The Magic Mountain (11 page)

“So that’s her problem,” Hans Castorp said. “I wonder if she’ll say the same thing to me when I get to know her? That would be so strange—I mean, it would be comical and weird at the same time,” he said, and his eyes took on yesterday’s look—seemed too hot and heavy, as if he had been weeping for a long time, and shone with the same glint that the

Austrian horseman’s novel cough had enkindled in them. In fact, he felt as if he had only just now reestablished a connection with yesterday, as if he were taking in the whole picture again, as it were, which had not really been the case since he awoke. He was ready, by the way, he declared, shaking a few drops of lavender water on his handkerchief so that he could dab at his brow and under his eyes. “If it’s all right with you, we can go to breakfast—
tous les deux
,” he added as a joke, in a burst of high spirits. Joachim cast him a gentle glance and smiled a curious smile—melancholy and slightly mocking, it seemed—but why, he kept to himself.

After making sure that he had cigars to smoke, Hans Castorp picked up his walking stick, coat, and hat—the last out of obstinacy, because he was all too definite in his own civilized habits to change them lightly and adopt strange new ones for a mere three weeks. And so they left, taking the stairs, and as they passed one door or another, Joachim would name its occupant—German names, but also all sorts of odd-sounding ones—adding brief remarks about the person’s character and the severity of the case.

They also met people already returning from breakfast, and whenever Joachim said good morning to anyone, Hans Castorp would politely tip his hat. He was tense and nervous, like a young man about to introduce himself to a host of strangers, all the while plagued by the distinct feeling that his eyes and face are red—which was only partly true, because he was actually rather pale.

“Before I forget,” he suddenly said rather impulsively, “you can go ahead and introduce me to the lady in the garden if we happen to meet her, I have no objections. She can repeat her ‘
tous les deux
’ to me, it won’t matter. I’m ready for it now and understand what it means and will know how to put on the proper face. But I don’t want to make the acquaintance of the Russian couple, do you hear? I definitely don’t want that. They are people devoid of all manners, and although I am going to have to live next door to them for three weeks because there was no other way to arrange things, I do not wish to know them. I am perfectly within my rights in expressly forbidding it.”

“Fine,” Joachim said. “Did they disturb you all that much? Yes, they are barbarians, so to speak—uncivilized, to put a word on it—I did warn you. He always comes to meals in a leather jacket—quite shabby, let me tell you. I’m amazed Behrens doesn’t do something about it. And she’s not all that well groomed herself, despite the plumed hat. But in any case, you needn’t worry, they sit a good distance away, at the Bad Russian table—because there’s also a Good Russian table, where the more refined Russians sit. So there’s hardly any possibility you’d meet them, even if you wanted to. It’s not at all easy to make acquaintances here, if only because there are so many foreigners among the guests. I personally have got to know only a few myself in all my months here.”

“Which of them is ill?” Hans Castorp asked. “He or she?”

“He is, I think. Yes, just him,” Joachim said, obviously preoccupied. They hung their coats on the stands outside the dining hall, and entered it, a bright, low-vaulted room, where voices buzzed, dishes clattered, and “dining attendants” scurried about with steaming pots of coffee.

There were seven tables in the dining hall, five placed lengthwise, only two crosswise. The tables were large, with room for ten persons at each, although not all the places had been set. They took only a few steps diagonally across the room, and Hans Castorp found that he was already at the place set for him, at the end of the middle table toward the front of the room, halfway between the two crosswise tables. Standing erect behind his chair, Hans Castorp bowed stiffly and cordially to his tablemates as Joachim formally introduced them, although he barely looked at them, let alone made a conscious note of their names. The only face and name he put together was Frau Stöhr, noticing her red face and oily, ash-blond hair, and an expression of such willful ignorance that it was easy to believe her guilty of howling gaffes. Then he sat down and noted approvingly that early breakfast here was a serious meal.

There were pots of marmalade and honey, bowls of oatmeal and creamed rice, plates of scrambled eggs and cold meats; they had been generous with the butter. Someone lifted the glass bell from a soft Swiss cheese and cut off a piece; what was more, a bowl of fruit, both fresh and dried, stood in the middle of the table. A dining attendant in black and white asked Hans Castorp what he wanted to drink—cocoa, coffee, or tea? She was as small as a child, with an old, long face—a dwarf, he realized with a shock. He looked at his cousin, who merely shrugged and lifted an eyebrow as if to say, “Right, what else is new?” And so Hans Castorp simply accepted the fact and, since it was a dwarf, asked for his tea with special courtesy. He began with some creamed rice topped with sugar and cinnamon, meanwhile letting his eyes wander over the other items he intended to sample and across the seven tables of assembled guests—Joachim’s colleagues, his companions in misfortune, all with the same illness deep inside, all chatting and breakfasting.

