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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 + + +Title: The Picture of Dorian Gray + +Author: Oscar Wilde + +Release Date: October 1, 2008 [EBook #26740] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY *** + + + + +Produced by David Clarke, Chuck Greif and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + +<hr class="full" /> + +<p class="f2">THE PICTURE</p> + +<p class="f4">OF</p> + +<p class="f3">DORIAN GRAY</p> + +<p class="c">BY</p> + +<p class="f5">OSCAR WILDE</p> + + +<h3 class="top5">LONDON: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL,<br /> +HAMILTON, KENT & CO., LTD.</h3> + +<p class="c"><span class="smcap">Paris</span><br /> +ON SALE AT YE OLD PARIS BOOKE SHOPPE<br /> +<span class="smcap">11 Rue de Châteaudun</span></p> + +<div class="blockquot"> +<p class="c"><i>Registered at Stationers' Hall and protected<br /> +under the Copyright Law Act.</i></p> + +<p class="c"><i>First published in complete book form in 1891 by<br /> +Messrs. Ward, Lock & Co. (London),</i></p> + +<p class="c"><i>First printed in this Edition April 1913,<br /> +Reprinted June 1913, September 1913,<br /> +June 1914, January 1916<br /> +October 1916.</i></p> +</div> + +<div class="blockquot"><p class="c"><i>See the <a href="#BIBLIOGRAPHICAL_NOTE">Bibliographical Note</a> on certain<br />Pirated and Mutilated +Editions of "Dorian<br />Gray" at the end of this present volume.</i></p></div> + +<div class="bbox"> +<p class="c n"><a href="#CHAPTER_I"><b>CHAPTER: I, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_II"><b> II, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_III"><b> III, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_IV"><b> IV, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_V"><b> V, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_VI"><b> VI, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_VII"><b> VII, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_VIII"><b> VIII, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_IX"><b> IX, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_X"><b> X, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XI"><b> XI, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XII"><b> XII, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XIII"><b> XIII, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XIV"><b> XIV, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XV"><b> XV, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XVI"><b> XVI, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XVII"><b> XVII, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII"><b> XVIII, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XIX"><b> XIX, </b></a> +<a href="#CHAPTER_XX"><b> XX, </b></a></p> +<p class="c n"><a href="#BIBLIOGRAPHICAL_NOTE"><b>BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE</b></a><br /></p> +</div> + +<h3 class="top15">THE PREFACE</h3> + +<p class="n"><span class="smcap">The</span> artist is the creator of beautiful things.<br /> + +To reveal art and conceal the artist is art's aim.<br /> + +The critic is he who can translate into another manner +or a new material his impression of beautiful things.<br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">The highest, as the lowest, form of criticism</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 6.5em;">is a mode of autobiography.</span><br /> + +Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are +corrupt without being charming. This is a fault.<br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 7.5em;">Those who find beautiful meanings in</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 7.5em;">beautiful things are the cultivated. For</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 7.5em;">these there is hope.</span><br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">They are the elect to whom beautiful things</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">mean only Beauty.</span><br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">book. Books are well written, or</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">badly written. That is all.</span><br /> + +The nineteenth century dislike of Realism is the rage +of Caliban seeing his own face in a glass.<br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 7em;">The nineteenth century dislike of Romanticism</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 7em;">is the rage of Caliban not seeing</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 7em;">his own face in a glass.</span><br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">The moral life of man forms part of the subject-matter</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">of the artist, but the morality of art consists</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">in the perfect use of an imperfect medium.</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">No artist desires to prove anything. Even</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">things that are true can be proved.</span><br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">No artist has ethical sympathies. An ethical</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">sympathy in an artist is an unpardonable</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">mannerism of style.</span><br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 7em;">No artist is ever morbid. The artist</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 7em;">can express everything.</span><br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Thought and language are to the artist instruments</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">of an art.</span><br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Vice and virtue are to the artist materials</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">for an art.</span><br /> + +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.<br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 7em;">All art is at once surface and symbol.</span><br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril.</span><br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Those who read the symbol do so at their peril.</span><br /> + +It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors.<br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">that the work is new, complex, and vital.</span><br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">When critics disagree the artist is in accord with himself.</span><br /> + +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.<br /> + +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">All art is quite useless.</span></p> + +<p class="r smcap">Oscar Wilde.</p> + + + + +<h1 class="top15">THE PICTURE OF<br /> +DORIAN GRAY</h1> + + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I</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 saddlebags 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 flame-like 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 Tokio 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 anyone. 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 +daresay, 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 stockbroker, can gain a reputation for +being civilised. Well, after I had been in the room about ten minutes, +talking to huge over-dressed dowagers and tedious Academicians, I +suddenly became conscious that someone was looking at me. I turned +halfway 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 someone 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 ladles 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 lionise 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 +everyone; that is to say, you are indifferent to everyone."