The Picture Of Dorian Gray - Chapter 14

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Episode Transcript

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Chapter fourteen of the Picture of DorrianGray by Oscar Wild Bred by Bobnefeld.
At nine o'clock the next morning,his servant came in with a cup of
chocolate on a tray and opened theshutters. Dorrian was sleeping quite peacefully,
lying on his right side with onehand underneath his cheek. He looked like

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a boy who had been tired outwith play or study. The man had
to touch him twice on the shoulderbefore he woke, and as he opened
his eyes, a faint smile passedacross 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 anyimages of pleasure or of pain. But

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youth smiles without any reason. Itis one of its chiefest charms. He
turned round, and, leaning uponhis elbow, began to sip his chocolate.
The mellow November sun came streaming intothe room. The sky was bright,
and there was a genial warmth inthe air. It was almost like

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a morning in May. Gradually,the events of the preceding night crept with
silent, bloodstained feet into his brainand reconstructed themselves. There with terrible distinctness.
He winced at the memory of allthat he had suffered, and for
a moment, the same curious feelingof loathing for Basil Hallward that had made

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him kill him as he sat inthe chair came back to him, and
he grew cold with passion. Thedead man were still sitting there too,
and in the sunlight. Now,how horrible that was. Such hideous things
were for the darkness, not forthe day. He felt that if he

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brooden on what he had gone through, he would sicken or grow mad.
There were sins whose fascination was morein the memory than in the doing of
them, strange triumphs that gratified thepride more than the passions, and gave
to the intellect a quickened sense ofjoy greater than any joy they brought,
or could ever bring to the senses. But this was not one of them.

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It was a thing to be drivenout of the mind, to be
drugged with poppies, to be strangled, lest it might strangle one itself.
When the half hour struck, hepassed his hand across his forehead, and
then got up hastily and dressed himselfwith even more than his usual care,
giving a good deal of attention tothe choice of his necktie and scarf pin,

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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 gettingmade for the servants at Selby, and
going through his correspondence. At someof the letters he smiled. Three of

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them bored him. One he readseveral times over and then tore up,
with a slight look of annoyance inhis face. That awful thing a woman's
memory, as Lord Henry had oncesaid. After he had drunk his cup
of black coffee, he wiped hislips slowly with a napkin, motioned to

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his servant to wait, and goingover to the table, sat down and
wrote two letters. One he putin his pocket, the other he handed
to the valet. Take this roundto one fifty two Hertford Street, Francis,
and if mister Campbell is out oftown, get his address. As

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soon as he was alone, helit a cigarette and began sketching upon a
piece of paper, drawing first flowersand bits of architecture, and then human
faces. Suddenly he remarked that everyface that he drew seemed to have a
fantastic likeness to Basil Hallward. Hefrowned, and, getting up, went

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over to the bookcase and took outa volume at Hazard. He was determined
that he would not think about whathad happened until he became absolutely necessary that
he should do so. When hehad stretched himself on the sofa, he
looked at the title page of thebook. It was Gautier's mos A Cami
Charponthier's Japanese paper edition with the Jacquesmar etching. The binding was of citron

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green leather with the design of guilttrellis 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 aboutthe hand of Lasannaire, the cold yellow
hand to supplice sans cour mala,with its downy red hairs and its duards

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de fun. He glanced at hisown white taper fingers, shudder rings slightly
in spite of himself, and passedon till he came to those lovely stanzas
upon venice siurund gamachromatique les san depare roussilon la venue de latriatique saw the

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low san cor rose, a blancled dome silazur desonde sui vand de frazo
porquantur Saint flan com des gouge randcousulev en supi or damou l'esquif abord lemu
depose Gertan Saint amar Ropelier, deVantine Fassar rose Sieur le marbre don Escalier.

