by brown girls for the pleasure of Athena? Where the huge velarium -that Nero had stretched across the Colosseum at Rome, that Titan sail of purple -on which was represented the starry sky, and Apollo driving a chariot drawn by -white, gilt-reined steeds? He longed to see the curious table-napkins wrought -for the Priest of the Sun, on which were displayed all the dainties and viands -that could be wanted for a feast; the mortuary cloth of King Chilperic, with -its three hundred golden bees; the fantastic robes that excited the indignation -of the Bishop of Pontus and were figured with “lions, panthers, bears, -dogs, forests, rocks, hunters—all, in fact, that a painter can copy from -nature”; and the coat that Charles of Orleans once wore, on the sleeves -of which were embroidered the verses of a song beginning “<i>Madame, je -suis tout joyeux</i>,” the musical accompaniment of the words being -wrought in gold thread, and each note, of square shape in those days, formed -with four pearls. He read of the room that was prepared at the palace at Rheims -for the use of Queen Joan of Burgundy and was decorated with “thirteen -hundred and twenty-one parrots, made in broidery, and blazoned with the -king’s arms, and five hundred and sixty-one butterflies, whose wings were -similarly ornamented with the arms of the queen, the whole worked in -gold.” Catherine de Medicis had a mourning-bed made for her of black -velvet powdered with crescents and suns. Its curtains were of damask, with -leafy wreaths and garlands, figured upon a gold and silver ground, and fringed -along the edges with broideries of pearls, and it stood in a room hung with -rows of the queen’s devices in cut black velvet upon cloth of silver. -Louis XIV. had gold embroidered caryatides fifteen feet high in his apartment. -The state bed of Sobieski, King of Poland, was made of Smyrna gold brocade -embroidered in turquoises with verses from the Koran. Its supports were of -silver gilt, beautifully chased, and profusely set with enamelled and jewelled -medallions. It had been taken from the Turkish camp before Vienna, and the -standard of Mohammed had stood beneath the tremulous gilt of its canopy. -</p> - -<p> -And so, for a whole year, he sought to accumulate the most exquisite specimens -that he could find of textile and embroidered work, getting the dainty Delhi -muslins, finely wrought with gold-thread palmates and stitched over with -iridescent beetles’ wings; the Dacca gauzes, that from their transparency -are known in the East as “woven air,” and “running -water,” and “evening dew”; strange figured cloths from Java; -elaborate yellow Chinese hangings; books bound in tawny satins or fair blue -silks and wrought with <i>fleurs-de-lis</i>, birds and images; veils of -<i>lacis</i> worked in Hungary point; Sicilian brocades and stiff Spanish -velvets; Georgian work, with its gilt coins, and Japanese <i>Foukousas</i>, -with their green-toned golds and their marvellously plumaged birds. -</p> - -<p> -He had a special passion, also, for ecclesiastical vestments, as indeed he had -for everything connected with the service of the Church. In the long cedar -chests that lined the west gallery of his house, he had stored away many rare -and beautiful specimens of what is really the raiment of the Bride of Christ, -who must wear purple and jewels and fine linen that she may hide the pallid -macerated body that is worn by the suffering that she seeks for and wounded by -self-inflicted pain. He possessed a gorgeous cope of crimson silk and -gold-thread damask, figured with a repeating pattern of golden pomegranates set -in six-petalled formal blossoms, beyond which on either side was the pine-apple -device wrought in seed-pearls. The orphreys were divided into panels -representing scenes from the life of the Virgin, and the coronation of the -Virgin was figured in coloured silks upon the hood. This was Italian work of -the fifteenth century. Another cope was of green velvet, embroidered with -heart-shaped groups of acanthus-leaves, from which spread long-stemmed white -blossoms, the details of which were picked out with silver thread and coloured -crystals. The morse bore a seraph’s head in gold-thread raised work. The -orphreys were woven in a diaper of red and gold silk, and were starred with -medallions of many saints and martyrs, among whom was St. Sebastian. He had -chasubles, also, of amber-coloured silk, and blue silk and gold brocade, and -yellow silk damask and cloth of gold, figured with representations of the -Passion and Crucifixion of Christ, and embroidered with lions and peacocks and -other emblems; dalmatics of white satin and pink silk damask, decorated with -tulips and dolphins and <i>fleurs-de-lis</i>; altar frontals of crimson velvet -and blue linen; and many corporals, chalice-veils, and sudaria. In the mystic -offices to which such things were put, there was something that quickened his -imagination. -</p> - -<p> -For these treasures, and everything that he collected in his lovely house, were -to be to him means of forgetfulness, modes by which he could escape, for a -season, from the fear that seemed to him at times to be almost too great to be -borne. Upon the walls of the lonely locked room where he had spent so much of -his boyhood, he had hung with his own hands the terrible portrait whose -changing features showed him the real degradation of his life, and in front of -it had draped the purple-and-gold pall as a curtain. For weeks he would not go -there, would forget the hideous painted thing, and get back his light heart, -his wonderful joyousness, his passionate absorption in mere existence. Then, -suddenly, some night he would creep out of the house, go down to dreadful -places near Blue Gate Fields, and stay there, day after day, until he was -driven away. On his return he would sit in front of the picture, sometimes -loathing it and himself, but filled, at other times, with that pride of -individualism that is half the fascination of sin, and smiling with secret -pleasure at the misshapen shadow that had to bear the burden that should have -been his own. -</p> - -<p> -After a few years he could not endure to be long out of England, and gave up -the villa that he had shared at Trouville with Lord Henry, as well as the -little white walled-in house at Algiers where they had more than once spent the -winter. He hated to be separated from the picture that was such a part of his -life, and was also afraid that during his absence some one might gain access to -the room, in spite of the elaborate bars that he had caused to be placed upon -the door. -</p> - -<p> -He was quite conscious that this would tell them nothing. It was true that the -portrait still preserved, under all the foulness and ugliness of the face, its -marked likeness to himself; but what could they learn from that? He would laugh -at any one who tried to taunt him. He had not painted it. What was it to him -how vile and full of shame it looked? Even if he told them, would they believe -it? -</p> - -<p> -Yet he was afraid. Sometimes when he was down at his great house in -Nottinghamshire, entertaining the fashionable young men of his own rank who -were his chief companions, and astounding the county by the wanton luxury and -gorgeous splendour of his mode of life, he would suddenly leave his guests and -rush back to town to see that the door had not been tampered with and that the -picture was still there. What if it should be stolen? The mere thought made him -cold with horror. Surely the world would know his secret then. Perhaps the -world already suspected it. -</p> - -<p> -For, while he fascinated many, there were not a few who distrusted him. He was -very nearly blackballed at a West End club of which his birth and social -position fully entitled him to become a member, and it was said that on one -occasion, when he was brought by a friend into the smoking-room of the -Churchill, the Duke of Berwick and another gentleman got up in a marked manner -and went out. Curious stories became current about him after he had passed his -twenty-fifth year. It was rumoured that he had been seen brawling with foreign -sailors in a low den in the distant parts of Whitechapel, and that he consorted -with thieves and coiners and knew the mysteries of their trade. His -extraordinary absences became notorious, and, when he used to reappear again in -society, men would whisper to each other in corners, or pass him with a sneer, -or look at him with cold searching eyes, as though they were determined to -discover his secret. -</p> - -<p> -Of such insolences and attempted slights he, of course, took no notice, and in -the opinion of most people his frank debonair manner, his charming boyish -smile, and the infinite grace of that wonderful youth that seemed never to -leave him, were in themselves a sufficient answer to the calumnies, for so they -termed them, that were circulated about him. It was remarked, however, that -some of those who had been most intimate with him appeared, after a time, to -shun him. Women who had wildly adored him, and for his sake had braved all -social censure and set convention at defiance, were seen to grow pallid with -shame or horror if Dorian Gray entered the room. -</p> - -<p> -Yet these whispered scandals only increased in the eyes of many his strange and -dangerous charm. His great wealth was a certain element of security. -Society—civilized society, at least—is never very ready to believe -anything to the detriment of those who are both rich and fascinating. It feels -instinctively that manners are of more importance than morals, and, in its -opinion, the highest respectability is of much less value than the possession -of a good <i>chef</i>. And, after all, it is a very poor consolation to be told -that the man who has given one a bad dinner, or poor wine, is irreproachable in -his private life. Even the cardinal virtues cannot atone for half-cold -<i>entrées</i>, as Lord Henry remarked once, in a discussion on the subject, -and there is possibly a good deal to be said for his view. For the canons of -good society are, or should be, the same as the canons of art. Form is -absolutely essential to it. It should have the dignity of a ceremony, as well -as its unreality, and should combine the insincere character of a romantic play -with the wit and beauty that make such plays delightful to us. Is insincerity -such a terrible thing? I think not. It is merely a method by which we can -multiply our personalities. -</p> - -<p> -Such, at any rate, was Dorian Gray’s opinion. He used to wonder at the -shallow psychology of those who conceive the ego in man as a thing simple, -permanent, reliable, and of one essence. To him, man was a being with myriad -lives and myriad sensations, a complex multiform creature that bore within -itself strange legacies of thought and passion, and whose very flesh was -tainted with the monstrous maladies of the dead. He loved to stroll through the -gaunt cold picture-gallery of his country house and look at the various -portraits of those whose blood flowed in his veins. Here was Philip Herbert, -described by Francis Osborne, in his Memoires on the Reigns of Queen Elizabeth -and King James, as one who was “caressed by the Court for his handsome -face, which kept him not long company.” Was it young Herbert’s life -that he sometimes led? Had some strange poisonous germ crept from body to body -till it had reached his own? Was it some dim sense of that ruined grace that -had made him so suddenly, and almost without cause, give utterance, in Basil -Hallward’s studio, to the mad prayer that had so changed his life? Here, -in gold-embroidered red doublet, jewelled surcoat, and gilt-edged ruff and -wristbands, stood Sir Anthony Sherard, with his silver-and-black armour piled -at his feet. What had this man’s legacy been? Had the lover of Giovanna -of Naples bequeathed him some inheritance of sin and shame? Were his own -actions merely the dreams that the dead man had not dared to realize? Here, -from the fading canvas, smiled Lady Elizabeth Devereux, in her gauze hood, -pearl stomacher, and pink slashed sleeves. A flower was in her right hand, and -her left clasped an enamelled collar of white and damask roses. On a table by -her side lay a mandolin and an apple. There were large green rosettes upon her -little pointed shoes. He knew her life, and the strange stories that were told -about her lovers. Had he something of her temperament in him? These oval, -heavy-lidded eyes seemed to look curiously at him. What of George Willoughby, -with his powdered hair and fantastic patches? How evil he looked! The face was -saturnine and swarthy, and the sensual lips seemed to be twisted with disdain. -Delicate lace ruffles fell over the lean yellow hands that were so overladen -with rings. He had been a macaroni of the eighteenth century, and the friend, -in his youth, of Lord Ferrars. What of the second Lord Beckenham, the companion -of the Prince Regent in his wildest days, and one of the witnesses at the -secret marriage with Mrs. Fitzherbert? How proud and handsome he was, with his -chestnut curls and insolent pose! What passions had he bequeathed? The world -had looked upon him as infamous. He had led the orgies at Carlton House. The -star of the Garter glittered upon his breast. Beside him hung the portrait of -his wife, a pallid, thin-lipped woman in black. Her blood, also, stirred within -him. How curious it all seemed! And his mother with her Lady Hamilton face and -her moist, wine-dashed lips—he knew what he had got from her. He had got -from her his beauty, and his passion for the beauty of others. She laughed at -him in her loose Bacchante dress. There were vine leaves in her hair. The -purple spilled from the cup she was holding. The carnations of the painting had -withered, but the eyes were still wonderful in their depth and brilliancy of -colour. They seemed to follow him wherever he went. -</p> - -<p> -Yet one had ancestors in literature as well as in one’s own race, nearer -perhaps in type and temperament, many of them, and certainly with an influence -of which one was more absolutely conscious. There were times when it appeared -to Dorian Gray that the whole of history was merely the record of his own life, -not as he had lived it in act and circumstance, but as his imagination had -created it for him, as it had been in his brain and in his passions. He felt -that he had known them all, those strange terrible figures that had passed -across the stage of the world and made sin so marvellous and evil so full of -subtlety. It seemed to him that in some mysterious way their lives had been his -own. -</p> - -<p> -The hero of the wonderful novel that had so influenced his life had himself -known this curious fancy. In the seventh chapter he tells how, crowned with -laurel, lest lightning might strike him, he had sat, as Tiberius, in a garden -at Capri, reading the shameful books of Elephantis, while dwarfs and peacocks -strutted round him and the flute-player mocked the swinger of the censer; and, -as Caligula, had caroused with the green-shirted jockeys in their stables and -supped in an ivory manger with a jewel-frontleted horse; and, as Domitian, had -wandered through a corridor lined with marble mirrors, looking round with -haggard eyes for the reflection of the dagger that was to end his days, and -sick with that ennui, that terrible <i>tædium vitæ</i>, that comes on those -to whom life denies nothing; and had peered through a clear emerald at the red -shambles of the circus and then, in a litter of pearl and purple drawn by -silver-shod mules, been carried through the Street of Pomegranates to a House -of Gold and heard men cry on Nero Caesar as he passed by; and, as Elagabalus, -had painted his face with colours, and plied the distaff among the women, and -brought the Moon from Carthage and given her in mystic marriage to the Sun. -</p> - -<p> -Over and over again Dorian used to read this fantastic chapter, and the two -chapters immediately following, in which, as in some curious tapestries or -cunningly wrought enamels, were pictured the awful and beautiful forms of those -whom vice and blood and weariness had made monstrous or mad: Filippo, Duke of -Milan, who slew his wife and painted her lips with a scarlet poison that her -lover might suck death from the dead thing he fondled; Pietro Barbi, the -Venetian, known as Paul the Second, who sought in his vanity to assume the -title of Formosus, and whose tiara, valued at two hundred thousand florins, was -bought at the price of a terrible sin; Gian Maria Visconti, who used hounds to -chase living men and whose murdered body was covered with roses by a harlot who -had loved him; the Borgia on his white horse, with Fratricide riding beside him -and his mantle stained with the blood of Perotto; Pietro Riario, the young -Cardinal Archbishop of Florence, child and minion of Sixtus IV., whose beauty -was equalled only by his debauchery, and who received Leonora of Aragon in a -pavilion of white and crimson silk, filled with nymphs and centaurs, and gilded -a boy that he might serve at the feast as Ganymede or Hylas; Ezzelin, whose -melancholy could be cured only by the spectacle of death, and who had a passion -for red blood, as other men have for red wine—the son of the Fiend, as -was reported, and one who had cheated his father at dice when gambling with him -for his own soul; Giambattista Cibo, who in mockery took the name of Innocent -and into whose torpid veins the blood of three lads was infused by a Jewish -doctor; Sigismondo Malatesta, the lover of Isotta and the lord of Rimini, whose -effigy was burned at Rome as the enemy of God and man, who strangled Polyssena -with a napkin, and gave poison to Ginevra d’Este in a cup of emerald, and -in honour of a shameful passion built a pagan church for Christian worship; -Charles VI., who had so wildly adored his brother’s wife that a leper had -warned him of the insanity that was coming on him, and who, when his brain had -sickened and grown strange, could only be soothed by Saracen cards painted with -the images of love and death and madness; and, in his trimmed jerkin and -jewelled cap and acanthuslike curls, Grifonetto Baglioni, who slew Astorre with -his bride, and Simonetto with his page, and whose comeliness was such that, as -he lay dying in the yellow piazza of Perugia, those who had hated him could not -choose but weep, and Atalanta, who had cursed him, blessed him. -</p> - -<p> -There was a horrible fascination in them all. He saw them at night, and they -troubled his imagination in the day. The Renaissance knew of strange manners of -poisoning—poisoning by a helmet and a lighted torch, by an embroidered -glove and a jewelled fan, by a gilded pomander and by an amber chain. Dorian -Gray had been poisoned by a book. There were moments when he looked on evil -simply as a mode through which he could realize his conception of the -beautiful. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap12"></a>CHAPTER XII.</h2> - -<p> -It was on the ninth of November, the eve of his own thirty-eighth birthday, as -he often remembered afterwards. -</p> - -<p> -He was walking home about eleven o’clock from Lord Henry’s, where -he had been dining, and was wrapped in heavy furs, as the night was cold and -foggy. At the corner of Grosvenor Square and South Audley Street, a man passed -him in the mist, walking very fast and with the collar of his grey ulster -turned up. He had a bag in his hand. Dorian recognized him. It was Basil -Hallward. A strange sense of fear, for which he could not account, came over -him. He made no sign of recognition and went on quickly in the direction of his -own house. -</p> - -<p> -But Hallward had seen him. Dorian heard him first stopping on the pavement and -then hurrying after him. In a few moments, his hand was on his arm. -</p> - -<p> -“Dorian! What an extraordinary piece of luck! I have been waiting for you -in your library ever since nine o’clock. Finally I took pity on your -tired servant and told him to go to bed, as he let me out. I am off to Paris by -the midnight train, and I particularly wanted to see you before I left. I -thought it was you, or rather your fur coat, as you passed me. But I -wasn’t quite sure. Didn’t you recognize me?” -</p> - -<p> -“In this fog, my dear Basil? Why, I can’t even recognize Grosvenor -Square. I believe my house is somewhere about here, but I don’t feel at -all certain about it. I am sorry you are going away, as I have not seen you for -ages. But I suppose you will be back soon?” -</p> - -<p> -“No: I am going to be out of England for six months. I intend to take a -studio in Paris and shut myself up till I have finished a great picture I have -in my head. However, it wasn’t about myself I wanted to talk. Here we are -at your door. Let me come in for a moment. I have something to say to -you.” -</p> - -<p> -“I shall be charmed. But won’t you miss your train?” said -Dorian Gray languidly as he passed up the steps and opened the door with his -latch-key. -</p> - -<p> -The lamplight struggled out through the fog, and Hallward looked at his watch. -“I have heaps of time,” he answered. “The train doesn’t -go till twelve-fifteen, and it is only just eleven. In fact, I was on my way to -the club to look for you, when I met you. You see, I shan’t have any -delay about luggage, as I have sent on my heavy things. All I have with me is -in this bag, and I can easily get to Victoria in twenty minutes.