"Lord, I don't love Monica. I don't love her. But if she'd give up to me, I'd love her if you wanted me to."
He thought about this. Somewhere, his soul burned against Monica. And somewhere, his soul burned for her.
But she must give up to him. She must give herself up. He demanded this submission, as if it were a submission to his mysterious Lord. She would never submit to the mysterious Lord direct. Like that old demon of a Gran, who knew the Lord, and played with Him, spited Him even. Monica would have first to submit to himself, Jack, in person, before she would really yield before the immense Lord. And yield before the immense Lord she must. Through him.
"Lord!" he said, invoking the supreme power, "I love Lennie and Tom, and I want always to love them, and I want you to back them."
The prickles of pain entered his soul again.
"Lord, I don't love my father, but I don't want to hurt him. Only, I don't love him, Lord. And it's not my fault, though he's a good man, because I wasn't born with love for him in me."
This had been a thorn in his consciousness since he was a child. Best get it out now. Because the fear of not loving his father had almost made him hate him. If he ought to love him, and he couldn't love him, then there was nothing to do but hate him, because of the hopeless obligation. But if he needn't love him, then he needn't hate him, and they could both be in peace. He would leave it to his Lord.
"Perhaps I ought to love Mary," he continued. "But I don't really love her, because she doesn't realise about the Lord. She doesn't realise there is any Lord. She thinks there's only me, and herself. But there is the Lord. And Monica knows. But Monica is spiteful against the Lord. Lord! Lord!"
He ended on the old human cry of invocation: a cry which is answered, when it comes from the extreme, passionate soul. The strange, dark comfort and power came back to him again, and he could go to sleep once more, with his Lord.
When he woke in the morning, the fever had left him. Lennie was there at dawn, to see if he wanted anything. The quick little Lennie, who always came straight from the Lord, unless his emotions of pity got the better of him. Then he lost his connections, and became maudlin.