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How exquisite they were as one bredthem. One seemed to be floating
down the green waterways of the pinkand 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 thatfollow one as one pushes out to the

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leader. The sudden flashes of colorreminded him of the gleam of the opal
and iris throated birds that flutter roundthe tall honeycombed campanile or stalk with such
stately grace through the dim dust stainedarcades. Leaning back with half closed eyes,
he kept saying over and over tohimself, De vaunty Fassar rose se

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le Marborough don Escalier. The wholeof Venice was in those two lines.
He remembered the autumn that he hadpassed there, and a wonderful love that
had stirred him to mad, delightfulfollies. There was romance in every place,
but Venice, like Oxford, hadkept the background for romance, and

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to the true romantic background was everything, or almost everything. Basil had been
with him part of the time andhad gone wild over Tintreto. Poor Basil,
What a horrible way for a manto die, he sighed, and

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took up the volume again and triedto forget. He read of the swallows
that fly in and out of thelittle cafe at Smyrna, where the Hadjis
sit counting their amber beads, andthe turbined merchants smoke their long tasseled pipes
and talked gravely to each other.He read of the obelisk in the Pas

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de la Concorde that weeps tears ofgranite in its lonely, sunless exile,
and longs to be back by thehot, lotus covered nile, where there
are sphinxes and rose red eyebisses andwhite vultures with gilded and crocodiles with small
barrel eyes that crawl over the green, steaming mud. He began to brood

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over those verses which, drawing musicfrom kiss stained marble, tell of that
curious statue that Gautier compares to acontralto voice, the monster Charmond that couches
in the porphiry room of the Louver. But after a time the book fell
from his hand. He grew nervous, and a horrible fit of terror came

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over him. What if Alan Campbellshould be out of England? Days would
elapse before he could come back.Perhaps he might refuse to come. What
could he do? Then? Everymoment was of vital importance. They had
been great friends once five years before, almost inseparable. Indeed, then the

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intimacy had come suddenly to an endwhen they met in society. Now it
was only Dorian Gray who smiled.Alan Campbell never did. He was an
extremely clever young man, though hehad no real appreciation of the visible arts,
and whatever little sense of beauty ofpoetry he possessed, he had gained

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entirely from Dorian. His dominant intellectualpassion was for science. At Cambridge,
he had spent a great deal ofhis time working in the laboratory, and
had taken a good class in thenatural science tree pots of his year.
Indeed, he was still devoted tothe study of chemistry, and had a

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laboratory of his own in which heused 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 hada vague idea that a chemist was a
person who made up prescriptions. Hewas an excellent musician, however, as
well, and played both the violinand the piano better than most amateurs.

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In fact, it was music thathad first brought him and Dorian Gray together.
Music and that indefinable attraction that Dorianseems to be able to exercise whenever
he wished, and indeed exercised oftenwithout being conscious of it. They had
met at Lady Berkshire's the Knight thatRubinstein played there, and after that used

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to be seen together at the operaand 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 iswonderful and fascinating in life. Whether or

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not a quarrel had taken place betweenthem, no one ever knew. But
suddenly people remarked that they scarcely spokewhen they met, and that Campbell seemed
always to go away early from anyparty at which Dorry and Gray was present.
He had changed, too, wasstrangely melancholy at times, appeared almost

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to dislike hearing music, and wouldnever himself play, giving as his excuse
when he was called upon, thathe was so absorbed in science that he
had no time left in which topractice, and this was certainly true.
Every day he seemed to become moreinterested in biology, and his name appeared

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once or twice in some of thescientific reviews in connection with certain curious experiments.
This was the man Dorry and Graywas waiting for. Every second,
he kept glancing at the clock.As the minutes went by, he became
horribly agitated. At last, hegot up and began to pace up and

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down the room, looking like abeautiful caged thing. He took long,
stealthy strides. His hands were curiouslycold. The suspense became unbearable. Time
seems to him to be crawling withfeet of lead, while he, by

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monstrous winds, was being swept towardsthe jagged edge of some black cleft of
precipice. He knew what was waitingfor him there saw it, indeed,
and shuddering, crushed with dank handshis burning lids. As though he would
have robbed the very brain of sightsand driven the eyeballs back into their cave.

