Why the heck
wasn't the wife and maid thrown in jail?!!!! They were "sent back to India". They should have been sent to jail...unbelievable.
God loves you as if you were the only person on this earth.
When they wrote the script, they kept some things from the book and dropped others, seemingly at random. This leads to some serious fails in logic and continuity for this movie.
In the book, Hester was innocent and the maid always set things up to look like an accident, so they couldn't prove any wrong-doing. That's why they were sent back to India instead of being arrested.
In the movie, they changed it so that the maid directly attacks her. I guess they thought it would make a more exciting climax, but then they go and keep the part about her being sent back. You're right, it makes no sense.