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian looked at him and smiled. “What a way for a fashionable painter to -travel! A Gladstone bag and an ulster! Come in, or the fog will get into the -house. And mind you don’t talk about anything serious. Nothing is serious -nowadays. At least nothing should be.” -</p> - -<p> -Hallward shook his head, as he entered, and followed Dorian into the library. -There was a bright wood fire blazing in the large open hearth. The lamps were -lit, and an open Dutch silver spirit-case stood, with some siphons of -soda-water and large cut-glass tumblers, on a little marqueterie table. -</p> - -<p> -“You see your servant made me quite at home, Dorian. He gave me -everything I wanted, including your best gold-tipped cigarettes. He is a most -hospitable creature. I like him much better than the Frenchman you used to -have. What has become of the Frenchman, by the bye?” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian shrugged his shoulders. “I believe he married Lady Radley’s -maid, and has established her in Paris as an English dressmaker. -<i>Anglomanie</i> is very fashionable over there now, I hear. It seems silly of -the French, doesn’t it? But—do you know?—he was not at all a -bad servant. I never liked him, but I had nothing to complain about. One often -imagines things that are quite absurd. He was really very devoted to me and -seemed quite sorry when he went away. Have another brandy-and-soda? Or would -you like hock-and-seltzer? I always take hock-and-seltzer myself. There is sure -to be some in the next room.” -</p> - -<p> -“Thanks, I won’t have anything more,” said the painter, -taking his cap and coat off and throwing them on the bag that he had placed in -the corner. “And now, my dear fellow, I want to speak to you seriously. -Don’t frown like that. You make it so much more difficult for me.” -</p> - -<p> -“What is it all about?” cried Dorian in his petulant way, flinging -himself down on the sofa. “I hope it is not about myself. I am tired of -myself to-night. I should like to be somebody else.” -</p> - -<p> -“It is about yourself,” answered Hallward in his grave deep voice, -“and I must say it to you. I shall only keep you half an hour.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian sighed and lit a cigarette. “Half an hour!” he murmured. -</p> - -<p> -“It is not much to ask of you, Dorian, and it is entirely for your own -sake that I am speaking. I think it right that you should know that the most -dreadful things are being said against you in London.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t wish to know anything about them. I love scandals about -other people, but scandals about myself don’t interest me. They have not -got the charm of novelty.” -</p> - -<p> -“They must interest you, Dorian. Every gentleman is interested in his -good name. You don’t want people to talk of you as something vile and -degraded. Of course, you have your position, and your wealth, and all that kind -of thing. But position and wealth are not everything. Mind you, I don’t -believe these rumours at all. At least, I can’t believe them when I see -you. Sin is a thing that writes itself across a man’s face. It cannot be -concealed. People talk sometimes of secret vices. There are no such things. If -a wretched man has a vice, it shows itself in the lines of his mouth, the droop -of his eyelids, the moulding of his hands even. Somebody—I won’t -mention his name, but you know him—came to me last year to have his -portrait done. I had never seen him before, and had never heard anything about -him at the time, though I have heard a good deal since. He offered an -extravagant price. I refused him. There was something in the shape of his -fingers that I hated. I know now that I was quite right in what I fancied about -him. His life is dreadful. But you, Dorian, with your pure, bright, innocent -face, and your marvellous untroubled youth—I can’t believe anything -against you. And yet I see you very seldom, and you never come down to the -studio now, and when I am away from you, and I hear all these hideous things -that people are whispering about you, I don’t know what to say. Why is -it, Dorian, that a man like the Duke of Berwick leaves the room of a club when -you enter it? Why is it that so many gentlemen in London will neither go to -your house or invite you to theirs? You used to be a friend of Lord Staveley. I -met him at dinner last week. Your name happened to come up in conversation, in -connection with the miniatures you have lent to the exhibition at the Dudley. -Staveley curled his lip and said that you might have the most artistic tastes, -but that you were a man whom no pure-minded girl should be allowed to know, and -whom no chaste woman should sit in the same room with. I reminded him that I -was a friend of yours, and asked him what he meant. He told me. He told me -right out before everybody. It was horrible! Why is your friendship so fatal to -young men? There was that wretched boy in the Guards who committed suicide. You -were his great friend. There was Sir Henry Ashton, who had to leave England -with a tarnished name. You and he were inseparable. What about Adrian Singleton -and his dreadful end? What about Lord Kent’s only son and his career? I -met his father yesterday in St. James’s Street. He seemed broken with -shame and sorrow. What about the young Duke of Perth? What sort of life has he -got now? What gentleman would associate with him?” -</p> - -<p> -“Stop, Basil. You are talking about things of which you know -nothing,” said Dorian Gray, biting his lip, and with a note of infinite -contempt in his voice. “You ask me why Berwick leaves a room when I enter -it. It is because I know everything about his life, not because he knows -anything about mine. With such blood as he has in his veins, how could his -record be clean? You ask me about Henry Ashton and young Perth. Did I teach the -one his vices, and the other his debauchery? If Kent’s silly son takes -his wife from the streets, what is that to me? If Adrian Singleton writes his -friend’s name across a bill, am I his keeper? I know how people chatter -in England. The middle classes air their moral prejudices over their gross -dinner-tables, and whisper about what they call the profligacies of their -betters in order to try and pretend that they are in smart society and on -intimate terms with the people they slander. In this country, it is enough for -a man to have distinction and brains for every common tongue to wag against -him. And what sort of lives do these people, who pose as being moral, lead -themselves? My dear fellow, you forget that we are in the native land of the -hypocrite.” -</p> - -<p> -“Dorian,” cried Hallward, “that is not the question. England -is bad enough I know, and English society is all wrong. That is the reason why -I want you to be fine. You have not been fine. One has a right to judge of a -man by the effect he has over his friends. Yours seem to lose all sense of -honour, of goodness, of purity. You have filled them with a madness for -pleasure. They have gone down into the depths. You led them there. Yes: you led -them there, and yet you can smile, as you are smiling now. And there is worse -behind. I know you and Harry are inseparable. Surely for that reason, if for -none other, you should not have made his sister’s name a by-word.” -</p> - -<p> -“Take care, Basil. You go too far.” -</p> - -<p> -“I must speak, and you must listen. You shall listen. When you met Lady -Gwendolen, not a breath of scandal had ever touched her. Is there a single -decent woman in London now who would drive with her in the park? Why, even her -children are not allowed to live with her. Then there are other -stories—stories that you have been seen creeping at dawn out of dreadful -houses and slinking in disguise into the foulest dens in London. Are they true? -Can they be true? When I first heard them, I laughed. I hear them now, and they -make me shudder. What about your country-house and the life that is led there? -Dorian, you don’t know what is said about you. I won’t tell you -that I don’t want to preach to you. I remember Harry saying once that -every man who turned himself into an amateur curate for the moment always began -by saying that, and then proceeded to break his word. I do want to preach to -you. I want you to lead such a life as will make the world respect you. I want -you to have a clean name and a fair record. I want you to get rid of the -dreadful people you associate with. Don’t shrug your shoulders like that. -Don’t be so indifferent. You have a wonderful influence. Let it be for -good, not for evil. They say that you corrupt every one with whom you become -intimate, and that it is quite sufficient for you to enter a house for shame of -some kind to follow after. I don’t know whether it is so or not. How -should I know? But it is said of you. I am told things that it seems impossible -to doubt. Lord Gloucester was one of my greatest friends at Oxford. He showed -me a letter that his wife had written to him when she was dying alone in her -villa at Mentone. Your name was implicated in the most terrible confession I -ever read. I told him that it was absurd—that I knew you thoroughly and -that you were incapable of anything of the kind. Know you? I wonder do I know -you? Before I could answer that, I should have to see your soul.” -</p> - -<p> -“To see my soul!” muttered Dorian Gray, starting up from the sofa -and turning almost white from fear. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes,” answered Hallward gravely, and with deep-toned sorrow in his -voice, “to see your soul. But only God can do that.” -</p> - -<p> -A bitter laugh of mockery broke from the lips of the younger man. “You -shall see it yourself, to-night!” he cried, seizing a lamp from the -table. “Come: it is your own handiwork. Why shouldn’t you look at -it? You can tell the world all about it afterwards, if you choose. Nobody would -believe you. If they did believe you, they would like me all the better for it. -I know the age better than you do, though you will prate about it so tediously. -Come, I tell you. You have chattered enough about corruption. Now you shall -look on it face to face.” -</p> - -<p> -There was the madness of pride in every word he uttered. He stamped his foot -upon the ground in his boyish insolent manner. He felt a terrible joy at the -thought that some one else was to share his secret, and that the man who had -painted the portrait that was the origin of all his shame was to be burdened -for the rest of his life with the hideous memory of what he had done. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes,” he continued, coming closer to him and looking steadfastly -into his stern eyes, “I shall show you my soul. You shall see the thing -that you fancy only God can see.” -</p> - -<p> -Hallward started back. “This is blasphemy, Dorian!” he cried. -“You must not say things like that. They are horrible, and they -don’t mean anything.” -</p> - -<p> -“You think so?” He laughed again. -</p> - -<p> -“I know so. As for what I said to you to-night, I said it for your good. -You know I have been always a stanch friend to you.” -</p> - -<p> -“Don’t touch me. Finish what you have to say.” -</p> - -<p> -A twisted flash of pain shot across the painter’s face. He paused for a -moment, and a wild feeling of pity came over him. After all, what right had he -to pry into the life of Dorian Gray? If he had done a tithe of what was -rumoured about him, how much he must have suffered! Then he straightened -himself up, and walked over to the fire-place, and stood there, looking at the -burning logs with their frostlike ashes and their throbbing cores of flame. -</p> - -<p> -“I am waiting, Basil,” said the young man in a hard clear voice. -</p> - -<p> -He turned round. “What I have to say is this,” he cried. “You -must give me some answer to these horrible charges that are made against you. -If you tell me that they are absolutely untrue from beginning to end, I shall -believe you. Deny them, Dorian, deny them! Can’t you see what I am going -through? My God! don’t tell me that you are bad, and corrupt, and -shameful.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray smiled. There was a curl of contempt in his lips. “Come -upstairs, Basil,” he said quietly. “I keep a diary of my life from -day to day, and it never leaves the room in which it is written. I shall show -it to you if you come with me.” -</p> - -<p> -“I shall come with you, Dorian, if you wish it. I see I have missed my -train. That makes no matter. I can go to-morrow. But don’t ask me to read -anything to-night. All I want is a plain answer to my question.” -</p> - -<p> -“That shall be given to you upstairs. I could not give it here. You will -not have to read long.” -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap13"></a>CHAPTER XIII.</h2> - -<p> -He passed out of the room and began the ascent, Basil Hallward following close -behind. They walked softly, as men do instinctively at night. The lamp cast -fantastic shadows on the wall and staircase. A rising wind made some of the -windows rattle. -</p> - -<p> -When they reached the top landing, Dorian set the lamp down on the floor, and -taking out the key, turned it in the lock. “You insist on knowing, -Basil?” he asked in a low voice. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am delighted,” he answered, smiling. Then he added, somewhat -harshly, “You are the one man in the world who is entitled to know -everything about me. You have had more to do with my life than you -think”; and, taking up the lamp, he opened the door and went in. A cold -current of air passed them, and the light shot up for a moment in a flame of -murky orange. He shuddered. “Shut the door behind you,” he -whispered, as he placed the lamp on the table. -</p> - -<p> -Hallward glanced round him with a puzzled expression. The room looked as if it -had not been lived in for years. A faded Flemish tapestry, a curtained picture, -an old Italian <i>cassone</i>, and an almost empty book-case—that was all -that it seemed to contain, besides a chair and a table. As Dorian Gray was -lighting a half-burned candle that was standing on the mantelshelf, he saw that -the whole place was covered with dust and that the carpet was in holes. A mouse -ran scuffling behind the wainscoting. There was a damp odour of mildew. -</p> - -<p> -“So you think that it is only God who sees the soul, Basil? Draw that -curtain back, and you will see mine.” -</p> - -<p> -The voice that spoke was cold and cruel. “You are mad, Dorian, or playing -a part,” muttered Hallward, frowning. -</p> - -<p> -“You won’t? Then I must do it myself,” said the young man, -and he tore the curtain from its rod and flung it on the ground. -</p> - -<p> -An exclamation of horror broke from the painter’s lips as he saw in the -dim light the hideous face on the canvas grinning at him. There was something -in its expression that filled him with disgust and loathing. Good heavens! it -was Dorian Gray’s own face that he was looking at! The horror, whatever -it was, had not yet entirely spoiled that marvellous beauty. There was still -some gold in the thinning hair and some scarlet on the sensual mouth. The -sodden eyes had kept something of the loveliness of their blue, the noble -curves had not yet completely passed away from chiselled nostrils and from -plastic throat. Yes, it was Dorian himself. But who had done it? He seemed to -recognize his own brushwork, and the frame was his own design. The idea was -monstrous, yet he felt afraid. He seized the lighted candle, and held it to the -picture. In the left-hand corner was his own name, traced in long letters of -bright vermilion. -</p> - -<p> -It was some foul parody, some infamous ignoble satire. He had never done that. -Still, it was his own picture. He knew it, and he felt as if his blood had -changed in a moment from fire to sluggish ice. His own picture! What did it -mean? Why had it altered? He turned and looked at Dorian Gray with the eyes of -a sick man. His mouth twitched, and his parched tongue seemed unable to -articulate. He passed his hand across his forehead. It was dank with clammy -sweat. -</p> - -<p> -The young man was leaning against the mantelshelf, watching him with that -strange expression that one sees on the faces of those who are absorbed in a -play when some great artist is acting. There was neither real sorrow in it nor -real joy. There was simply the passion of the spectator, with perhaps a flicker -of triumph in his eyes. He had taken the flower out of his coat, and was -smelling it, or pretending to do so. -</p> - -<p> -“What does this mean?” cried Hallward, at last. His own voice -sounded shrill and curious in his ears. -</p> - -<p> -“Years ago, when I was a boy,” said Dorian Gray, crushing the -flower in his hand, “you met me, flattered me, and taught me to be vain -of my good looks. One day you introduced me to a friend of yours, who explained -to me the wonder of youth, and you finished a portrait of me that revealed to -me the wonder of beauty. In a mad moment that, even now, I don’t know -whether I regret or not, I made a wish, perhaps you would call it a -prayer....” -</p> - -<p> -“I remember it! Oh, how well I remember it! No! the thing is impossible. -The room is damp. Mildew has got into the canvas. The paints I used had some -wretched mineral poison in them. I tell you the thing is impossible.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah, what is impossible?” murmured the young man, going over to the -window and leaning his forehead against the cold, mist-stained glass. -</p> - -<p> -“You told me you had destroyed it.” -</p> - -<p> -“I was wrong. It has destroyed me.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t believe it is my picture.” -</p> - -<p> -“Can’t you see your ideal in it?” said Dorian bitterly. -</p> - -<p> -“My ideal, as you call it...” -</p> - -<p> -“As you called it.” -</p> - -<p> -“There was nothing evil in it, nothing shameful. You were to me such an -ideal as I shall never meet again. This is the face of a satyr.” -</p> - -<p> -“It is the face of my soul.” -</p> - -<p> -“Christ! what a thing I must have worshipped! It has the eyes of a -devil.” -</p> - -<p> -“Each of us has heaven and hell in him, Basil,” cried Dorian with a -wild gesture of despair. -</p> - -<p> -Hallward turned again to the portrait and gazed at it. “My God! If it is -true,” he exclaimed, “and this is what you have done with your -life, why, you must be worse even than those who talk against you fancy you to -be!” He held the light up again to the canvas and examined it. The -surface seemed to be quite undisturbed and as he had left it. It was from -within, apparently, that the foulness and horror had come. Through some strange -quickening of inner life the leprosies of sin were slowly eating the thing -away. The rotting of a corpse in a watery grave was not so fearful. -</p> - -<p> -His hand shook, and the candle fell from its socket on the floor and lay there -sputtering. He placed his foot on it and put it out. Then he flung himself into -the rickety chair that was standing by the table and buried his face in his -hands. -</p> - -<p> -“Good God, Dorian, what a lesson! What an awful lesson!” There was -no answer, but he could hear the young man sobbing at the window. “Pray, -Dorian, pray,” he murmured. “What is it that one was taught to say -in one’s boyhood? ‘Lead us not into temptation. Forgive us our -sins. Wash away our iniquities.’ Let us say that together. The prayer of -your pride has been answered. The prayer of your repentance will be answered -also. I worshipped you too much. I am punished for it. You worshipped yourself -too much. We are both punished.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray turned slowly around and looked at him with tear-dimmed eyes. -“It is too late, Basil,” he faltered. -</p> - -<p> -“It is never too late, Dorian. Let us kneel down and try if we cannot -remember a prayer. Isn’t there a verse somewhere, ‘Though your sins -be as scarlet, yet I will make them as white as snow’?” -</p> - -<p> -“Those words mean nothing to me now.” -</p> - -<p> -“Hush! Don’t say that. You have done enough evil in your life. My -God! Don’t you see that accursed thing leering at us?” