"
"I?" said Valentine, with genuine surprise. "Why, I never tried to."
"Exactly. If you had, no doubt you'd have failed."
"But explain."
"I've never told you all you do for me, Val. You are my armour against
all these damned things. When I'm with you, I hate the notion of being a
sinner. I never hated it before I met you. In fact, I loved it. I wanted
sin more than I wanted anything in heaven or earth. And then--just at the
critical moment when I was passing from boyhood into manhood, I met you."
He stopped. His brown cheeks were glowing, and he avoided Valentine's
gaze.
"Go on, Julian," Valentine said. "I want to hear this."
"All right, I'll finish now, but I don't know why I ever began. Perhaps
you'll think me a fool, or a sentimentalist."
"Nonsense!"
"Well, I don't know how it is, but when I saw you I first understood
that there is a good deal in what the parsons say, that sin is beastly
in itself, don't you know, even apart from one's religious convictions,
or the injury one may do to others. When I saw you, I understood that
sin degrades one's self, Valentine. For you had never sinned as I had,
and you were so different from me. You are the only sinless man I know,
and you have made me know what beasts we men are.
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