by Oscar Wilde
As he spoke, Helen watched him with a look of pride on her face, like a mother whose son has come home after a long time away to deliver her his riches. She could take credit for all the changes in him. His nature had developed like a flower, had born blossoms of scarlet flame. He was no longer the restrained, inexperienced boy that Helen had met in Rosemary’s studio. Out of its hiding place had crept his soul, and desire had come to meet it on the way. That pleased Helen, which in part pleased Dorian, given that he felt oddly compelled to obey her, as if she were a Goddess who would ruin him if he didn’t earn her enchantments.
But since the incident with Rosemary, he’d felt conflicted. There was great fun in being sinful, in sucking from the nectar of youth before it ran out, but at what cost? He’d been cruel to Rosemary, deflowered her in a rage of greed, taking advantage of her vulnerable love for him. And yet, curiously enough, he’d felt a love for her, too. As he started making love to her, he’d wanted to excite and fulfill her. It wasn’t until the end of their lovemaking that a darkness had roused in him and he heard Helen’s maddening orders to punish without mercy.
She sighed with contentment.
“There are exquisite things in store for you,” said Helen.
“This is merely the beginning. Tell me, who is the divine redhead?”
“Her name is Sybil Vane.”
“Never heard of her,” said Helen.
“I’m afraid it may remain that way,” said Dorian. “She’s a mediocre actress—too mediocre to be terrible, in fact. She merely blends in with the dreadful scenery.”
Helen laughed at the sound of her own wisdom coming out of Dorian’s mouth. Like any disease looking to thrive, it was good news to be contagious.
“My dear,” she began. “No tawdry girl like that could be anything but mediocre. She’s designed to be a decorative sex object. Girls like her never have anything to say, but they say it charmingly.”
Dorian considered Helen’s words. He thought of how beautiful Rosemary was, with eyes so blue they could color the sky; her bashful smile; her chestnut hair that fell like dark leaves around her pale, heart-shaped face. There was something of the fawn in her shy grace and startled eyes. The curves of her throat were the curves of a white lily. Her cool, ivory hands around his hard cock had been so delicate and willing to learn.
“There are beautiful women who are also geniuses,” said Dorian, returning the glasses to Helen’s lap. “Do you think my nature so shallow?”
“No, I think your nature so deep. My dear Dorian, I am analyzing women at present for the very motive of your pleasure. But you seem to gaze upon these gazelles as potential players in actual conversation. For that sport, there are only a few women in London worth talking to, and you’re talking to one of them now.”
“What about Rosemary?” he asked. “Would you relegate her to the lowly majority, or does she get residence in your high quarters?”
“Rosemary is a fine painter,” Helen said. “She can articulate a paintbrush wondrously. But she puts everything that is charming in her into her work. The consequence is that she has nothing left for life but her prejudices, her principles, and her pitifully 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 secondrate sonnets makes one quite irresistible. Such a person lives the poetry that he cannot write. The others write the poetry that they dare not realize. Rosemary is no exception. Why, the picture she painted of you! All her desires turned to oil.”
Dorian shook his head. To hear of Rosemary discussed this way was maddening. He couldn’t remember ever having felt so defensive of—nor intrigued by—someone. He thought of Rosemary’s little animal screams as he plunged into her, and how she’d writhed under his mouth when he feasted between her thighs, moving her closer and closer to oblivion. How sweet she had tasted. And what desires she had—turned to oil, perhaps, but also to sexual juices that had run down his lips and chin. Helen had no idea!
“Rosemary has not merely art in her, but she has personality also, and you have often told me that it is personalities, not principles, that move the age.”
“Yes, that does sound like something I would say,” said Helen. She was distracted, fishing around in her reticule. She withdrew a plump cigarette.
“You fucked her, didn’t you?” said Helen.
Dorian felt his mouth drop open. Well, she had some idea, alright.
“Oh, the scandal of it all,” mocked Helen. She lit the cigarette and sucked with a hiss. The musky smell of opium enveloped them.
“You must have a cigarette,” continued Helen. “A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied.”
She held the case out to him.
“How did you know?” he asked.
“You haven’t learned how to keep a secret yet,” she said.
Dorian frowned. “I didn’t say a word to anyone.”
Helen smirked and held a finger to his lips. “Not here,” she said. “Here,” and dabbed the middle of his forehead with two pointed fingers. “Your eyes say it all.”
Dorian was dumbfounded. Helen offered the cigarette case to him again.
“Your cigarettes are always a bit dangerous,” said Dorian, not wanting to become as obliterated as he had the last time he’d been to see Sybil Vane perform. “May I have one that is just tobacco?”
“I’m sorry, but when I go to the theater, I prepare for the greatest of boredoms. You’ll have to make do with these. Here, take this one—it’s thin.”
Dorian accepted. Before making Helen’s acquaintance, he never much cared for smoking, but now he ardently enjoyed it. Within the first inhalation, he felt a fuzzy calm lay into his brain. The touch of opium made clay of his senses, rolling them into a sluggish blob.