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray glanced at the picture, and suddenly an uncontrollable feeling of -hatred for Basil Hallward came over him, as though it had been suggested to him -by the image on the canvas, whispered into his ear by those grinning lips. The -mad passions of a hunted animal stirred within him, and he loathed the man who -was seated at the table, more than in his whole life he had ever loathed -anything. He glanced wildly around. Something glimmered on the top of the -painted chest that faced him. His eye fell on it. He knew what it was. It was a -knife that he had brought up, some days before, to cut a piece of cord, and had -forgotten to take away with him. He moved slowly towards it, passing Hallward -as he did so. As soon as he got behind him, he seized it and turned round. -Hallward stirred in his chair as if he was going to rise. He rushed at him and -dug the knife into the great vein that is behind the ear, crushing the -man’s head down on the table and stabbing again and again. -</p> - -<p> -There was a stifled groan and the horrible sound of some one choking with -blood. Three times the outstretched arms shot up convulsively, waving -grotesque, stiff-fingered hands in the air. He stabbed him twice more, but the -man did not move. Something began to trickle on the floor. He waited for a -moment, still pressing the head down. Then he threw the knife on the table, and -listened. -</p> - -<p> -He could hear nothing, but the drip, drip on the threadbare carpet. He opened -the door and went out on the landing. The house was absolutely quiet. No one -was about. For a few seconds he stood bending over the balustrade and peering -down into the black seething well of darkness. Then he took out the key and -returned to the room, locking himself in as he did so. -</p> - -<p> -The thing was still seated in the chair, straining over the table with bowed -head, and humped back, and long fantastic arms. Had it not been for the red -jagged tear in the neck and the clotted black pool that was slowly widening on -the table, one would have said that the man was simply asleep. -</p> - -<p> -How quickly it had all been done! He felt strangely calm, and walking over to -the window, opened it and stepped out on the balcony. The wind had blown the -fog away, and the sky was like a monstrous peacock’s tail, starred with -myriads of golden eyes. He looked down and saw the policeman going his rounds -and flashing the long beam of his lantern on the doors of the silent houses. -The crimson spot of a prowling hansom gleamed at the corner and then vanished. -A woman in a fluttering shawl was creeping slowly by the railings, staggering -as she went. Now and then she stopped and peered back. Once, she began to sing -in a hoarse voice. The policeman strolled over and said something to her. She -stumbled away, laughing. A bitter blast swept across the square. The gas-lamps -flickered and became blue, and the leafless trees shook their black iron -branches to and fro. He shivered and went back, closing the window behind him. -</p> - -<p> -Having reached the door, he turned the key and opened it. He did not even -glance at the murdered man. He felt that the secret of the whole thing was not -to realize the situation. The friend who had painted the fatal portrait to -which all his misery had been due had gone out of his life. That was enough. -</p> - -<p> -Then he remembered the lamp. It was a rather curious one of Moorish -workmanship, made of dull silver inlaid with arabesques of burnished steel, and -studded with coarse turquoises. Perhaps it might be missed by his servant, and -questions would be asked. He hesitated for a moment, then he turned back and -took it from the table. He could not help seeing the dead thing. How still it -was! How horribly white the long hands looked! It was like a dreadful wax -image. -</p> - -<p> -Having locked the door behind him, he crept quietly downstairs. The woodwork -creaked and seemed to cry out as if in pain. He stopped several times and -waited. No: everything was still. It was merely the sound of his own footsteps. -</p> - -<p> -When he reached the library, he saw the bag and coat in the corner. They must -be hidden away somewhere. He unlocked a secret press that was in the -wainscoting, a press in which he kept his own curious disguises, and put them -into it. He could easily burn them afterwards. Then he pulled out his watch. It -was twenty minutes to two. -</p> - -<p> -He sat down and began to think. Every year—every month, almost—men -were strangled in England for what he had done. There had been a madness of -murder in the air. Some red star had come too close to the earth.... And yet, -what evidence was there against him? Basil Hallward had left the house at -eleven. No one had seen him come in again. Most of the servants were at Selby -Royal. His valet had gone to bed.... Paris! Yes. It was to Paris that Basil had -gone, and by the midnight train, as he had intended. With his curious reserved -habits, it would be months before any suspicions would be roused. Months! -Everything could be destroyed long before then. -</p> - -<p> -A sudden thought struck him. He put on his fur coat and hat and went out into -the hall. There he paused, hearing the slow heavy tread of the policeman on the -pavement outside and seeing the flash of the bull’s-eye reflected in the -window. He waited and held his breath. -</p> - -<p> -After a few moments he drew back the latch and slipped out, shutting the door -very gently behind him. Then he began ringing the bell. In about five minutes -his valet appeared, half-dressed and looking very drowsy. -</p> - -<p> -“I am sorry to have had to wake you up, Francis,” he said, stepping -in; “but I had forgotten my latch-key. What time is it?” -</p> - -<p> -“Ten minutes past two, sir,” answered the man, looking at the clock -and blinking. -</p> - -<p> -“Ten minutes past two? How horribly late! You must wake me at nine -to-morrow. I have some work to do.” -</p> - -<p> -“All right, sir.” -</p> - -<p> -“Did any one call this evening?” -</p> - -<p> -“Mr. Hallward, sir. He stayed here till eleven, and then he went away to -catch his train.” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh! I am sorry I didn’t see him. Did he leave any message?” -</p> - -<p> -“No, sir, except that he would write to you from Paris, if he did not -find you at the club.” -</p> - -<p> -“That will do, Francis. Don’t forget to call me at nine -to-morrow.” -</p> - -<p> -“No, sir.” -</p> - -<p> -The man shambled down the passage in his slippers. -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray threw his hat and coat upon the table and passed into the library. -For a quarter of an hour he walked up and down the room, biting his lip and -thinking. Then he took down the Blue Book from one of the shelves and began to -turn over the leaves. “Alan Campbell, 152, Hertford Street, -Mayfair.” Yes; that was the man he wanted. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap14"></a>CHAPTER XIV.</h2> - -<p> -At nine o’clock the next morning his servant came in with a cup of -chocolate on a tray and opened the shutters. Dorian was sleeping quite -peacefully, lying on his right side, with one hand underneath his cheek. He -looked like a boy who had been tired out with play, or study. -</p> - -<p> -The man had to touch him twice on the shoulder before he woke, and as he opened -his eyes a faint smile passed across his lips, as though he had been lost in -some delightful dream. Yet he had not dreamed at all. His night had been -untroubled by any images of pleasure or of pain. But youth smiles without any -reason. It is one of its chiefest charms. -</p> - -<p> -He turned round, and leaning upon his elbow, began to sip his chocolate. The -mellow November sun came streaming into the room. The sky was bright, and there -was a genial warmth in the air. It was almost like a morning in May. -</p> - -<p> -Gradually the events of the preceding night crept with silent, blood-stained -feet into his brain and reconstructed themselves there with terrible -distinctness. He winced at the memory of all that he had suffered, and for a -moment the same curious feeling of loathing for Basil Hallward that had made -him kill him as he sat in the chair came back to him, and he grew cold with -passion. The dead man was still sitting there, too, and in the sunlight now. -How horrible that was! Such hideous things were for the darkness, not for the -day. -</p> - -<p> -He felt that if he brooded on what he had gone through he would sicken or grow -mad. There were sins whose fascination was more in the memory than in the doing -of them, strange triumphs that gratified the pride more than the passions, and -gave to the intellect a quickened sense of joy, greater than any joy they -brought, or could ever bring, to the senses. But this was not one of them. It -was a thing to be driven out of the mind, to be drugged with poppies, to be -strangled lest it might strangle one itself. -</p> - -<p> -When the half-hour struck, he passed his hand across his forehead, and then got -up hastily and dressed himself with even more than his usual care, giving a -good deal of attention to the choice of his necktie and scarf-pin and changing -his rings more than once. He spent a long time also over breakfast, tasting the -various dishes, talking to his valet about some new liveries that he was -thinking of getting made for the servants at Selby, and going through his -correspondence. At some of the letters, he smiled. Three of them bored him. One -he read several times over and then tore up with a slight look of annoyance in -his face. “That awful thing, a woman’s memory!” as Lord Henry -had once said. -</p> - -<p> -After he had drunk his cup of black coffee, he wiped his lips slowly with a -napkin, motioned to his servant to wait, and going over to the table, sat down -and wrote two letters. One he put in his pocket, the other he handed to the -valet. -</p> - -<p> -“Take this round to 152, Hertford Street, Francis, and if Mr. Campbell is -out of town, get his address.” -</p> - -<p> -As soon as he was alone, he lit a cigarette and began sketching upon a piece of -paper, drawing first flowers and bits of architecture, and then human faces. -Suddenly he remarked that every face that he drew seemed to have a fantastic -likeness to Basil Hallward. He frowned, and getting up, went over to the -book-case and took out a volume at hazard. He was determined that he would not -think about what had happened until it became absolutely necessary that he -should do so. -</p> - -<p> -When he had stretched himself on the sofa, he looked at the title-page of the -book. It was Gautier’s “Émaux et Camées”, Charpentier’s -Japanese-paper edition, with the Jacquemart etching. The binding was of -citron-green leather, with a design of gilt trellis-work and dotted -pomegranates. It had been given to him by Adrian Singleton. As he turned over -the pages, his eye fell on the poem about the hand of Lacenaire, the cold -yellow hand “<i>du supplice encore mal lavée</i>,” with its downy -red hairs and its “<i>doigts de faune</i>.” He glanced at his own -white taper fingers, shuddering slightly in spite of himself, and passed on, -till he came to those lovely stanzas upon Venice: -</p> - -<p class="poem"> -Sur une gamme chromatique,<br /> - Le sein de perles ruisselant,<br /> -La Vénus de l’Adriatique<br /> - Sort de l’eau son corps rose et blanc.<br /> -<br /> -Les dômes, sur l’azur des ondes<br /> - Suivant la phrase au pur contour,<br /> -S’enflent comme des gorges rondes<br /> - Que soulève un soupir d’amour.<br /> -<br /> -L’esquif aborde et me dépose,<br /> - Jetant son amarre au pilier,<br /> -Devant une façade rose,<br /> - Sur le marbre d’un escalier. -</p> - -<p> -How exquisite they were! As one read them, one seemed to be floating down the -green water-ways of the pink and pearl city, seated in a black gondola with -silver prow and trailing curtains. The mere lines looked to him like those -straight lines of turquoise-blue that follow one as one pushes out to the Lido. -The sudden flashes of colour reminded him of the gleam of the -opal-and-iris-throated birds that flutter round the tall honeycombed Campanile, -or stalk, with such stately grace, through the dim, dust-stained arcades. -Leaning back with half-closed eyes, he kept saying over and over to himself: -</p> - -<p class="poem"> -“Devant une façade rose,<br /> -Sur le marbre d’un escalier.” -</p> - -<p class="noindent"> -The whole of Venice was in those two lines. He remembered the autumn that he -had passed there, and a wonderful love that had stirred him to mad delightful -follies. There was romance in every place. But Venice, like Oxford, had kept -the background for romance, and, to the true romantic, background was -everything, or almost everything. Basil had been with him part of the time, and -had gone wild over Tintoret. Poor Basil! What a horrible way for a man to die! -</p> - -<p> -He sighed, and took up the volume again, and tried to forget. He read of the -swallows that fly in and out of the little <i>café</i> at Smyrna where the -Hadjis sit counting their amber beads and the turbaned merchants smoke their -long tasselled pipes and talk gravely to each other; he read of the Obelisk in -the Place de la Concorde that weeps tears of granite in its lonely sunless -exile and longs to be back by the hot, lotus-covered Nile, where there are -Sphinxes, and rose-red ibises, and white vultures with gilded claws, and -crocodiles with small beryl eyes that crawl over the green steaming mud; he -began to brood over those verses which, drawing music from kiss-stained marble, -tell of that curious statue that Gautier compares to a contralto voice, the -“<i>monstre charmant</i>” that couches in the porphyry-room of the -Louvre. But after a time the book fell from his hand. He grew nervous, and a -horrible fit of terror came over him. What if Alan Campbell should be out of -England? Days would elapse before he could come back. Perhaps he might refuse -to come. What could he do then? Every moment was of vital importance. -</p> - -<p> -They had been great friends once, five years before—almost inseparable, -indeed. Then the intimacy had come suddenly to an end. When they met in society -now, it was only Dorian Gray who smiled: Alan Campbell never did. -</p> - -<p> -He was an extremely clever young man, though he had no real appreciation of the -visible arts, and whatever little sense of the beauty of poetry he possessed he -had gained entirely from Dorian. His dominant intellectual passion was for -science. At Cambridge he had spent a great deal of his time working in the -laboratory, and had taken a good class in the Natural Science Tripos of his -year. Indeed, he was still devoted to the study of chemistry, and had a -laboratory of his own in which he used to shut himself up all day long, greatly -to the annoyance of his mother, who had set her heart on his standing for -Parliament and had a vague idea that a chemist was a person who made up -prescriptions. He was an excellent musician, however, as well, and played both -the violin and the piano better than most amateurs. In fact, it was music that -had first brought him and Dorian Gray together—music and that indefinable -attraction that Dorian seemed to be able to exercise whenever he -wished—and, indeed, exercised often without being conscious of it. They -had met at Lady Berkshire’s the night that Rubinstein played there, and -after that used to be always seen together at the opera and wherever good music -was going on. For eighteen months their intimacy lasted. Campbell was always -either at Selby Royal or in Grosvenor Square. To him, as to many others, Dorian -Gray was the type of everything that is wonderful and fascinating in life. -Whether or not a quarrel had taken place between them no one ever knew. But -suddenly people remarked that they scarcely spoke when they met and that -Campbell seemed always to go away early from any party at which Dorian Gray was -present. He had changed, too—was strangely melancholy at times, appeared -almost to dislike hearing music, and would never himself play, giving as his -excuse, when he was called upon, that he was so absorbed in science that he had -no time left in which to practise. And this was certainly true. Every day he -seemed to become more interested in biology, and his name appeared once or -twice in some of the scientific reviews in connection with certain curious -experiments. -</p> - -<p> -This was the man Dorian Gray was waiting for. Every second he kept glancing at -the clock. As the minutes went by he became horribly agitated. At last he got -up and began to pace up and down the room, looking like a beautiful caged -thing. He took long stealthy strides. His hands were curiously cold. -</p> - -<p> -The suspense became unbearable. Time seemed to him to be crawling with feet of -lead, while he by monstrous winds was being swept towards the jagged edge of -some black cleft of precipice. He knew what was waiting for him there; saw it, -indeed, and, shuddering, crushed with dank hands his burning lids as though he -would have robbed the very brain of sight and driven the eyeballs back into -their cave. It was useless. The brain had its own food on which it battened, -and the imagination, made grotesque by terror, twisted and distorted as a -living thing by pain, danced like some foul puppet on a stand and grinned -through moving masks. Then, suddenly, time stopped for him. Yes: that blind, -slow-breathing thing crawled no more, and horrible thoughts, time being dead, -raced nimbly on in front, and dragged a hideous future from its grave, and -showed it to him. He stared at it. Its very horror made him stone. -</p> - -<p> -At last the door opened and his servant entered. He turned glazed eyes upon -him. -</p> - -<p> -“Mr. Campbell, sir,” said the man. -</p> - -<p> -A sigh of relief broke from his parched lips, and the colour came back to his -cheeks. -</p> - -<p> -“Ask him to come in at once, Francis.” He felt that he was himself -again. His mood of cowardice had passed away. -</p> - -<p> -The man bowed and retired. In a few moments, Alan Campbell walked in, looking -very stern and rather pale, his pallor being intensified by his coal-black hair -and dark eyebrows. -</p> - -<p> -“Alan! This is kind of you. I thank you for coming.” -</p> - -<p> -“I had intended never to enter your house again, Gray. But you said it -was a matter of life and death.” His voice was hard and cold. He spoke -with slow deliberation. There was a look of contempt in the steady searching -gaze that he turned on Dorian. He kept his hands in the pockets of his -Astrakhan coat, and seemed not to have noticed the gesture with which he had -been greeted. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes: it is a matter of life and death, Alan, and to more than one -person. Sit down.” -</p> - -<p> -Campbell took a chair by the table, and Dorian sat opposite to him. The two -men’s eyes met. In Dorian’s there was infinite pity. He knew that -what he was going to do was dreadful. -</p> - -<p> -After a strained moment of silence, he leaned across and said, very quietly, -but watching the effect of each word upon the face of him he had sent for, -“Alan, in a locked room at the top of this house, a room to which nobody -but myself has access, a dead man is seated at a table. He has been dead ten -hours now. Don’t stir, and don’t look at me like that. Who the man -is, why he died, how he died, are matters that do not concern you. What you -have to do is this—” -</p> - -<p> -“Stop, Gray. I don’t want to know anything further. Whether what -you have told me is true or not true doesn’t concern me. I entirely -decline to be mixed up in your life. Keep your horrible secrets to yourself. -They don’t interest me any more.” -</p> - -<p> -“Alan, they will have to interest you. This one will have to interest -you. I am awfully sorry for you, Alan. But I can’t help myself. You are -the one man who is able to save me. I am forced to bring you into the matter. I -have no option. Alan, you are scientific. You know about chemistry and things -of that kind. You have made experiments. What you have got to do is to destroy -the thing that is upstairs—to destroy it so that not a vestige of it will -be left. Nobody saw this person come into the house. Indeed, at the present -moment he is supposed to be in Paris. He will not be missed for months. When he -is missed, there must be no trace of him found here. You, Alan, you must change -him, and everything that belongs to him, into a handful of ashes that I may -scatter in the air.” -</p> - -<p> -“You are mad, Dorian.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! I was waiting for you to call me Dorian.” -</p> - -<p> -“You are mad, I tell you—mad to imagine that I would raise a finger -to help you, mad to make this monstrous confession. I will have nothing to do -with this matter, whatever it is. Do you think I am going to peril my -reputation for you? What is it to me what devil’s work you are up -to?” -</p> - -<p> -“It was suicide, Alan.