An American Tragedy quotes

Dusk⁠—of a summer night.

And the tall walls of the commercial heart of an American city of perhaps 400,000 inhabitants—such walls as in time may linger as a mere fable.

Despite much mission work and family cares, she managed to be fairly cheerful, or at least sustaining, often declaring most emphatically “God will provide” or “God will show the way,” especially in times of too great stress about food or clothes.

Yet apparently, in spite of this, as he and all the other children could see, God did not show any very clear way, even though there was always an extreme necessity for His favorable intervention in their affairs.

Tonight, walking up the great street with his sisters and brother, he wished that they need not do this any more, or at least that he need not be a part of it.

“What does he always want to go around saying, ‘Praise the Lord’ for? Other people don’t do it.”

It was that old mass yearning for a likeness in all things that troubled them, and him.

Neither his father nor his mother was like other people, because they were always making so much of religion, and now at last they were making a business of it.

Look, then, not upon the wine when it is red: it biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder. Proverbs 23:31,32.

These mighty adjurations were as silver and gold plates set in a wall of dross.

The rear forty feet of this very commonplace floor was intricately and yet neatly divided into three small bedrooms, a living room which overlooked the backyard and wooden fences of yards no better than those at the back;

Wasn’t it menial, as miserable as the life he had thus far been leading, to wear old clothes and get up so early in the morning and do all the commonplace things such people had to do?

For Clyde was as vain and proud as he was poor.

He was one of those interesting individuals who looked upon himself as a thing apart—never quite wholly and indissolubly merged with the family of which he was a member, and never with any profound obligations to those who had been responsible for his coming into …

It was painful to him now to think that his clothes were not right; that he was not as handsome as he might be, not as interesting.

What a wretched thing it was to be born poor and not to have anyone to do anything for you and not to be able to do so very much for yourself!

Casual examination of himself in mirrors whenever he found them tended rather to assure him that he was not so bad-looking—a straight, well-cut nose, high white forehead, wavy, glossy, black hair, eyes that were black and rather melancholy at times.

So that all the while, and not unlike her brother Clyde, her thoughts as well as her emotions were wandering here and there—to love, to comfort—to things which in the main had little, if anything, to do with any self-abnegating and self-immolating religious theory.

Within her was a chemism of dreams which somehow counteracted all they had to say.

Yet she had neither Clyde’s force, nor, on the other hand, his resistance.

And they were always of such gorgeous textures, as Clyde saw them. Such grandeur.

This, then, most certainly was what it meant to be rich, to be a person of consequence in the world⁠—to have money.

It meant that you did what you pleased. That other people, like himself, waited upon you. That you possessed all of these luxuries. That you went how, where and when you pleased.

Only now she intended to break that engagement and appear alone with Louise and Greta and announce that her proposed partner was ill. That would give her an opportunity to leave early with Clyde and with him walk past the Rubenstein store.

But having the temperament of a spider that spins a web for flies, she foresaw that this might involve the possibility of Louise’s explaining to Clyde or Ratterer that it was Hortense who had instigated the party.

It might even bring up some accidental mention of the coat on the part of Clyde to Louise later, which, as she felt, would never do. She did not care to let her friends know how she provided for herself.

… men whom he saw entering or departing from here might take a fancy to him and offer him a connection with something important somewhere, such as he had never had before, and that might lift him into a world such as he had never known.

For to say the truth, Clyde had a soul that was not destined to grow up.

He lacked decidedly that mental clarity and inner directing application that in so many permits them to sort out from the facts and avenues of life the particular thing or things that make for their direct advancement.

At once Clyde straightened up, as though dashed with cold water. His uncle’s! His residence! Then that was one of his automobiles standing before the garage at the rear there. And there was another visible through the open door of the garage.

Indeed in his immature and really psychically unilluminated mind it suddenly evoked a mood which was as of roses, perfumes, lights and music.

