Coth began to weep: and he said that his sins in the flesh had been too heinous for this comfort to be permitted him in the unendurable torment which he had fairly earned, and hoped some day to come by.
"Do you care about me, one way or the other, then?" says Jurgen, quite astounded.
And from the midst of his flame Coth, the son of Smoit, talked of the birth of Jurgen, and of the infant that had been Jurgen, and of the child that had been Jurgen. And a horrible, deep, unreasonable emotion moved in Jurgen as he listened to the man who had begotten him, and whose flesh was Jurgen's flesh, and whose thoughts had not ever been Jurgen's thoughts: and Jurgen did not like it. Then the voice of Coth was bitterly changed, as he talked of the young man that had been Jurgen, of the young man who was idle and rebellious and considerate of nothing save his own light desires; and of the division which had arisen between Jurgen and Jurgen's father Coth spoke likewise: and Jurgen felt better now, but was still grieved to know how much his father had once loved him.
"It is lamentably true," says Jurgen, "that I was an idle and rebellious son. So I did not follow your teachings. I went astray, oh, very terribly astray. I even went astray, sir I must tell you, with a nature myth connected with the Moon."
"Oh, hideous abomination of the heathen!"
"And she considered, sir, that thereafter I was likely to become a solar legend."
"I should not wonder," said Coth, and he shook his bald and dome-shaped head despondently. "Ah, my son, it simply shows you what comes of these wild courses."
"And in that event, I would, of course, be released from sojourning in the underworld by the Spring Equinox. Do you not think so, sir?" says Jurgen, very coaxingly, because he remembered that, according to Satan, whatever Coth believed would be the truth in Hell.
"I am sure," said Coth—"why, I am sure I do not know anything about such matters."
"Yes, but what do you think?"