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am glad of that. But who drove him to it? You, I should fancy.” -</p> - -<p> -“Do you still refuse to do this for me?” -</p> - -<p> -“Of course I refuse. I will have absolutely nothing to do with it. I -don’t care what shame comes on you. You deserve it all. I should not be -sorry to see you disgraced, publicly disgraced. How dare you ask me, of all men -in the world, to mix myself up in this horror? I should have thought you knew -more about people’s characters. Your friend Lord Henry Wotton can’t -have taught you much about psychology, whatever else he has taught you. Nothing -will induce me to stir a step to help you. You have come to the wrong man. Go -to some of your friends. Don’t come to me.” -</p> - -<p> -“Alan, it was murder. I killed him. You don’t know what he had made -me suffer. Whatever my life is, he had more to do with the making or the -marring of it than poor Harry has had. He may not have intended it, the result -was the same.” -</p> - -<p> -“Murder! Good God, Dorian, is that what you have come to? I shall not -inform upon you. It is not my business. Besides, without my stirring in the -matter, you are certain to be arrested. Nobody ever commits a crime without -doing something stupid. But I will have nothing to do with it.” -</p> - -<p> -“You must have something to do with it. Wait, wait a moment; listen to -me. Only listen, Alan. All I ask of you is to perform a certain scientific -experiment. You go to hospitals and dead-houses, and the horrors that you do -there don’t affect you. If in some hideous dissecting-room or fetid -laboratory you found this man lying on a leaden table with red gutters scooped -out in it for the blood to flow through, you would simply look upon him as an -admirable subject. You would not turn a hair. You would not believe that you -were doing anything wrong. On the contrary, you would probably feel that you -were benefiting the human race, or increasing the sum of knowledge in the -world, or gratifying intellectual curiosity, or something of that kind. What I -want you to do is merely what you have often done before. Indeed, to destroy a -body must be far less horrible than what you are accustomed to work at. And, -remember, it is the only piece of evidence against me. If it is discovered, I -am lost; and it is sure to be discovered unless you help me.” -</p> - -<p> -“I have no desire to help you. You forget that. I am simply indifferent -to the whole thing. It has nothing to do with me.” -</p> - -<p> -“Alan, I entreat you. Think of the position I am in. Just before you came -I almost fainted with terror. You may know terror yourself some day. No! -don’t think of that. Look at the matter purely from the scientific point -of view. You don’t inquire where the dead things on which you experiment -come from. Don’t inquire now. I have told you too much as it is. But I -beg of you to do this. We were friends once, Alan.” -</p> - -<p> -“Don’t speak about those days, Dorian—they are dead.” -</p> - -<p> -“The dead linger sometimes. The man upstairs will not go away. He is -sitting at the table with bowed head and outstretched arms. Alan! Alan! If you -don’t come to my assistance, I am ruined. Why, they will hang me, Alan! -Don’t you understand? They will hang me for what I have done.” -</p> - -<p> -“There is no good in prolonging this scene. I absolutely refuse to do -anything in the matter. It is insane of you to ask me.” -</p> - -<p> -“You refuse?” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes.” -</p> - -<p> -“I entreat you, Alan.” -</p> - -<p> -“It is useless.” -</p> - -<p> -The same look of pity came into Dorian Gray’s eyes. Then he stretched out -his hand, took a piece of paper, and wrote something on it. He read it over -twice, folded it carefully, and pushed it across the table. Having done this, -he got up and went over to the window. -</p> - -<p> -Campbell looked at him in surprise, and then took up the paper, and opened it. -As he read it, his face became ghastly pale and he fell back in his chair. A -horrible sense of sickness came over him. He felt as if his heart was beating -itself to death in some empty hollow. -</p> - -<p> -After two or three minutes of terrible silence, Dorian turned round and came -and stood behind him, putting his hand upon his shoulder. -</p> - -<p> -“I am so sorry for you, Alan,” he murmured, “but you leave me -no alternative. I have a letter written already. Here it is. You see the -address. If you don’t help me, I must send it. If you don’t help -me, I will send it. You know what the result will be. But you are going to help -me. It is impossible for you to refuse now. I tried to spare you. You will do -me the justice to admit that. You were stern, harsh, offensive. You treated me -as no man has ever dared to treat me—no living man, at any rate. I bore -it all. Now it is for me to dictate terms.” -</p> - -<p> -Campbell buried his face in his hands, and a shudder passed through him. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, it is my turn to dictate terms, Alan. You know what they are. The -thing is quite simple. Come, don’t work yourself into this fever. The -thing has to be done. Face it, and do it.” -</p> - -<p> -A groan broke from Campbell’s lips and he shivered all over. The ticking -of the clock on the mantelpiece seemed to him to be dividing time into separate -atoms of agony, each of which was too terrible to be borne. He felt as if an -iron ring was being slowly tightened round his forehead, as if the disgrace -with which he was threatened had already come upon him. The hand upon his -shoulder weighed like a hand of lead. It was intolerable. It seemed to crush -him. -</p> - -<p> -“Come, Alan, you must decide at once.” -</p> - -<p> -“I cannot do it,” he said, mechanically, as though words could -alter things. -</p> - -<p> -“You must. You have no choice. Don’t delay.” -</p> - -<p> -He hesitated a moment. “Is there a fire in the room upstairs?” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, there is a gas-fire with asbestos.” -</p> - -<p> -“I shall have to go home and get some things from the laboratory.” -</p> - -<p> -“No, Alan, you must not leave the house. Write out on a sheet of -notepaper what you want and my servant will take a cab and bring the things -back to you.” -</p> - -<p> -Campbell scrawled a few lines, blotted them, and addressed an envelope to his -assistant. Dorian took the note up and read it carefully. Then he rang the bell -and gave it to his valet, with orders to return as soon as possible and to -bring the things with him. -</p> - -<p> -As the hall door shut, Campbell started nervously, and having got up from the -chair, went over to the chimney-piece. He was shivering with a kind of ague. -For nearly twenty minutes, neither of the men spoke. A fly buzzed noisily about -the room, and the ticking of the clock was like the beat of a hammer. -</p> - -<p> -As the chime struck one, Campbell turned round, and looking at Dorian Gray, saw -that his eyes were filled with tears. There was something in the purity and -refinement of that sad face that seemed to enrage him. “You are infamous, -absolutely infamous!” he muttered. -</p> - -<p> -“Hush, Alan. You have saved my life,” said Dorian. -</p> - -<p> -“Your life? Good heavens! what a life that is! You have gone from -corruption to corruption, and now you have culminated in crime. In doing what I -am going to do—what you force me to do—it is not of your life that -I am thinking.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah, Alan,” murmured Dorian with a sigh, “I wish you had a -thousandth part of the pity for me that I have for you.” He turned away -as he spoke and stood looking out at the garden. Campbell made no answer. -</p> - -<p> -After about ten minutes a knock came to the door, and the servant entered, -carrying a large mahogany chest of chemicals, with a long coil of steel and -platinum wire and two rather curiously shaped iron clamps. -</p> - -<p> -“Shall I leave the things here, sir?” he asked Campbell. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes,” said Dorian. “And I am afraid, Francis, that I have -another errand for you. What is the name of the man at Richmond who supplies -Selby with orchids?” -</p> - -<p> -“Harden, sir.” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes—Harden. You must go down to Richmond at once, see Harden -personally, and tell him to send twice as many orchids as I ordered, and to -have as few white ones as possible. In fact, I don’t want any white ones. -It is a lovely day, Francis, and Richmond is a very pretty -place—otherwise I wouldn’t bother you about it.” -</p> - -<p> -“No trouble, sir. At what time shall I be back?” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian looked at Campbell. “How long will your experiment take, -Alan?” he said in a calm indifferent voice. The presence of a third -person in the room seemed to give him extraordinary courage. -</p> - -<p> -Campbell frowned and bit his lip. “It will take about five hours,” -he answered. -</p> - -<p> -“It will be time enough, then, if you are back at half-past seven, -Francis. Or stay: just leave my things out for dressing. You can have the -evening to yourself. I am not dining at home, so I shall not want you.” -</p> - -<p> -“Thank you, sir,” said the man, leaving the room. -</p> - -<p> -“Now, Alan, there is not a moment to be lost. How heavy this chest is! -I’ll take it for you. You bring the other things.” He spoke rapidly -and in an authoritative manner. Campbell felt dominated by him. They left the -room together. -</p> - -<p> -When they reached the top landing, Dorian took out the key and turned it in the -lock. Then he stopped, and a troubled look came into his eyes. He shuddered. -“I don’t think I can go in, Alan,” he murmured. -</p> - -<p> -“It is nothing to me. I don’t require you,” said Campbell -coldly. -</p> - -<p> -Dorian half opened the door. As he did so, he saw the face of his portrait -leering in the sunlight. On the floor in front of it the torn curtain was -lying. He remembered that the night before he had forgotten, for the first time -in his life, to hide the fatal canvas, and was about to rush forward, when he -drew back with a shudder. -</p> - -<p> -What was that loathsome red dew that gleamed, wet and glistening, on one of the -hands, as though the canvas had sweated blood? How horrible it was!—more -horrible, it seemed to him for the moment, than the silent thing that he knew -was stretched across the table, the thing whose grotesque misshapen shadow on -the spotted carpet showed him that it had not stirred, but was still there, as -he had left it. -</p> - -<p> -He heaved a deep breath, opened the door a little wider, and with half-closed -eyes and averted head, walked quickly in, determined that he would not look -even once upon the dead man. Then, stooping down and taking up the -gold-and-purple hanging, he flung it right over the picture. -</p> - -<p> -There he stopped, feeling afraid to turn round, and his eyes fixed themselves -on the intricacies of the pattern before him. He heard Campbell bringing in the -heavy chest, and the irons, and the other things that he had required for his -dreadful work. He began to wonder if he and Basil Hallward had ever met, and, -if so, what they had thought of each other. -</p> - -<p> -“Leave me now,” said a stern voice behind him. -</p> - -<p> -He turned and hurried out, just conscious that the dead man had been thrust -back into the chair and that Campbell was gazing into a glistening yellow face. -As he was going downstairs, he heard the key being turned in the lock. -</p> - -<p> -It was long after seven when Campbell came back into the library. He was pale, -but absolutely calm. “I have done what you asked me to do,” he -muttered. “And now, good-bye. Let us never see each other again.” -</p> - -<p> -“You have saved me from ruin, Alan. I cannot forget that,” said -Dorian simply. -</p> - -<p> -As soon as Campbell had left, he went upstairs. There was a horrible smell of -nitric acid in the room. But the thing that had been sitting at the table was -gone. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap15"></a>CHAPTER XV.</h2> - -<p> -That evening, at eight-thirty, exquisitely dressed and wearing a large -button-hole of Parma violets, Dorian Gray was ushered into Lady -Narborough’s drawing-room by bowing servants. His forehead was throbbing -with maddened nerves, and he felt wildly excited, but his manner as he bent -over his hostess’s hand was as easy and graceful as ever. Perhaps one -never seems so much at one’s ease as when one has to play a part. -Certainly no one looking at Dorian Gray that night could have believed that he -had passed through a tragedy as horrible as any tragedy of our age. Those -finely shaped fingers could never have clutched a knife for sin, nor those -smiling lips have cried out on God and goodness. He himself could not help -wondering at the calm of his demeanour, and for a moment felt keenly the -terrible pleasure of a double life. -</p> - -<p> -It was a small party, got up rather in a hurry by Lady Narborough, who was a -very clever woman with what Lord Henry used to describe as the remains of -really remarkable ugliness. She had proved an excellent wife to one of our most -tedious ambassadors, and having buried her husband properly in a marble -mausoleum, which she had herself designed, and married off her daughters to -some rich, rather elderly men, she devoted herself now to the pleasures of -French fiction, French cookery, and French <i>esprit</i> when she could get it. -</p> - -<p> -Dorian was one of her especial favourites, and she always told him that she was -extremely glad she had not met him in early life. “I know, my dear, I -should have fallen madly in love with you,” she used to say, “and -thrown my bonnet right over the mills for your sake. It is most fortunate that -you were not thought of at the time. As it was, our bonnets were so unbecoming, -and the mills were so occupied in trying to raise the wind, that I never had -even a flirtation with anybody. However, that was all Narborough’s fault. -He was dreadfully short-sighted, and there is no pleasure in taking in a -husband who never sees anything.” -</p> - -<p> -Her guests this evening were rather tedious. The fact was, as she explained to -Dorian, behind a very shabby fan, one of her married daughters had come up -quite suddenly to stay with her, and, to make matters worse, had actually -brought her husband with her. “I think it is most unkind of her, my -dear,” she whispered. “Of course I go and stay with them every -summer after I come from Homburg, but then an old woman like me must have fresh -air sometimes, and besides, I really wake them up. You don’t know what an -existence they lead down there. It is pure unadulterated country life. They get -up early, because they have so much to do, and go to bed early, because they -have so little to think about. There has not been a scandal in the -neighbourhood since the time of Queen Elizabeth, and consequently they all fall -asleep after dinner. You shan’t sit next either of them. You shall sit by -me and amuse me.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian murmured a graceful compliment and looked round the room. Yes: it was -certainly a tedious party. Two of the people he had never seen before, and the -others consisted of Ernest Harrowden, one of those middle-aged mediocrities so -common in London clubs who have no enemies, but are thoroughly disliked by -their friends; Lady Ruxton, an overdressed woman of forty-seven, with a hooked -nose, who was always trying to get herself compromised, but was so peculiarly -plain that to her great disappointment no one would ever believe anything -against her; Mrs. Erlynne, a pushing nobody, with a delightful lisp and -Venetian-red hair; Lady Alice Chapman, his hostess’s daughter, a dowdy -dull girl, with one of those characteristic British faces that, once seen, are -never remembered; and her husband, a red-cheeked, white-whiskered creature who, -like so many of his class, was under the impression that inordinate joviality -can atone for an entire lack of ideas. -</p> - -<p> -He was rather sorry he had come, till Lady Narborough, looking at the great -ormolu gilt clock that sprawled in gaudy curves on the mauve-draped -mantelshelf, exclaimed: “How horrid of Henry Wotton to be so late! I sent -round to him this morning on chance and he promised faithfully not to -disappoint me.” -</p> - -<p> -It was some consolation that Harry was to be there, and when the door opened -and he heard his slow musical voice lending charm to some insincere apology, he -ceased to feel bored. -</p> - -<p> -But at dinner he could not eat anything. Plate after plate went away untasted. -Lady Narborough kept scolding him for what she called “an insult to poor -Adolphe, who invented the <i>menu</i> specially for you,” and now and -then Lord Henry looked across at him, wondering at his silence and abstracted -manner. From time to time the butler filled his glass with champagne. He drank -eagerly, and his thirst seemed to increase. -</p> - -<p> -“Dorian,” said Lord Henry at last, as the <i>chaud-froid</i> was -being handed round, “what is the matter with you to-night? You are quite -out of sorts.” -</p> - -<p> -“I believe he is in love,” cried Lady Narborough, “and that -he is afraid to tell me for fear I should be jealous. He is quite right. I -certainly should.” -</p> - -<p> -“Dear Lady Narborough,” murmured Dorian, smiling, “I have not -been in love for a whole week—not, in fact, since Madame de Ferrol left -town.” -</p> - -<p> -“How you men can fall in love with that woman!” exclaimed the old -lady. “I really cannot understand it.” -</p> - -<p> -“It is simply because she remembers you when you were a little girl, Lady -Narborough,” said Lord Henry. “She is the one link between us and -your short frocks.” -</p> - -<p> -“She does not remember my short frocks at all, Lord Henry. But I remember -her very well at Vienna thirty years ago, and how <i>décolletée</i> she was -then.” -</p> - -<p> -“She is still <i>décolletée</i>,” he answered, taking an olive in -his long fingers; “and when she is in a very smart gown she looks like an -<i>édition de luxe</i> of a bad French novel. She is really wonderful, and full -of surprises. Her capacity for family affection is extraordinary. When her -third husband died, her hair turned quite gold from grief.” -</p> - -<p> -“How can you, Harry!” cried Dorian. -</p> - -<p> -“It is a most romantic explanation,” laughed the hostess. -“But her third husband, Lord Henry! You don’t mean to say Ferrol is -the fourth?” -</p> - -<p> -“Certainly, Lady Narborough.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t believe a word of it.” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, ask Mr. Gray. He is one of her most intimate friends.” -</p> - -<p> -“Is it true, Mr. Gray?” -</p> - -<p> -“She assures me so, Lady Narborough,” said Dorian. “I asked -her whether, like Marguerite de Navarre, she had their hearts embalmed and hung -at her girdle. She told me she didn’t, because none of them had had any -hearts at all.” -</p> - -<p> -“Four husbands! Upon my word that is <i>trop de zêle</i>.” -</p> - -<p> -“<i>Trop d’audace</i>, I tell her,” said Dorian. -</p> - -<p> -“Oh! she is audacious enough for anything, my dear. And what is Ferrol -like? I don’t know him.” -</p> - -<p> -“The husbands of very beautiful women belong to the criminal -classes,” said Lord Henry, sipping his wine. -</p> - -<p> -Lady Narborough hit him with her fan. “Lord Henry, I am not at all -surprised that the world says that you are extremely wicked.” -</p> - -<p> -“But what world says that?” asked Lord Henry, elevating his -eyebrows. “It can only be the next world. This world and I are on -excellent terms.” -</p> - -<p> -“Everybody I know says you are very wicked,” cried the old lady, -shaking her head. -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry looked serious for some moments. “It is perfectly -monstrous,” he said, at last, “the way people go about nowadays -saying things against one behind one’s back that are absolutely and -entirely true.” -</p> - -<p> -“Isn’t he incorrigible?” cried Dorian, leaning forward in his -chair. -</p> - -<p> -“I hope so,” said his hostess, laughing. “But really, if you -all worship Madame de Ferrol in this ridiculous way, I shall have to marry -again so as to be in the fashion.” -</p> - -<p> -“You will never marry again, Lady Narborough,” broke in Lord Henry. -“You were far too happy. When a woman marries again, it is because she -detested her first husband. When a man marries again, it is because he adored -his first wife. Women try their luck; men risk theirs.” -</p> - -<p> -“Narborough wasn’t perfect,” cried the old lady. -</p> - -<p> -“If he had been, you would not have loved him, my dear lady,” was -the rejoinder. “Women love us for our defects. If we have enough of them, -they will forgive us everything, even our intellects. You will never ask me to -dinner again after saying this, I am afraid, Lady Narborough, but it is quite -true.” -</p> - -<p> -“Of course it is true, Lord Henry. If we women did not love you for your -defects, where would you all be? Not one of you would ever be married. You -would be a set of unfortunate bachelors. Not, however, that that would alter -you much. Nowadays all the married men live like bachelors, and all the -bachelors like married men.” -</p> - -<p> -“<i>Fin de siêcle</i>,” murmured Lord Henry. -</p> - -<p> -“<i>Fin du globe</i>,” answered his hostess. -</p> - -<p> -“I wish it were <i>fin du globe</i>,” said Dorian with a sigh. -“Life is a great disappointment.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah, my dear,” cried Lady Narborough, putting on her gloves, -“don’t tell me that you have exhausted life. When a man says that -one knows that life has exhausted him. Lord Henry is very wicked, and I -sometimes wish that I had been; but you are made to be good—you look so -good. I must find you a nice wife. Lord Henry, don’t you think that Mr. -Gray should get married?” -</p> - -<p> -“I am always telling him so, Lady Narborough,” said Lord Henry with -a bow. -</p> - -<p> -“Well, we must look out for a suitable match for him. I shall go through -Debrett carefully to-night and draw out a list of all the eligible young -ladies.” -</p> - -<p> -“With their ages, Lady Narborough?” asked Dorian. -</p> - -<p> -“Of course, with their ages, slightly edited. But nothing must be done in -a hurry. I want it to be what <i>The Morning Post</i> calls a suitable -alliance, and I want you both to be happy.” -</p> - -<p> -“What nonsense people talk about happy marriages!” exclaimed Lord -Henry. “A man can be happy with any woman, as long as he does not love -her.