Were these his own thoughts, or had he merely copied them? There were no corrections, so most likely it was a copy. In any case it showed where his thoughts were.

  Rafael came quietly home, went straight to his room and lighted a candle, even before he took off his overcoat. As he stood he wrote down a few formulae, then seized a book, sat down astride of a chair, and made a rapid calculation. Just then Angelika came in, leaned forward towards him, and said in a low voice:

  "You are a nice fellow! Now I know what you have in hand. Look there: your secret thoughts are with that beast."

  "Beast!" he repeated. His anger at being disturbed, at her having found this particular paper, and now the abuse from her coarse lips of the most delicate creature he had ever known, and, above all, the absolute unexpectedness of the attack, made him lose his head.

  "How dare you? What do you mean?"

  "Don't be a fool. Do you suppose that I don't guess that that is meant for the girl who looked after your estate in order to catch you?"

  She saw that this hit the mark, so she went still further.

  "She, the model of virtue! why, when she was a mere girl, she disgraced herself with an old man."

  As she spoke she was seized by the throat and flung backwards on to the sofa, without the grasp being relaxed. She was breathless, she saw his face over her; deadly rage was in it. A strength, a wildness of which she had no conception, gazed upon her in sensual delight at being able to strangle her.

  After a wild struggle her arms sank down powerless, her will with them; only her eyes remained wide open, in terror and wonderment.

  Dare he? "Yes, he dare!" Her eyes grew dim, her limbs began to tremble.

  "You have taken MY apple, I tell you," was heard in a childish voice from the next room, a soft lisping voice.

  It came from the most peaceful innocence in the world! It saved her!

  He rushed out again; but even when the rage had left him which had seized upon him and dominated him as a rider does a horse, he was still not horrified at himself. His satisfaction at having at length made his power felt was too great for that.

  But by degrees there came a revulsion. Suppose he had killed her, and had to go into penal servitude for the rest of his life for it! Had such a possibility come into his life? Might it happen in the future? No! no! no! How strange that Angelika should have wounded him! How frightful her state of mind must be when she could think so odiously of absolutely innocent people; and how angry she must have been to behave in such a way towards him, whom she loved above all others, indeed, as the only one for whom she had to live!

  A long, long sum followed: his faults, her faults, and the faults of others. He cooled down and began to feel more like himself.

  In an hour or two he was fit to go home, to find her on her bed, dissolved in tears, prepared at once to throw her arms round his neck.

  He asked pardon a hundred times, with words, kisses, and caresses.

  But with this scene his invention had fled. The spell was broken. It never did more than flutter before him, tempting him to pursue it once more; but he turned away from the whole subject and began to work for money again. Something offered itself just at that moment which Angelika had hunted up.

  Back to the unending toil again. Now at last it became an irritation to him: he chafed as the war horse chafes at being made a beast of burden.

  This made the scenes at home still worse. Since that episode their quarrels knew no bounds. Words were no longer necessary to bring them about: a gesture, a look, a remark of his unanswered, was enough to arouse the most violent scenes. Hitherto they had been restrained by the presence of others, but now it was the same whether they were alone or not. Very soon, as far as brutality of expression or the triviality of the question was concerned, he was as bad or worse than she.

  His idle fancy and creative genius found no other vent, but overthrew and trampled underfoot many of life's most beautiful gifts. Thus he squandered much of the happiness which such talents can duly give. Sometimes his daily regrets and sufferings, sometimes his passionate nature, were in the ascendant, but the cause of his despair was always the same - that this could have happened to him. Should he leave her? He would not thus escape. The state of the case had touched his conscience at first, later he had become fond of the children, and his mother's example said to him, "Hold out, hold out!"

  The unanimous prediction that this marriage would be dissolved as quickly as it had been made he would prove to be untrue. Besides, he knew Angelika too well now not to know that he would never obtain a separation from her until, with the law at her back, she had flayed him alive. He could not get free.

  From the first it had been a question of honour and duty; honour and duty on account of the child which was to come - and which did not come. Here he had a serious grievance against her; but yet, in the midst of the tragedy, he could not but be amused at the skill with which she turned his own gallantries against him. At last he dared not mention the subject, for he only heard in return about his gay bachelor life.

  The longer this state of things lasted and the more it became known, the more incomprehensible it became to most people that they did not separate - to himself, too, at times, during sleepless nights. But it is sometimes the case that he, who makes a thousand small revolts, cannot brace himself to one great one. The endless strife itself strengthens the bonds, in that it saps the strength.

  He deteriorated.