The Magic Mountain Part 14

"What other matters?"

"Don't be so irresponsible! You only came for three weeks, and brought a steamertrunk. You will need underwear and linen, and winter clothes-and more footwear.

And anyhow, you will want money sent."

"If," said Hans Castorp, "if I need it." I need it."

"Very well, we'll wait and see. But we ought not"-Joachim paced up and down the room as he spoke, "we ought not to behave like ostriches. I have been up here too long not to know how things go. When Behrens says there is a rough place, almost rhonchi-oh well, of course, we can wait and see."

There, for the time, the matter rested; and the weekly and fortnightly variations of the normal day set in. Hans Castorp could partake of them even in his present state, if not at first hand, then through the reports Joachim gave when he came and sat by the bedside for fifteen minutes.

His Sunday morning breakfast-tray was adorned with a vase of flowers; and they did not fail to send him his share of the Sunday pastries. After luncheon the sounds of social intercourse floated up from the terrace below, and with tantara and squealing of clarinets the fortnightly concert began. During its progress Joachim entered, and sat down by the open balcony door; his cousin half reclined in his bed, with his head on one side, and his eyes swimming with pious enjoyment as he listened to the mounting harmonies, and bestowed a momentary metaphorical shoulder-shrug upon Settembrini's twaddle about music being "politically suspect."

And, as we have said, he had Joachim post him upon the sights and events of the sanatorium life. Had there, he asked, been any toilets made in honour of the day, lace matinees or that sort of thing?-though for lace matinees the weather was too cold. Whether there were people going driving (certain expeditions had in fact been undertaken, among others by the Half-Lung Club, which had gone in a body to Clavadel). On the next day, Monday, he demanded to hear all about Dr. Krokowski's lecture, when Joachim came from it and looked in upon his cousin on his way to the rest-cure. Joachim did not feel like talking, he appeared disinclined to make a report. He would have let the subject drop, as it had after the previous lecture, had not Hans Castorp persisted, and demanded to hear details.

"I am lying up here," he said, "paying full pension. I am ent.i.tled to have all that is going." He recalled the Monday of two weeks ago, and his solitary walk, which had done him so little good; and committed himself to the view that it was that walk which had revolutionized his system and brought to the surface the latent infection. "But what a stately and solemn way the people hereabout have of talking," he said, "I mean the common people; almost like poetry. 'Then thank ye kindly and G.o.d be with ye,' " he repeated, giving the words the woodman's intonation. "I heard that up in the woods, and I shall remember it all my life. You get to a.s.sociate a thing like that with other memories and impressions, you know, and you never forget it as long as you live.-Well, so Krokowski held forth again on the subject of love, did he? What did he say about it to-day?"

"Oh, nothing in particular. You know from the other time how he talks." "But what did he offer that was new?"

"Nothing different.-Oh, well, the stuff to-day was pure chemistry," Joachim unwillingly condescended to enlighten his cousin. It seemed there was a sort of poisoning, an auto-infection of the organisms, so Dr. Krokowski said; it was caused by the disintegration of a substance, of the nature of which we were still ignorant, but which was present everywhere in the body; and the products of this disintegration operated like an intoxicant upon the nerve-centres of the spinal cord, with an effect similar to that of certain poisons, such as morphia, or cocaine, when introduced in the usual way from outside.

"And so you get the hectic flush," said Hans Castorp. "But that's all worth hearing. What doesn't the man know! He must have simply lapped it up. You just wait, one of these days he will discover what that substance is that exists everywhere in the body and sets free the soluble toxins that act like a narcotic on the nervous system; then he will be able to fuddle us all more than ever. Perhaps in the past they were able to do that very thing. When I listen to him, I could almost think there is some truth in the old legends about love potions and the like.-Are you going?"

"Yes," Joachim said, "I must go lie down. My curve has been rising since yesterday. This affair of yours has had its effect on me."