The beauty! The ease! What member of his own immediate family had ever even dreamed that his uncle lived thus! The grandeur! And his own parents so wretched—so poor, preaching on the streets of Kansas City and no doubt Denver. Conducting a mission!

Heavens! The matter of that slain child in Kansas City! His parents’ miserable makeshift life! Esta! At once his face fell, his dreams being so thickly clouded over. If they should guess! If they should sense!

Oh, the devil⁠—who was he anyway? And what did he really amount to?

What could he hope for from such a great world as this really, once they knew why he had troubled to come here?

Oh, the devil—who was he anyway? And what did he really amount to? What could he hope for from such a great world as this really, once they knew why he had troubled to come here?

A little disgusted and depressed he turned to retrace his steps, for all at once he felt himself very much of a nobody.

The only trouble with this was that Clyde’s manner was very soft and not as impressive as it should be—not so aggressive and contemptuous.

And most of them were of that type of mind that respects insolence even where it pretends to condemn it.

In so far as the young girls were concerned, it was even more noticeable. For Dillard was making this important relationship of Clyde’s perfectly plain to everyone. “This is Clyde Griffiths, the nephew of Samuel Griffiths, Mr. Gilbert Griffiths’ cousin, you know.

“Yes, sir, I guess that’s true, too,” he commented.

“But you don’t need to guess in this case,” insisted Gilbert. “You know. That’s the trouble with people who don’t know. They’re always guessing.”

The truth was that Gilbert was so irritated to think that he must now make a place for his cousin, and that despite his having done nothing at all to deserve it, that he could scarcely conceal the spleen that now colored his mood.

Titus Alden was one of that vast company of individuals who are born, pass through and die out of the world without ever quite getting any one thing straight.

They appear, blunder, and end in a fog.

Like his two brothers, both older and almost as nebulous, Titus was a farmer solely because his father had been a farmer.

… most colorfully inflamed by her, if only he might venture to talk to her more—to walk home with her some day from the mill—to bring her out here to this lake on a Saturday or Sunday, and row about—just to idle and dream with her.

He rounded a point studded with a clump of trees and bushes and covering a shallow where were scores of water lilies afloat, their large leaves resting flat upon the still water of the lake.

And on the bank to the left was a girl standing and looking at them. She had her hat off and one hand to her eyes for she was facing the sun and was looking down in the water.

Now, all their occupants were away at their summer places. The houses were dark. And Sondra Finchley and Bertine Cranston and all that company—what were they doing on a night like this? Where dancing? Where speeding? Where loving?

It was so hard to be poor, not to have money and position and to be able to do in life exactly as you wished.

And the next morning, more eager than usual, he was out of Mrs. Peyton’s by six-forty-five, anxious to find some way of renewing his attentions to Roberta. For there was that crowd of factory workers that proceeded north along Central Avenue.

He looked up and before him in the east over the low roofs of the city was the thinnest, yellowest topmost arc of the rising July moon.

It seemed at the moment as though life had given him all⁠—all⁠—that he could possibly ask of it.

Instead she was merely thinking, “Oh, Clyde, please don’t go, Clyde. Oh, please don’t go.” And he was already out of hearing, walking briskly and grimly on, the click and echo of his receding steps falling less and less clearly on her suffering ears.

It was the first flashing, blinding, bleeding stab of love for her.

He would trump up some excuse—tell her in the morning that he had been called upon by his uncle or cousin to do some work. He could not and would not go, feeling as he did just now.

So much for the effect of wealth, beauty, the peculiar social state to which he most aspired, on a temperament that was as fluid and unstable as water.

On the other hand, later, thinking over her contact with Clyde, Sondra was definitely taken with what may only be described as his charm for her, all the more definite in this case since it represented a direct opposite to all that his cousin offered …

“Oh, well, then maybe you don’t, but you are just the same. But that won’t help you much either, unless you have money—that is, if you want to run with people who have.” She looked up at him and added quite blandly.

“People like money even more than they do looks.”

