道林.格雷的画像 英文版 The Picture of Dorian Gray
奥斯卡.王尔德 Oscar Wilde
CHAPTER XIII
"There is no good telling me you are going to be good, Dorian, "cried Lord Henry, dipping his white fingers into a red copper bowlfilled with rose-water. "You are quite perfect. Pray don't change. "
Dorian shook his head. "No, Harry, I have done too many dreadfulthings in my life. I am not going to do any more. I began my goodactions yesterday. "
"Where were you yesterday?"
"In the country, Harry. I was staying at a little inn by myself. "
"My dear boy, " said Lord Henry smiling, "anybody can be good in thecountry. There are no temptations there. That is the reason whypeople who live out of town are so uncivilized. There are only twoways, as you know, of becoming civilized. One is by being cultured,the other is by being corrupt. Country-people have no opportunity ofbeing either, so they stagnate. "
"Culture and corruption, " murmured Dorian. "I have known somethingof both. It seems to me curious now that they should ever be foundtogether. For I have a new ideal, Harry. I am going to alter. Ithink I have altered. "
"You have not told me yet what your good action was. Or did you sayyou had done more than one?"
"I can tell you, Harry. It is not a story I could tell to any oneelse. I spared somebody. It sounds vain, but you understand what Imean. She was quite beautiful, and wonderfully like Sibyl Vane. Ithink it was that which first attracted me to her. You rememberSibyl, don't you? How long ago that seems! Well, Hetty was not oneof 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. Allduring this wonderful May that we have been having, I used to rundown and see her two or three times a week. Yesterday she met me ina little orchard. The apple-blossoms kept tumbling down on her hair,and she was laughing. We were to have gone away together thismorning at dawn. Suddenly I determined to leave her as flower-likeas I had found her. "
"I should think the novelty of the emotion must have given you athrill of real pleasure, Dorian, " interrupted Lord Henry. "But I canfinish your idyl for you. You gave her good advice, and broke herheart. That was the beginning of your reformation. "
"Harry, you are horrible! You mustn't say these dreadful things.Hetty's heart is not broken. Of course she cried, and all that. Butthere is no disgrace upon her. She can live, like Perdita, in hergarden. "
"And weep over a faithless Florizel, " said Lord Henry, laughing. "Mydear Dorian, you have the most curious boyish moods. Do you thinkthis girl will ever be really contented now with any one of her ownrank? I suppose she will be married some day to a rough carter or agrinning ploughman. Well, having met you, and loved you, will teachher to despise her husband, and she will be wretched. From a moralpoint of view I really don't think much of your great renunciation.Even as a beginning, it is poor. Besides, how do you know thatHetty isn't floating at the present moment in some mill-pond, withwater-lilies round her, like Ophelia?"
"I can't bear this, Harry! You mock at everything, and then suggestthe most serious tragedies. I am sorry I told you now. I don't carewhat you say to me, I know I was right in acting as I did. PoorHetty! As I rode past the farm this morning, I saw her white face atthe window, like a spray of jasmine. Don't let me talk about it anymore, and don't try to persuade me that the first good action I havedone for years, the first little bit of self-sacrifice I have everknown, is really a sort of sin. I want to be better. I am going tobe better. Tell me something about yourself. What is going on intown? I have not been to the club for days. "
"The people are still discussing poor Basil's disappearance. "
"I should have thought they had got tired of that by this time, " saidDorian, pouring himself out some wine, and frowning slightly.
"My dear boy, they have only been talking about it for six weeks, andthe public are really not equal to the mental strain of having morethan one topic every three months. They have been very fortunatelately, however. They have had my own divorce-case, and AlanCampbell's suicide. Now they have got the mysterious disappearanceof an artist. Scotland Yard still insists that the man in the grayulster who left Victoria by the midnight train on the 7th of Novemberwas poor Basil, and the French police declare that Basil neverarrived in Paris at all. I suppose in about a fortnight we will betold that he has been seen in San Francisco. It is an odd thing, butevery one who disappears is said to be seen at San Francisco. Itmust be a delightful city, and possess all the attractions of thenext world. "
"What do you think has happened to Basil?" asked Dorian, holding uphis Burgundy against the light, and wondering how it was that hecould discuss the matter so calmly.
