Part 29 (1/2)

”Yes, yes; but tell me, why did he never become a Father? He was old enough,wasn't he?”

”I did tell you-it was his illness prevented him.”

”Well, but don't you think-if he is first a Jesuit and second a man of intellect,always making new combinations-don't you think this second, added characteristichas to do with his illness?”

”What do you mean by that?”

”I only mean-look: he has a moist spot, and that hinders him from becoming a Father. But his combinations would probably have hindered him anyhow, and so, in a certain way, the spot and the combinations hang together. In his way he too is a sort of delicate child-a joli jesuite joli jesuite with a pe with a pet.i.te tache humide.”

They had reached the sanatorium, but stood in a little group on the terrace before the house talking still awhile before parting, and watched by a few guests who happened to be lounging there. Herr Setrembrini said: ”I repeat, my young friends-I warn you. I cannot prevent you from cultivating the acquaintance now it is made, if curiosity leads you to do so. But arm yourselves, arm your hearts and minds with suspicion, oppose him with a critical spirit. I will characterize this man for you with a single word. He is a voluptuary.”

The cousins made astonished faces. Hans Castorp asked: ”A-what? But he is a member of a Society. They have to take certain vows, I have always supposed-and then he is such a poor creature physically, so-”

”You are talking rubbish, Engineer,” Settembrini interposed. ”It has nothing to do with physical insufficiency; while as for the vows you speak of, there are always reservations. I was speaking in a broader, more intellectual sense, your comprehension of which I felt I might presume upon, by now. You probably remember my visiting you one day in your room-it was long ago, frightfully long ago-you had just finished your three weeks in bed, after being received into the sanatorium.”

”Of course. You came in at dusk, and turned on the light-I remember it as if it were yesterday-”

”Good. We fell into talk, as we have often done, I rejoice to say, and upon somewhat elevated subjects. We spoke, I believe, of life and death: of the dignity of death in so far as it is the condition and appurtenance of life, and the grotesqueness into which it declines so soon as the mind erects it into an independent principle. Young men,” went on Herr Settembrini, standing close to the two, with the thumb and middle finger of his left hand splayed out like a fork, as if to collect their attention, while he raised the forefinger of his right in warning, ”imprint it upon your minds: the mind is sovereign. Its will is free, it conditions the moral world. Let it once dualistically isolate death, and death will become, in actual fact, actu actu, by this mental act of will, you understand me, a power in itself, the power opposed to life, the inimical principle, the great temptation; whose kingdom is the kingdom of the flesh. You ask me why of the flesh? I answer you: because it unlooses and delivers, because it is deliverance-yet not deliverance from evil, but deliverance by evil. It relaxes manners and morals, it frees man from discipline and restraint, it abandons him to l.u.s.t. If I warn you against this man, whose acquaintance with you I have unwillingly brought about, if I exhort you to go thrice-armed with a critical spirit in all your dealings with him, it is because all his thoughts are voluptuous, and stand under the aegis of death-and death is the most dissolute of powers, as I told you then, Engineer-I well remember my words, for I never fail to retain in my mind any good and telling phrase I may have chanced to avail myself of-a power hostile to civilization and progress, to work and to life, against whose mephitic breath it is the n.o.blest task of the teacher to s.h.i.+eld the mind of youth.”

Who could talk more beautifully than Herr Settembrini, who clearer, or in betterrounded periods? Hans Castorp and Joachim Ziemssen thanked him most warmly for all he had said, and mounted the Berghof steps, while Herr Settembrini betook himself once more to his humanistic writing-desk, in the storey above Naphta's silken cell. This first visit of the cousins to Naphta, whose course we have described, was followed by two or three others; one, even, in the absence of Herr Settembrini. All of them afforded young Hans Castorp much food for thought, when, in his blueblossoming retreat, with the image of the human form divine, called h.o.m.o Dei h.o.m.o Dei, hovering before his mind's eye, he sat and ”took stock.”