That was the Sunday, and the Monday. The evening and the morning made the third day of Hans Castorp's sojourn in the "caboose." It was a day without distinction, an ordinary weekday, that Tuesday-but after all, it was the day of his arrival in this place, he had been here a round three weeks, and time pressed; he would have to send a letter home and inform his uncle of the state of affairs, even though cursorily and without reference to their true inwardness. He stuffed his down quilt behind his back, and wrote upon the note-paper of the establishment, to the effect that his departure was being delayed beyond the appointed time. He was in bed with a feverish cold, which Hofrat Behrens-over-conscientious as he probably was-refused to take lightly; insisting on regarding it as immediately connected with his (Hans Castorp's) const.i.tution and general state of health. The physician had perceived directly he saw him that he was decidedly anaemic; and take it all in all, it seemed as though the limit he had originally set for his stay was not regarded by the authorities as long enough for a full recovery. He would write again as soon as he could.-That's the idea, thought Hans Castorp; not too much or too little; and whatever the issue, it will satisfy them for a while. The letter was given to the servant, with instructions that it be taken direct to the station and sent off by the earliest possible train, instead of being posted in the usual way in the house letter-box, with consequent delays.

Our adventurous youth felt much relieved to have set affairs in such good train-if likewise a good deal plagued by his cough and the heavy-headedness caused by his catarrh-and now he began to live each day as it came-a day which never varied, which was always broken up into a number of sections, and which, in its abiding uniformity, could not be said either to pa.s.s too fast or to hang too heavy on the hands. In the morning the bathing-master would give a mighty thump on the door and enter-a nervous individual named Turnherr, who wore his sleeves rolled up, and had great standing veins upon his forearms, and a gurgling, impeded speech. He addressed Hans Castorp, as he did all the patients, by the number of his room, and rubbed him with alcohol. Not long after he left, Joachim would appear ready dressed, to greet his cousin, inquire after his seven o'clock temperature, and communicate his own. While he breakfasted below, Hans Castorp did the same above, his down quilt tucked behind his back, in enjoyment of the good appet.i.te a change engenders. He was scarcely disturbed by the bustling and businesslike entrance of the two physicians, who at this hour made a hurried round of the dining-hall and the rooms of the bedridden and moribund. Hans Castorp, with his mouth full of jam, announced himself to have slept "splendidly" and looked over the rim of his cup at the Hofrat, who leaned with his fists on the centre table, and hastily scanned the fever chart. Both physicians wished him good-morning, and he responded in an unconcerned drawl as they went out. Then he lighted a cigarette, and beheld Joachim returning from the morning walk, almost before he realized his departure. Again they chatted of this and that; Joachim went to lie down until second breakfast, and the interval seemed so short that even the emptiest-headed could hardly have felt bored. Hans Castorp, indeed, had so much food for thought in the events of the past three weeks, so much to ponder in his present state and what might come of it, that although two bound volumes of an ill.u.s.trated periodical from the Berghof library lay upon his night-table, he had no need to resort to them.

It was no different with the brief hour during which Joachim took his regular walk down to the Platz. He came in to Hans Castorp afterwards, told him whatever of interest he had seen, and sat or stood a few minutes by the sick-bed before he withdrew to his own balcony for the midday rest. And how long did that last? Again, only a brief hour. It seemed to Hans Castorp he had barely settled to commune a little with his own thoughts, hands folded behind his head and eyes directed upon the ceiling, before the gong droned through the house, summoning all those not bedridden or moribund to prepare for the princ.i.p.al meal of the day.

Joachim went down, and the "midday broth" was brought-"broth" in a symbolic sense merely, considering in what it consisted. Hans Castorp was not on sick-diet. He lay there and paid full pension, and what they brought him in the abiding present of that midday hour was by no means broth, it was the full six-course Berghof dinner, in all its amplitude, with nothing left out. Even on week-days this was a sumptuous meal; on Sundays it was a gala banquet and "gaudy," prepared by a cosmopolitan chef in the kitchens of the establishment, which were precisely those of a European hotel de luxe de luxe. The "dining-room girl" whose duty it was to serve the bedridden brought it to him in dainty cook-pots under nickel-plated dish-covers. She produced an invalid table, a marvel of one-legged equilibrium, adjusted it across his bed, and Hans Castorp banqueted like the tailor's son in the fairy-story.

