“I must reveal the secret,” answered Hester,
firmly. “He must discern thee in thy true
character. What may be the result I know not.
But this long debt of confidence, due from me to him,
whose bane and ruin I have been, shall at length be
paid. So far as concerns the overthrow or preservation
of his fair fame and his earthly state, and perchance
his life, he is in my hands. Nor do I—whom
the scarlet letter has disciplined to truth, though
it be the truth of red-hot iron entering into the
soul—nor do I perceive such advantage in
his living any longer a life of ghastly emptiness,
that I shall stoop to implore thy mercy. Do
with him as thou wilt! There is no good for him,
no good for me, no good for thee. There is no
good for little Pearl. There is no path to guide
us out of this dismal maze.”
“Woman, I could well-nigh pity thee,”
said Roger Chillingworth, unable to restrain a thrill
of admiration too, for there was a quality almost
majestic in the despair which she expressed.
“Thou hadst great elements. Peradventure,
hadst thou met earlier with a better love than mine,
this evil had not been. I pity thee, for the
good that has been wasted in thy nature.”
“And I thee,” answered Hester Prynne,
“for the hatred that has transformed a wise
and just man to a fiend! Wilt thou yet purge
it out of thee, and be once more human? If not
for his sake, then doubly for thine own! Forgive,
and leave his further retribution to the Power that
claims it! I said, but now, that there could
be no good event for him, or thee, or me, who are
here wandering together in this gloomy maze of evil,
and stumbling at every step over the guilt wherewith
we have strewn our path. It is not so!
There might be good for thee, and thee alone, since
thou hast been deeply wronged and hast it at thy will
to pardon. Wilt thou give up that only privilege?
Wilt thou reject that priceless benefit?”
“Peace, Hester—peace!” replied
the old man, with gloomy sternness—“it
is not granted me to pardon. I have no such power
as thou tellest me of. My old faith, long forgotten,
comes back to me, and explains all that we do, and
all we suffer. By thy first step awry, thou
didst plant the germ of evil; but since that moment
it has all been a dark necessity. Ye that have
wronged me are not sinful, save in a kind of typical
illusion; neither am I fiend-like, who have snatched
a fiend’s office from his hands. It is
our fate. Let the black flower blossom as it
may! Now, go thy ways, and deal as thou wilt
with yonder man.”
He waved his hand, and betook himself again to his
employment of gathering herbs.