Choler. And Worse And Worse

AUGUST arrived, and with its entry slipped past the anniversary of our hero's arrival in these parts. So much the better when it was gone-young Hans Castorp had scarcely looked forward to it with pleasure. And that was the rule. The anniversary was not popular. The old inhabitants pa.s.sed it by without thought; and-though in general they seized on every pretext for jollification, and took occasion to celebrate their own private anniversaries in addition to these that accented the recurrent rhythm of the year; making merry with popping of corks in the restaurant, over birthdays, general examinations, imminent departures whether ”wild” or sanctioned, and the like-they accorded to the anniversary of arrival no other attention than that of a profound silence. They let it slip past, perhaps they actually managed to forget it, and they might be confident that no one else would remember. They set store by a proper articulation of the time, they gave heed to the calendar, observed the turning-points of the year, its recurrent limits. But to measure one's own private time, that time which for the individual in these parts was so closely bound up with s.p.a.ce-that was held to be an occupation only fit for new arrivals and short-termers. The settled citizens preferred the unmeasured, the eternal, the day that was for ever the same; and delicately each respected in others the sentiment he so warmly cherished himself. To say to anybody that this day three years ago was the day of his arrival, that would have been considered brutal, in consummately bad taste-it simply never happened. Even Frau Stohr, whatever her lacks in other respects, was far too tactful and well disciplined to let it slip out. Certainly she united great ignorance with her infected and feverish physical state. Recently at table she had alluded to the ”affectation” of the tip of her lung; and the conversation having taken a historical turn, she explained that dates were her ”ring of Polycrates”-a remark which made her hearers stare. But it was unthinkable that she should remind young Ziemssen his year would be up in February-though she had very likely thought of it. For the unhappy creature's head was full of useless baggage, and she loved to keep track of other people's affairs. But the tradition of the place held her in check.

Thus also on Hans Castorp's anniversary. She may have even tried to nod at him meaningfully, at table; but encountering a vacant stare dexterously withdrew. Joachim too had kept silence, though he probably had clearly in mind the date on which he had fetched the guest from the Dorf station. Joachim was ever by nature taciturn; had always talked less than his cousin, even before they came up here-there had never been any comparison between him and the humanists and controversialists of their acquaintance-and in these days his silence had a.s.sumed heroic proportions, only monosyllables pa.s.sed his lips. His manner, however, spoke volumes. It was plain that in his mind the Dorf station was a.s.sociated with another order of ideas than those of arrival or meeting people. He was conducting a lively correspondence with the flatland; his resolve was ripening, his preparations drawing to a head.

July had been warm and bright. But with August bad weather set in, cloudy and damp; with first a sleety drizzle and then actual snow. And it lasted-with interludes of single resplendent days-all through the month, and on into September. At first the rooms held the warmth of the summery period just past: they stood at fifty degrees, which pa.s.sed for comfortable. But it grew rapidly colder; there were rejoicings when the snowfall whitened the valley, for the sight of it-the sight alone, for the mere drop of the temperature would not have sufficed-compelled the management to heat, first the dining-room, then the chambers as well; so that when one rolled out of the rugs, at the end of a rest period, and re-entered one's chamber, one might warm one's stiffened fingers against the hot pipes, though the dry air these gave out did accentuate the burning in the cheeks.