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It was useless. The brain hadits own food on which it battened,
and the imagination, made grotesque byterror, twisted and distorted as a
living thing by pain, danced likesome foul puppet on a stand, and
grinned through moving masks. Then suddenlytime stopped for him. Yes, that

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blind, slow breathing thing crawled nomore, and horrible thoughts. Time being
dead, raced nimbly on in frontand dragged a hideous future from its grave
and showed it to him. Hestared at it. Its very horror made
him stone. At last, thedoor opened and his servant entered. It

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turned glazed eyes upon him, misterCampbell, Sir, said the man.
A sigh of relief broke from hisparched lips, and the collar came back
to his cheeks ask him to comein at once. Francis, he felt
that he was himself again. Hismood of cowardice had passed away. The

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man bowed and retired. In afew moments, Alan Campbell walked in,
looking very stone urn and rather pale, his pallor being intensified by his cold,
black hair and dark eyebrows. Allan, this is kind of you.
I thank you for coming. Ihad intended never to enter your house again,

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Gray, but you said it wasa 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 pocketsof his Astrakhan coats and seemed not

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to have noticed the gesture with whichhe had been greeted. Yes, it
is a matter of life and death, Alan, and to more than one
person. Sit down. Campbell tooka chair by the table, and Dorian
sat opposite to him. The twomen's eyes met, and Dorian there was

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infinite pity. He knew that whathe was going to do was dreadful.
After a strained moment of silence,he leaned across and said, very quietly,
but watching the effect of each wordupon the face of him, he
had send for heaven. In alocked room at the top of this house,

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a room to which nobody but myselfhas access, a dead man is
seated at a table. He hasbeen dead ten hours. Now. Don't
stir and don't look at me likethat. Who the man is, why
he died, how he died arematters that do not concern you. What

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you have to do is this stopGray. I don't want to know anything
further. Whether what you have toldme is true or not true doesn't concern
me entirely. Decline to be mixedup in your life. Keep your horrible
secrets to yourself. They don't interestme anymore. Allan, they will have

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to interest you. This one willhave to interest you. I am awfully
sorry for you, Alan, butI can't help myself. You are the
one man who is able to saveme. I am forced to bring you
into the matter. I have nooption. Alan. You are scientific,

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You know about chemistry and things ofthat kind. You have made experiments.
What you have got to do isto destroy the thing that is upstairs,
To destroy it so that not avestige of it will be left. Nobody
saw this person come into the house. Indeed, at the present moment he

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is supposed to be in Paris.He will not be missed for months.
When he is missed, there mustbe no trace of him found here.
You, Alan, you must changehim and everything that belongs to him into
a handful of ashes that I mayscatter into the air. You are mad,

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Dorian, Ah, I was waitingfor you to call me, Dorian.
You are mad. I tell youmad, to imagine that I would
raise a finger to help you,mad to make this monstrous confession. I
will have nothing to do with thismatter, whatever it is. Do you

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think I am going to peril myreputation for you? What is it to
me? What devil's work you areup to? He was suicide, Alan,
I am glad of that, Butwho'd drove him to it? You?
I should fancy? Do you stillrefuse to do this for me?

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Of course I refuse. I willhave absolutely nothing to do with it.
I don't care what shame comes onyou. You deserve it all. I
should not be sorry to see youdisgraced, publicly disgraced. How dare you
ask me of all men in theworld to mix myself up in this horror.

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I should have thought you knew moreabout people's characters. Your friend,
Lord Henry Watton, can't have taughtyou much about psychology. Whatever else he
has taught you, nothing will induceme to stir a step to help you.
You have come to the wrong man. Go to some of your friends.

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Don't come to me, Allen.It was murder. I killed him.
You don't know what he had mademe suffer, whatever my life is.
He had more to do with themaking or the marring of it than
poor Harry has had. He maynot have intended it, but the result

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was the same. Murder, murder, Good God, Dorian, is that
what you have come to? Ishall not inform upon you. It is
not my business. Besides, withoutmy stirring in the matter, you are
certain to be arrested. Nobody evercommits a crime without doing something stupid.

