JUDITH (passionately). Do you want to kill me? Do you think I can
bear to live for days and days with every knock at the door--
every footstep--giving me a spasm of terror? to lie awake for
nights and nights in an agony of dread, listening for them to
come and arrest you?

ANDERSON. Do you think it would be better to know that I had run
away from my post at the first sign of danger?

JUDITH (bitterly). Oh, you won't go. I know it. You'll stay; and
I shall go mad.

ANDERSON. My dear, your duty--

JUDITH (fiercely). What do I care about my duty?

ANDERSON (shocked). Judith!

JUDITH. I am doing my duty. I am clinging to my duty. My duty is
to get you away, to save you, to leave him to his fate. (Essie
utters a cry of distress and sinks on the chair at the fire,
sobbing silently.) My instinct is the same as hers--to save him
above all things, though it would be so much better for him to
die! so much greater! But I know you will take your own way as he
took it. I have no power. (She sits down sullenly on the railed
seat.) I'm only a woman: I can do nothing but sit here and
suffer. Only, tell him I tried to save you--that I did my best to
save you.