[July 9, 2009] [Sweeney Todd] In Good Conscience

[carey-pontmercy.livejournal.com]

Title: In Good Conscience
Day/Theme:9 July- but I'll come back to haunt you if I drown
Character: Anthony Hope
Rating: PG

Sometimes, Anthony wonders if he did the right thing. When he saw the half-drowned man clinging to a piece of driftwood in Botany Bay, there was no question in his mind, so he jumped into the freezing water. Now his bones ache with the memory of that water and the knowledge that he is the one who brought the monster to London.

 

That’s the word that the papers use for Mr. Todd-monster-and Anthony supposes that it fits. He knows that he should adopt it as his own, that he should be as angry as the mob that smashed the windows of the pie shop after the scandal came to light, but he can’t stop thinking of Mr. Todd as the man who needed his help.

 

You’d have helped him far more if you’d let him drown, says a voice in the back of his mind. Usually, it comes to him at three in the morning, when he and Johanna are both pretending to sleep in their little rented room. You’d have helped everybody far more, it whispers, including her.

 

Most of the time, Anthony dismisses these thoughts as unfair. He tells himself that he couldn’t have known what Mr. Todd was. Even if he had, he couldn’t have let him drown, hoping that some good would come of it.

 

When Anthony passes a woman dressed in black on the street, though, or when Johanna refuses to speak for days on end, he wishes that he’d done something, anything differently. Now he can only hide the newspapers from Johanna, who already knows most of their contents, or make her cups of tea that she’ll never drink.

 

Damned if you do, damned if you don’t, says the voice. In the end, there’s nothing for Anthony to do but agree and long for the untroubled sleep of somebody who knows, without a doubt, that he is right.