“Tell me about the actress,” Helen said, making no secret of the fact that hearing such flattering talk about Rosemary disagreed with her. “Was she worth the trouble? Would you like to try her again?”
“I didn’t try her at all,” Dorian said, agitation managing to poke its way through the haze. “After the performance, I took up with a group of charming monsters and by the time I parted with them I was so addled with opium that I had trouble collecting myself for pursuit. When I got to her dressing room, she was gone.”
“Hmm,” considered Helen. “She is beautiful, and the initial sight of her ignited in me a wicked curiosity. I must say, my dear, I’m craving a taste of her.”
Dorian had to agree—she was lovely to behold. 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.
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 struck up a few bars of music, and the dance began. Through the crowd of ungainly, shabbily dressed actors, Sybil Vane moved like a creature from a finer world. Her body swayed while she danced, as a plant sways in the water.
“She is quite beautiful, Dorian,” murmured Helen.
“Mm-hmm,” said Dorian with a slight nod. Dimly, he thought of what he would like to do to her, but his thoughts—the things beneath the haze, calling him back to himself—were only of Rosemary. It could be that she would never see or speak to him again. What could he do? For starters, he would hang the painting above the mantle, as she’d wished. Yes, it was the perfect place for it. Why had he been so stubborn? He was ill with a hangover that day, and so many poisons had yet to leave his system when she’d shown up looking like she’d broken out of a madhouse. Ah, but still, she had been beautiful and had moved him to new height
s of feeling.
As it were, Sybil Vane moved much finer than she acted. As an actress, she was curiously listless. She showed no sign of joy when her eyes rested on Romeo. The staginess of her acting was unbearable, and grew worse as she went on. Her gestures became absurdly artificial. She overemphasized everything she had to say. The other actors weren’t much better, and ultimately, the play was a fiasco that just dragged on and on interminably. To concentrate on the scenes being painfully doled out onstage was to risk brain damage, and so Dorian smoked another laced cigarette, this one of medium width.
Half of the audience that left during intermission never returned, tramping out in heavy boots and laughing. The last act was played to almost empty benches. The curtain went down on a titter and some groans.
“Ha!” laughed Helen, amused. “What a farce!”
“Yes, I guess she actually is terrible, in fact,” said Dorian. He was feeling tired and removed from his surroundings. He longed to be at home. His wish to hang up the painting, to honor Rosemary’s fine work, had persisted.
“I suppose I should like to go home now,” he said to Helen, knowing she would be displeased. “I’ve some things I’d like to take care of.”
Helen scoffed. “And miss the best part of the play?”
“Pardon?” said Dorian.
“Dorian,” said Helen, reaching her arm around him with authority. “The best part of the play is when the play is over. Now don’t be daft. Let’s go get some Sybil Vane.” Dorian laughed. The theater swirled around him. He was more affected by the opium than he’d thought. Helen’s eyes seemed very large, and very black. All the various greens and browns and golds of her irises had fallen into her expansive pupils.
“Are you serious?” asked Dorian.
“I hope to never be serious, Dorian,” she said, then laughed. “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 for us. There are only two kinds of people who are really fascinating: people who know absolutely everything, and people who know absolutely nothing.”
Dorian shrugged. He wasn’t wholly convinced, but perhaps Helen had a point. They were already out, after all, and they’d just sat through two hours of worthless performances.
“In our play, she won’t be so dreadful, I assure you,” said Helen.
Dorian chuckled. It was all just a play, wasn’t it? He looked around the empty theater. The audience had merely left one play for another, that of their own lives.
“Well?” said Helen, losing patience. “Do you not believe a most entertaining play can be arranged?”
“I have total faith in your boldness, Helen,” said Dorian, shaking his head and smiling. The barking of his conscience had finally ceased.
“Terrific,” said Helen. “Now, let’s eat! Oh, I know, I know, you think we had a full meal before we came here. Ha!” She slapped his hand. “That was only a starter course!”
CHAPTER VIII
Backstage, the air was thick with smoke and rumbling with loud, divergent chatter. Everyone seemed to be talking at once and to no one in particular. It was randomness and chaos and every now and again a perfect harmony was born of it. Dorian was excited to be a member of such a late-night choir of dissonance, in which sex and sordidness felt both the origin and the destination. Helen was an expert in navigating the crowd. She hooked arms with Dorian, and together they slithered through the crowd like eels.
“What a place to find one’s divinity!” cried Helen, winking as she broke away from him and sunk into the sea of smoke and men. She remained out of sight for a long while.
Dorian soon found himself in fragmented talk with some of the actors from the play. Aside from an untucked shirt here or a loosened suspender there, the men were essentially still in costume. To be up close and talking to them as men rather than as characters was disillusioning. They were like impostors; their smiling, natural faces were devilishly unreal, and Romeo was just an average ruffian who talked speedily about a “pre-arranged” and “upcoming” trip to America that was obviously neither. A black, hairy mole took liberty on the tip his nose. It summarized him in a sad way.
