Since his brother’s wife had lain in his arms he had lived a double life.  During the day he worked outside and at night he sat in his room among his books, all that went on mechanically; in spite of his efforts his heart was only half in his work; the other half lived its own life, hovering with the jackdaws about the flaw in the tower-roof and brooding over the coming disaster which he had forged that morning.  His soul fought ever anew the battle with his brother.  Was it his brother’s fall that he had forged?  Perhaps it would have been possible to save the madman.  Anxiously he sought for possibilities, and shrank with horror from the thought that he might find one.  All his good qualities became overwrought—­his loyalty, his conscientiousness, his scrupulousness.  He did not try to put his shortcomings upon his brother; with loving hand he took his brother’s guilt and placed it on his own shoulders.  It became ever clearer in his mind that he might have saved his brother.  He could have found some way if his heart and head had not been full of wild, forbidden desires, if he had not been full of wrath against the madman instead of feeling pity for him.  With his evil thoughts he had forged disaster for his brother.  Without those thoughts his work would have been finished and his brother would not have found him in the tower, would have come too late and would have repented of his resolve.  Or, if he had still been there, he was the stronger, cooler headed, and he should have found a way to prevent the calamity.

It was natural that people should chaff him about the marriage that seemed a necessity to them.  He had to confess to himself that they were right and that his desires were no longer forbidden ones.  But the fact that they had once been so cast its shadow over the blameless present.  His love seemed sullied to him.  Reason and love might say what they would, he felt that there would be guilt in the marriage.  And so it came that Christiane’s presence brought him no cheer.  There were moments when his gloom struck him as a sort of illness and he hoped that it would pass over.  But even then he drew no nearer to Christiane, much as his heart yearned for her.  He continued the same as on that day when he placed the child between him and her.  She remained pure and holy to him.

To the old gentleman with his external sense of honor, a life like Apollonius’ and Christiane’s, without the consecration of the church, was a grave offense.  Only under the name of her husband could Apollonius, without disgrace, be the protector and supporter of the beautiful young widow and her children.  According to his way he pronounced the ultimatum.  He fixed the time for the wedding.  The indispensable half-year of mourning was over; in a week the betrothal should be announced, three weeks later the marriage should take place.