"I have not the slightest idea. If Basil chooses to hide himself, itis no business of mine. If he is dead, I don't want to think abouthim. Death is the only thing that ever terrifies me. I hate it.One can survive everything nowadays except that. Death and vulgarityare the only two facts in the nineteenth century that one cannotexplain away. Let us have our coffee in the music-room, Dorian. Youmust play Chopin to me. The man with whom my wife ran away playedChopin exquisitely. Poor Victoria! I was very fond of her. Thehouse is rather lonely without her. "
Dorian said nothing, but rose from the table, and, passing into thenext room, sat down to the piano and let his fingers stray across thekeys. After the coffee had been brought in, he stopped, and, lookingover at Lord Henry, said, "Harry, did it ever occur to you that Basilwas murdered?"
Lord Henry yawned. "Basil had no enemies, and always wore aWaterbury watch. Why should he be murdered? He was not cleverenough to have enemies. Of course he had a wonderful genius forpainting. But a man can paint like Velasquez and yet be as dull aspossible. Basil was really rather dull. He only interested me once,and that was when he told me, years ago, that he had a wildadoration for you. "
"I was very fond of Basil, " said Dorian, with a sad look in his eyes."But don't people say that he was murdered?"
"Oh, some of the papers do. It does not seem to be probable. I knowthere are dreadful places in Paris, but Basil was not the sort of manto have gone to them. He had no curiosity. It was his chief defect.Play me a nocturne, Dorian, and, as you play, tell me, in a lowvoice, how you have kept your youth. You must have some secret. Iam only ten years older than you are, and I am wrinkled, and bald,and yellow. You are really wonderful, Dorian. You have never lookedmore charming than you do to-night. You remind me of the day I sawyou first. You were rather cheeky, very shy, and absolutelyextraordinary. You have changed, of course, but not in appearance.I wish you would tell me your secret. To get back my youth I woulddo anything in the world, except take exercise, get up early, or berespectable. Youth! There is nothing like it. It's absurd to talkof the ignorance of youth. The only people whose opinions I listento now with any respect are people much younger than myself. Theyseem in front of me. Life has revealed to them her last wonder. Asfor 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 worehigh stocks and knew absolutely nothing. How lovely that thing youare playing is! I wonder did Chopin write it at Majorca, with thesea weeping round the villa, and the salt spray dashing against thepanes? It is marvelously romantic. What a blessing it is that thereis one art left to us that is not imitative! Don't stop. I wantmusic to-night. It seems to me that you are the young Apollo, andthat I am Marsyas listening to you. I have sorrows, Dorian, of myown, that even you know nothing of. The tragedy of old age is notthat one is old, but that one is young. I am amazed sometimes at myown sincerity. Ah, Dorian, how happy you are! What an exquisitelife you have had! You have drunk deeply of everything. You havecrushed the grapes against your palate. Nothing has been hidden fromyou. But it has all been to you no more than the sound of music. Ithas not marred you. You are still the same.
"I wonder what the rest of your life will be. Don't spoil it byrenunciations. At present you are a perfect type. Don't makeyourself incomplete. You are quite flawless now. You need not shakeyour head: you know you are. Besides, Dorian, don't deceiveyourself. Life is not governed by will or intention. Life is aquestion of nerves, and fibres, and slowly-built-up cells in whichthought hides itself and passion has its dreams. You may fancyyourself safe, and think yourself strong. But a chance tone of colorin a room or a morning sky, a particular perfume that you had onceloved and that brings strange memories with it, a line from aforgotten poem that you had come across again, a cadence from a pieceof music that you had ceased to play, --I tell you, Dorian, that it ison things like these that our lives depend. Browning writes aboutthat somewhere; but our own senses will imagine them for us.There are moments when the odor of heliotrope passes suddenly acrossme, and I have to live the strangest year of my life over again.
