he same moment his
brother rushed headlong past him. The weights below rattled, and the
clock struck two. The jackdaws, disturbed in their rest by the
struggle, swooped wildly down to the roof-door and fluttered about in
a croaking cloud. There was the sound of a heavy body striking on the
street pavement far below. A cry went up from all sides. Pale living
faces looked on a paler dead one which lay all bloody on the pavement.
Ghastly haste, screams, a clasping of hands, a running hither and
thither, spread like a whirlwind from the church-yard to the farthest
corner of the town. But the clouds high above in the sky heeded it not
and continued on their vast course unmoved. They see so much
self-created misery below them that a single instance cannot touch
them.

Everything in the world has its use, if not in itself or for him who
does it or who has it, then at least for others. So that which had
brought disgrace on the house of Nettenmair was now a guard against
greater disgrace. Fritz Nettenmair's love of drink was known
everywhere; everybody had seen him drunk; it was no wonder that all
who learned of his death attributed it to this vice. It was well that
nobody outside of the Nettenmair household knew that he had intended
to go to America; it was also well that, to avoid attracting attention
upon his return, he had worn his ordinary workman's clothes in the
mail coach with only his overcoat thrown over them. The coat had got
lost on the way and those who had a right to its restitution naturally
put in no claim for it. It did not occur to anybody to attach much
importance to this scarcely-noticed incident, as it was not necessary
to piece a story together when a complete one was already at hand.
Moreover, before the deed he had gone to his usual place of
recreation, had drunk heavily, and, after boasting in his foolhardy
way that he would now perform his master-piece, had left the tavern
for St. George's much intoxicated. All these outward circumstances
served to confirm the generally accepted opinion. By a fortunate
chance there had been no workmen at St. George's; of the struggle that
had taken place before the fall nobody knew anything except Apollonius
and the jackdaws who lived there. As soon as the inspector learned of
Fritz's death he looked up Apollonius, whom he found sitting exhausted
at the foot of the tower, and told him the story that was going the
rounds. It entered nobody's head to question Apollonius.