Dorian sought sympathy in a bottle of gin that was being passed around. A couple of the actors were talking about going to a men’s club, and Dorian had halfway agreed to join them when he felt a tug on his shirt cuff. He turned around and there was Helen, smiling broadly at him, a smug twinkle in the blackness of her eyes.
“There you are,” he said.
“Busy?” she asked.
Dorian shook his head.
“Bored,” he replied. “I’m soon to head out to a club, I think.”
“You may want to postpone that,” said Helen. Dorian frowned. How Helen dreaded this time of the night, when her rowdy companions trotted off to vile, stinking places where she was not permitted entry. He felt a strange compassion for her, this soul who had been miscast as the fairer sex, when she was as swarthy and rugged as any brute. The most prestigious women’s clubs of London kept their innocuous reading rooms stocked with romance novels, and their bed chambers virginal and immaculate to appeal to the virtues of a woman of her wealth and position. The finest boutiques swung open their doors in the hopes that a lady as spendthrift as she would buy their soaps and petticoats. She could have anything she wanted, but the frills and flowers and gasp-worthy price tags that sent the hearts of the most sophisticated women squirreling into a most unsophisticated squall left Helen unfazed at best, but often insulted. The objects of her desire lived in the smoking parlors and the men’s clubs; they didn’t bear any designer label or cashmere, or pearl. These objects, in fact, were not objects at all; they were actions representing freedom, and they were not for women to touch.
Dorian knew how badly she wanted to be a part of a man’s devil-may-care world. He perceived her as a kind of vampire in reverse: banished to the day, to dress fittings, to teatime, and to gardens being coaxed into year-round blossom. He pitied her sometimes. How peculiar it was to be friends with a woman. Everything in society complicated, shunned, and forbade it.
As a meager means of consolation, Dorian offered Helen the bottle of gin that the men had been sharing. She took a hearty swig, her eyes bent on him. She then slammed the drained bottle on a little table with such force that the table broke. The commotion barely ruffled a feather in the general clamor, and the spectacle, it seemed, would soon be forgotten—until Dorian saw Romeo. When Helen had broken the table, she had sent a bucket of melting ice careening into Romeo’s lap. He leaped up in a laughing fit, too drunk to stand straight. He held his stomach, either for equilibrium or to measure his need to retch, or both. His eyes settled in a bleary squint on Helen.
“Helen Wotton!” he cried, as if her name won him a raffle in the underworld.
“Romeo, oh, Romeo,” said Helen, with a roll of her eyes.
“Ah!” he scowled, then cried out. “It’s me! Alan Campbell!”
“All right,” said Helen, with an air of indifference that indicated the name didn’t ring a bell. This upset Romeo Alan Campbell. He shook his fist heavenward.
“You feign ignorance, Helen Wotton!” he cried, turning to the small group of men around him for sympathy. They shared a crude, confused laughter.
“Well, I suppose lying is a necessary skill in your field,” said Romeo Alan Campbell.
“Lying?” said Helen. “I leave that to you. You do it so well.”
Romeo Alan Campbell scoffed.
“You make the mistake of the low commoners, Helen Wotton! Acting and lying are unrelated!”
“I agree. I love acting. It is so much more real than life. But what you were doing out on stage was lying.”
Romeo Alan Campbell turned a curious shade of red.
“Mr. Campbell, is there something you wish to obtain from me?” asked Helen.
Romeo Alan Campbell bit his lip, and waved to the small group of men around him.
“You know of Helen Wotton,” he cried to them.
“Ah, the rich old whore!” called one of the men, who, for some reason, was dressed as a clown, with a fat red honker affixed to his nose and a tassel of painted bells strung around his neck. He saluted Dorian empty-handed.
“She’ll fuck ya’ blind!” cried another man in thick spectacles.
“Does she need a dressing room?” cried another, rather nonsensically. He was too short to be seen over the shoulder of Romeo Alan Campbell.
“An undressing room is what she needs,” cried Romeo Alan Campbell, riling the crowd into an uproar.
Helen remained stoic, dragging coolly from her cigarette.
“Old husband, quite the moneybags,” said the clown. “You can find him belly up in the gutter by Madame Stroggel’s lodging house. And we all know the sort of lasses who lodge with Madame Stroggel!”
“Aye!” cheered the men, then snickering like meddling rats. Helen only smiled. On one hand, Dorian was proud of her endurance; on the other, he was appalled that she had to endure such behavior at all. He was embarrassed for her and took her aside, a gesture that made the men hoot and holler all the more.
“Is there anywhere you’d like to go?” he murmured in her ear.
Her eyes were frosty and unfocused. For the first time, Dorian was worried about her.
“Where would you like me to take you?” he asked.
“Wherever you wish.”
“What about the club?” she asked, clutching his arm.
“Aren’t you heading there shortly?”
“I want nothing to do with these boorish asses,” he said. “I am your humble guest, and they are content to insult you as if it were a wicked game wherein the greatest loser wins.”
Helen nodded.
“If I may just take a moment to sit down and just . . .” she said, puffing rapidly from a cigarette perilously nearing its nub.