Custer weekly chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, S.D.) 1890-1931, 1896-10-31
XII.

CHAPTER XII.
At nine o'clock the next morning his SER
want came in with a cup Of chocolate on a
tray, and opened the shutters. Dorian was
sleeping quite peacefully, lying an his right
side, with one hand underneath his cheek.
He looked like a boy who had been tired
out with play, or study.
The man had to touch him twice on the
shoulder before he woke, and as he opened
his eyes a faint smile passed across his lips,
as though he had been having some delight
ful dream. Yet he had not dreamed at all.
His night had been untroubled by images Of
pleasure or of pain. But youth smiles with
out any reason. II is one of its chiefest
charms.
He turned round, and, leaning on his ell
bow. began to drink his chocolate. The
mellow November sun was sire aiming into
the room. The sky was bright blue, and there
was a genial warmth in the air. 1t was al
most like a morning in May.
Gradually the events Of the preceding
night crept with silent blood-stained feet i'll
TO his brain, and reconstructed themselves
there with terrible distinctness. He WINGED
ut the memory OF ali that iie had suffered,
and for q moment the same curious feeling
of loathing for Basil Hallward, that had
made him kill him as he sat in the chair,
came back to him, and he grew cold with
passion. The dead man was still sitting
there. too, and in the sunlight now How
horrible that was. Such hideous things
were for the darkness, not for the day.
He felt that il 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 prid'
more than the passions, and gave to thu
intellect O ~quickened sense Of JOY. create
than any joy they brought, or could eve
bring, To the senses. But this was not ons
of them. 1t was a thing to be driven out o
the mind, to be drugged with peoples, I,
be strangled lest il might strangle one il
self.
He passed his hand across his forehead
and then got up hastily. and dressed him
self with even more than his usual atten
ton, giving a good deal OF care to tn,
selection of his neck-tie aud sc~arf-pin, AN,
changing his rings more than once.
He spent a long time over breakfast
tasting the various dishes, talking to hi.
valet about some new liveries that he wa,
thinking Of getting made for the servant.
at Selby, and going through his CORES
pondencc. Over some Of the letters h,
smiled. Three of them bored him. One
he read several times over, and then tori
up with a slight look Of annoyance in hi:
face. THAT awful thing, q romans mem
oryi" as Lord Henry had once said.
, When he had drunk his coffee, ne sal
down at the table. and wrote two letters
One he put In his pocket, the other he hand
cd to the valet.
J ''Tske this round to 15a HEREFORD Street
Francis, and IL Mr.. Campbell is out Of town
get his address"
As soon as he was alone, he lighted Q
cigarette, and began sketching upon q piece
,of paper, drawing flowers, and bits OF
architecture first and then faces. Sudden.
,ly he remarked that every faco that he
ldrew seemed to have an extraordinary like.
mess TO Basil Hallward. He frowned, and,
gekting up, went over TO the bookcase and
ltook out . volume at hazard. He was de-
'termined that he would not think about
what had happened, till it became absolute
)y necessary TO do SO.
! When he had stretched himself on the
,sofA, be locked at the title-pago of the book.
1T was 0sutier's ssFmaux ct Canoes, " Char.
,pentsr's japanese papsr edition. with the