An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser

connection with such a thought as this! But if he were going

to think of such a thing as this at all, he had better think well

—he could tell himself that—or stop thinking about it now—

once and forever—forever. But Sondra! Roberta! If ever he

were caught—electrocuted! And yet the actual misery of his

present state. The difficulty! The danger of losing Sondra.

And yet, murder—

He wiped his hot and wet face, and paused and gazed at a

group of trees across a field which somehow reminded him

of the trees of … well … he didn’t like this road. It was

getting too dark out here. He had better turn and go back.

But that road at the south and leading to Three Mile Bay

and Greys Lake—if one chose to go that way—to Sharon

and the Cranston Lodge—whither he would be going

afterwards if he did go that way. God! Big Bittern—the trees

along there after dark would be like that—blurred and

gloomy. It would have to be toward evening, of course. No

one would think of trying to … well … in the morning, when

there was so much light. Only a fool would do that. But at

night, toward dusk, as it was now, or a little later. But, damn

it, he would not listen to such thoughts. Yet no one would

be likely to see him or Roberta either—would they—there?

It would be so easy to go to a place like Big Bittern—for an

alleged wedding trip—would it not—over the Fourth, say—

or after the fourth or fifth, when there would be fewer

people. And to register as some one else—not himself—so

that he could never be traced that way. And then, again, it

would be so easy to get back to Sharon and the Cranstons’

by midnight, or the morning of the next day, maybe, and

An American Tragedy

680

then, once there he could pretend also that he had come

north on that early morning train that arrived about ten

o’clock. And then …

Confound it—why should his mind keep dwelling on this

idea? Was he actually planning to do a thing like this? But

he was not! He could not be! He, Clyde Griffiths, could not

be serious about a thing like this. That was not possible. He

could not be. Of course! It was all too impossible, too

wicked, to imagine that he, Clyde Griffiths, could bring

himself to execute a deed like that. And yet …

And forthwith an uncanny feeling of wretchedness and

insufficiency for so dark a crime insisted on thrusting itself

forward. He decided to retrace his steps toward Lycurgus,

where at least he could be among people.

An American Tragedy

681

Chapter 45

THERE are moments when in connection with the

sensitively imaginative or morbidly anachronistic—the

mentality assailed and the same not of any great strength

and the problem confronting it of sufficient force and

complexity—the reason not actually toppling from its throne,

still totters or is warped or shaken—the mind befuddled to

the extent that for the time being, at least, unreason or

disorder and mistaken or erroneous counsel would appear

to hold against all else. In such instances the will and the

courage confronted by some great difficulty which it can

neither master nor endure, appears in some to recede in

precipitate flight, leaving only panic and temporary

unreason in its wake.

And in this instance, the mind of Clyde might well have

been compared to a small and routed army in full flight

before a major one, yet at various times in its precipitate

departure, pausing for a moment to meditate on some way

of escaping complete destruction and in the coincident

panic of such a state, resorting to the weirdest and most

haphazard of schemes of escaping from an impending and

yet wholly unescapable fate. The strained and bedeviled

look in his eyes at moments—the manner in which, from

moment to moment and hour to hour, he went over and

over his hitherto poorly balanced actions and thoughts but

with no smallest door of escape anywhere. And yet again at

moments the solution suggested by the item in The Times-

Union again thrusting itself forward, psychogenetically, born

An American Tragedy

682

of his own turbulent, eager and disappointed seeking. And

hence persisting.

Indeed, it was now as though from the depths of some

lower or higher world never before guessed or plumbed by

him … a region otherwhere than in life or death and

peopled by creatures otherwise than himself … there had

now suddenly appeared, as the genie at the accidental

rubbing of Aladdin’s lamp—as the efrit emerging as smoke

from the mystic jar in the net of the fisherman—the very

substance of some leering and diabolic wish or wisdom

concealed in his own nature, and that now abhorrent and

yet compelling, leering and yet intriguing, friendly and yet

cruel, offered him a choice between an evil which

threatened to destroy him (and against his deepest

opposition) and a second evil which, however it might

disgust or sear or terrify, still provided for freedom and

success and love.

Indeed the center or mentating section of his brain at this

time might well have been compared to a sealed and silent

hall in which alone and undisturbed, and that in spite of

himself, he now sat thinking on the mystic or evil and

terrifying desires or advice of some darker or primordial and

unregenerate nature of his own, and without the power to

drive the same forth or himself to decamp, and yet also

without the courage to act upon anything.

For now the genie of his darkest and weakest side was

speaking. And it said: “And would you escape from the

demands of Roberta that but now and unto this hour have

appeared unescapable to you? Behold! I bring you a way. It

is the way of the lake—Pass Lake. This item that you have

read—do you think it was placed in your hands for nothing?

Remember Big Bittern, the deep, blue-black water, the

island to the south, the lone road to Three Mile Bay? How

An American Tragedy

683

suitable to your needs! A row-boat or a canoe upset in such

a lake and Roberta would pass forever from your life. She

cannot swim! The lake—the lake—that you have seen—

that I have shown you—is it not ideal for the purpose? So

removed and so little frequented and yet comparatively near

—but a hundred miles from here. And how easy for you and

Roberta to go there—not directly but indirectly—on this

purely imaginative marriage-trip that you have already

agreed to. And all that you need do now is to change your

name—and hers—or let her keep her own and you use

yours. You have never permitted her to speak of you and

this relationship, and she never has. You have written her

but formal notes. And now if you should meet her

somewhere as you have already agreed to, and without any

one seeing you, you might travel with her, as in the past to

Fonda, to Big Bittern—or some point near there.”

“But there is no hotel at Big Bittern,” at once corrected

Clyde. “A mere shack that entertains but few people and

that not very well.”

“All the better. The less people are likely to be there.”

“But we might be seen on the train going up together. I

would be identified as having been with her.”

“Were you seen at Fonda, Gloversville, Little Falls? Have

you not ridden in separate cars or seats before and could

you not do so now? Is it not presumably to be a secret

marriage? Then why not a secret honeymoon?”

“True enough—true enough.”

“And once you have arranged for that and arrive at Big

Bittern or some lake like it—there are so many there—how

easy to row out on such a lake? No questions. No registry

under your own name or hers. A boat rented for an hour or

half-day or day. You saw the island far to the south on that

An American Tragedy

684

lone lake. Is it not beautiful? It is well worth seeing. Why

should you not go there on such a pleasure trip before

marriage? Would she not be happy so to do—as weary and

distressed as she is now—an outing—a rest before the

ordeal of the new life? Is not that sensible—plausible? And

neither of you will ever return presumably. You will both be

drowned, will you not? Who is to see? A guide or two—the

man who rents you the boat—the innkeeper once, as you

go. But how are they to know who you are? Or who she is?

And you heard the depth of the water.”

“But I do not want to kill her. I do not want to kill her. I do

not want to injure her in any way. If she will but let me go

and she go her own way, I will be so glad and so happy