Requiem for a Nun

262 WILLIAM FAULKNER

been enough for her, let alone three or four or a dozen or two or three

dozen.

(staring at the Governor)

No, not even one lesson because the bad was already there waiting, who

hadn't even heard yet that you must be already resisting the corruption

not only before you look at it but before you even know what it is, what

you are resisting. So I wrote the letters, I dont know how many, enough,

more than enough because just one would have been enough. And that's all.

GOVERNOR

All?

TEMPLE

Yes. You've certainly heard the blackmail. The letters turned up again

of course. And of course, being Temple Drake, the first way to buy them

back that Temple Drake thought of, was to produce the material for

another set of them.

STEVENS

(to Temple)

Yes, that's all. But you've got to tell him why it's all.

TEMPLE

I thought I had. I wrote some letters that you would have thought that

even Temple Drake might have been ashamed to put on paper, and then the

man I wrote them to died, and I married another man and reformed, or

thought I had, and bore two children and hired another reformed whore so

that I would have somebody to talk to, and I even thought I had forgotten

about the letters until they turned up again and then I found out that

I not only hadn't forgot about the letters, I hadn't even reformed-

STEVENS

All right. Do you want me to tell it, then?

TEMPLE

And you were the one preaching moderation.

STEVENS

I was preaching against orgasms of it.

TEMPLE

(bitterly)

Oh, I know. Just suffering. Not for anything: just suf-