An Ideal Husband by Oscar Wilde (different e readers TXT) 📖

>SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. And, after all, whom did I wrong by what I did?

No one.

 

LORD GORING. [Looking at him steadily.] Except yourself, Robert.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. [After a pause.] Of course I had private

information about a certain transaction contemplated by the

Government of the day, and I acted on it. Private information is

practically the source of every large modern fortune.

 

LORD GORING. [Tapping his boot with his cane.] And public scandal

invariably the result.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. [Pacing up and down the room.] Arthur, do you

think that what I did nearly eighteen years ago should be brought up

against me now? Do you think it fair that a man’s whole career

should be ruined for a fault done in one’s boyhood almost? I was

twenty-two at the time, and I had the double misfortune of being

well-born and poor, two unforgiveable things nowadays. Is it fair

that the folly, the sin of one’s youth, if men choose to call it a

sin, should wreck a life like mine, should place me in the pillory,

should shatter all that I have worked for, all that I have built up.

Is it fair, Arthur?

 

LORD GORING. Life is never fair, Robert. And perhaps it is a good

thing for most of us that it is not.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Every man of ambition has to fight his century

with its own weapons. What this century worships is wealth. The God

of this century is wealth. To succeed one must have wealth. At all

costs one must have wealth.

 

LORD GORING. You underrate yourself, Robert. Believe me, without

wealth you could have succeeded just as well.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. When I was old, perhaps. When I had lost my

passion for power, or could not use it. When I was tired, worn out,

disappointed. I wanted my success when I was young. Youth is the

time for success. I couldn’t wait.

 

LORD GORING. Well, you certainly have had your success while you are

still young. No one in our day has had such a brilliant success.

Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs at the age of forty - that’s good

enough for any one, I should think.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. And if it is all taken away from me now? If I

lose everything over a horrible scandal? If I am hounded from public

life?

 

LORD GORING. Robert, how could you have sold yourself for money?

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. [Excitedly.] I did not sell myself for money.

I bought success at a great price. That is all.

 

LORD GORING. [Gravely.] Yes; you certainly paid a great price for

it. But what first made you think of doing such a thing?

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Baron Arnheim.

 

LORD GORING. Damned scoundrel!

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. No; he was a man of a most subtle and refined

intellect. A man of culture, charm, and distinction. One of the

most intellectual men I ever met.

 

LORD GORING. Ah! I prefer a gentlemanly fool any day. There is more

to be said for stupidity than people imagine. Personally I have a

great admiration for stupidity. It is a sort of fellow-feeling, I

suppose. But how did he do it? Tell me the whole thing.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. [Throws himself into an armchair by the

writing-table.] One night after dinner at Lord Radley’s the Baron

began talking about success in modern life as something that one

could reduce to an absolutely definite science. With that

wonderfully fascinating quiet voice of his he expounded to us the

most terrible of all philosophies, the philosophy of power, preached

to us the most marvellous of all gospels, the gospel of gold. I

think he saw the effect he had produced on me, for some days

afterwards he wrote and asked me to come and see him. He was living

then in Park Lane, in the house Lord Woolcomb has now. I remember so

well how, with a strange smile on his pale, curved lips, he led me

through his wonderful picture gallery, showed me his tapestries, his

enamels, his jewels, his carved ivories, made me wonder at the

strange loveliness of the luxury in which he lived; and then told me

that luxury was nothing but a background, a painted scene in a play,

and that power, power over other men, power over the world, was the

one thing worth having, the one supreme pleasure worth knowing, the

one joy one never tired of, and that in our century only the rich

possessed it.

 

LORD GORING. [With great deliberation.] A thoroughly shallow creed.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. [Rising.] I didn’t think so then. I don’t

think so now. Wealth has given me enormous power. It gave me at the

very outset of my life freedom, and freedom is everything. You have

never been poor, and never known what ambition is. You cannot

understand what a wonderful chance the Baron gave me. Such a chance

as few men get.

 

LORD GORING. Fortunately for them, if one is to judge by results.

But tell me definitely, how did the Baron finally persuade you to -

well, to do what you did?

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. When I was going away he said to me that if I

ever could give him any private information of real value he would

make me a very rich man. I was dazed at the prospect he held out to

me, and my ambition and my desire for power were at that time

boundless. Six weeks later certain private documents passed through

my hands.

 

LORD GORING. [Keeping his eyes steadily fixed on the carpet.] State

documents?

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Yes. [LORD GORING sighs, then passes his hand

across his forehead and looks up.]