The room was done in the kind of modern decor that combines the most efficient simplicity with just a dash of fantasy. It was not deep in relation to its width, and on all four sides was a kind of passageway where the sideboards stood and that opened as a series of arches onto the central dining area. Its columns were paneled with a sandalwood finish, but only partway up; the top of each was painted white, like the upper half of the walls and the ceiling, but colorfully trimmed with simple, cheerful stenciled stripes, which then continued along the broad arches of the low ceiling. The hall was also decorated with several shiny brass chandeliers, all electric, each a series of three stacked rings joined by delicate filigree, with bells of milk glass set like little moons on the lowest circle. There were four glass doors—two on the long wall opposite, opening onto a veranda outside; a third up front to the left, leading directly into the front lobby; and finally the one through which Hans Castorp had entered and that opened off a different hallway, because Joachim had not used the same set of stairs as the night before.

To his right was a homely creature in black, with a dull, flushed complexion and fuzzy cheeks; he took her to be a seamstress or dressmaker, chiefly because her breakfast consisted of nothing but coffee and buttered rolls—and for some reason he had always associated dressmakers with coffee and buttered rolls. On his left sat an English maiden lady—likewise well on in years, very ugly, with skinny, frigid fingers, who was drinking tea the color of blood and reading letters from home, written in a full, rounded hand. Next to her came Joachim, and then Frau Stöhr in a Scotchplaid woolen blouse. She kept the balled fist of her left hand pressed to her cheek while she ate and took obvious pains to make a refined impression when she talked, primarily by pulling her upper lip back to expose her long, narrow, rabbitlike teeth. A young man with a sparse moustache and an expression on his face as if he had something foul-tasting in his mouth sat down next to her and ate his breakfast in total silence. Hans Castorp had already taken his seat when the fellow entered, his chin sunk against his chest as he walked, and took his place without a glance at anyone, showing by his demeanor that he absolutely did not wish to be introduced to the new guest. Perhaps he was too ill to value or see any point in mere formalities, or even to take any interest in his surroundings. Seated across from him, very briefly, was an extraordinarily gaunt, very blond young woman, who emptied a bottle of yogurt onto her plate, spooned down this dairy product, and promptly departed.

The table conversation was not exactly lively. Joachim chatted politely with Frau Stöhr, inquiring after her health and expressing gentlemanly regrets that it left something to be desired. She complained of her “listlessness.” “I’m so listless,” she said, drawling it out with the affectation of the uneducated. Her temperature had already been 99.2 degrees when she got up, and what would it be by afternoon? The dressmaker admitted to a temperature equally as high, but declared the effect was just the opposite with her, that she felt quite excitable, nervous and restless inside, as if some special, decisive event were about to happen, which was not the case at all, this being simply a physical excitation with no psychological basis. She was probably not a dressmaker after all, because she spoke correctly, almost pedantically. All the same, Hans Castorp found her excitability, or at least her discussion of it, somehow inappropriate, almost indecent for such a nondescript, insignificant creature. He asked them, first the dressmaker and then Frau Stöhr, how long they had been up here—the former had been a resident for five months, the latter for seven; he marshaled his English to ask his neighbor on the left what sort of tea that was she was drinking—rose-hip, he learned—and whether it tasted good, to which she responded almost stormily in the affirmative. He now gazed out across the room where people were coming and going: early breakfast was not a strictly communal affair.

He had been a little afraid of the dreadful effect all this might have on him, but found himself disappointed in that—the dining hall atmosphere was quite congenial, one had no sense of being in a place of misery. Well-tanned young people of both sexes entered humming a tune, spoke with the dining attendants, and weighed into breakfast with a robust appetite. There were more mature people as well, married couples, a whole family with children, including teenage boys, all speaking Russian. Almost all the women wore close-fitting jackets of wool or silk, called “sweaters,” in white or bright colors, with shawl collars and side pockets; it looked very pretty when they just stood there chatting, both hands buried in their sweater pockets. Photographs were passed around at several tables—recent shots they had taken themselves, no doubt; at one table they were trading postage stamps. The talk was of the weather, of how one had slept and what one’s “oral measurement” had been that morning. Most of them were cheerful—for no particular reason presumably, but simply because they had no immediate cares and were assembled in considerable numbers. A few people, to be sure, sat at the table with heads propped in their hands, staring straight ahead. People let them stare and paid them no attention.