</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 sympathise +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 anyone 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 Antinoüs +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 realise 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 +someone 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-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."</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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II</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 anyone 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 someone 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 someone else's music, an actor of a +part that has not been written for him. The aim of life is +self-development. To realise 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, flower-like 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 someone 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! realise 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 life-long 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. "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 recognised 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 +exaggerations 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 daresay."</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 anyone 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III</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 at 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 despatches, +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 buttonhole 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 to 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, Dryad-like 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 analysed 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 everyone 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, someone 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 sympathise with everything, except suffering," said Lord Henry, +shrugging his shoulders. "I cannot sympathise with that. It is too ugly, +too horrible, too distressing. There is something terribly morbid in the +modern sympathy with pain. One should sympathise 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 demoralising. 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 encyclopædias. 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 Athenæum. 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV</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 plaster-work, 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 "<i>Les Cent Nouvelles</i>," 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 mantel-shelf, and through the small +leaded panels 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 "<i>Manon Lescaut</i>" that he had +found in one of the bookcases. 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 daresay, 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, Henry. 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 the 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 failures. 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 +fairy 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 flower-like 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 hautbois. 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 reed-like 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 realise."</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 physical 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 tyrannised 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V</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. Sibyl 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 the 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 flower-like 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 passers-by 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 super-cargo, 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 under-lip.</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 re-writing. 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 anyone 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 Sibyl'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 only have 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI</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 +white-washing."</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 organised, and to be highly organised 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 someone 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 +anyone. 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 anyone 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 +civilised man ever regrets a pleasure, and no uncivilised man ever +knows what a pleasure is."</p> + +<p>"I know what pleasure is," cried Dorian Gray. "It is to adore someone."</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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII</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 spiritualises 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. Anyone you love +must be marvellous, and any girl that has the effect you describe must +be fine and noble. To spiritualise 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"> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Which mannerly devotion shows in this;</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss—</span><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 +over-emphasised everything that she had to say. The beautiful passage—</p> + +<p class="poem"> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">For that which thou hast heard me speak to-night—</span><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"> +<span style="margin-left: 9em;">Although I joy in thee,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">I have no joy of this contract to-night:</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden;</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Ere one can say, "It lightens." Sweet, good-night!</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">This bud of love by summer's ripening breath</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet—</span><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 apologise 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 anyone 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 +realised 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 doorsteps, +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, and 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 +buttonhole 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, æon upon æon 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 someone 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII</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 softly in with a cup of tea, and a pile of letters, on a +small tray of old Sèvres 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 realise that we live in an age when unnecessary +things are our only necessities; and there were several very courteously +worded communiations 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 anyone, 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 anyone 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 anyone 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? Someone +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 someone 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 of 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX</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 +<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 heartbroken 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 the 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 realised 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 +anyone. 