tation. In months, his lower-class girlfriend is pregnant. This does not phase Clyde, who is now a prominent member of Lycurgus. He falls in love with a beautiful, respected, rich girl, and rejects his old girlfriend, who he promised to love forever. His pregnant girlfriend is in despair; she will be fired for her relations with Clyde, and society will reject her for not being married. Her only way out is to threaten to expose his libido to everyone unless he marries her. Clyde is intelligent enough to realize that if she reveals his secret, he will never have his beautiful girlfriend. So, he plans his pregnant girlfriend's murder. Under the guise of a honeymoon, he takes her to a deserted lake and drowns her. His crime backfires; it is so poorly planned that police have a warrant for his arrest less than one day later. He is arrested, tried, and sentenced to electrocution. Truly unconscious, Clyde does not contemplates his crime or his guilt for more than a year. With the help of a benevolent pastor, he finds God. Clyde accepts his guilt and fate, and is reconciled. Finally, he thinks about someone other than himself. He prays that other people will understand his follies and save themselves, and for a time he believes they will. But he is too late: his "friends" are ruined, and he is going to die. Less than one week later, he is electrocuted, ending his moral conflict. His moral conflict continues: he is reincarnated into Russell, and the novel abruptly restart. Clyde's reincarnation proves Dresser's contention that all humans are seeking the same empty promises. Constantly at odds with is environment, it appears that Clyde must adapt. For example, when he moves to Kansas, he seems mellower and more meditative. In reality, however, he just does not have the opportunity to screw up his life. Clyde is a stock character until his last days; he is greed. Regardless of the consequences, he wants more -- more money, more social contacts, mo...