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But I will have nothing to dowith it. You must have something to
do with it. Wait, waita moment. Listen to me, only
listen, Alan. All I askof you is to perform a certain scientific
experiment. You go to hospitals anddead houses, and the horrors that you

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do there don't affect you. Ifin some hideous dissecting room or fettered laboratory
you found this man lying on aleaden table with red gutter scooped out in
it for the blood to flow through, you would simply look upon him as
an admirable subject. You would notturn a hair, You would not believe

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that you were doing anything wrong.On the contrary, you would probably feel
that you were benefiting the human race, or or increasing the sum of knowledge
in the world, or gratifying intellectualcuriosity, or something of that kind.
What I want you to do ismerely what you have often done before.

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Indeed, to destroy a body,it 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 isdiscovered. I am lost, and it
is sure to be discovered unless youhelp me. I have no desire to

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help you. I am simply indifferentto the whole thing. It has nothing
to do with me. Malin,I entreat you. Think of the position
I am in. Just before youcame, I almost fainted with terror.

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You may no terror yourself some day. No, don't think of that.
Look at the matter purely from thescientific point of view. You don't inquire
where the dead things on which youexperiment come from. Don't why? And
now I have told you too muchas it is, But I beg of

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you to do this. We werefriends once, Sillen. Don't speak about
those days, Dorian. They aredead the dead linger. Sometimes the man
upstairs will not go away. Heis sitting at the table with bowed head
and outstretched arms. Allen, Allen, if you don't come to my assistance,

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I am ruined. Why they willhang me? Alan. Don't you
understand they will hang me for whatI have done. There is no good
in prolonging this scene. I absolutelyrefuse to do anything in the matter.
It is insane of you to askme. You refuse, Yes, I

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entreats you, Alan, It isuseless. The same look of pity came
into dorry in Gray's eyes. Thenhe stretched out his hand, took a
piece of paper and wrote something onit. He read it over twice,
folded it carefully, and pushed itacross the table. Having done this,

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he got up and went over tothe window. Campbell looked at him in
surprise, and then took up thepaper 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 overhim. He felt as if his

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heart was beating itself to death insome empty hollow. After two or three
minutes of terrible silence, Dorrion turnedround and came and stood behind him,
putting his hand upon on his shoulder. I am so sorry for you allan,
he murmured. But you leave meno alternative. I have a letter

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written already here it is you seethe address. If you don't help me,
I must send it. If youdon't help me, I will send
it. You know what the resultwill be. But you are going to

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help me. It is impossible foryou to refuse. Now I try to
spare you. You will do methe justice to admit that you were stern,
harsh offensive. You treated me asno man has ever dared to treat
me, no living man at anyrate. I bore it all. Now

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it is for me to dictate terms. Campbell buried his face in his hands,
and a shudder passed through him.Yes, it is my turn to
dictate terms. Alan, You knowwhat they are. The thing is quite
simple. Come don't work yourself intothis fever. The thing has to be

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done. Face it and do it. A groan broke from Campbell's lips,
and he shivered all over. Theticking of the clock on the mantelpiece seemed
to him to be dividing time intoseparate atoms of agony, each of which
was too terrible to be borne.He felt as if an iron ring was

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being slowly tightened round his forehead,as if the disgrace with which he was
threatened had already come upon him.The hand upon his shoulder weighed like a
hand of lead. It was intolerable. It seemed to crush him. Come,

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Alan, you must decide at once. I cannot do it, he
said mechanically, as though words couldalter things. You must, you have
no choice. Don't delay, hehesitated a moment. Is there a fire

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in the room upstairs? Yes,there is a gas fire with asbestos.
I shall have to go home andget some things from the laboratory. No,
Alan, you must not leave thehouse right out. On a sheap
of notepaper, what you want,and my servant will take a cab and
bring the things back to you.Campbell scrawled a few lines blotted them and

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addressed an envelope to his assistant.Dorrian took the note up and read it
carefully. Then he rang the belland gave it to his valet, with
orders to return as soon as possibleand to bring the things with him.
As the hall door shot, Campbellstarted nervously, and, having got up
from the chair, went over tothe chimney piece. He was shivering with