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. George 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 everyone 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 leant 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 realise 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 someone +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 came 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X</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 housekeeper 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 Michael Angelo 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 judgment. 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 bookcase +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 anyone 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 encrusted 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="top3">"<span class="smcap">Inquest on an Actress.</span>—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 class="top3">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 realise 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 characterises 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI</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 beauty 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 over-emphasised, account of the sorrow and despair +of one who had himself lost what in others, and in 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 ageing 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 realisation 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 +spiritualising of the senses its highest realisation.</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 organised 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 +symbolise. He loved to kneel down on the cold marble pavement, and watch +the priest, in his stiff flowered vestment, 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, or +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 +gypsies 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 civilisations, 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 Chili, 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 "Tannhäuser," 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 +lamp-light, the cymophane with its wire-like 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, +at 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 Brantôme, +and his cap had double rows of rubles 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 earrings 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 flower-like 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 Médicis 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 lys</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 lys</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 someone 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 anyone 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, civilised 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 +wrist-bands, 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 realise? 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 over-laden 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 +Cæsar 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 +acanthus-like 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 +realise his conception of the beautiful.</p> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII</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 recognised 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 recognise me?"</p> + +<p>"In this fog, my dear Basil? Why, I can't even recognise 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 lamp-light 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 nor 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 everyone 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 someone 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 staunch 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 fireplace, and stood +there, looking at the burning logs with their frost-like 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII</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 <i>cassone</i>, and an almost empty +bookcase—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 mantel-shelf, 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 recognise his own brush-work, +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 mantel-shelf, 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 the 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 someone 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 realise 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 aroused. 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 anyone 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV</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 bookcase 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"> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"Sur une gamme chromatique,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Le sein de perles ruisselant,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">La Vénus de l'Adriatique</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Sort de l'eau son corps rose et blanc.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"Les dômes, sur l'azur des ondes</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Suivant la phrase au pur contour,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">S'enflent comme des gorges rondes</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Que soulève un soupir d'amour.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"L'esquif aborde et me dépose,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Jetant son amarre au pilier,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Devant une façade rose,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Sur le marbre d'un escalier."</span><br /> +</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 +honey-combed 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"> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"Devant une façade rose,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Sur le marbre d'un escalier."</span><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 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 "<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. 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 +note-paper 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_XV" id="CHAPTER_XV"></a>CHAPTER XV</h3> + + +<p>That evening, at eight-thirty, exquisitely dressed and wearing a large +buttonhole 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 special 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 +over-dressed 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 mantel-shelf, 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 zèle</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 siècle</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 makes 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 over-dressed, 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. "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 daresay 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 realised 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 under-lip. 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 the 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_XVI" id="CHAPTER_XVI"></a>CHAPTER XVI</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 side-windows 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 spilt. 