Chapter 9
As he was sitting at breakfast m, Basil Hallward was shown into the room.
"I am so glad I have found you, Dorian," he said gravely. "I called last night, and they told me you were at the opera. Of course, I khat was impossible. But I wish you had left word where you had really goo. I passed a dreadful evening, half afraid that oragedy 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 a late edition of The Globe that I picked up at the club. I came here at ond was miserable at not finding you. I t tell you how heart-broken I am about the whole thing. I know what you must suffer. But where were you? Did you go down ahe girls mother? For a moment I thought of following you there. They gave the address in the paper. Somewhere in the Euston Road, isnt it? But I was afraid of intruding upon a sorrow that I could not lighten. Poor woman! What a state she must be in! And her only child, too! What did she say about it all?"
"My dear Basil, how do I know?" murmured Dorian Gray, sipping some pale-yellow wine from a delicate, gold-beaded bubble of Veian glass and looking dreadfully bored. "I was at the opera. You should have e on there. I met Lady Gwendolen, Harrys sister, for the first time. We were in her box. She is perfectly charming; and Patti sang divinely. Dont talk about horrid subjects. If one doesnt 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 womans only child. There is a son, a charming fellow, I believe. But he is not oage. He is a sailor, or something. And now, tell me about yourself and what you are painting."
"You went to the opera?" said Hallward, speaking very slowly and with a straiouch of pain in his voice. "You went to the opera while Sibyl Vane was lying dead in some sordid lodging? You talk to me of other women being charming, and of Patti singing divinely, before the girl you loved has even the quiet of a grave to sleep in? Why, man, there are horrors in store for that little white body of hers!"
"Stop, Basil! I wont hear it!" cried Dorian, leaping to his feet. "You must not tell me about things. What is done is done. What is past is past."
"You call yesterday the past?"
"What has the actual lapse of time got to do with it? It is only shallow people who require years to get rid of aion. A man who is master of himself end a sorrow as easily as he i a pleasure. I dont want to be at the mery emotions. I want to use them, to enjoy them, and to domihem."
"Dorian, this is horrible! Something has ged you pletely. You look exactly the same wonderful boy who, day after day, used to e down to my studio to sit for his picture. But you were simple, natural, and affeate then. You were the most unspoiled creature in the whole world. Now, I dont know what has e over you. You talk as if you had , no pity in you. It is all Harrys influence. I see that."
The lad flushed up and, going to the window, looked out for a few moments on the green, flickering, sun-lashed garden. "I owe a great deal to Harry, Basil," he said at last, "more than I owe to you. You only taught me to be vain."
"Well, I am punished for that, Dorian--or shall be some day."
"I dont know what you mean, Basil," he exclaimed, turning round. "I dont know what you want. What do you want?"
"I want the Dorian Gray I used