Was it winter again? Almost the senses thought so. On every hand were loud complaints, that they had been cheated out of their summer; though they had really cheated themselves, abetted by conditions both natural and artificial, and by a consumption of time-units reckless alike within and without. Reason was aware that fine autumnal weather was certain to follow, there would be a succession of brilliant days each outvying the other, and so fine that one might still honour them with the name of summer, save for the flatter arc the sun made in its course, and its earlier setting. But the effect of the winter landscape on the spirit was stronger than the power of such consolatory thoughts. The cousins would stand at the closed door into the balcony, and look out with loathing into the whirl of flakes-it was Joachim who stood thus, and in a suppressed voice he said: ”So that's to begin all over again, is it?” From behind him in the room Hans Castorp responded: ”That would be rather early-surely it can't be settling down to winter already-but it has a terribly final look. If winter consists in darkness and cold, snow and hot pipes, then there's no denying it's winter again. And when you think we'd just finished with it and that the snow only just melted-at least, it seems that way, doesn't it, as though spring were only just over-well, it gives one a turn, I will say. It is actually a blow to one's love of life-let me explain to you how I mean. I mean the world as normally arranged is conducive to man's needs and his pleasure in life-isn't that so? I won't go so far as to say that the whole natural order of things, for instance the size of the earth, the time it takes to revolve on its axis and about the sun, the division between day and night, summer and winter-in short, the whole cosmic rhythm, if you like to call it that- was especially arranged for our use and behoof; that would be cheek, I suppose, and simple-minded into the bargain. It would be teleological reasoning, as the philosophers express it. No, it would be truer to say that our needs are-thank G.o.d that it should be so-in harmony with the larger, the fundamental facts of nature. I say thank G.o.d, for it is really ground for praising Him. Now, when summer or winter comes along down below, the past summer or winter is far enough in the past to make one glad to see it again-and therein lies some of the joy we have in life. But up here this order and harmony are destroyed: first because there are no proper seasons, as you yourself said when I first came, but only summer days and winter days all mixed up together; and secondly, because what we spend up here isn't time at all, and the new winter, when it comes, isn't new, but the same old winter all the time. All that explains perfectly the disgust you feel when you look out at the window.”

”Thanks,” Joachim said. ”And now that you have explained it, you feel so satisfied that you are even satisfied with the situation itself-although in all human-no!” said he. ”I'm done. Fed up. It's beastly. The whole thing is just one tremendous, rotten, beastly sell; and I, for my part-” He went with hasty steps through the room, and shut the door angrily behind him. Unless Hans Castorp was much mistaken, there had been tears in the mild, beautiful eyes.

He left the other staggered. So long as Joachim had confined himself to putting his determination into words, his cousin had not taken it too seriously. But now that silence spoke for him, and his behaviour too, Hans Castorp was alarmed, for he saw that the military Joachim was the man to translate words into deeds-he was so alarmed that he grew pale, and his pallor was for them both. ”Fort possible qu'il va mourir mourir,” he thought. And that piece of third-hand information mingled itself with an old, painful, never-quite-to-be-suppressed fear, which made him say to himself: ”Is it possible he could leave me alone up here-me, who only came on a visit to him? That would be crazy, horrible; at the bare thought of it I can feel my heart flutter and my cheek pale. Because if if I am left up here-as I shall be, if he goes down, for it is out of the question for me to go with him- I am left up here-as I shall be, if he goes down, for it is out of the question for me to go with him-if I am left up here, it is for ever; alone I should never find my way back. Never back down to the world again. And at the thought my heart stands still.” I am left up here, it is for ever; alone I should never find my way back. Never back down to the world again. And at the thought my heart stands still.”

Such the course of Hans Castorp's fearful musings. But that very afternoon, cert.i.tude was vouchsafed. Joachim declared himself, the die was cast, the bridgesburnt.

They went down after tea to the bas.e.m.e.nt for the monthly examination. This was the beginning of September. On entering the warm air of the consulting-room, they saw Dr. Krokowski sitting at his table, and the Hofrat, very blue in the face, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, tapping his shoulder with the stethoscope, and yawning at the ceiling. ”Mahlzeit, children,” said he, languidly. His mood was lax, resigned and melancholic, and he had probably been smoking. There were also, however, some objective grounds for his state, as the cousins had heard: international scandal of a kind only too familiar in the establishment. A certain young girl called Emmy Nolting had entered House Berghof two years before in the autumn, and after a stay of some nine months departed cured. But before September was out she had returned, saying she did not ”feel well” at home. In February, with lungs from which all vestige of rhonchi had disappeared, she was sent home again-but by the middle of July was back in her place at Frau Iltis's table. This Emmy, then, had been discovered in her room at one o'clock at night in company with another sufferer, a Greek named Polypraxios, the same whose shapely legs had attracted favourable attention the night of mardi gras- mardi gras-a young chemist whose father owned dye-works in the Piraeus. The discovery had been made through the jealousy of another young girl, a friend of Emmy, who had found her way to Emmy's room by the same route the Greek had taken-namely, across the balconies; and, distracted by her jealous rage, had made great outcry, so that everybody came running, and the scandal became known to the sparrows on the house-tops. Behrens had to send all three of them away; and had been at the moment going over the whole unsavoury affair with Krokowski, who had had both girls under private treatment. The Hofrat, as he examined, continued to let fall remarks, in resigned and dreary tones-for he was such a master of auscultation that he could listen to a man's inside, dictate what he heard to his a.s.sistant, and talk about something else all the time.

