. The sense of obligation
which he felt was often almost unbearable, and he longed to throw it
off. The man whom he hated for his own sake and despised for his
connection with the church, was daily in his house; at every turn he met
with Paolo's tacit disapprobation or outspoken resistance. For a long
time Paolo had doubted whether the marriage between the two young people
would turn out well, and while he expressed his doubts Marzio had
remained stubborn in his determination. Latterly, and doubtless owing to
the change in Gianbattista's character, Paolo had always spoken of the
marriage with favour. This sufficed at first to rouse Marzio's
suspicions, and ultimately led to his opposing with all his might what
he had so long and so vigorously defended; he resolved to be done with
what he considered a sort of slavery, and at one stroke to free himself
from his brother's influence, and to assure Lucia's future. During
several weeks he had planned the scene which had taken place that
evening, waiting for his opportunity, trying to make sure of being
strong enough to make it effective, and revolving the probable answers
he might expect from the different persons concerned. It had come, and
he was satisfied with the result.

Marzio Pandolfi's intelligence lacked logic. In its place he possessed
furious enthusiasm, an exaggerated estimate of the value of his social
doctrines, and a whole vocabulary of terms by which to describe the
ideal state after which he hankered. But though he did not possess a
logic of his own, his life was itself the logical result of the
circumstances he had created. As, in the diagram called the
parallelogram of forces, various conflicting powers are seen to act at a
point, producing an inevitable resultant in a fixed line, so in the plan
of Marzio's life, a number of different tendencies all acted at a
centre, in his overstrained intelligence, and continued to push him in a
direction he had not expected to follow, and of which even now he was
far from suspecting the ultimate termination.

He had never loved his brother, but he had loved his wife with all his
heart. He had begun to love Lucia when she was a child. He had felt a
sort of admiring fondness for Gianbattista Bordogni, and a decided pride
in the progress and the talent of the apprentice. By degrees, as the
prime mover, his hatred for Paolo, gained force, it had absorbed his
affection for Maria Luisa, who, after eighteen years of irreproac