"Ah--yes! The further I flounder, the more harm I do!"
"O Sue!" said he with a sudden sense of his own danger. "Do not
do an immoral thing for moral reasons! You have been my social
salvation. Stay with me for humanity's sake! You know what a weak
fellow I am. My two arch-enemies you know--my weakness for womankind
and my impulse to strong liquor. Don't abandon me to them, Sue, to
save your own soul only! They have been kept entirely at a distance
since you became my guardian-angel! Since I have had you I have been
able to go into any temptations of the sort, without risk. Isn't
my safety worth a little sacrifice of dogmatic principle? I am in
terror lest, if you leave me, it will be with me another case of the
pig that was washed turning back to his wallowing in the mire!"
Sue burst out weeping. "Oh, but you must not, Jude! You won't!
I'll pray for you night and day!"
"Well--never mind; don't grieve," said Jude generously. "I did
suffer, God knows, about you at that time; and now I suffer again.
But perhaps not so much as you. The woman mostly gets the worst of
it in the long run!"
"She does."
"Unless she is absolutely worthless and contemptible. And this one
is not that, anyhow!"
Sue drew a nervous breath or two. "She is--I fear! ... Now
Jude--good-night,--please!"
"I mustn't stay?--Not just once more? As it has been so many
times--O Sue, my wife, why not!"
"No--no--not wife! ... I am in your hands, Jude--don't tempt me back
now I have advanced so far!"
"Very well. I do your bidding. I owe that to you, darling, in
penance for how I overruled it at the first time. My God, how
selfish I was! Perhaps--perhaps I spoilt one of the highest and
purest loves that ever existed between man and woman! ... Then let
the veil of our temple be rent in two from this hour!"
He went to the bed, removed one of the pair of pillows thereon, and
flung it to the floor.
Sue looked at him, and bending over the bed-rail wept silently.
"You don't see that it is a matter of conscience with me, and not
of dislike to you!" she brokenly murmured. "Dislike to you! But I
can't say any more--it breaks my heart--it will be undoing all I
have begun! Jude--good-night!"
"Good-night," he said, and turned to go.