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! what a cynic you are!” cried the old lady, pushing back her -chair and nodding to Lady Ruxton. “You must come and dine with me soon -again. You are really an admirable tonic, much better than what Sir Andrew -prescribes for me. You must tell me what people you would like to meet, though. -I want it to be a delightful gathering.” -</p> - -<p> -“I like men who have a future and women who have a past,” he -answered. “Or do you think that would make it a petticoat party?” -</p> - -<p> -“I fear so,” she said, laughing, as she stood up. “A thousand -pardons, my dear Lady Ruxton,” she added, “I didn’t see you -hadn’t finished your cigarette.” -</p> - -<p> -“Never mind, Lady Narborough. I smoke a great deal too much. I am going -to limit myself, for the future.” -</p> - -<p> -“Pray don’t, Lady Ruxton,” said Lord Henry. “Moderation -is a fatal thing. Enough is as bad as a meal. More than enough is as good as a -feast.” -</p> - -<p> -Lady Ruxton glanced at him curiously. “You must come and explain that to -me some afternoon, Lord Henry. It sounds a fascinating theory,” she -murmured, as she swept out of the room. -</p> - -<p> -“Now, mind you don’t stay too long over your politics and -scandal,” cried Lady Narborough from the door. “If you do, we are -sure to squabble upstairs.” -</p> - -<p> -The men laughed, and Mr. Chapman got up solemnly from the foot of the table and -came up to the top. Dorian Gray changed his seat and went and sat by Lord -Henry. Mr. Chapman began to talk in a loud voice about the situation in the -House of Commons. He guffawed at his adversaries. The word -<i>doctrinaire</i>—word full of terror to the British -mind—reappeared from time to time between his explosions. An alliterative -prefix served as an ornament of oratory. He hoisted the Union Jack on the -pinnacles of thought. The inherited stupidity of the race—sound English -common sense he jovially termed it—was shown to be the proper bulwark for -society. -</p> - -<p> -A smile curved Lord Henry’s lips, and he turned round and looked at -Dorian. -</p> - -<p> -“Are you better, my dear fellow?” he asked. “You seemed -rather out of sorts at dinner.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am quite well, Harry. I am tired. That is all.” -</p> - -<p> -“You were charming last night. The little duchess is quite devoted to -you. She tells me she is going down to Selby.” -</p> - -<p> -“She has promised to come on the twentieth.” -</p> - -<p> -“Is Monmouth to be there, too?” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, yes, Harry.” -</p> - -<p> -“He bores me dreadfully, almost as much as he bores her. She is very -clever, too clever for a woman. She lacks the indefinable charm of weakness. It -is the feet of clay that make the gold of the image precious. Her feet are very -pretty, but they are not feet of clay. White porcelain feet, if you like. They -have been through the fire, and what fire does not destroy, it hardens. She has -had experiences.” -</p> - -<p> -“How long has she been married?” asked Dorian. -</p> - -<p> -“An eternity, she tells me. I believe, according to the peerage, it is -ten years, but ten years with Monmouth must have been like eternity, with time -thrown in. Who else is coming?” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, the Willoughbys, Lord Rugby and his wife, our hostess, Geoffrey -Clouston, the usual set. I have asked Lord Grotrian.” -</p> - -<p> -“I like him,” said Lord Henry. “A great many people -don’t, but I find him charming. He atones for being occasionally somewhat -overdressed by being always absolutely over-educated. He is a very modern -type.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t know if he will be able to come, Harry. He may have to go -to Monte Carlo with his father.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! what a nuisance people’s people are! Try and make him come. By -the way, Dorian, you ran off very early last night. You left before eleven. -What did you do afterwards? Did you go straight home?” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian glanced at him hurriedly and frowned. -</p> - -<p> -“No, Harry,” he said at last, “I did not get home till nearly -three.” -</p> - -<p> -“Did you go to the club?” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes,” he answered. Then he bit his lip. “No, I don’t -mean that. I didn’t go to the club. I walked about. I forget what I -did.... How inquisitive you are, Harry! You always want to know what one has -been doing. I always want to forget what I have been doing. I came in at -half-past two, if you wish to know the exact time. I had left my latch-key at -home, and my servant had to let me in. If you want any corroborative evidence -on the subject, you can ask him.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry shrugged his shoulders. “My dear fellow, as if I cared! Let us -go up to the drawing-room. No sherry, thank you, Mr. Chapman. Something has -happened to you, Dorian. Tell me what it is. You are not yourself -to-night.” -</p> - -<p> -“Don’t mind me, Harry. I am irritable, and out of temper. I shall -come round and see you to-morrow, or next day. Make my excuses to Lady -Narborough. I shan’t go upstairs. I shall go home. I must go home.” -</p> - -<p> -“All right, Dorian. I dare say I shall see you to-morrow at tea-time. The -duchess is coming.” -</p> - -<p> -“I will try to be there, Harry,” he said, leaving the room. As he -drove back to his own house, he was conscious that the sense of terror he -thought he had strangled had come back to him. Lord Henry’s casual -questioning had made him lose his nerve for the moment, and he wanted his nerve -still. Things that were dangerous had to be destroyed. He winced. He hated the -idea of even touching them. -</p> - -<p> -Yet it had to be done. He realized that, and when he had locked the door of his -library, he opened the secret press into which he had thrust Basil -Hallward’s coat and bag. A huge fire was blazing. He piled another log on -it. The smell of the singeing clothes and burning leather was horrible. It took -him three-quarters of an hour to consume everything. At the end he felt faint -and sick, and having lit some Algerian pastilles in a pierced copper brazier, -he bathed his hands and forehead with a cool musk-scented vinegar. -</p> - -<p> -Suddenly he started. His eyes grew strangely bright, and he gnawed nervously at -his underlip. Between two of the windows stood a large Florentine cabinet, made -out of ebony and inlaid with ivory and blue lapis. He watched it as though it -were a thing that could fascinate and make afraid, as though it held something -that he longed for and yet almost loathed. His breath quickened. A mad craving -came over him. He lit a cigarette and then threw it away. His eyelids drooped -till the long fringed lashes almost touched his cheek. But he still watched the -cabinet. At last he got up from the sofa on which he had been lying, went over -to it, and having unlocked it, touched some hidden spring. A triangular drawer -passed slowly out. His fingers moved instinctively towards it, dipped in, and -closed on something. It was a small Chinese box of black and gold-dust lacquer, -elaborately wrought, the sides patterned with curved waves, and the silken -cords hung with round crystals and tasselled in plaited metal threads. He -opened it. Inside was a green paste, waxy in lustre, the odour curiously heavy -and persistent. -</p> - -<p> -He hesitated for some moments, with a strangely immobile smile upon his face. -Then shivering, though the atmosphere of the room was terribly hot, he drew -himself up and glanced at the clock. It was twenty minutes to twelve. He put -the box back, shutting the cabinet doors as he did so, and went into his -bedroom. -</p> - -<p> -As midnight was striking bronze blows upon the dusky air, Dorian Gray, dressed -commonly, and with a muffler wrapped round his throat, crept quietly out of his -house. In Bond Street he found a hansom with a good horse. He hailed it and in -a low voice gave the driver an address. -</p> - -<p> -The man shook his head. “It is too far for me,” he muttered. -</p> - -<p> -“Here is a sovereign for you,” said Dorian. “You shall have -another if you drive fast.” -</p> - -<p> -“All right, sir,” answered the man, “you will be there in an -hour,” and after his fare had got in he turned his horse round and drove -rapidly towards the river. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap16"></a>CHAPTER XVI.</h2> - -<p> -A cold rain began to fall, and the blurred street-lamps looked ghastly in the -dripping mist. The public-houses were just closing, and dim men and women were -clustering in broken groups round their doors. From some of the bars came the -sound of horrible laughter. In others, drunkards brawled and screamed. -</p> - -<p> -Lying back in the hansom, with his hat pulled over his forehead, Dorian Gray -watched with listless eyes the sordid shame of the great city, and now and then -he repeated to himself the words that Lord Henry had said to him on the first -day they had met, “To cure the soul by means of the senses, and the -senses by means of the soul.” Yes, that was the secret. He had often -tried it, and would try it again now. There were opium dens where one could buy -oblivion, dens of horror where the memory of old sins could be destroyed by the -madness of sins that were new. -</p> - -<p> -The moon hung low in the sky like a yellow skull. From time to time a huge -misshapen cloud stretched a long arm across and hid it. The gas-lamps grew -fewer, and the streets more narrow and gloomy. Once the man lost his way and -had to drive back half a mile. A steam rose from the horse as it splashed up -the puddles. The sidewindows of the hansom were clogged with a grey-flannel -mist. -</p> - -<p> -“To cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses by means of the -soul!” How the words rang in his ears! His soul, certainly, was sick to -death. Was it true that the senses could cure it? Innocent blood had been -spilled. What could atone for that? Ah! for that there was no atonement; but -though forgiveness was impossible, forgetfulness was possible still, and he was -determined to forget, to stamp the thing out, to crush it as one would crush -the adder that had stung one. Indeed, what right had Basil to have spoken to -him as he had done? Who had made him a judge over others? He had said things -that were dreadful, horrible, not to be endured. -</p> - -<p> -On and on plodded the hansom, going slower, it seemed to him, at each step. He -thrust up the trap and called to the man to drive faster. The hideous hunger -for opium began to gnaw at him. His throat burned and his delicate hands -twitched nervously together. He struck at the horse madly with his stick. The -driver laughed and whipped up. He laughed in answer, and the man was silent. -</p> - -<p> -The way seemed interminable, and the streets like the black web of some -sprawling spider. The monotony became unbearable, and as the mist thickened, he -felt afraid. -</p> - -<p> -Then they passed by lonely brickfields. The fog was lighter here, and he could -see the strange, bottle-shaped kilns with their orange, fanlike tongues of -fire. A dog barked as they went by, and far away in the darkness some wandering -sea-gull screamed. The horse stumbled in a rut, then swerved aside and broke -into a gallop. -</p> - -<p> -After some time they left the clay road and rattled again over rough-paven -streets. Most of the windows were dark, but now and then fantastic shadows were -silhouetted against some lamplit blind. He watched them curiously. They moved -like monstrous marionettes and made gestures like live things. He hated them. A -dull rage was in his heart. As they turned a corner, a woman yelled something -at them from an open door, and two men ran after the hansom for about a hundred -yards. The driver beat at them with his whip. -</p> - -<p> -It is said that passion makes one think in a circle. Certainly with hideous -iteration the bitten lips of Dorian Gray shaped and reshaped those subtle words -that dealt with soul and sense, till he had found in them the full expression, -as it were, of his mood, and justified, by intellectual approval, passions that -without such justification would still have dominated his temper. From cell to -cell of his brain crept the one thought; and the wild desire to live, most -terrible of all man’s appetites, quickened into force each trembling -nerve and fibre. Ugliness that had once been hateful to him because it made -things real, became dear to him now for that very reason. Ugliness was the one -reality. The coarse brawl, the loathsome den, the crude violence of disordered -life, the very vileness of thief and outcast, were more vivid, in their intense -actuality of impression, than all the gracious shapes of art, the dreamy -shadows of song. They were what he needed for forgetfulness. In three days he -would be free. -</p> - -<p> -Suddenly the man drew up with a jerk at the top of a dark lane. Over the low -roofs and jagged chimney-stacks of the houses rose the black masts of ships. -Wreaths of white mist clung like ghostly sails to the yards. -</p> - -<p> -“Somewhere about here, sir, ain’t it?” he asked huskily -through the trap. -</p> - -<p> -Dorian started and peered round. “This will do,” he answered, and -having got out hastily and given the driver the extra fare he had promised him, -he walked quickly in the direction of the quay. Here and there a lantern -gleamed at the stern of some huge merchantman. The light shook and splintered -in the puddles. A red glare came from an outward-bound steamer that was -coaling. The slimy pavement looked like a wet mackintosh. -</p> - -<p> -He hurried on towards the left, glancing back now and then to see if he was -being followed. In about seven or eight minutes he reached a small shabby house -that was wedged in between two gaunt factories. In one of the top-windows stood -a lamp. He stopped and gave a peculiar knock. -</p> - -<p> -After a little time he heard steps in the passage and the chain being unhooked. -The door opened quietly, and he went in without saying a word to the squat -misshapen figure that flattened itself into the shadow as he passed. At the end -of the hall hung a tattered green curtain that swayed and shook in the gusty -wind which had followed him in from the street. He dragged it aside and entered -a long low room which looked as if it had once been a third-rate -dancing-saloon. Shrill flaring gas-jets, dulled and distorted in the fly-blown -mirrors that faced them, were ranged round the walls. Greasy reflectors of -ribbed tin backed them, making quivering disks of light. The floor was covered -with ochre-coloured sawdust, trampled here and there into mud, and stained with -dark rings of spilled liquor. Some Malays were crouching by a little charcoal -stove, playing with bone counters and showing their white teeth as they -chattered. In one corner, with his head buried in his arms, a sailor sprawled -over a table, and by the tawdrily painted bar that ran across one complete side -stood two haggard women, mocking an old man who was brushing the sleeves of his -coat with an expression of disgust. “He thinks he’s got red ants on -him,” laughed one of them, as Dorian passed by. The man looked at her in -terror and began to whimper. -</p> - -<p> -At the end of the room there was a little staircase, leading to a darkened -chamber. As Dorian hurried up its three rickety steps, the heavy odour of opium -met him. He heaved a deep breath, and his nostrils quivered with pleasure. When -he entered, a young man with smooth yellow hair, who was bending over a lamp -lighting a long thin pipe, looked up at him and nodded in a hesitating manner. -</p> - -<p> -“You here, Adrian?” muttered Dorian. -</p> - -<p> -“Where else should I be?” he answered, listlessly. “None of -the chaps will speak to me now.” -</p> - -<p> -“I thought you had left England.” -</p> - -<p> -“Darlington is not going to do anything. My brother paid the bill at -last. George doesn’t speak to me either.... I don’t care,” he -added with a sigh. “As long as one has this stuff, one doesn’t want -friends. I think I have had too many friends.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian winced and looked round at the grotesque things that lay in such -fantastic postures on the ragged mattresses. The twisted limbs, the gaping -mouths, the staring lustreless eyes, fascinated him. He knew in what strange -heavens they were suffering, and what dull hells were teaching them the secret -of some new joy. They were better off than he was. He was prisoned in thought. -Memory, like a horrible malady, was eating his soul away. From time to time he -seemed to see the eyes of Basil Hallward looking at him. Yet he felt he could -not stay. The presence of Adrian Singleton troubled him. He wanted to be where -no one would know who he was. He wanted to escape from himself. -</p> - -<p> -“I am going on to the other place,” he said after a pause. -</p> - -<p> -“On the wharf?” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes.” -</p> - -<p> -“That mad-cat is sure to be there. They won’t have her in this -place now.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian shrugged his shoulders. “I am sick of women who love one. Women -who hate one are much more interesting. Besides, the stuff is better.” -</p> - -<p> -“Much the same.” -</p> - -<p> -“I like it better. Come and have something to drink. I must have -something.” -</p> - -<p> -“I don’t want anything,” murmured the young man. -</p> - -<p> -“Never mind.” -</p> - -<p> -Adrian Singleton rose up wearily and followed Dorian to the bar. A half-caste, -in a ragged turban and a shabby ulster, grinned a hideous greeting as he thrust -a bottle of brandy and two tumblers in front of them. The women sidled up and -began to chatter. Dorian turned his back on them and said something in a low -voice to Adrian Singleton. -</p> - -<p> -A crooked smile, like a Malay crease, writhed across the face of one of the -women. “We are very proud to-night,” she sneered. -</p> - -<p> -“For God’s sake don’t talk to me,” cried Dorian, -stamping his foot on the ground. “What do you want? Money? Here it is. -Don’t ever talk to me again.” -</p> - -<p> -Two red sparks flashed for a moment in the woman’s sodden eyes, then -flickered out and left them dull and glazed. She tossed her head and raked the -coins off the counter with greedy fingers. Her companion watched her enviously. -</p> - -<p> -“It’s no use,” sighed Adrian Singleton. “I don’t -care to go back. What does it matter? I am quite happy here.” -</p> - -<p> -“You will write to me if you want anything, won’t you?” said -Dorian, after a pause. -</p> - -<p> -“Perhaps.” -</p> - -<p> -“Good night, then.” -</p> - -<p> -“Good night,” answered the young man, passing up the steps and -wiping his parched mouth with a handkerchief. -</p> - -<p> -Dorian walked to the door with a look of pain in his face. As he drew the -curtain aside, a hideous laugh broke from the painted lips of the woman who had -taken his money. “There goes the devil’s bargain!” she -hiccoughed, in a hoarse voice. -</p> - -<p> -“Curse you!” he answered, “don’t call me that.” -</p> - -<p> -She snapped her fingers. “Prince Charming is what you like to be called, -ain’t it?” she yelled after him. -</p> - -<p> -The drowsy sailor leaped to his feet as she spoke, and looked wildly round. The -sound of the shutting of the hall door fell on his ear. He rushed out as if in -pursuit. -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray hurried along the quay through the drizzling rain. His meeting with -Adrian Singleton had strangely moved him, and he wondered if the ruin of that -young life was really to be laid at his door, as Basil Hallward had said to him -with such infamy of insult. He bit his lip, and for a few seconds his eyes grew -sad. Yet, after all, what did it matter to him? One’s days were too brief -to take the burden of another’s errors on one’s shoulders. Each man -lived his own life and paid his own price for living it. The only pity was one -had to pay so often for a single fault. One had to pay over and over again, -indeed. In her dealings with man, destiny never closed her accounts. -</p> - -<p> -There are moments, psychologists tell us, when the passion for sin, or for what -the world calls sin, so dominates a nature that every fibre of the body, as -every cell of the brain, seems to be instinct with fearful impulses. Men and -women at such moments lose the freedom of their will. They move to their -terrible end as automatons move. Choice is taken from them, and conscience is -either killed, or, if it lives at all, lives but to give rebellion its -fascination and disobedience its charm. For all sins, as theologians weary not -of reminding us, are sins of disobedience. When that high spirit, that morning -star of evil, fell from heaven, it was as a rebel that he fell. -</p> - -<p> -Callous, concentrated on evil, with stained mind, and soul hungry for -rebellion, Dorian Gray hastened on, quickening his step as he went, but as he -darted aside into a dim archway, that had served him often as a short cut to -the ill-famed place where he was going, he felt himself suddenly seized from -behind, and before he had time to defend himself, he was thrust back against -the wall, with a brutal hand round his throat. -</p> - -<p> -He struggled madly for life, and by a terrible effort wrenched the tightening -fingers away. In a second he heard the click of a revolver, and saw the gleam -of a polished barrel, pointing straight at his head, and the dusky form of a -short, thick-set man facing him. -</p> - -<p> -“What do you want?” he gasped. -</p> - -<p> -“Keep quiet,” said the man. “If you stir, I shoot you.” -</p> - -<p> -“You are mad. What have I done to you?” -</p> - -<p> -“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.