He pointed to his wife.  “She’s begging me to go.  Why should I?  I’ll look out of the window.  That will do just as well.  I shan’t see what you are doing.”

Apollonius did not understand him.  Christiane knew that he did not, without looking at him.  She tried to leave the room.  She could not endure to be humiliated in Apollonius’ presence till she was nothing but dirt under his feet.  Her husband held her with a savage grip.  He seized her with the swoop of a bird of prey.  She would have had to scream aloud if her mental torture had not deadened her physical pain.

“Don’t mind her wanting to go away,” gasped Fritz Nettenmair, stifled with unnatural laughter, and held his brother with his eye as he held his wife with his hand.  “You needn’t be afraid.  Just as soon as I turn my back she will be here again.  Go on, talk to each other.  Go on, tell him that you can’t bear him; I believe it of course; what won’t a man believe if a woman like you tells him so?  And you, give her some of your teachings from Cologne, where you learnt everything, how to drive your brother out of his house and business so as to—­hm—­well—­Ha, ha!  Why don’t you tell her?  A woman ought to be willing.  Oh, such a willing woman is—­go on, tell her what that kind of a woman is.  She doesn’t know it yet, innocent as she is!  Ha, ha!”

Apollonius understood nothing of what he heard and saw; but the abuse of a man’s strength on a helpless woman filled him with indignation.  Involuntarily this feeling carried him away.  It doubled his strength, which was far superior to his brother’s at all times, when he gripped him by the arm that held his wife so that it let go its prey and dropped as if paralyzed.  Christiane tried to leave the room, but she collapsed helplessly.  Apollonius caught her and laid her on the sofa, supported against its back.  Then he stood before his brother like a wrathful angel.

“I have tried to win you by gentleness, but you are not worthy of it.  I have endured much at your hands and will continue to endure,” said Apollonius; “you are my brother.  You blame me for having driven you into misfortune; God is my witness that I have done everything that I knew to hold you back.  For whom have I done what you reproach me with doing, if not for you, and for the sake of your honor and to save your wife and your children?  Who compelled me to be hard on you?  For whom do I work?  For whom am I doing all that I do?  If you knew how it hurts me to have you force me to tell you what I am doing for you!  God knows, you force me to it; I have never done it yet, not with others, nor with myself.  You know that you are only seeking an excuse to be unbrotherly toward me.  I know it, and will continue to endure you as I have done till now.  But that you should make an excuse of your wife’s dislike of me to torture her too, and to treat her as no good man treats a good woman, that I will not stand.”