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 fan-like +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 lamp-lit 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 discs of light. The floor was covered with +ochre-coloured sawdust, trampled here and there into mud, and stained +with dark rings of spilt 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 leapt 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 her haggard face +quite close to his. "I knew you were following him when you rushed out +from Daly's. You fool! You should have killed him. He has lots of money, +and he's as bad as bad."</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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_XVII" id="CHAPTER_XVII"></a>CHAPTER XVII</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 buttonhole. 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 recognise 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 recognise 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 someone 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 someone +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>"Sphynxes 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 death-like 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII" id="CHAPTER_XVIII"></a>CHAPTER XVIII</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 +footmarks 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's 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 someone 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 +prefigure 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 +leapt 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 doorpost 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_XIX" id="CHAPTER_XIX"></a>CHAPTER XIX</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're 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 uncivilised. Civilisation 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 spilt 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 anyone 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 flower-like 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 +leant back in his chair. "My dear Dorian, you have the most curiously +boyish moods. Do you think this girl will ever be really contented now +with anyone 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 +star-lit 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 everyone 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 any thing 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 glass-like 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"> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">"'Like the painting of a sorrow,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">A face without a heart.'</span><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 +<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 moralise. 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> + + + +<h3 class="top15"><a name="CHAPTER_XX" id="CHAPTER_XX"></a>CHAPTER XX</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 a 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 spilt. 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 recognised 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 recognised who it was.</p> + +<p class="c smcap top15">the end</p> + + +<hr /> +<h3 class="top15"><a name="BIBLIOGRAPHICAL_NOTE" id="BIBLIOGRAPHICAL_NOTE"></a>BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE</h3> + + +<p class="c">PIRATED EDITIONS</p> + +<p class="n">Owing to the number of unauthorised editions of "THE PICTURE OF DORIAN +GRAY" issued at various times both in America and on the Continent of +Europe, it has become necessary to indicate which are the only +authorised editions of Oscar Wilde's masterpiece.</p> + +<p>Many of the pirated editions are incomplete in that they omit the +Preface and seven additional chapters which were first published in the +London edition of 1891. In other cases certain passages have been +mutilated, and faulty spellings and misprints are numerous.</p> + + +<p class="c">AUTHORISED EDITIONS</p> + +<p>(I) First published in <i>Lippincott's Monthly Magazine</i>, July, 1890. +London: Ward, Lock & Co. <i>Copyrighted in London</i>.</p> + +<p>Published <i>simultaneously</i> in America. Philadelphia: J.-B. Lippincott +Co. <i>Copyrighted in the United States of America</i>.</p> + +<p>(II) A Preface to "Dorian Gray." <i>Fortnightly Review</i>, March 1, 1891. +London: Chapman & Hall. (<i>All rights reserved.</i>)</p> + +<p>(III) With the Preface and Seven additional chapters. London, New York, +and Melbourne: Ward, Lock & Co. (n. d.).</p> + +<p>(Of this edition 250 copies were issued on L.P., <i>dated</i> 1891.)</p> + +<p>(IV) The same. London, New York, and Melbourne: Ward, Lock & Bowden. (n. +d.).</p> + +<p>(Published 1894 or 1895.) See Stuart Mason's "Art and Morality" (page +153).</p> + + +<p class="c">THE FOLLOWING EDITIONS</p> + +<p class="n">were issued by Charles Carrington, <i>Publisher and Literary Agent</i>, late +of 13 Faubourg Montmartre, Paris, and 10 <i>Rue de la Tribune</i>, <span class="smcap">Brussels</span> +(Belgium), to whom the Copyright belongs.</p> + +<p>(V) Small 8vo, vii 334 pages, printed on English antique wove paper, +silk-cloth boards. 500 copies, 1901.</p> + +<p>(VI) The same, vii 327 pages, silk-cloth boards. 500 copies, 1905.</p> + +<p>Of this edition 100 copies were issued on hand-made paper.</p> + +<p>(VII) 4to, vi 312 pages, broad margins, claret-coloured paper wrappers, +title on label on the outside. 250 copies. Price 10<i>s</i>. 6<i>d</i>. 1908 +(February).</p> + +<p>(VIII) Cr. 8vo, uniform with Methuen's (London) complete edition of +Wilde's <i>Works</i>. xi 362 pages, printed on hand-made paper, white cloth, +gilt extra.</p> + +<p>1000 copies. Price 12<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i> 1908 (April 16).</p> + +<p>Of this edition 80 further copies were printed on Imperial Japanese +vellum, full vellum binding, gilt extra. Price 42<i>s</i>.</p> + +<p>(IX) Illustrated edition. Containing seven fullpaged illustrations by +Paul Thirlat, engraved on Wood by Eugène Dété (both of Paris), and +artistically printed by Brendon & Son, Ltd. (of Plymouth), 4to, vi 312 +pages, half parchment bound, with corners, and <i>fleur-de-lys</i> on side. +1908-9. Price 15<i>s.</i></p> + +<p>(X) Small edition, uniform with Messrs. Methuen's Issue of "Oscar +Wilde's Works" at same price. 12mo, xii and 352 pages. 2000 copies. +Bound in green cloth. 1910. Price 5<i>s.</i></p> + +<p class="top3">It follows from all this that, with the exception of the version in +<i>Lippincott's Magazine</i> only those editions are authorised to be sold in +Great Britain and her Colonies which bear the imprimatur of Ward, Lock & +Co., London, or Charles Carrington, Paris and Brussels; and that all +other editions, whether American, Continental (<i>save Carrington's Paris +editions above specified</i>) or otherwise, may not be sold within British +jurisdiction without infringing the <i>Berne</i> law of literary copyright +and incurring the disagreements that may therefrom result.</p> + +<p class="c smcap">london: simpkin, marshall, hamilton, kent & co., limited.</p> +<hr /> +<div class="bbox"> +<p class="c"><b>To possess a good edition<br /> +of SHAKESPEARE<br /><br /> +is surely the desire of every one.</b><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size:200%;">Simpkin's</span><br /> +<span style="font-size:200%;">THIN PAPER EDITION</span><br /> +<br /> +of<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size:200%;"><b>Shakespeare</b></span><br /> +<br /> +is a charming Edition, suitable for the pocket<br /> +or bookshelf. 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