As he finished, Joachim would return, and it might be as late as half past two before the latter went into his loggia, and the hush of the main rest period fell upon the Berghof. Not quite, perhaps; perhaps it would be nearer the truth to call it a quarter after, but these odd quarter-hours outside the round figures do not count, they are swallowed up unregarded, in places where one reckons time in large units-on long train journeys of many hours on end, or wherever one is in a state of vacant suspense, with all one's being concentrated on pulling the time behind one. A quarter past two will pa.s.s for half past, will even pa.s.s for three, on the theory that it is already well on the way toward it. The thirty minutes are taken as a sort of onset to the full hour from three to four, and inwardly discounted. In this wise the duration of the main rest period was finally reduced to no more than an hour; and even this hour was lopped off at its latter end, elided, as it were. Dr. Krokowski played the part of apostrophe. Yes, nowadays when Dr. Krokowski went his independent afternoon round, he no longer made a circle round Hans Castorp; our young man was no longer an interval and hiatus, he counted as much as the others, he too was a patient. He was questioned, not ignored, as had so long been the case, to his slight and concealed but daily recurring annoyance. It was on Monday that Dr. Krokowski for the first time manifested himself in the room-manifested being the only proper word for the phenomenon as Hans Castorp, with an involuntary start, perceived it. He lay in half- or quarter-slumber, and became aware that the a.s.sistant was beside him, having entered not through the door, but approaching from outside. His round at this time lay not through the corridor, but along the balconies, and he had come through the open door of the loggia with an effect of having flown through the air. There he stood at Hans Castorp's bedside, in all his pallor and blackness, broad-shouldered and squat, his lips parted in a manly smile that showed the yellowish teeth through his beard- the apostrophe!

"You seem surprised to see me, Herr Castorp," he said, mildly baritone, drawling, unquestionably rather affected: he gave the r r a foreign, palatal sound, not rolled, but p.r.o.nounced with a single impact of the tongue against the upper front teeth. "But I am only performing my pleasant duty, in seeing after your welfare. Your relations with us have entered upon a new phase. Overnight the guest has become the comrade." His patient was rather alarmed by the word comrade.-"Who would have thought it?" he jested fraternally. "Who would have thought it on that evening when I had the honour of making your acquaintance, and you replied to my mistaken supposition-at that time mistaken-with the explanation that you were perfectly healthy? I believe I expressed some doubt, but I a.s.sure you I did not mean it in that sense. I will not pretend to being more sharp-sighted than I am. I was not thinking of a moist spot. My remark was meant only in the general, philosophical sense, as a doubt whether the two conceptions, man and perfect health, were after all consistent one with the other. Even to-day, after the examination, I confess that I personally, as distinguished from my honoured chief, cannot regard the moist spot as the most important factor in the situation. It is, for me, a secondary phenomenon-the organic is always secondary-" Hans Castorp drew a short breath. a foreign, palatal sound, not rolled, but p.r.o.nounced with a single impact of the tongue against the upper front teeth. "But I am only performing my pleasant duty, in seeing after your welfare. Your relations with us have entered upon a new phase. Overnight the guest has become the comrade." His patient was rather alarmed by the word comrade.-"Who would have thought it?" he jested fraternally. "Who would have thought it on that evening when I had the honour of making your acquaintance, and you replied to my mistaken supposition-at that time mistaken-with the explanation that you were perfectly healthy? I believe I expressed some doubt, but I a.s.sure you I did not mean it in that sense. I will not pretend to being more sharp-sighted than I am. I was not thinking of a moist spot. My remark was meant only in the general, philosophical sense, as a doubt whether the two conceptions, man and perfect health, were after all consistent one with the other. Even to-day, after the examination, I confess that I personally, as distinguished from my honoured chief, cannot regard the moist spot as the most important factor in the situation. It is, for me, a secondary phenomenon-the organic is always secondary-" Hans Castorp drew a short breath.

"-and thus your catarrh is, in my view, a third-line phenomenon," Dr. Krokowski concluded, very softly. "How is it? The rest in bed will undoubtedly be efficacious, in this respect. What have you measured to-day?" And from then on the a.s.sistant's visit was in the key of an ordinary professional call, to which it kept during the following days and weeks. Dr. Krokowski would enter by the open balcony door at a quarter to four or earlier, greet the patient with manly readiness, put the usual professional questions, with perhaps a little personal touch as well, a jest or two-and if all this had a slight aura of the questionable about it, yet one can get used even to the questionable, provided it keeps within bounds. It was not long before Hans Castorp forgot any feeling he may have had about Dr. Krokowski's visits. They took their place in the programme of the normal day, and performed, as it were, an elision in the latter end of the main rest period.