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray grew sick with fear. “I never knew her,” he stammered. -“I never heard of her. You are mad.” -</p> - -<p> -“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 to-night for India, -and I must do my job first. One minute. That’s all.” -</p> - -<p> -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!” -</p> - -<p> -“Eighteen years,” said the man. “Why do you ask me? What do -years matter?” -</p> - -<p> -“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!” -</p> - -<p> -James Vane hesitated for a moment, not understanding what was meant. Then he -seized Dorian Gray and dragged him from the archway. -</p> - -<p> -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. -</p> - -<p> -He loosened his hold and reeled back. “My God! my God!” he cried, -“and I would have murdered you!” -</p> - -<p> -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.” -</p> - -<p> -“Forgive me, sir,” muttered James Vane. “I was deceived. A -chance word I heard in that damned den set me on the wrong track.” -</p> - -<p> -“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. -</p> - -<p> -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. -</p> - -<p> -“Why didn’t you kill him?” she hissed out, putting 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.” -</p> - -<p> -“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.” -</p> - -<p> -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.” -</p> - -<p> -“You lie!” cried James Vane. -</p> - -<p> -She raised her hand up to heaven. “Before God I am telling the -truth,” she cried. -</p> - -<p> -“Before God?” -</p> - -<p> -“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. -</p> - -<p> -“You swear this?” -</p> - -<p> -“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.” -</p> - -<p> -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. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap17"></a>CHAPTER XVII.</h2> - -<p> -A week later Dorian Gray was sitting in the conservatory at Selby Royal, -talking to the pretty Duchess of Monmouth, who with her husband, a -jaded-looking man of sixty, was amongst his guests. It was tea-time, and the -mellow light of the huge, lace-covered lamp that stood on the table lit up the -delicate china and hammered silver of the service at which the duchess was -presiding. Her white hands were moving daintily among the cups, and her full -red lips were smiling at something that Dorian had whispered to her. Lord Henry -was lying back in a silk-draped wicker chair, looking at them. On a -peach-coloured divan sat Lady Narborough, pretending to listen to the -duke’s description of the last Brazilian beetle that he had added to his -collection. Three young men in elaborate smoking-suits were handing tea-cakes -to some of the women. The house-party consisted of twelve people, and there -were more expected to arrive on the next day. -</p> - -<p> -“What are you two talking about?” said Lord Henry, strolling over -to the table and putting his cup down. “I hope Dorian has told you about -my plan for rechristening everything, Gladys. It is a delightful idea.” -</p> - -<p> -“But I don’t want to be rechristened, Harry,” rejoined the -duchess, looking up at him with her wonderful eyes. “I am quite satisfied -with my own name, and I am sure Mr. Gray should be satisfied with his.” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear Gladys, I would not alter either name for the world. They are -both perfect. I was thinking chiefly of flowers. Yesterday I cut an orchid, for -my button-hole. It was a marvellous spotted thing, as effective as the seven -deadly sins. In a thoughtless moment I asked one of the gardeners what it was -called. He told me it was a fine specimen of <i>Robinsoniana</i>, or something -dreadful of that kind. It is a sad truth, but we have lost the faculty of -giving lovely names to things. Names are everything. I never quarrel with -actions. My one quarrel is with words. That is the reason I hate vulgar realism -in literature. The man who could call a spade a spade should be compelled to -use one. It is the only thing he is fit for.” -</p> - -<p> -“Then what should we call you, Harry?” she asked. -</p> - -<p> -“His name is Prince Paradox,” said Dorian. -</p> - -<p> -“I recognize him in a flash,” exclaimed the duchess. -</p> - -<p> -“I won’t hear of it,” laughed Lord Henry, sinking into a -chair. “From a label there is no escape! I refuse the title.” -</p> - -<p> -“Royalties may not abdicate,” fell as a warning from pretty lips. -</p> - -<p> -“You wish me to defend my throne, then?” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes.” -</p> - -<p> -“I give the truths of to-morrow.” -</p> - -<p> -“I prefer the mistakes of to-day,” she answered. -</p> - -<p> -“You disarm me, Gladys,” he cried, catching the wilfulness of her -mood. -</p> - -<p> -“Of your shield, Harry, not of your spear.” -</p> - -<p> -“I never tilt against beauty,” he said, with a wave of his hand. -</p> - -<p> -“That is your error, Harry, believe me. You value beauty far too -much.” -</p> - -<p> -“How can you say that? I admit that I think that it is better to be -beautiful than to be good. But on the other hand, no one is more ready than I -am to acknowledge that it is better to be good than to be ugly.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ugliness is one of the seven deadly sins, then?” cried the -duchess. “What becomes of your simile about the orchid?” -</p> - -<p> -“Ugliness is one of the seven deadly virtues, Gladys. You, as a good -Tory, must not underrate them. Beer, the Bible, and the seven deadly virtues -have made our England what she is.” -</p> - -<p> -“You don’t like your country, then?” she asked. -</p> - -<p> -“I live in it.” -</p> - -<p> -“That you may censure it the better.” -</p> - -<p> -“Would you have me take the verdict of Europe on it?” he inquired. -</p> - -<p> -“What do they say of us?” -</p> - -<p> -“That Tartuffe has emigrated to England and opened a shop.” -</p> - -<p> -“Is that yours, Harry?” -</p> - -<p> -“I give it to you.” -</p> - -<p> -“I could not use it. It is too true.” -</p> - -<p> -“You need not be afraid. Our countrymen never recognize a -description.” -</p> - -<p> -“They are practical.” -</p> - -<p> -“They are more cunning than practical. When they make up their ledger, -they balance stupidity by wealth, and vice by hypocrisy.” -</p> - -<p> -“Still, we have done great things.” -</p> - -<p> -“Great things have been thrust on us, Gladys.” -</p> - -<p> -“We have carried their burden.” -</p> - -<p> -“Only as far as the Stock Exchange.” -</p> - -<p> -She shook her head. “I believe in the race,” she cried. -</p> - -<p> -“It represents the survival of the pushing.” -</p> - -<p> -“It has development.” -</p> - -<p> -“Decay fascinates me more.” -</p> - -<p> -“What of art?” she asked. -</p> - -<p> -“It is a malady.” -</p> - -<p> -“Love?” -</p> - -<p> -“An illusion.” -</p> - -<p> -“Religion?” -</p> - -<p> -“The fashionable substitute for belief.” -</p> - -<p> -“You are a sceptic.” -</p> - -<p> -“Never! Scepticism is the beginning of faith.” -</p> - -<p> -“What are you?” -</p> - -<p> -“To define is to limit.” -</p> - -<p> -“Give me a clue.” -</p> - -<p> -“Threads snap. You would lose your way in the labyrinth.” -</p> - -<p> -“You bewilder me. Let us talk of some one else.” -</p> - -<p> -“Our host is a delightful topic. Years ago he was christened Prince -Charming.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! don’t remind me of that,” cried Dorian Gray. -</p> - -<p> -“Our host is rather horrid this evening,” answered the duchess, -colouring. “I believe he thinks that Monmouth married me on purely -scientific principles as the best specimen he could find of a modern -butterfly.” -</p> - -<p> -“Well, I hope he won’t stick pins into you, Duchess,” laughed -Dorian. -</p> - -<p> -“Oh! my maid does that already, Mr. Gray, when she is annoyed with -me.” -</p> - -<p> -“And what does she get annoyed with you about, Duchess?” -</p> - -<p> -“For the most trivial things, Mr. Gray, I assure you. Usually because I -come in at ten minutes to nine and tell her that I must be dressed by half-past -eight.” -</p> - -<p> -“How unreasonable of her! You should give her warning.” -</p> - -<p> -“I daren’t, Mr. Gray. Why, she invents hats for me. You remember -the one I wore at Lady Hilstone’s garden-party? You don’t, but it -is nice of you to pretend that you do. Well, she made it out of nothing. All -good hats are made out of nothing.” -</p> - -<p> -“Like all good reputations, Gladys,” interrupted Lord Henry. -“Every effect that one produces gives one an enemy. To be popular one -must be a mediocrity.” -</p> - -<p> -“Not with women,” said the duchess, shaking her head; “and -women rule the world. I assure you we can’t bear mediocrities. We women, -as some one says, love with our ears, just as you men love with your eyes, if -you ever love at all.” -</p> - -<p> -“It seems to me that we never do anything else,” murmured Dorian. -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! then, you never really love, Mr. Gray,” answered the duchess -with mock sadness. -</p> - -<p> -“My dear Gladys!” cried Lord Henry. “How can you say that? -Romance lives by repetition, and repetition converts an appetite into an art. -Besides, each time that one loves is the only time one has ever loved. -Difference of object does not alter singleness of passion. It merely -intensifies it. We can have in life but one great experience at best, and the -secret of life is to reproduce that experience as often as possible.” -</p> - -<p> -“Even when one has been wounded by it, Harry?” asked the duchess -after a pause. -</p> - -<p> -“Especially when one has been wounded by it,” answered Lord Henry. -</p> - -<p> -The duchess turned and looked at Dorian Gray with a curious expression in her -eyes. “What do you say to that, Mr. Gray?” she inquired. -</p> - -<p> -Dorian hesitated for a moment. Then he threw his head back and laughed. -“I always agree with Harry, Duchess.” -</p> - -<p> -“Even when he is wrong?” -</p> - -<p> -“Harry is never wrong, Duchess.” -</p> - -<p> -“And does his philosophy make you happy?” -</p> - -<p> -“I have never searched for happiness. Who wants happiness? I have -searched for pleasure.” -</p> - -<p> -“And found it, Mr. Gray?” -</p> - -<p> -“Often. Too often.” -</p> - -<p> -The duchess sighed. “I am searching for peace,” she said, -“and if I don’t go and dress, I shall have none this -evening.” -</p> - -<p> -“Let me get you some orchids, Duchess,” cried Dorian, starting to -his feet and walking down the conservatory. -</p> - -<p> -“You are flirting disgracefully with him,” said Lord Henry to his -cousin. “You had better take care. He is very fascinating.” -</p> - -<p> -“If he were not, there would be no battle.” -</p> - -<p> -“Greek meets Greek, then?” -</p> - -<p> -“I am on the side of the Trojans. They fought for a woman.” -</p> - -<p> -“They were defeated.” -</p> - -<p> -“There are worse things than capture,” she answered. -</p> - -<p> -“You gallop with a loose rein.” -</p> - -<p> -“Pace gives life,” was the <i>riposte</i>. -</p> - -<p> -“I shall write it in my diary to-night.” -</p> - -<p> -“What?” -</p> - -<p> -“That a burnt child loves the fire.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am not even singed. My wings are untouched.” -</p> - -<p> -“You use them for everything, except flight.” -</p> - -<p> -“Courage has passed from men to women. It is a new experience for -us.” -</p> - -<p> -“You have a rival.” -</p> - -<p> -“Who?” -</p> - -<p> -He laughed. “Lady Narborough,” he whispered. “She perfectly -adores him.” -</p> - -<p> -“You fill me with apprehension. The appeal to antiquity is fatal to us -who are romanticists.” -</p> - -<p> -“Romanticists! You have all the methods of science.” -</p> - -<p> -“Men have educated us.” -</p> - -<p> -“But not explained you.” -</p> - -<p> -“Describe us as a sex,” was her challenge. -</p> - -<p> -“Sphinxes without secrets.” -</p> - -<p> -She looked at him, smiling. “How long Mr. Gray is!” she said. -“Let us go and help him. I have not yet told him the colour of my -frock.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! you must suit your frock to his flowers, Gladys.” -</p> - -<p> -“That would be a premature surrender.” -</p> - -<p> -“Romantic art begins with its climax.” -</p> - -<p> -“I must keep an opportunity for retreat.” -</p> - -<p> -“In the Parthian manner?” -</p> - -<p> -“They found safety in the desert. I could not do that.” -</p> - -<p> -“Women are not always allowed a choice,” he answered, but hardly -had he finished the sentence before from the far end of the conservatory came a -stifled groan, followed by the dull sound of a heavy fall. Everybody started -up. The duchess stood motionless in horror. And with fear in his eyes, Lord -Henry rushed through the flapping palms to find Dorian Gray lying face -downwards on the tiled floor in a deathlike swoon. -</p> - -<p> -He was carried at once into the blue drawing-room and laid upon one of the -sofas. After a short time, he came to himself and looked round with a dazed -expression. -</p> - -<p> -“What has happened?” he asked. “Oh! I remember. Am I safe -here, Harry?” He began to tremble. -</p> - -<p> -“My dear Dorian,” answered Lord Henry, “you merely fainted. -That was all. You must have overtired yourself. You had better not come down to -dinner. I will take your place.” -</p> - -<p> -“No, I will come down,” he said, struggling to his feet. “I -would rather come down. I must not be alone.” -</p> - -<p> -He went to his room and dressed. There was a wild recklessness of gaiety in his -manner as he sat at table, but now and then a thrill of terror ran through him -when he remembered that, pressed against the window of the conservatory, like a -white handkerchief, he had seen the face of James Vane watching him. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap18"></a>CHAPTER XVIII.</h2> - -<p> -The next day he did not leave the house, and, indeed, spent most of the time in -his own room, sick with a wild terror of dying, and yet indifferent to life -itself. The consciousness of being hunted, snared, tracked down, had begun to -dominate him. If the tapestry did but tremble in the wind, he shook. The dead -leaves that were blown against the leaded panes seemed to him like his own -wasted resolutions and wild regrets. When he closed his eyes, he saw again the -sailor’s face peering through the mist-stained glass, and horror seemed -once more to lay its hand upon his heart. -</p> - -<p> -But perhaps it had been only his fancy that had called vengeance out of the -night and set the hideous shapes of punishment before him. Actual life was -chaos, but there was something terribly logical in the imagination. It was the -imagination that set remorse to dog the feet of sin. It was the imagination -that made each crime bear its misshapen brood. In the common world of fact the -wicked were not punished, nor the good rewarded. Success was given to the -strong, failure thrust upon the weak. That was all. Besides, had any stranger -been prowling round the house, he would have been seen by the servants or the -keepers. Had any foot-marks been found on the flower-beds, the gardeners would -have reported it. Yes, it had been merely fancy. Sibyl Vane’s brother had -not come back to kill him. He had sailed away in his ship to founder in some -winter sea. From him, at any rate, he was safe. Why, the man did not know who -he was, could not know who he was. The mask of youth had saved him. -</p> - -<p> -And yet if it had been merely an illusion, how terrible it was to think that -conscience could raise such fearful phantoms, and give them visible form, and -make them move before one! What sort of life would his be if, day and night, -shadows of his crime were to peer at him from silent corners, to mock him from -secret places, to whisper in his ear as he sat at the feast, to wake him with -icy fingers as he lay asleep! As the thought crept through his brain, he grew -pale with terror, and the air seemed to him to have become suddenly colder. Oh! -in what a wild hour of madness he had killed his friend! How ghastly the mere -memory of the scene! He saw it all again. Each hideous detail came back to him -with added horror. Out of the black cave of time, terrible and swathed in -scarlet, rose the image of his sin. When Lord Henry came in at six -o’clock, he found him crying as one whose heart will break. -</p> - -<p> -It was not till the third day that he ventured to go out. There was something -in the clear, pine-scented air of that winter morning that seemed to bring him -back his joyousness and his ardour for life. But it was not merely the physical -conditions of environment that had caused the change. His own nature had -revolted against the excess of anguish that had sought to maim and mar the -perfection of its calm. With subtle and finely wrought temperaments it is -always so. Their strong passions must either bruise or bend. They either slay -the man, or themselves die. Shallow sorrows and shallow loves live on. The -loves and sorrows that are great are destroyed by their own plenitude. Besides, -he had convinced himself that he had been the victim of a terror-stricken -imagination, and looked back now on his fears with something of pity and not a -little of contempt. -</p> - -<p> -After breakfast, he walked with the duchess for an hour in the garden and then -drove across the park to join the shooting-party. The crisp frost lay like salt -upon the grass. The sky was an inverted cup of blue metal. A thin film of ice -bordered the flat, reed-grown lake. -</p> - -<p> -At the corner of the pine-wood he caught sight of Sir Geoffrey Clouston, the -duchess’s brother, jerking two spent cartridges out of his gun. He jumped -from the cart, and having told the groom to take the mare home, made his way -towards his guest through the withered bracken and rough undergrowth. -</p> - -<p> -“Have you had good sport, Geoffrey?” he asked. -</p> - -<p> -“Not very good, Dorian. I think most of the birds have gone to the open. -I dare say it will be better after lunch, when we get to new ground.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian strolled along by his side. The keen aromatic air, the brown and red -lights that glimmered in the wood, the hoarse cries of the beaters ringing out -from time to time, and the sharp snaps of the guns that followed, fascinated -him and filled him with a sense of delightful freedom. He was dominated by the -carelessness of happiness, by the high indifference of joy. -</p> - -<p> -Suddenly from a lumpy tussock of old grass some twenty yards in front of them, -with black-tipped ears erect and long hinder limbs throwing it forward, started -a hare. It bolted for a thicket of alders. Sir Geoffrey put his gun to his -shoulder, but there was something in the animal’s grace of movement that -strangely charmed Dorian Gray, and he cried out at once, “Don’t -shoot it, Geoffrey. Let it live.” -</p> - -<p> -“What nonsense, Dorian!” laughed his companion, and as the hare -bounded into the thicket, he fired. There were two cries heard, the cry of a -hare in pain, which is dreadful, the cry of a man in agony, which is worse. -</p> - -<p> -“Good heavens! I have hit a beater!” exclaimed Sir Geoffrey. -“What an ass the man was to get in front of the guns! Stop shooting -there!” he called out at the top of his voice. “A man is -hurt.” -</p> - -<p> -The head-keeper came running up with a stick in his hand. -</p> - -<p> -“Where, sir? Where is he?” he shouted. At the same time, the firing -ceased along the line. -</p> - -<p> -“Here,” answered Sir Geoffrey angrily, hurrying towards the -thicket. “Why on earth don’t you keep your men back? Spoiled my -shooting for the day.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian watched them as they plunged into the alder-clump, brushing the lithe -swinging branches aside. In a few moments they emerged, dragging a body after -them into the sunlight. He turned away in horror. It seemed to him that -misfortune followed wherever he went. He heard Sir Geoffrey ask if the man was -really dead, and the affirmative answer of the keeper. The wood seemed to him -to have become suddenly alive with faces. There was the trampling of myriad -feet and the low buzz of voices. A great copper-breasted pheasant came beating -through the boughs overhead. -</p> - -<p> -After a few moments—that were to him, in his perturbed state, like -endless hours of pain—he felt a hand laid on his shoulder. He started and -looked round. -</p> - -<p> -“Dorian,” said Lord Henry, “I had better tell them that the -shooting is stopped for to-day. It would not look well to go on.” -</p> - -<p> -“I wish it were stopped for ever, Harry,” he answered bitterly. -“The whole thing is hideous and cruel. Is the man ...?” -</p> - -<p> -He could not finish the sentence. -</p> - -<p> -“I am afraid so,” rejoined Lord Henry. “He got the whole -charge of shot in his chest. He must have died almost instantaneously. Come; -let us go home.” -</p> - -<p> -They walked side by side in the direction of the avenue for nearly fifty yards -without speaking. Then Dorian looked at Lord Henry and said, with a heavy sigh, -“It is a bad omen, Harry, a very bad omen.” -</p> - -<p> -“What is?” asked Lord Henry. “Oh! this accident, I suppose. -My dear fellow, it can’t be helped. It was the man’s own fault. Why -did he get in front of the guns? Besides, it is nothing to us. It is rather -awkward for Geoffrey, of course. It does not do to pepper beaters. It makes -people think that one is a wild shot. And Geoffrey is not; he shoots very -straight. But there is no use talking about the matter.