What a sharp girl this was, he thought, and what a hard, cold statement. It cut him not a little, even though she had not intended that it should.

And once outside in the dark, after the doctor had most courteously and ruefully closed the door behind her, she paused to lean against a tree that was there—her nervous and physical strength all but failing her.

He had refused to help her. He had refused to help her. And now what?

He paused, his face a picture of puzzled fear and opposition.

He was not unlike a harried animal, deftly pursued by hunter and hound.

But Roberta, imagining that his total defection had been caused by the social side of Lycurgus as opposed to her own low state and not because of the superior lure of any particular girl, now retorted resentfully, although she desired not to appear so:

And now and then, in running to serve him, it was as though she were poised birdlike in flight—her racquet arm high, a single toe seeming barely to touch the ground, her head thrown back, her lips parted and smiling always.

And in calling twenty love, thirty love, forty love, it was always with a laughing accent on the word love, which at once thrilled and saddened him

, as he saw, and rejoiced in from one point of view, she was his to take, if only he were free to take her now. But this other black barrier which he himself had built!

But no, no, no—not that.

He was not a murderer and never could be. He was not a murderer⁠—never⁠—never⁠—never.

How to avoid that and win to Sondra after all.

Use a false name and alter your handwriting as much as possible.

Assume that you will be successful.

And whisper, whisper—let your language be soft, your tone tender, loving, even. It must be, if you are to win her to your will now.

Assume that you will be successful.

And whisper, whisper⁠—let your language be soft, your tone tender, loving, even. It must be, if you are to win her to your will now.

So the Afreet of his own darker self.

And she was thinking of compelling him to give up Sondra in order to marry her, and from which union he might never be able to extricate himself until such time as would make Sondra and all she represented a mere recollection.

The difference between the attitudes of these two girls⁠—Sondra with everything offering all⁠—asking nothing of him; Roberta, with nothing, asking all.

A feeling of dark and bitter resentment swept over him and he could not help but feel sympathetic toward that unknown man at Pass Lake and secretly wish that he had been successful. Perhaps he, too, had been confronted by a situation just like this.

He would say that he wanted to show her the lake—take some pictures of her and himself. He had brought his camera for that and for other pictures of Sondra later.

The blackness of this plot of his!

(Those nine black and white cows on that green hillside.)

He was to come with Bertine and Grant and whoever else was coming from there, and then at the pier he could change to Stuart’s launch. They were certain to have so much fun—just loads of it—but just now she would have to go. Bye-bye!

And once more like a bright-colored bird she was gone.

But three hours to wait before he could leave here and so avoid the danger of encountering anyone who might be looking for Clifford Golden or Carl Graham!

Unbelievable! And only four days after the murder of the other poor girl, playing about with this beautiful girl in this fashion, and hoping to marry her, as Roberta had hoped to marry him.

The unbelievable villainies of life!

Now, half-determining since Clyde did not appear, that he would proclaim himself and proceed to search for and seize his belongings here, Ed Swenk reappearing and with a motion of the head indicating that Mason was to follow him.

Besides once all that was known would he not be done for just the same in connection with Sondra, the Griffiths—everybody. And very likely prosecuted and executed for murder just the same.

Oh, heavens⁠—murder.

And to be tried for that now; this terrible crime against her proved. They would electrocute him just the same—wouldn’t they? And then the full horror of that coming upon him—death, possibly—and for murder—he sat there quite still. Death! God!

And now in jail, and offering no better explanation of all the amazing circumstances, as reported by Smillie, than that he had not intended to kill her at all—had not even plotted to do so—that the wind had blown his hat off!

How impossibly weak!

And with no suitable explanation for the two hats, or the missing suit, or of not going to the aid of the drowning girl. And those unexplained marks on her face. How strongly all these things pointed to his guilt.

“

Hear me, when I call, O God of my righteousness.

”

So you’ve got to use the potatoes or beans.

And beans is what we’re going to give ’em. But the justification is that you’re not guilty.