The a.s.sistant would return along the balconies at four o'clock or thereabouts, that is to say mid-afternoon. Yes, thus suddenly, before one realized it, there one was, in the very deep of the afternoon, and steadily still deepening on toward twilight. Before tea was finished drinking, up above and down below, it was well on the way toward five o'clock; and by the time Joachim returned from his third daily round and looked in on his cousin, it would be near enough to six to reduce the remaining rest period to no more than a single hour-reckoned always in round numbers. It was an easy matter to kill that much time, if one had ideas in one's head, and a whole orbis pictus...o...b..s pictus on the table to boot. on the table to boot.

Joachim, on his way to the evening meal, stopped to say goodbye. Hans Castorp's tray was brought. The valley had long since filled with shadow, and darkened apace as he ate. When he had done, he leaned back against his down quilt, with the magic table cleared before him, and looked into the growing dusk, to-day's dusk, yet scarcely distinguishable from the dusk of yesterday or last week. It was evening-and had just been morning. The day, artificially shortened, broken into small bits, had literally crumbled in his hands and was reduced to nothing: he remarked it to himself with a start-or, at any rate, he did at least remark; for to shudder at it was foreign to his years. It seemed to him that from the beginning of time he had been lying and looking thus.

One day-some ten or twelve had pa.s.sed since Hans Castorp retired to bed-there was a knock on his door at about this hour, before Joachim had returned from dinner and the social half-hour. Upon Hans Castorp's inquiring "Come in," it opened, and Ludovico Settembrini appeared-and lo, on the instant the room was flooded with light. For the visitor's first motion, while still on the threshold, had been to turn on the electric light, which filled the room in a trice with vibrating brilliance, and reverberated from the gleaming white ceiling and furniture.

The Italian had been the only one of the guests after whom Hans Castorp had expressly asked in these days. Joachim indeed, when he stood or sat by his cousin for ten or fifteen minutes-and that happened ten times in the course of the day-would relate whatever there was of interest or variation in the daily life of the community; and Hans Castorp's questions, whenever he put any, had been of a general nature. The exile wished to know whether there were new guests, or if any of the familiar faces were absent; it seemed to gratify him that only the former was the case. There was one new-comer, a hollow-cheeked, green-complexioned young man, who had been given a place at the next table on the right with Frau Iltis and the ivory-skinned Levi. Hans Castorp might look forward to the pleasure of seeing him. So no one had left? Joachim answered in a curt negative, his eyes on the ground. But he had to reply to this question every day or so, until at last he became restive and sought to answer once for all by saying that, so far as he knew, no one was purposing to leave-n.o.body did leave very much, up here, as a matter of fact.

But Hans Castorp had asked after Settembrini by name, and desired to hear what he had "said to it." To what? "Why, that I am in bed and supposed to be ill." Settembrini, it seemed, had expressed himself on the subject, though briefly. On the very day of Hans Castorp's disappearance he had come to find out his whereabouts of Joachim, obviously prepared to hear that the guest had departed; and on learning the explanation had responded only in Italian: first "Ecco!" and then " and then "Poveretto!"-as much as to say: "There you are, poor chap!"-It needed no more Italian than the cousins could boast to understand the sense in which he uttered the words. "Why 'poveretto'?" Hans Castorp inquired. "He sits up here with his literature made of politics and humanism and he is very little good for the ordinary interests of life. He needn't look down his nose and pity me like that, I shall get down to the flat-land before he does."

And now Herr Settembrini stood here in the suddenly illuminated room-Hans Castorp, who had raised himself on his elbow and turned blinking toward the door, recognized him and flushed. Settembrini wore, as usual, his thick coat with the wide lapels, a frayed turnover collar, and the check trousers. As he came from supper, he was armed with the usual wooden toothpick. The corner of his mouth, beneath the beautiful curve of his moustache, displayed the familiar fine, dry, critical smile. "Good-evening, Engineer! May I be permitted to look in on you? If so, I need light-you will pardon my taking it upon myself"-and he waved his small hand toward the lamp in the ceiling. "You were absorbed in contemplation, I should not wish to disturb you. A tendency to meditate is surely natural under the circ.u.mstances, and if you want to talk, you have your cousin. You see, I am well aware that I am superfluous. But even so-we live here close together, a sympathy springs up between man and man, intellectual and emotional sympathy.-It has been a full week that we have not seen you. I began to think you had left, as I saw your place empty down in the refectory. The Lieutenant told me better-or should we say worse, if that would not sound impolite? Well, and how are you? How do you feel? Not too much cast down, I hope?"