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian shook his head. “It is a bad omen, Harry. I feel as if something -horrible were going to happen to some of us. To myself, perhaps,” he -added, passing his hand over his eyes, with a gesture of pain. -</p> - -<p> -The elder man laughed. “The only horrible thing in the world is -<i>ennui</i>, Dorian. That is the one sin for which there is no forgiveness. -But we are not likely to suffer from it unless these fellows keep chattering -about this thing at dinner. I must tell them that the subject is to be tabooed. -As for omens, there is no such thing as an omen. Destiny does not send us -heralds. She is too wise or too cruel for that. Besides, what on earth could -happen to you, Dorian? You have everything in the world that a man can want. -There is no one who would not be delighted to change places with you.” -</p> - -<p> -“There is no one with whom I would not change places, Harry. Don’t -laugh like that. I am telling you the truth. The wretched peasant who has just -died is better off than I am. I have no terror of death. It is the coming of -death that terrifies me. Its monstrous wings seem to wheel in the leaden air -around me. Good heavens! don’t you see a man moving behind the trees -there, watching me, waiting for me?” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry looked in the direction in which the trembling gloved hand was -pointing. “Yes,” he said, smiling, “I see the gardener -waiting for you. I suppose he wants to ask you what flowers you wish to have on -the table to-night. How absurdly nervous you are, my dear fellow! You must come -and see my doctor, when we get back to town.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian heaved a sigh of relief as he saw the gardener approaching. The man -touched his hat, glanced for a moment at Lord Henry in a hesitating manner, and -then produced a letter, which he handed to his master. “Her Grace told me -to wait for an answer,” he murmured. -</p> - -<p> -Dorian put the letter into his pocket. “Tell her Grace that I am coming -in,” he said, coldly. The man turned round and went rapidly in the -direction of the house. -</p> - -<p> -“How fond women are of doing dangerous things!” laughed Lord Henry. -“It is one of the qualities in them that I admire most. A woman will -flirt with anybody in the world as long as other people are looking on.” -</p> - -<p> -“How fond you are of saying dangerous things, Harry! In the present -instance, you are quite astray. I like the duchess very much, but I don’t -love her.” -</p> - -<p> -“And the duchess loves you very much, but she likes you less, so you are -excellently matched.” -</p> - -<p> -“You are talking scandal, Harry, and there is never any basis for -scandal.” -</p> - -<p> -“The basis of every scandal is an immoral certainty,” said Lord -Henry, lighting a cigarette. -</p> - -<p> -“You would sacrifice anybody, Harry, for the sake of an epigram.” -</p> - -<p> -“The world goes to the altar of its own accord,” was the answer. -</p> - -<p> -“I wish I could love,” cried Dorian Gray with a deep note of pathos -in his voice. “But I seem to have lost the passion and forgotten the -desire. I am too much concentrated on myself. My own personality has become a -burden to me. I want to escape, to go away, to forget. It was silly of me to -come down here at all. I think I shall send a wire to Harvey to have the yacht -got ready. On a yacht one is safe.” -</p> - -<p> -“Safe from what, Dorian? You are in some trouble. Why not tell me what it -is? You know I would help you.” -</p> - -<p> -“I can’t tell you, Harry,” he answered sadly. “And I -dare say it is only a fancy of mine. This unfortunate accident has upset me. I -have a horrible presentiment that something of the kind may happen to -me.” -</p> - -<p> -“What nonsense!” -</p> - -<p> -“I hope it is, but I can’t help feeling it. Ah! here is the -duchess, looking like Artemis in a tailor-made gown. You see we have come back, -Duchess.” -</p> - -<p> -“I have heard all about it, Mr. Gray,” she answered. “Poor -Geoffrey is terribly upset. And it seems that you asked him not to shoot the -hare. How curious!” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, it was very curious. I don’t know what made me say it. Some -whim, I suppose. It looked the loveliest of little live things. But I am sorry -they told you about the man. It is a hideous subject.” -</p> - -<p> -“It is an annoying subject,” broke in Lord Henry. “It has no -psychological value at all. Now if Geoffrey had done the thing on purpose, how -interesting he would be! I should like to know some one who had committed a -real murder.” -</p> - -<p> -“How horrid of you, Harry!” cried the duchess. “Isn’t -it, Mr. Gray? Harry, Mr. Gray is ill again. He is going to faint.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian drew himself up with an effort and smiled. “It is nothing, -Duchess,” he murmured; “my nerves are dreadfully out of order. That -is all. I am afraid I walked too far this morning. I didn’t hear what -Harry said. Was it very bad? You must tell me some other time. I think I must -go and lie down. You will excuse me, won’t you?” -</p> - -<p> -They had reached the great flight of steps that led from the conservatory on to -the terrace. As the glass door closed behind Dorian, Lord Henry turned and -looked at the duchess with his slumberous eyes. “Are you very much in -love with him?” he asked. -</p> - -<p> -She did not answer for some time, but stood gazing at the landscape. “I -wish I knew,” she said at last. -</p> - -<p> -He shook his head. “Knowledge would be fatal. It is the uncertainty that -charms one. A mist makes things wonderful.” -</p> - -<p> -“One may lose one’s way.” -</p> - -<p> -“All ways end at the same point, my dear Gladys.” -</p> - -<p> -“What is that?” -</p> - -<p> -“Disillusion.” -</p> - -<p> -“It was my <i>début</i> in life,” she sighed. -</p> - -<p> -“It came to you crowned.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am tired of strawberry leaves.” -</p> - -<p> -“They become you.” -</p> - -<p> -“Only in public.” -</p> - -<p> -“You would miss them,” said Lord Henry. -</p> - -<p> -“I will not part with a petal.” -</p> - -<p> -“Monmouth has ears.” -</p> - -<p> -“Old age is dull of hearing.” -</p> - -<p> -“Has he never been jealous?” -</p> - -<p> -“I wish he had been.” -</p> - -<p> -He glanced about as if in search of something. “What are you looking -for?” she inquired. -</p> - -<p> -“The button from your foil,” he answered. “You have dropped -it.” -</p> - -<p> -She laughed. “I have still the mask.” -</p> - -<p> -“It makes your eyes lovelier,” was his reply. -</p> - -<p> -She laughed again. Her teeth showed like white seeds in a scarlet fruit. -</p> - -<p> -Upstairs, in his own room, Dorian Gray was lying on a sofa, with terror in -every tingling fibre of his body. Life had suddenly become too hideous a burden -for him to bear. The dreadful death of the unlucky beater, shot in the thicket -like a wild animal, had seemed to him to pre-figure death for himself also. He -had nearly swooned at what Lord Henry had said in a chance mood of cynical -jesting. -</p> - -<p> -At five o’clock he rang his bell for his servant and gave him orders to -pack his things for the night-express to town, and to have the brougham at the -door by eight-thirty. He was determined not to sleep another night at Selby -Royal. It was an ill-omened place. Death walked there in the sunlight. The -grass of the forest had been spotted with blood. -</p> - -<p> -Then he wrote a note to Lord Henry, telling him that he was going up to town to -consult his doctor and asking him to entertain his guests in his absence. As he -was putting it into the envelope, a knock came to the door, and his valet -informed him that the head-keeper wished to see him. He frowned and bit his -lip. “Send him in,” he muttered, after some moments’ -hesitation. -</p> - -<p> -As soon as the man entered, Dorian pulled his chequebook out of a drawer and -spread it out before him. -</p> - -<p> -“I suppose you have come about the unfortunate accident of this morning, -Thornton?” he said, taking up a pen. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, sir,” answered the gamekeeper. -</p> - -<p> -“Was the poor fellow married? Had he any people dependent on him?” -asked Dorian, looking bored. “If so, I should not like them to be left in -want, and will send them any sum of money you may think necessary.” -</p> - -<p> -“We don’t know who he is, sir. That is what I took the liberty of -coming to you about.” -</p> - -<p> -“Don’t know who he is?” said Dorian, listlessly. “What -do you mean? Wasn’t he one of your men?” -</p> - -<p> -“No, sir. Never saw him before. Seems like a sailor, sir.” -</p> - -<p> -The pen dropped from Dorian Gray’s hand, and he felt as if his heart had -suddenly stopped beating. “A sailor?” he cried out. “Did you -say a sailor?” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, sir. He looks as if he had been a sort of sailor; tattooed on both -arms, and that kind of thing.” -</p> - -<p> -“Was there anything found on him?” said Dorian, leaning forward and -looking at the man with startled eyes. “Anything that would tell his -name?” -</p> - -<p> -“Some money, sir—not much, and a six-shooter. There was no name of -any kind. A decent-looking man, sir, but rough-like. A sort of sailor we -think.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian started to his feet. A terrible hope fluttered past him. He clutched at -it madly. “Where is the body?” he exclaimed. “Quick! I must -see it at once.” -</p> - -<p> -“It is in an empty stable in the Home Farm, sir. The folk don’t -like to have that sort of thing in their houses. They say a corpse brings bad -luck.” -</p> - -<p> -“The Home Farm! Go there at once and meet me. Tell one of the grooms to -bring my horse round. No. Never mind. I’ll go to the stables myself. It -will save time.” -</p> - -<p> -In less than a quarter of an hour, Dorian Gray was galloping down the long -avenue as hard as he could go. The trees seemed to sweep past him in spectral -procession, and wild shadows to fling themselves across his path. Once the mare -swerved at a white gate-post and nearly threw him. He lashed her across the -neck with his crop. She cleft the dusky air like an arrow. The stones flew from -her hoofs. -</p> - -<p> -At last he reached the Home Farm. Two men were loitering in the yard. He leaped -from the saddle and threw the reins to one of them. In the farthest stable a -light was glimmering. Something seemed to tell him that the body was there, and -he hurried to the door and put his hand upon the latch. -</p> - -<p> -There he paused for a moment, feeling that he was on the brink of a discovery -that would either make or mar his life. Then he thrust the door open and -entered. -</p> - -<p> -On a heap of sacking in the far corner was lying the dead body of a man dressed -in a coarse shirt and a pair of blue trousers. A spotted handkerchief had been -placed over the face. A coarse candle, stuck in a bottle, sputtered beside it. -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray shuddered. He felt that his could not be the hand to take the -handkerchief away, and called out to one of the farm-servants to come to him. -</p> - -<p> -“Take that thing off the face. I wish to see it,” he said, -clutching at the door-post for support. -</p> - -<p> -When the farm-servant had done so, he stepped forward. A cry of joy broke from -his lips. The man who had been shot in the thicket was James Vane. -</p> - -<p> -He stood there for some minutes looking at the dead body. As he rode home, his -eyes were full of tears, for he knew he was safe. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap19"></a>CHAPTER XIX.</h2> - -<p> -“There is no use your telling me that you are going to be good,” -cried Lord Henry, dipping his white fingers into a red copper bowl filled with -rose-water. “You are quite perfect. Pray, don’t change.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray shook his head. “No, Harry, I have done too many dreadful -things in my life. I am not going to do any more. I began my good actions -yesterday.” -</p> - -<p> -“Where were you yesterday?” -</p> - -<p> -“In the country, Harry. I was staying at a little inn by myself.” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear boy,” said Lord Henry, smiling, “anybody can be good -in the country. There are no temptations there. That is the reason why people -who live out of town are so absolutely uncivilized. Civilization is not by any -means an easy thing to attain to. There are only two ways by which man can -reach it. One is by being cultured, the other by being corrupt. Country people -have no opportunity of being either, so they stagnate.” -</p> - -<p> -“Culture and corruption,” echoed Dorian. “I have known -something of both. It seems terrible to me now that they should ever be found -together. For I have a new ideal, Harry. I am going to alter. I think I have -altered.” -</p> - -<p> -“You have not yet told me what your good action was. Or did you say you -had done more than one?” asked his companion as he spilled into his plate -a little crimson pyramid of seeded strawberries and, through a perforated, -shell-shaped spoon, snowed white sugar upon them. -</p> - -<p> -“I can tell you, Harry. It is not a story I could tell to any one else. I -spared somebody. It sounds vain, but you understand what I mean. She was quite -beautiful and wonderfully like Sibyl Vane. I think it was that which first -attracted me to her. You remember Sibyl, don’t you? How long ago that -seems! Well, Hetty was not one of our own class, of course. She was simply a -girl in a village. But I really loved her. I am quite sure that I loved her. -All during this wonderful May that we have been having, I used to run down and -see her two or three times a week. Yesterday she met me in a little orchard. -The apple-blossoms kept tumbling down on her hair, and she was laughing. We -were to have gone away together this morning at dawn. Suddenly I determined to -leave her as flowerlike as I had found her.” -</p> - -<p> -“I should think the novelty of the emotion must have given you a thrill -of real pleasure, Dorian,” interrupted Lord Henry. “But I can -finish your idyll for you. You gave her good advice and broke her heart. That -was the beginning of your reformation.” -</p> - -<p> -“Harry, you are horrible! You mustn’t say these dreadful things. -Hetty’s heart is not broken. Of course, she cried and all that. But there -is no disgrace upon her. She can live, like Perdita, in her garden of mint and -marigold.” -</p> - -<p> -“And weep over a faithless Florizel,” said Lord Henry, laughing, as -he leaned back in his chair. “My dear Dorian, you have the most curiously -boyish moods. Do you think this girl will ever be really content now with any -one of her own rank? I suppose she will be married some day to a rough carter -or a grinning ploughman. Well, the fact of having met you, and loved you, will -teach her to despise her husband, and she will be wretched. From a moral point -of view, I cannot say that I think much of your great renunciation. Even as a -beginning, it is poor. Besides, how do you know that Hetty isn’t floating -at the present moment in some starlit mill-pond, with lovely water-lilies round -her, like Ophelia?” -</p> - -<p> -“I can’t bear this, Harry! You mock at everything, and then suggest -the most serious tragedies. I am sorry I told you now. I don’t care what -you say to me. I know I was right in acting as I did. Poor Hetty! As I rode -past the farm this morning, I saw her white face at the window, like a spray of -jasmine. Don’t let us talk about it any more, and don’t try to -persuade me that the first good action I have done for years, the first little -bit of self-sacrifice I have ever known, is really a sort of sin. I want to be -better. I am going to be better. Tell me something about yourself. What is -going on in town? I have not been to the club for days.” -</p> - -<p> -“The people are still discussing poor Basil’s disappearance.” -</p> - -<p> -“I should have thought they had got tired of that by this time,” -said Dorian, pouring himself out some wine and frowning slightly. -</p> - -<p> -“My dear boy, they have only been talking about it for six weeks, and the -British public are really not equal to the mental strain of having more than -one topic every three months. They have been very fortunate lately, however. -They have had my own divorce-case and Alan Campbell’s suicide. Now they -have got the mysterious disappearance of an artist. Scotland Yard still insists -that the man in the grey ulster who left for Paris by the midnight train on the -ninth of November was poor Basil, and the French police declare that Basil -never arrived in Paris at all. I suppose in about a fortnight we shall be told -that he has been seen in San Francisco. It is an odd thing, but every one who -disappears is said to be seen at San Francisco. It must be a delightful city, -and possess all the attractions of the next world.” -</p> - -<p> -“What do you think has happened to Basil?” asked Dorian, holding up -his Burgundy against the light and wondering how it was that he could discuss -the matter so calmly. -</p> - -<p> -“I have not the slightest idea. If Basil chooses to hide himself, it is -no business of mine. If he is dead, I don’t want to think about him. -Death is the only thing that ever terrifies me. I hate it.” -</p> - -<p> -“Why?” said the younger man wearily. -</p> - -<p> -“Because,” said Lord Henry, passing beneath his nostrils the gilt -trellis of an open vinaigrette box, “one can survive everything nowadays -except that. Death and vulgarity are the only two facts in the nineteenth -century that one cannot explain away. Let us have our coffee in the music-room, -Dorian. You must play Chopin to me. The man with whom my wife ran away played -Chopin exquisitely. Poor Victoria! I was very fond of her. The house is rather -lonely without her. Of course, married life is merely a habit, a bad habit. But -then one regrets the loss even of one’s worst habits. Perhaps one regrets -them the most. They are such an essential part of one’s -personality.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian said nothing, but rose from the table, and passing into the next room, -sat down to the piano and let his fingers stray across the white and black -ivory of the keys. After the coffee had been brought in, he stopped, and -looking over at Lord Henry, said, “Harry, did it ever occur to you that -Basil was murdered?” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry yawned. “Basil was very popular, and always wore a Waterbury -watch. Why should he have been murdered? He was not clever enough to have -enemies. Of course, he had a wonderful genius for painting. But a man can paint -like Velasquez and yet be as dull as possible. Basil was really rather dull. He -only interested me once, and that was when he told me, years ago, that he had a -wild adoration for you and that you were the dominant motive of his art.” -</p> - -<p> -“I was very fond of Basil,” said Dorian with a note of sadness in -his voice. “But don’t people say that he was murdered?” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh, some of the papers do. It does not seem to me to be at all probable. -I know there are dreadful places in Paris, but Basil was not the sort of man to -have gone to them. He had no curiosity. It was his chief defect.” -</p> - -<p> -“What would you say, Harry, if I told you that I had murdered -Basil?” said the younger man. He watched him intently after he had -spoken. -</p> - -<p> -“I would say, my dear fellow, that you were posing for a character that -doesn’t suit you. All crime is vulgar, just as all vulgarity is crime. It -is not in you, Dorian, to commit a murder. I am sorry if I hurt your vanity by -saying so, but I assure you it is true. Crime belongs exclusively to the lower -orders. I don’t blame them in the smallest degree. I should fancy that -crime was to them what art is to us, simply a method of procuring extraordinary -sensations.” -</p> - -<p> -“A method of procuring sensations? Do you think, then, that a man who has -once committed a murder could possibly do the same crime again? Don’t -tell me that.” -</p> - -<p> -“Oh! anything becomes a pleasure if one does it too often,” cried -Lord Henry, laughing. “That is one of the most important secrets of life. -I should fancy, however, that murder is always a mistake. One should never do -anything that one cannot talk about after dinner. But let us pass from poor -Basil. I wish I could believe that he had come to such a really romantic end as -you suggest, but I can’t. I dare say he fell into the Seine off an -omnibus and that the conductor hushed up the scandal. Yes: I should fancy that -was his end. I see him lying now on his back under those dull-green waters, -with the heavy barges floating over him and long weeds catching in his hair. Do -you know, I don’t think he would have done much more good work. During -the last ten years his painting had gone off very much.