"Logically carried out, Fritz. The saints prosper your wooing."
CHAPTER XII
[THE STRUGGLE OF LOVE AND DUTY]
In his lonely room in the mountain hut in which he had taken up his quarters, Christian Almer sat writing. It was early morning; he had risen before the sun. During the past week he had struggled earnestly with the terror which oppressed him; his suffering had been great, but he believed he was conquering. The task he had imposed upon himself of setting his duty before him in clear terms afforded him consolation. The book in which he was writing contained the record of a love which had filled him with unrest, and threatened to bring dishonor into his life.
* * * * * *
"I thank Heaven," he wrote, "that I am calmer than I have been for several days. Separation has proved an inestimable blessing. The day may come when I shall look upon my love as dead, and shall be able to think of it as one thinks of a beloved being whom death has snatched away.
"Even now, as I think of her, there is no fever in the thought. I have not betrayed my friend.
"How would he regard me if he were acquainted with my mad passion--if he knew that the woman he adored looked upon him with aversion, and gave her love to the friend whom he trusted as a brother?
"There was the error. To listen to her confession of love, and to make confession of my own.
"That a man should so forget himself--should be so completely the slave of his passions!