You’re not guilty. You’ve sworn to me that you didn’t intend to strike her there at the last, whatever you might have been provoked to do at first. And that’s enough for me. You’re not guilty.”

“Well, it’s about time, I guess. Looks as though all Cataraqui would like to get inside. We’re going to have quite an audience.” And turning to Clyde once more, he added: “Now, you don’t want to let those people disturb you, Clyde.

They’re nothing but a lot of country people come to town to see a show.

”

“

Friends, this thing has happened millions of times in this world of ours, and it will happen millions and millions of times in the days to come. It is not new and it will never be old.

“But in January or February last, this girl, who is now dead in her grave, was compelled to come to this defendant, Clyde Griffiths, and tell him that she was about to become a mother.

Clifford Golden and wife, to her death. The poor little thing imagined that she was going for a brief outing before that marriage of which he talked and which was to seal and sanctify it.

To seal and sanctify it! To seal and sanctify, as closing waters seal and sanctify, but in no other way⁠—no other way.

And with him walking, whole and sly—as a wolf from its kill—to freedom, to marriage, to social and material and affectionate bliss and superiority and ease, while she slept still and nameless in her watery grave.

“But, oh, gentlemen, the ways of nature, or of God, and the Providence that shapes our ends, rough-hew them how we may!

It is man who proposes, but God⁠—God⁠—who disposes!

“The defendant is still wondering, I am sure, as to how I know that she thought she was still going to be married after leaving the inn at Big Bittern.

“Because the door to her room was right next to the door to the general front entrance where everybody went in and out and anybody that was around could see.”

That was another answer he had memorized.

“But you slipped in and out, didn’t you?”

How was it that you had so much pity all of a sudden up at Big Bittern, but none at all down there at Lycurgus?

Is it something you can turn on and off like a faucet?

”

He was going to be acquitted sure. He was going to go on the stand and testify for himself. But now … now … oh, he needed her now—so much. Quite everyone, as it seemed now, had forsaken him.

He was terribly, terribly alone.

And he must send her some word quickly. He must. He must. And then asking Jephson for a piece of paper and a pencil, he wrote: “Mrs. Asa Griffiths, care of Star of Hope Mission, Denver, Colorado. Dear mother—I am convicted—Clyde.”

“By God! Orville Mason, you deserve the thanks of this county!” “Hy-oh! Heigh! Heigh!” “Three cheers for Orville Mason!” And with that the crowd bursting into three resounding huzzahs—which Clyde in his cell could clearly hear and at the same time sense the meaning of.

They were cheering Mason for convicting him.

In that large crowd out there there was not one who did not believe him totally and completely guilty. Roberta—her letters—her determination to make him marry her—her giant fear of exposure—had dragged him down to this. To conviction. To death, maybe.

“Thou art mighty, O God, and there is none beside Thee. Behold, to Thee all things are possible. In Thy favor is Life. Have mercy, O God.

Though his sins be as scarlet, make him white as snow.

Though they be red like crimson, make them as wool.”

And then the voice again, as before, “Oh, my God! Oh, my God!”

He sank to his couch and covered his ears with his hands.

“Your name’s Griffiths, isn’t it?”

“Well, my name’s Nicholson. Don’t be frightened. You’ll get used to it.”

He achieved a cheerful, if wan smile. But his eyes—they did not seem like that—no smile there.

“I don’t suppose I’m so scared either,” replied Clyde, trying to modify his first, quick and unintended confession.

“Well, that’s good. Be game. We all have to be here⁠—or the whole place would go crazy. Better breathe a little. Or walk fast. It’ll do you good.”

He moved away a few paces and began exercising his arms while Clyde stood there, saying—almost loudly—so shaken was he still: “We all have to be or the whole place would go crazy.”

God! God! God!” he now exclaimed to himself—but not aloud—and yet not unlike that other man who had so terrorized him on the night of his arrival here and who was still here. But he would go too. And all of these others—and himself maybe—unless—unless.

He had seen his first man die.