Pagina 372 van 490

Campbell took a chair by the table, and Dorian sat opposite to

him. The two men's eyes met. In Dorian's there was infinite pity.

He knew that what he 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 word upon the face

of him he had sent for, "Alan, in a locked room at the top of

this house, a room to which nobody but myself has access, a dead

man is seated at a table. He has been dead ten hours now. Don't

stir, and don't look at me like that. Who the man is, why he

died, how he died, are matters that do not concern you. What you

have to do is this-"

"Stop, Gray. I don't want to know anything further. Whether what

you have told me is true or not true doesn't concern me. I

entirely decline to be mixed up in your life. Keep your horrible

secrets to yourself. They don't interest me any more."