"I wish I could change places with you, Dorian. The world has criedout against us both, but it has always worshipped you. It alwayswill 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 neverdone anything, never carved a statue, or painted a picture, orproduced anything outside of yourself! Life has been your art. Youhave set yourself to music. Your days have been your sonnets. "
Dorian rose up from the piano, and passed his hand through his hair."Yes, life has been exquisite, " he murmured, "but I am not going tohave the same life, Harry. And you must not say these extravagantthings to me. You don't know everything about me. I think that ifyou did, even you would turn from me. You laugh. Don't laugh. "
"Why have you stopped playing, Dorian? Go back and play the nocturneover again. Look at that great honey-colored moon that hangs in thedusky air. She is waiting for you to charm her, and if you play shewill 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 the club who wants immensely to know you, --youngLord Poole, Bournmouth's eldest son. He has already copied yourneckties, and has begged me to introduce him to you. He is quitedelightful, and rather reminds me of you. "
"I hope not, " said Dorian, with a touch of pathos in his voice. "ButI am tired to-night, Harry. I won't go to the club. It is nearlyeleven, and I want to go to bed early. "
"Do stay. You have never played so well as to-night. There wassomething in your touch that was wonderful. It had more expressionthan I had ever heard from it before. "
"It is because I am going to be good, " he answered, smiling. "I am alittle changed already. "
"Don't change, Dorian; at any rate, don't change to me. We mustalways be friends. "
"Yet you poisoned me with a book once. I should not forgive that.Harry, promise me that you will never lend that book to any one. Itdoes harm. "
"My dear boy, you are really beginning to moralize. You will soon begoing about warning people against all the sins of which you havegrown tired. You are much too delightful to do that. Besides, it isno use. You and I are what we are, and will be what we will be.Come round tomorrow. I am going to ride at eleven, and we might gotogether. The Park is quite lovely now. I don't think there havebeen such lilacs since the year I met you. "
"Very well. I will be here at eleven, " said Dorian. "Good-night,Harry. " As he reached the door he hesitated for a moment, as if hehad something more to say. Then he sighed and went out.
he answered, smiling. "I am alittle changed already. "better.
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 strolledhome, smoking his cigarette, two young men in evening dresspassed him. He heard one of them whisper to the other, "That isDorian Gray. " He remembered how pleased he used to be when he waspointed out, or stared at, or talked about. He was tired of hearinghis own name now. Half the charm of the little village where he hadbeen so often lately was that no one knew who he was. He had toldthe girl whom he had made love him that he was poor, and she hadbelieved him. He had told her once that he was wicked, and she hadlaughed at him, and told him that wicked people were always very oldand very ugly. What a laugh she had!--just like a thrush singing.And how pretty she had been in her cotton dresses and her large hats!She knew nothing, but she had everything that he had lost.
When he reached home, he found his servant waiting up for him. Hesent 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 saidto him.
Was it really true that one could never change? He felt a wildlonging for the unstained purity of his boyhood, --his rose-whiteboyhood, as Lord Henry had once called it. He knew that he hadtarnished himself, filled his mind with corruption, and given horrorto his fancy; that he had been an evil influence to others, and hadexperienced a terrible joy in being so; and that of the lives thathad crossed his own it had been the fairest and the most full ofpromise that he had brought to shame. But was it all irretrievable?Was there no hope for him?
It was better not to think of the past. Nothing could alter that.It was of himself, and of his own future, that he had to think. AlanCampbell had shot himself one night in his laboratory, but had notrevealed the secret that he had been forced to know. The excitement,such as it was, over Basil Hallward's disappearance would soon passaway. It was already waning. He was perfectly safe there. Nor,indeed, was it the death of Basil Hallward that weighed most upon hismind. It was the living death of his own soul that troubled him.Basil had painted the portrait that had marred his life. He couldnot forgive him that. It was the portrait that had done everything.Basil had said things to him that were unbearable, and that he hadyet borne with patience. The murder had been simply the madness of amoment. As for Alan Campbell, his suicide had been his own act. Hehad chosen to do it. It was nothing to him.
A new life! That was what he wanted. That was what he was waitingfor. Surely he had begun it already. He had spared one innocentthing, at any rate. He would never again tempt innocence. He wouldbe good.
As he thought of Hetty Merton, he began to wonder if the portrait inthe locked room had changed. Surely it was not still so horrible asit had been? Perhaps if his life became pure, he would be able toexpel every sign of evil passion from the face. Perhaps the signs ofevil had already gone away. He would go and look.