"Ah, that is you, Herr Settembrini! How friendly of you! Refectory-oh, I say, that is good! Always at your jokes-but do sit down. You are not disturbing me in the least. I was lying there musing-no, musing is too much to say. I was simply too lazy to turn on the light. Thanks very much, I am subjectively as good as normal, and my cold is much better from lying in bed. But it was a secondary phenomenon, so everybody tells me. My temperature is still not what it should be, I have 99.5 to 99.7, all the time." "You take your temperature regularly?"

"Yes, six times a day, like the rest of you. Pardon me, I am still laughing at your calling our dining-hall a refectory. That is what they are called in a cloister, isn't it? After all, there is some resemblance-not that I have been in a cloister, but I imagine they are something like this. And I have the 'Rule' at my fingers' ends, and observe it faithfully."

"As a pious brother should. One might say that your novitiate is at an end and you have made your profession. My formal congratulations. You even say 'our' dininghall. But, without meaning to affront your manly dignity, you remind me more of a young nun than a monk, a regular new-shorn, innocent bride of Christ, with great martyrlike eyes. I have seen such lambs, here and there about the world; never without a certain-a certain access of sensibility. Yes, your cousin has told me about it. So you had yourself examined after all, at the eleventh hour."

"Since I was febrile-of course, Herr Settembrini. What do you want? If I had been at home, I should have consulted a physician. And here, at the source and fount so to speak, with two specialists in the house-it would have been very strange-" "Of course, of course. And you took your temperature, too, before they told you to. But they did recommend it, from the beginning. And the Mylendonk slipped you the thermometer?" "Slipped me-? Since the occasion arose, I bought one from her."

"I understand. An irreproachable transaction. And how many months did the chief knock you down for? Good heavens, I have asked you that before! Do you remember? You had just come. You answered with such a.s.surance-"

"Of course I remember. I have had many new experiences since that time, but that I remember as though it were yesterday. You were so amusing, and spoke of Behrens as the judge of the lower regions-Radames, was it? No, wait, that is something else." "Rhadamanthus? Yes, I may have called him that. I am afraid I do not remember every phrase that happens to well up to my lips."

"Rhadamanthus, of course. Minos and Rhadamanthus. And you spoke to us of Carducci at the same time-"

"Pardon me, my dear young friend, we will, if you please, leave him out. The name, at this moment, sounds too strange upon your tongue."

"That's good too," laughed Hans Castorp. "But I have learned a good deal about him through you.-Yes, at that time I had not the faintest suspicion, I answered you that I was here for three weeks, I did not know any different. The Kleefeld girl had just been whistling at me with her pneumothorax, I hardly knew where I was. But I was feeling febrile even then-for the air up here is not only good against against the illness, you know, it is also good the illness, you know, it is also good for for it, it sometimes brings it to the surface-which is of course a necessary step in the cure." it, it sometimes brings it to the surface-which is of course a necessary step in the cure."

"An alluring hypothesis. And has Hofrat Behrens also told you about the GermanRussian woman we had here last year-no, year before last-for five months? He did not? He should have. A charming woman, of Russo-German origin, married, a young mother. She came from the Baltic provinces somewhere-lymphatic, anaemic, but probably some more serious trouble as well. She spent a month here and complained that she felt ill all the time. They told her to be patient. Another month pa.s.ses, she continues to a.s.sert that she is actually worse instead of better. They point out to her that only the physician can judge how she is-she herself only knows how she feels; which does not signify. They are satisfied with the condition of her lung. Good. She says no more, she goes on with the cure, and loses weight by the week. The fourth month she faints during the examination. That is nothing, says Behrens, her lung is perfectly satisfactory. But by the fifth month she cannot get about, she goes to bed and writes to her husband, out in the Baltic provinces; Behrens gets a letter from him marked 'personal' and 'urgent' in a very firm hand-I saw it myself. Yes, says Behrens, and shrugs his shoulders, it seems to be indicated that she certainly cannot stand the climate up here. The woman was beside herself. He ought to have said that before, she had felt it from the beginning, she declared-they had killed her among them. Let us hope she recovered her strength when she went back to her husband." "Oh, that's good, that's very good! You do tell stories capitally, Herr Settembrini; every word is so plastic. And that story about the girl that went bathing in the lake, the one they gave the 'silent sister' to take her temperature with-I have often laughed at it, all by myself. Yes, what strange things do happen. One lives and learns. But my own case is still quite uncertain. The Hofrat is supposed to have discovered a trifling weakness, places where I was infected long ago, I heard them myself when, he tapped me, and some fresh places he can hear now-what a funny word fresh is to use in such a connexion! But so far there are only the acoustic indications; real diagnostic certainty we shall only arrive at when I am about again, and the x-ray and photography have taken place. Then we shall have positive knowledge."

