You will recall that in the last piece of my story I recounted my encounters in my first school; I talked about my initial gatherings with a kid who looked and carried on as I did – whose name was even equivalent to mine: William Wilson.
I recounted the night when I went to Wilson's room, with an arrangement to hurt him. What I saw that night so alarmed me that I left the room and the school until the end of time. As I stood looking down at his dozing structure and face, I may have been taking a gander at myself in a mirror.
It dislikes this — without a dislike this — that he showed up in the daytime. A similar name, a similar face, a similar body, that day of coming to class! And after that his utilization of my method for strolling, my way of talking! Is it true that it was, in truth, humanly conceivable that what I presently observed was the outcome and the outcome just — of his proceeded with endeavours to resemble me? Apprehensive, I left the old school and never entered it again.
After a few months at home, doing nothing, I went to learn at a renowned school called Eton. I had half-forgotten my days at the other school, or if nothing else my sentiments about those days had changed. Reality — the terrible truth — of what had occurred there was gone. Presently I questioned what I recollected. Presently I called the subject into my mind just to grin at the quality of the odd thoughts and musings I had once had.
My life at Eton did not change this view. The trick's life into which I thoughtlessly discarded myself washed everything that was significant in my past. I don't wish, in any case, to recount here the account of my bad behaviour — bad behaviour which conflicted with each law of the school and got away from the attentive gazes of the considerable number of educators.
Three years of this had passed, and I had developed a lot bigger in body and littler in the soul. Three years of bad behaviour had made me detestable.
One night I solicited a gathering from companions who were as evil as I to go to a mystery meeting in my room. We met at a late hour. There was a stable beverage, and there were recreations of cards and loud talking until the point when the new day started showing up in the east.
Warm with the wine and with the amusements of possibility, I was raising my glass to drink out of appreciation for some particularly underhanded thought, when I heard the voice of a hireling outside the room. He said that somebody had requested to talk with me in another room.
I was pleased. A couple of steps carried me into the lobby of the building. In this room, no light was hanging. Be that as it may, I could see the type of a young fellow about my tallness, wearing garments like those I was wearing. His face I couldn't see. When I had entered he came rapidly up to me, and, taking me by the arm, he said delicately in my ear: "William Wilson!"
There was something in the way of the outsider, and in the trembling of his inspired finger, which made my eyes open wide; yet it was not this which had so entirely contacted my psyche and heart. It was the sound of those two, basic, surely understood words, William Wilson, which ventured into my spirit. Before I could reconsider and talk, he was no more.
For half a month I considered this occurrence. Who and what was this Wilson? — where did he originate from? — And what were his motivations? I discovered that for family reasons he had all of a sudden left the other school on the evening of the day I had abandoned it. Be that as it may, in a brief span I quit contemplating the subject; I gave all my idea to plans to concentrate at Oxford University.
There I before long went. My dad and mom sent me enough cash to live like the children of the most extravagant families in England. Presently my temperament showed itself with twofold power. I tossed aside all respect. Among the individuals who spent excessively cash, I spent more; and I added new types of bad behaviour to the more seasoned ones officially surely understood at the college.
Also, I fell still lower. In spite of the fact that it may not be effectively trusted, I overlooked my situation as a man of honour. I learned and utilized all the abhorrent methods for those men who live by playing a game of cards. Like such gifted card sharks, I played to profit.
My companions confided in me, be that as it may. To them, I was the snickering yet good William Wilson, who uninhibitedly offered endowments to anybody and everybody, who was youthful and who had some unusual thoughts, yet who never did anything downright awful.
For a long time, I was effective along these lines. At that point, a young fellow went to the college, a young fellow named Glendinning, who, individuals stated, had rapidly and effectively turned out to be exceptionally rich. I before long discovered him of feeble personality. This, made it simple for me to get his cash by playing a game of cards. I played with him frequently.
At first, with the speculator's typical expertise, I let him take cash from me. At that point, my arrangements were prepared. I met him one night in the room of another companion, Mr Preston. A gathering of eight or ten people was there. By my watchful arranging, I influenced it to appear that it was chance that begun us playing a game of cards. It was Glendinning himself who initially talked about a card amusement.
We sat and played far into the night, and finally, the others quit playing. Glendinning and I played without anyone else's input, while the others viewed. The diversion was the one I enjoyed best, an amusement called "écarté." Glendinning played with a wild apprehension that I couldn't see. However it was caused somewhat, I thought, by all the wine he had been drinking. In a brief span, he had lost a lot of cash to me.
Presently he needed to twofold the sum for which we played. This was as I had arranged, yet I influenced it to appear that I would not like to concur. Finally, I said yes. In an hour he had lost fourfold the amount of cash as previously.
For reasons unknown, his face had turned out to be white. I had thought him so rich that losing cash would not inconvenience him, and I trusted this whiteness, this pallor, was the consequence of drinking wine excessively.
Presently, dreading what my companions may state about me, I was going to stop the diversion when his broken cry and the wild look in his eyes influenced me to comprehend that he had lost all that he possessed. Feeble of the psyche and made flimsier by wine, he ought to never have been permitted to play that night. In any case, I had not ceased him; I had utilized his condition to annihilate him.
The room was calm. I could feel the frosty chilliness in my companions. What I would have done I can't state, for right then and there the wide, overwhelming entryways of the room where all of a sudden opened.
Each light in the room went out, yet I had seen that a man had entered; he was about my tallness, and he was wearing a beautiful, long coat. The dimness, nonetheless, was currently finished, and we could feel that he was remaining among us. At that point, we heard his voice. In a delicate, low, never-to-be-overlooked voice, which I felt somewhere down in my bones, he stated:
"Men of honour, I am here to carry out my responsibility. You can't know the genuine character of the man who has this evening taken a lot of cash from Mr Glendinning. If it's not too much trouble have him remove his jacket, and afterwards, look in it cautiously."
While he was talking, there was not another sound in the room. What's more, as he finished, he was no more!
Comments