He took the lamp from the table and crept up-stairs. As he unlockedthe door, a smile of joy flitted across his young face andlingered for a moment about his lips. Yes, he would be good, and thehideous thing that he had hidden away would no longer be a terror tohim. He felt as if the load had been lifted from him already.
He went in quietly, locking the door behind him, as was his custom,and dragged the purple hanging from the portrait. A cry of pain andindignation broke from him. He could see no change, unless that inthe eyes there was a look of cunning, and in the mouth the curvedwrinkle of the hypocrite. The thing was still loathsome, --moreloathsome, if possible, than before, --and the scarlet dew thatspotted the hand seemed brighter, and more like blood newly spilt.
Had it been merely vanity that had made him do his one good deed? Orthe desire of a new sensation, as Lord Henry had hinted, with hismocking laugh? Or that passion to act a part that sometimes makes usdo things finer than we are ourselves? Or, perhaps, all these?
Why was the red stain larger than it had been? It seemed to havecrept like a horrible disease over the wrinkled fingers. There wasblood on the painted feet, as though the thing had dripped, --bloodeven 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 wasmonstrous. Besides, who would believe him, even if he did confess?There was no trace of the murdered man anywhere. Everythingbelonging to him had been destroyed. He himself had burned what hadbeen below-stairs. The world would simply say he was mad. Theywould shut him up if he persisted in his story.
Yet it was his duty to confess, to suffer public shame, and to makepublic atonement. There was a God who called upon men to tell theirsins to earth as well as to heaven. Nothing that he could do wouldcleanse him till he had told his own sin. His sin? He shrugged hisshoulders. The death of Basil Hallward seemed very little to him.He was thinking of Hetty Merton.
It was an unjust mirror, this mirror of his soul that he was lookingat. Vanity? Curiosity? Hypocrisy? Had there been nothing more inhis renunciation than that? There had been something more. At leasthe thought so. But who could tell?
And this murder, --was it to dog him all his life? Was he never toget rid of the past? Was he really to confess? No. There was onlyone bit of evidence left against him. The picture itself, --that wasevidence.
He would destroy it. Why had he kept it so long? It had given himpleasure once to watch it changing and growing old. Of late he hadfelt no such pleasure. It had kept him awake at night. When he hadbeen away, he had been filled with terror lest other eyes should lookupon it. It had brought melancholy across his passions. Its merememory had marred many moments of joy. It had been like conscienceto him. Yes, it had been conscience. He would destroy it.
He looked round, and saw the knife that had stabbed Basil Hallward.He had cleaned it many times, till there was no stain left upon it.It was bright, and glistened. As it had killed the painter, so itwould kill the painter's work, and all that that meant. Itwould kill the past, and when that was dead he would be free. Heseized it, and stabbed the canvas with it, ripping the thing right upfrom top to bottom.
Yard still insists that the man in the grayulster who left Victoria by the midnight train .
There was a cry heard, and a crash. The cry was so horrible in itsagony that the frightened servants woke, and crept out of theirrooms. Two gentlemen, who were passing in the Square below, stopped,and looked up at the great house. They walked on till they met apoliceman, and brought him back. The man rang the bell severaltimes, but there was no answer. The house was all dark, except for alight in one of the top windows. After a time, he went away, andstood in the portico of the next house and watched.
"Whose house is that, constable?" asked the elder of the twogentlemen.
"Mr. Dorian Gray's, sir, " answered the policeman.
They looked at each other, as they walked away, and sneered. One ofthem was Sir Henry Ashton's uncle.
was to confess? To give himself up,and be put to death? He laughed. He felt that the idea.
Inside, in the servants' part of the house, the half-clad domesticswere talking in low whispers to each other. Old Mrs. Leaf wascrying, and wringing her hands. Francis was as pale as death.
After about a quarter of an hour, he got the coachman and one of thefootmen and crept up-stairs. They knocked, but there was no reply.They called out. Everything was still. Finally, after vainly tryingto force the door, they got on the roof, and dropped down on to thebalcony. The windows yielded easily: the bolts were old.
When they entered, they found hanging upon the wall a splendidportrait of their master as they had last seen him, in all the wonderof his exquisite youth and beauty. Lying on the floor was a deadman, in evening dress, with a knife in his heart. He was withered,wrinkled, and loathsome of visage. It was not till they had examinedthe rings that they recognized who it was.