”Ah, yes, gentlemen,” he said, ”this cursed libido. libido. You can get some fun out of the thing, it's all right for you.-Vesicular.-But a man in my position, verily I say unto you-dullness here-he hath his belly full. Is it my fault that phthisis and concupiscence go together-slight harshness here? I didn't arrange it that way; but before you know where you are you find yourself the keeper of a stew-restricted here under the left shoulder. We have psycho-a.n.a.lysis, we give the noodles every chance to talk themselves out-much good it does them! The more they talk the more lecherous they get. I preach mathematics.-Better here, the rhonchi are gone.-I tell them that if they will occupy themselves with the study of mathematics they will find in it the best remedy against the l.u.s.ts of the flesh. Lawyer Paravant was a bad case; he took my advice, he is now busy squaring the circle, and gets great relief. But most of them are too witless and lazy, G.o.d help them!-Vesicular.-You see, I know it's only too easy for young folk to go to the bad up here-I used to try to do something about these debauches. But it happened a few times that some brother or bridegroom asked me to my face what affair it was of mine-and since then I've stuck to my last.-Slight rales up on the right.” You can get some fun out of the thing, it's all right for you.-Vesicular.-But a man in my position, verily I say unto you-dullness here-he hath his belly full. Is it my fault that phthisis and concupiscence go together-slight harshness here? I didn't arrange it that way; but before you know where you are you find yourself the keeper of a stew-restricted here under the left shoulder. We have psycho-a.n.a.lysis, we give the noodles every chance to talk themselves out-much good it does them! The more they talk the more lecherous they get. I preach mathematics.-Better here, the rhonchi are gone.-I tell them that if they will occupy themselves with the study of mathematics they will find in it the best remedy against the l.u.s.ts of the flesh. Lawyer Paravant was a bad case; he took my advice, he is now busy squaring the circle, and gets great relief. But most of them are too witless and lazy, G.o.d help them!-Vesicular.-You see, I know it's only too easy for young folk to go to the bad up here-I used to try to do something about these debauches. But it happened a few times that some brother or bridegroom asked me to my face what affair it was of mine-and since then I've stuck to my last.-Slight rales up on the right.”

He finished with Joachim, thrust his stethoscope in the pocket of his smock, and rubbed his eyes with both huge hands, as was his habit when he had ”backslidden” and become melancholy. Half mechanically, between yawns, he reeled off his patter: ”Well, Ziemssen, just keep your p.e.c.k.e.r up, you'll be all right yet. You aren't like a picture in a physiology-book, there's a hitch here and there, and you haven't cleaned up your Gaffky, you've even gone up a peg or so, it's six this time-but never mind, don't pull a long face, you are better than you were when you came, I can hand it to you in writing. Just another five or six months-monaths, I mean. Did you know that is the earlier form of the word? I mean to say monath monath, after this-”

”Herr Hofrat,” Joachim began. He stood bare to the waist, heels together and chest out, with a determined bearing, and as mottled in the face as ever he had been that time when Hans Castorp first made observations on the pallor of the deeply tanned. Behrens ran on without noticing: ”-and if you stop another round half year and do particular pipe-clay, why, you'll be a made man, you can take Constantinople singlehanded; you'll be strong enough to command a regiment of Samsons-” Who knows how much more nonsense he might have uttered if Joachim's unflinching determination to make himself heard had not brought him to a stand.

”Herr Hofrat,” the young man said, ”I should like to tell you, if you will pardon me, that I have decided to leave.”

”What's that? So you want to leave? I thought you wanted to go down later as asound man, to be a soldier.”

”No, I must leave now, Herr Hofrat, in a week, that is.”

”Do you mean what you say? You want to hop out of the frying-pan into the fire? You're going to hook it? Don't you call that desertion?”