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a kind of ague. For nearlytwenty minutes, neither of the men spoke.
A fly buzzed noisily about the room, and the ticking of the clock
was like the beats of a hammer. As the chime struck one, Campbell
turned round and, looking at Dorryand Gray, saw that his eyes were

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filled with tears. There was somethingin the purity and refinement of that sad
face that seemed to enrage him.You are infamous, absolutely infamous, he
muttered. Hush, Allan, youhave saved my life, said Dorian,

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your life, good, heavens,what a life that is. You have
gone from corruption to corruption, andnow 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 Iam thinking, Ah, Alan murmured Dorian

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with a sigh. I wish youhad 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. Campbellmade no answer. After about ten minutes,
a knock came to the door,and the servant entered, carrying a

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large mahogany chest of chemicals with along core of steel and platinum wire and
two rather curiously shaped iron clamps.Shall I leave the things here, sir,
he asked Campbell. Yes, saidDorian, and I am afraid,
Francis, that I have another errandfor you. What is the name of

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the man at Bridgeman who supplies Selbywith orchids? Hardened? Sir? Yes,
Harden, you must go down toRichmond at once see Hardened personally and
tell him to send twice as manyorchids as I ordered, and to have
as few white ones as possible.In fact, I don't want any white

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ones. It is a lovely day, Francis, and Richmond is a very
pretty place. Otherwise I wouldn't botheryou about it. No trouble, sir.
At what time shall I be back? Dorian looked at Campbell. How
long will your experiment take, Allensaid in a calm, indifferent voice.

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The presence of a third person inthe room seemed to give him extraordinary courage.
Campbell frowned and bit his lip.He will take about five hours,
he answered. It will be timeand of then, if you are back
at half past seven, Francis orstay, just leave my things out for

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dressing. You can have evening toyourself. I am not dining at home,
so I shall not want you.Thank you, sir, said the
man leaving the room. Now,Alan, there is not a moment to
be lost. How heavy this chestis, I'll take it for you.
You bring the other things. Hespoke rapidly and in an authoritative manner.

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Campbell felt dominated by him. Theyleft the room together. When they reached
the top landing, Dorrian took outthe key and turned it in the lock.
Then he stopped and a troubled lookcame into his eyes. He shuddered.
I don't think I can go in, Alan, he murmured, it

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is nothing to me. I don'trequire you, said Campbell coldly, dorry
and half opened the door. Ashe 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. Heremembered that the night before he had

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forgotten, for the first time inhis life to hide the fatal canvas,
and was about to rush forward whenhe drew back with a shudder. What
was that loathsome red dew that gleamed, wet and glistening on one of the
hands, as though the canvas hadsweated blood. How horrible it was?

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More horrible, it seemed to him, for the moment than the sigh thing
that he knew was stretched across thetable, the thing, whose grotesque,
misshapen shadow on the spotted carpet showedhim that it had not stirred, but
was still there as he had leftit. He heaved a deep breath,
opened the door a little wider,and with half closed eyes and averted head,

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walked quickly in, determined that hewould not look even once upon the
dead man. Then, stooping downand taking up the gold and purple hanging,
he flung it right over the picture. There he stopped, feeling afraid
to turn round, and his eyesfixed themselves on the intricacies of the pattern

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before him. He heard Campbell bringingin the heavy chest and the irons and
the other things that he had requiredfor his dreadful work. He began to
wonder if he and Basil Howard hadever met, and if what they had
thought of each other. Leave menow, said a stern voice behind him.

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He turned and hurried out, justconscious that the dead man had been
thrust back into the chair and thatCampbell was gazing into a glistening yellow face.
As he was going downstairs, heheard the key being turned in the
lock. It was long after sevenwhen Campbell came back into the library.

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He was pale, but absolutely calm. I have done what you asked me
to do, he muttered, Andnow goodbye. Let us never see each
other again. You have saved mefrom ruin, Allan, I cannot forget

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that, said Dorrian simply. Assoon as Campbell had left, he went
upstairs. There was a horrible smellof nitric acid in the room, but
the thing that had been sitting atthe table was gone. End of Chapter fourteen.