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian heaved a sigh, and Lord Henry strolled across the room and began to -stroke the head of a curious Java parrot, a large, grey-plumaged bird with pink -crest and tail, that was balancing itself upon a bamboo perch. As his pointed -fingers touched it, it dropped the white scurf of crinkled lids over black, -glasslike eyes and began to sway backwards and forwards. -</p> - -<p> -“Yes,” he continued, turning round and taking his handkerchief out -of his pocket; “his painting had quite gone off. It seemed to me to have -lost something. It had lost an ideal. When you and he ceased to be great -friends, he ceased to be a great artist. What was it separated you? I suppose -he bored you. If so, he never forgave you. It’s a habit bores have. By -the way, what has become of that wonderful portrait he did of you? I -don’t think I have ever seen it since he finished it. Oh! I remember your -telling me years ago that you had sent it down to Selby, and that it had got -mislaid or stolen on the way. You never got it back? What a pity! it was really -a masterpiece. I remember I wanted to buy it. I wish I had now. It belonged to -Basil’s best period. Since then, his work was that curious mixture of bad -painting and good intentions that always entitles a man to be called a -representative British artist. Did you advertise for it? You should.” -</p> - -<p> -“I forget,” said Dorian. “I suppose I did. But I never really -liked it. I am sorry I sat for it. The memory of the thing is hateful to me. -Why do you talk of it? It used to remind me of those curious lines in some -play—Hamlet, I think—how do they run?— -</p> - -<p class="poem"> -“Like the painting of a sorrow,<br /> -A face without a heart.” -</p> - -<p class="noindent"> -Yes: that is what it was like.” -</p> - -<p> -Lord Henry laughed. “If a man treats life artistically, his brain is his -heart,” he answered, sinking into an arm-chair. -</p> - -<p> -Dorian Gray shook his head and struck some soft chords on the piano. -“‘Like the painting of a sorrow,’” he repeated, -“‘a face without a heart.’” -</p> - -<p> -The elder man lay back and looked at him with half-closed eyes. “By the -way, Dorian,” he said after a pause, “‘what does it profit a -man if he gain the whole world and lose—how does the quotation -run?—his own soul’?” -</p> - -<p> -The music jarred, and Dorian Gray started and stared at his friend. “Why -do you ask me that, Harry?” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear fellow,” said Lord Henry, elevating his eyebrows in -surprise, “I asked you because I thought you might be able to give me an -answer. That is all. I was going through the park last Sunday, and close by the -Marble Arch there stood a little crowd of shabby-looking people listening to -some vulgar street-preacher. As I passed by, I heard the man yelling out that -question to his audience. It struck me as being rather dramatic. London is very -rich in curious effects of that kind. A wet Sunday, an uncouth Christian in a -mackintosh, a ring of sickly white faces under a broken roof of dripping -umbrellas, and a wonderful phrase flung into the air by shrill hysterical -lips—it was really very good in its way, quite a suggestion. I thought of -telling the prophet that art had a soul, but that man had not. I am afraid, -however, he would not have understood me.” -</p> - -<p> -“Don’t, Harry. The soul is a terrible reality. It can be bought, -and sold, and bartered away. It can be poisoned, or made perfect. There is a -soul in each one of us. I know it.” -</p> - -<p> -“Do you feel quite sure of that, Dorian?” -</p> - -<p> -“Quite sure.” -</p> - -<p> -“Ah! then it must be an illusion. The things one feels absolutely certain -about are never true. That is the fatality of faith, and the lesson of romance. -How grave you are! Don’t be so serious. What have you or I to do with the -superstitions of our age? No: we have given up our belief in the soul. Play me -something. Play me a nocturne, Dorian, and, as you play, tell me, in a low -voice, how you have kept your youth. You must have some secret. I am only ten -years older than you are, and I am wrinkled, and worn, and yellow. You are -really wonderful, Dorian. You have never looked more charming than you do -to-night. You remind me of the day I saw you first. You were rather cheeky, -very shy, and absolutely extraordinary. You have changed, of course, but not in -appearance. I wish you would tell me your secret. To get back my youth I would -do anything in the world, except take exercise, get up early, or be -respectable. Youth! There is nothing like it. It’s absurd to talk of the -ignorance of youth. The only people to whose opinions I listen now with any -respect are people much younger than myself. They seem in front of me. Life has -revealed to them her latest wonder. As for the aged, I always contradict the -aged. I do it on principle. If you ask them their opinion on something that -happened yesterday, they solemnly give you the opinions current in 1820, when -people wore high stocks, believed in everything, and knew absolutely nothing. -How lovely that thing you are playing is! I wonder, did Chopin write it at -Majorca, with the sea weeping round the villa and the salt spray dashing -against the panes? It is marvellously romantic. What a blessing it is that -there is one art left to us that is not imitative! Don’t stop. I want -music to-night. It seems to me that you are the young Apollo and that I am -Marsyas listening to you. I have sorrows, Dorian, of my own, that even you know -nothing of. The tragedy of old age is not that one is old, but that one is -young. I am amazed sometimes at my own sincerity. Ah, Dorian, how happy you -are! What an exquisite life you have had! You have drunk deeply of everything. -You have crushed the grapes against your palate. Nothing has been hidden from -you. And it has all been to you no more than the sound of music. It has not -marred you. You are still the same.” -</p> - -<p> -“I am not the same, Harry.” -</p> - -<p> -“Yes, you are the same. I wonder what the rest of your life will be. -Don’t spoil it by renunciations. At present you are a perfect type. -Don’t make yourself incomplete. You are quite flawless now. You need not -shake your head: you know you are. Besides, Dorian, don’t deceive -yourself. Life is not governed by will or intention. Life is a question of -nerves, and fibres, and slowly built-up cells in which thought hides itself and -passion has its dreams. You may fancy yourself safe and think yourself strong. -But a chance tone of colour in a room or a morning sky, a particular perfume -that you had once loved and that brings subtle memories with it, a line from a -forgotten poem that you had come across again, a cadence from a piece of music -that you had ceased to play—I tell you, Dorian, that it is on things like -these that our lives depend. Browning writes about that somewhere; but our own -senses will imagine them for us. There are moments when the odour of <i>lilas -blanc</i> passes suddenly across me, and I have to live the strangest month of -my life over again. I wish I could change places with you, Dorian. The world -has cried out against us both, but it has always worshipped you. It always will -worship you. You are the type of what the age is searching for, and what it is -afraid it has found. I am so glad that you have never done anything, never -carved a statue, or painted a picture, or produced anything outside of -yourself! Life has been your art. You have set yourself to music. Your days are -your sonnets.” -</p> - -<p> -Dorian rose up from the piano and passed his hand through his hair. “Yes, -life has been exquisite,” he murmured, “but I am not going to have -the same life, Harry. And you must not say these extravagant things to me. You -don’t know everything about me. I think that if you did, even you would -turn from me. You laugh. Don’t laugh.” -</p> - -<p> -“Why have you stopped playing, Dorian? Go back and give me the nocturne -over again. Look at that great, honey-coloured moon that hangs in the dusky -air. She is waiting for you to charm her, and if you play she will come closer -to the earth. You won’t? Let us go to the club, then. It has been a -charming evening, and we must end it charmingly. There is some one at -White’s who wants immensely to know you—young Lord Poole, -Bournemouth’s eldest son. He has already copied your neckties, and has -begged me to introduce him to you. He is quite delightful and rather reminds me -of you.” -</p> - -<p> -“I hope not,” said Dorian with a sad look in his eyes. “But I -am tired to-night, Harry. I shan’t go to the club. It is nearly eleven, -and I want to go to bed early.” -</p> - -<p> -“Do stay. You have never played so well as to-night. There was something -in your touch that was wonderful. It had more expression than I had ever heard -from it before.” -</p> - -<p> -“It is because I am going to be good,” he answered, smiling. -“I am a little changed already.” -</p> - -<p> -“You cannot change to me, Dorian,” said Lord Henry. “You and -I will always be friends.” -</p> - -<p> -“Yet you poisoned me with a book once. I should not forgive that. Harry, -promise me that you will never lend that book to any one. It does harm.” -</p> - -<p> -“My dear boy, you are really beginning to moralize. You will soon be -going about like the converted, and the revivalist, warning people against all -the sins of which you have grown tired. You are much too delightful to do that. -Besides, it is no use. You and I are what we are, and will be what we will be. -As for being poisoned by a book, there is no such thing as that. Art has no -influence upon action. It annihilates the desire to act. It is superbly -sterile. The books that the world calls immoral are books that show the world -its own shame. That is all. But we won’t discuss literature. Come round -to-morrow. I am going to ride at eleven. We might go together, and I will take -you to lunch afterwards with Lady Branksome. She is a charming woman, and wants -to consult you about some tapestries she is thinking of buying. Mind you come. -Or shall we lunch with our little duchess? She says she never sees you now. -Perhaps you are tired of Gladys? I thought you would be. Her clever tongue gets -on one’s nerves. Well, in any case, be here at eleven.” -</p> - -<p> -“Must I really come, Harry?” -</p> - -<p> -“Certainly. The park is quite lovely now. I don’t think there have -been such lilacs since the year I met you.” -</p> - -<p> -“Very well. I shall be here at eleven,” said Dorian. “Good -night, Harry.” As he reached the door, he hesitated for a moment, as if -he had something more to say. Then he sighed and went out. -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<h2><a name="chap20"></a>CHAPTER XX.</h2> - -<p> -It was a lovely night, so warm that he threw his coat over his arm and did not -even put his silk scarf round his throat. As he strolled home, smoking his -cigarette, two young men in evening dress passed him. He heard one of them -whisper to the other, “That is Dorian Gray.” He remembered how -pleased he used to be when he was pointed out, or stared at, or talked about. -He was tired of hearing his own name now. Half the charm of the little village -where he had been so often lately was that no one knew who he was. He had often -told the girl whom he had lured to love him that he was poor, and she had -believed him. He had told her once that he was wicked, and she had laughed at -him and answered that wicked people were always very old and very ugly. What a -laugh she had!—just like a thrush singing. And how pretty she had been in -her cotton dresses and her large hats! She knew nothing, but she had everything -that he had lost. -</p> - -<p> -When he reached home, he found his servant waiting up for him. He sent him to -bed, and threw himself down on the sofa in the library, and began to think over -some of the things that Lord Henry had said to him. -</p> - -<p> -Was it really true that one could never change? He felt a wild longing for the -unstained purity of his boyhood—his rose-white boyhood, as Lord Henry had -once called it. He knew that he had tarnished himself, filled his mind with -corruption and given horror to his fancy; that he had been an evil influence to -others, and had experienced a terrible joy in being so; and that of the lives -that had crossed his own, it had been the fairest and the most full of promise -that he had brought to shame. But was it all irretrievable? Was there no hope -for him? -</p> - -<p> -Ah! in what a monstrous moment of pride and passion he had prayed that the -portrait should bear the burden of his days, and he keep the unsullied -splendour of eternal youth! All his failure had been due to that. Better for -him that each sin of his life had brought its sure swift penalty along with it. -There was purification in punishment. Not “Forgive us our sins” but -“Smite us for our iniquities” should be the prayer of man to a most -just God. -</p> - -<p> -The curiously carved mirror that Lord Henry had given to him, so many years ago -now, was standing on the table, and the white-limbed Cupids laughed round it as -of old. He took it up, as he had done on that night of horror when he had first -noted the change in the fatal picture, and with wild, tear-dimmed eyes looked -into its polished shield. Once, some one who had terribly loved him had written -to him a mad letter, ending with these idolatrous words: “The world is -changed because you are made of ivory and gold. The curves of your lips rewrite -history.” The phrases came back to his memory, and he repeated them over -and over to himself. Then he loathed his own beauty, and flinging the mirror on -the floor, crushed it into silver splinters beneath his heel. It was his beauty -that had ruined him, his beauty and the youth that he had prayed for. But for -those two things, his life might have been free from stain. His beauty had been -to him but a mask, his youth but a mockery. What was youth at best? A green, an -unripe time, a time of shallow moods, and sickly thoughts. Why had he worn its -livery? Youth had spoiled him. -</p> - -<p> -It was better not to think of the past. Nothing could alter that. It was of -himself, and of his own future, that he had to think. James Vane was hidden in -a nameless grave in Selby churchyard. Alan Campbell had shot himself one night -in his laboratory, but had not revealed the secret that he had been forced to -know. The excitement, such as it was, over Basil Hallward’s disappearance -would soon pass away. It was already waning. He was perfectly safe there. Nor, -indeed, was it the death of Basil Hallward that weighed most upon his mind. It -was the living death of his own soul that troubled him. Basil had painted the -portrait that had marred his life. He could not forgive him that. It was the -portrait that had done everything. Basil had said things to him that were -unbearable, and that he had yet borne with patience. The murder had been simply -the madness of a moment. As for Alan Campbell, his suicide had been his own -act. He had chosen to do it. It was nothing to him. -</p> - -<p> -A new life! That was what he wanted. That was what he was waiting for. Surely -he had begun it already. He had spared one innocent thing, at any rate. He -would never again tempt innocence. He would be good. -</p> - -<p> -As he thought of Hetty Merton, he began to wonder if the portrait in the locked -room had changed. Surely it was not still so horrible as it had been? Perhaps -if his life became pure, he would be able to expel every sign of evil passion -from the face. Perhaps the signs of evil had already gone away. He would go and -look. -</p> - -<p> -He took the lamp from the table and crept upstairs. As he unbarred the door, a -smile of joy flitted across his strangely young-looking face and lingered for a -moment about his lips. Yes, he would be good, and the hideous thing that he had -hidden away would no longer be a terror to him. He felt as if the load had been -lifted from him already. -</p> - -<p> -He went in quietly, locking the door behind him, as was his custom, and dragged -the purple hanging from the portrait. A cry of pain and indignation broke from -him. He could see no change, save that in the eyes there was a look of cunning -and in the mouth the curved wrinkle of the hypocrite. The thing was still -loathsome—more loathsome, if possible, than before—and the scarlet -dew that spotted the hand seemed brighter, and more like blood newly spilled. -Then he trembled. Had it been merely vanity that had made him do his one good -deed? Or the desire for a new sensation, as Lord Henry had hinted, with his -mocking laugh? Or that passion to act a part that sometimes makes us do things -finer than we are ourselves? Or, perhaps, all these? And why was the red stain -larger than it had been? It seemed to have crept like a horrible disease over -the wrinkled fingers. There was blood on the painted feet, as though the thing -had dripped—blood even on the hand that had not held the knife. Confess? -Did it mean that he was to confess? To give himself up and be put to death? He -laughed. He felt that the idea was monstrous. Besides, even if he did confess, -who would believe him? There was no trace of the murdered man anywhere. -Everything belonging to him had been destroyed. He himself had burned what had -been below-stairs. The world would simply say that he was mad. They would shut -him up if he persisted in his story.... Yet it was his duty to confess, to -suffer public shame, and to make public atonement. There was a God who called -upon men to tell their sins to earth as well as to heaven. Nothing that he -could do would cleanse him till he had told his own sin. His sin? He shrugged -his shoulders. The death of Basil Hallward seemed very little to him. He was -thinking of Hetty Merton. For it was an unjust mirror, this mirror of his soul -that he was looking at. Vanity? Curiosity? Hypocrisy? Had there been nothing -more in his renunciation than that? There had been something more. At least he -thought so. But who could tell? ... No. There had been nothing more. Through -vanity he had spared her. In hypocrisy he had worn the mask of goodness. For -curiosity’s sake he had tried the denial of self. He recognized that now. -</p> - -<p> -But this murder—was it to dog him all his life? Was he always to be -burdened by his past? Was he really to confess? Never. There was only one bit -of evidence left against him. The picture itself—that was evidence. He -would destroy it. Why had he kept it so long? Once it had given him pleasure to -watch it changing and growing old. Of late he had felt no such pleasure. It had -kept him awake at night. When he had been away, he had been filled with terror -lest other eyes should look upon it. It had brought melancholy across his -passions. Its mere memory had marred many moments of joy. It had been like -conscience to him. Yes, it had been conscience. He would destroy it. -</p> - -<p> -He looked round and saw the knife that had stabbed Basil Hallward. He had -cleaned it many times, till there was no stain left upon it. It was bright, and -glistened. As it had killed the painter, so it would kill the painter’s -work, and all that that meant. It would kill the past, and when that was dead, -he would be free. It would kill this monstrous soul-life, and without its -hideous warnings, he would be at peace. He seized the thing, and stabbed the -picture with it. -</p> - -<p> -There was a cry heard, and a crash. The cry was so horrible in its agony that -the frightened servants woke and crept out of their rooms. Two gentlemen, who -were passing in the square below, stopped and looked up at the great house. -They walked on till they met a policeman and brought him back. The man rang the -bell several times, but there was no answer. Except for a light in one of the -top windows, the house was all dark. After a time, he went away and stood in an -adjoining portico and watched. -</p> - -<p> -“Whose house is that, Constable?” asked the elder of the two -gentlemen. -</p> - -<p> -“Mr. Dorian Gray’s, sir,” answered the policeman. -</p> - -<p> -They looked at each other, as they walked away, and sneered. One of them was -Sir Henry Ashton’s uncle. -</p> - -<p> -Inside, in the servants’ part of the house, the half-clad domestics were -talking in low whispers to each other. Old Mrs. Leaf was crying and wringing -her hands. Francis was as pale as death. -</p> - -<p> -After about a quarter of an hour, he got the coachman and one of the footmen -and crept upstairs. They knocked, but there was no reply. They called out. -Everything was still. Finally, after vainly trying to force the door, they got -on the roof and dropped down on to the balcony. The windows yielded -easily—their bolts were old. -</p> - -<p> -When they entered, they found hanging upon the wall a splendid portrait of -their master as they had last seen him, in all the wonder of his exquisite -youth and beauty. Lying on the floor was a dead man, in evening dress, with a -knife in his heart. He was withered, wrinkled, and loathsome of visage. It was -not till they had examined the rings that they recognized who it was. -</p> - -<p class="center"> -THE END -</p> - -</div><!--end chapter--> - -<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY ***</div> -<div style='text-align:left'> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will -be renamed. -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™ -concept and trademark. 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