He lived over again the scene in the dining room; he pictured to himself how Pilar would sob, and fling herself on the floor, and clasp his knees, and tear her hair, and saw himself, after a useless repetition of his torture, disarmed anew.

For one moment he thought of giving a cry for help, of calling Schrotter to his aid, but he was ashamed of his want of manliness, and put the idea from him.

There was nothing for it but to resign himself.

He did so with a gloomy, desperate relinquishment of all his principles, his sense of morality, his ideals of life.

He was the victim of a malign fate, and there was no use fighting against it.
He must accept it as he would sickness or death.