"You think so? You know that the photographic plate often shows spots that are taken for cavities when there are none there? And that, sometimes, it shows no spots although there is something there? Madonna Madonna-the photographic plate! There was a young numismatician up here, with fever; and since he had fever, there were cavitiesplain to be seen on the plate. They could even hear them. They treated him for phthisis, and he died. The postmortem showed his lung to be sound; the cause of his death was some coccus or other."

"Oh, come, Herr Settembrini. Talking about post-mortems already. I haven't gotthat far yet, I a.s.sure you."

"Engineer, you are a wag."

"And you are an out-and-out critic and sceptic, I must say. You do not even believein science. Can you see spots on your plate, Herr Settembrini?"

"Yes, it shows some spots."

"And you really are ill too?"

"Yes, I am unfortunately rather ill," replied Settembrini, and his head drooped. There was a pause, in which he gave a little cough. Hans Castorp, from his bed, regarded his guest, whom he had reduced to silence. It seemed to him that with his two simple inquiries he had refuted Settembrini's whole position, even the republic and the bello stile bello stile. And he did nothing on his side to resume the conversation. After a while Herr Settembrini straightened himself, with a smile. "Tell me, Engineer," he said, "how have your family taken the news?"

"What news do you mean? Of my delayed return? Oh, my family, you know, consists of three uncles, a great-uncle and his two sons, who are more like my cousins. Other family I have none, I was doubly orphaned when I was very small. As to how they took it-they know as much, and as little, as I myself. At first, when I had to go to bed, I wrote that I had a severe cold, and could not travel. Yesterday, as it seemed rather long after all, I wrote again, saying that my catarrh had drawn Hofrat Behren's attention to the condition or my chest, and that he insisted I should remain until he is clear what the condition is. You may be perfectly sure they took it calmly- it didn't upset them."

"And your position? You spoke of a sphere of practical activity, where you were intending to enter shortly on certain duties."

"Yes, as volunteer apprentice. I have asked them to excuse me for the present. You must not imagine they are in despair over my defection. They can carry on indefinitely without an a.s.sistant."

"Good. Everything is in order, then, in that direction. Perfect equanimity all along the line. It is a phlegmatic race of people in your part of the country, is it not? But energetic, certainly?"

"Oh, yes, very energetic," said Hans Castorp. He mentally a.s.sayed the temper of his native city, and found that his interlocuter had characterized it justly. "Phlegmatic and energetic, yes, I should say they are."

"I a.s.sume," continued Herr Settembrini, "in case your stay is prolonged, we shall make the acquaintance of your uncle-I mean your great-uncle-shall we not? He will undoubtedly come up to ascertain your condition."

"Out of the question," cried Hans Castorp. "Under no conceivable circ.u.mstances. Wild horses could not drag him up here. My uncle is apoplectic, you understand; he has almost no neck at all. No, he has to have a reasonable atmospheric pressure; it would be worse for him up here than it was for your lady from the Baltic provinces- he would be in a dreadful way."

"I am disappointed. And apoplectic? Energy and phlegm are not much use under

those circ.u.mstances.-Your uncle is rich, I suppose? You are all rich down your way?"

Hans Castorp smiled at Herr Settembrini's literary generalizations. And again, from his distant couch, he cast a metaphorical eye upon the sphere from which he had been s.n.a.t.c.hed. He called up memories, he made an effort to judge objectively, and found that distance enabled him to do so.