 

LORD GORING. I had no idea that you, of all men in the world, could

have been so weak, Robert, as to yield to such a temptation as Baron

Arnheim held out to you.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Weak? Oh, I am sick of hearing that phrase.

Sick of using it about others. Weak? Do you really think, Arthur,

that it is weakness that yields to temptation? I tell you that there

are terrible temptations that it requires strength, strength and

courage, to yield to. To stake all one’s life on a single moment, to

risk everything on one throw, whether the stake be power or pleasure,

I care not - there is no weakness in that. There is a horrible, a

terrible courage. I had that courage. I sat down the same afternoon

and wrote Baron Arnheim the letter this woman now holds. He made

three-quarters of a million over the transaction

 

LORD GORING. And you?

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. I received from the Baron 110,000 pounds.

 

LORD GORING. You were worth more, Robert.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. No; that money gave me exactly what I wanted,

power over others. I went into the House immediately. The Baron

advised me in finance from time to time. Before five years I had

almost trebled my fortune. Since then everything that I have touched

has turned out a success. In all things connected with money I have

had a luck so extraordinary that sometimes it has made me almost

afraid. I remember having read somewhere, in some strange book, that

when the gods wish to punish us they answer our prayers.

 

LORD GORING. But tell me, Robert, did you never suffer any regret

for what you had done?

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. No. I felt that I had fought the century with

its own weapons, and won.

 

LORD GORING. [Sadly.] You thought you had won.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. I thought so. [After a long pause.] Arthur,

do you despise me for what I have told you?

 

LORD GORING. [With deep feeling in his voice.] I am very sorry for

you, Robert, very sorry indeed.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. I don’t say that I suffered any remorse. I

didn’t. Not remorse in the ordinary, rather silly sense of the word.

But I have paid conscience money many times. I had a wild hope that

I might disarm destiny. The sum Baron Arnheim gave me I have

distributed twice over in public charities since then.

 

LORD GORING. [Looking up.] In public charities? Dear me! what a

lot of harm you must have done, Robert!

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Oh, don’t say that, Arthur; don’t talk like

that!

 

LORD GORING. Never mind what I say, Robert! I am always saying what

I shouldn’t say. In fact, I usually say what I really think. A

great mistake nowadays. It makes one so liable to be misunderstood.

As regards this dreadful business, I will help you in whatever way I

can. Of course you know that.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Thank you, Arthur, thank you. But what is to

be done? What can be done?

 

LORD GORING. [Leaning back with his hands in his pockets.] Well,

the English can’t stand a man who is always saying he is in the

right, but they are very fond of a man who admits that he has been in

the wrong. It is one of the best things in them. However, in your

case, Robert, a confession would not do. The money, if you will

allow me to say so, is … awkward. Besides, if you did make a

clean breast of the whole affair, you would never be able to talk

morality again. And in England a man who can’t talk morality twice a

week to a large, popular, immoral audience is quite over as a serious

politician. There would be nothing left for him as a profession

except Botany or the Church. A confession would be of no use. It

would ruin you.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. It would ruin me. Arthur, the only thing for

me to do now is to fight the thing out.

 

LORD GORING. [Rising from his chair.] I was waiting for you to say

that, Robert. It is the only thing to do now. And you must begin by

telling your wife the whole story.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. That I will not do.

 

LORD GORING. Robert, believe me, you are wrong.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. I couldn’t do it. It would kill her love for

me. And now about this woman, this Mrs. Cheveley. How can I defend

myself against her? You knew her before, Arthur, apparently.

 

LORD GORING. Yes.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Did you know her well?

 

LORD GORING. [Arranging his necktie.] So little that I got engaged

to be married to her once, when I was staying at the Tenbys’. The

affair lasted for three days … nearly.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Why was it broken off?

 

LORD GORING. [Airily.] Oh, I forget. At least, it makes no matter.

By the way, have you tried her with money? She used to be

confoundedly fond of money.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. I offered her any sum she wanted. She refused.

 

LORD GORING. Then the marvellous gospel of gold breaks down

sometimes. The rich can’t do everything, after all.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Not everything. I suppose you are right.

Arthur, I feel that public disgrace is in store for me. I feel

certain of it. I never knew what terror was before. I know it now.

It is as if a hand of ice were laid upon one’s heart. It is as if

one’s heart were beating itself to death in some empty hollow.

 

LORD GORING. [Striking the table.] Robert, you must fight her. You

must fight her.

 

SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. But how?

 

LORD GORING. I can’t tell you how at present. I have not the

smallest idea. But every one has some weak point. There is some

flaw in each one