An American Tragedy - Theodore Dreiser [345]
“All very good, but how?” queried Belknap.
“There’s no other way, I tell you,” went on Jephson quite to himself, and ignoring his senior, “and I think this will do it.” He turned to look out the window again, and began as though talking to some one outside: “He goes up there, you see, because he’s frightened and because he has to do something or be exposed. And he signs those registers just as he did because he’s afraid to have it known by anybody down there in Lycurgus that he is up there. And he has this plan about confessing to her about this other girl. BUT,” and now he paused and looked fixedly at Belknap, “and this is the keystone of the whole thing—if this won’t hold water, then down we go! Listen! He goes up there with her, frightened, and not to marry her or to kill her but to argue with her to go away. But once up there and he sees how sick she is, and tired, and sad— well, you know how much she still loves him, and he spends two nights with her, see?”
“Yes, I see,” interrupted Belknap, curiously, but not quite so dubiously now. “And that might explain those nights.”
“MIGHT? Would!” replied Jephson, slyly and calmly, his harebell eyes showing only cold, eager, practical logic, no trace of emotion or even sympathy of any kind, really. “Well, while he’s up there with her under those conditions—so close to her again, you see” (and his facial expression never altered so much as by a line) “he experiences a change of heart. You get me? He’s sorry for her. He’s ashamed of himself—his sin against her. That ought to appeal to these fellows around here, these religious and moral people, oughtn’t it?”
“It might,” quietly interpolated Belknap, who by now was very much interested and a little hopeful.
“He sees that he’s done her a wrong,” continued Jephson, intent, like a spider spinning a web, on his own plan, “and in spite of all his affection for this other girl, he’s now ready to do the right thing by this Alden girl, do you see, because he’s sorry and ashamed of himself. That takes the black look off his plotting to kill her while spending those two nights in Utica and Grass Lake with her.”
“He still loves the other girl, though?” interjected Belknap.
“Well, sure. He likes her at any rate, has been fascinated by that life down there and sort of taken out of himself, made over into a different person, but now he’s ready to marry Roberta, in case, after telling her all about this other girl and his love for her, she still wants him to.”
“I see. But how about the boat now and that bag and his going up to this Finchley girl’s place afterwards?”
“Just a minute! Just a minute! I’ll tell you about that,” continued Jephson, his blue eyes boring into space like a powerful electric ray. “Of course, he goes out in the boat with her, and of course he takes that bag, and of course he signs those registers falsely, and walks away through those woods to that other girl, after Roberta is drowned. But why? Why? Do you want to know why? I’ll tell you! He felt sorry for her, see, and he wanted to marry her, or at least he wanted to do the right thing by her at the very last there. Not before, not before, remember, but AFTER he had spent a night with her in Utica and another one in Grass Lake. But once she was drowned—and accidentally, of course, as he says, there was his love for that other girl. He hadn’t ceased loving her even though he was willing to sacrifice her in order to do the right thing by Roberta. See?”
“I see.”
“And how are they going to prove that he didn’t experience a change of heart if he says he did and sticks to it?”
“I see, but he’ll have to tell a mighty convincing story,” added Belknap, a little heavily. “And how about those two hats? They’re going to have to be explained.”
“Well, I’m coming to those now. The one he had was a little soiled. And so he decided to buy another. As for that story he told Mason about wearing a cap, well, he was frightened and lied because he thought he would have to get out of it. Now, of course, before he goes to that other girl afterwards—while Roberta is still alive, I mean, there