Suddenly Hans Castorp flinched—he was annoyed and offended. A door, the one to his left that led to the lobby, had banged shut—someone had simply let it slam, or perhaps even slammed it intentionally, and that was a noise that Hans Castorp absolutely could not tolerate, he had always hated it. Perhaps it was a learned dislike, perhaps an inborn idiosyncrasy—whatever it was, he abhorred banging doors and could have slapped anyone guilty of slamming one within earshot. In this case, the door was divided into little glass panes, which only heightened the shock: it was a bang
and
a rattle. “Damn it,” Hans Castorp thought angrily, “what kind of sloppiness is that?” Since the seamstress had said something to him at the same moment, he had no chance to determine who the malefactor was. But as he answered the seamstress, there were deep furrows between his blond eyebrows and his face was wrenched with distress.

Joachim asked whether the doctors had been through yet. Yes, they had been there once already, someone replied, but had left the dining hall at almost the same moment the cousins arrived. Then they might as well not wait, Joachim said. There would be an opportunity in the course of the day to make the introductions. But at the door they almost collided with Director Behrens, who came striding through it at high speed, followed by Dr. Krokowski.

“Whoops, heads up, gentlemen!” Behrens said. “That could have meant some badly trodden corns for all parties.” He spoke with a strong Lower Saxon accent, chewing his words broadly. “So,
you’re
the fellow,” he said to Hans Castorp, after Joachim clicked his heels together and made the introductions. “Well, my pleasure.” And he extended a hand as big as a shovel. He was a bony man, a good three heads taller than Dr. Krokowski, with a shock of white hair; his neck vertebrae stuck out, and his watery, bloodshot blue eyes protruded; he had a snub nose above a little short-cropped moustache, which sat slightly askew because his upper lip was turned up at one corner. What Joachim had said about his cheeks proved to be the absolute truth—they were purple, making his head look that much more colorful against his belted, white surgical smock, which fell just below the knees, revealing striped trousers and colossal feet in a pair of yellow, rather worn, laced boots. Dr. Krokowski was in professional uniform as well, except that his smock was more shirtlike, with elastic at the wrists, and of a black, shiny fabric that only emphasized his pallor. He played the role of the perfect assistant, taking no part whatever in the exchanged greetings—although the tense, critical way he held his mouth suggested that he found his subordinate position a little absurd.

“Cousins?” the director asked, gesturing with his hand, pointing now at one, now at the other, and looking down out of bloodshot blue eyes. “Well, is he going to march to the pipe and drum like you?” he asked Joachim, nodding his head toward Hans Castorp. “Ha, God forbid—right? I spotted it at once.” And now he spoke directly to Hans Castorp: “There’s something so civilian, so comfortable about you—no rattling sabers like our corporal here. You would be a better patient than he, I’d lay odds on that. I can tell right off whether someone will make a competent patient or not, because that takes talent, everything takes talent, and this Myrmidon here hasn’t the least talent for it. For military drill, maybe, I can’t say as to that, but none for being ill. He constantly wants to leave, can you believe it? Forever asking to leave, pesters and badgers me and simply can’t wait to live a life of drudgery down below. What a zealot! Won’t give us six months of his time. Even though we have such a lovely place here—you must admit, Ziemssen, it is lovely here, isn’t it? Well, your good cousin will know better how to appreciate us, he’ll be able to amuse himself. There’s no shortage of ladies—we have the most adorable ladies here. Many of them quite picturesque—viewed externally, at least. But
you
’ll have to improve your color somewhat, too, otherwise the ladies will give you the cold shoulder. ‘The golden tree of life is green,’ true, but a green face is really not quite the thing. Totally anemic, of course,” he said, and mechanically stepped up to Hans Castorp, extended two fingers, and pulled an eyelid down. “No doubt of it, totally anemic, just as I said. Do you know what? It was not all that stupid of you to leave your Hamburg to fend for itself for a while. A highly commendable institution, your Hamburg. Always sends us a nice contingent, what with its intoxicatingly damp meteorology. But if I might use this opportunity to give you some modest advice—quite
sine pecunia
, of course—as long as you’re here with us, why don’t you do just what your cousin does? In a case like yours, there’s no wiser course than to live for a while as if it were a slight
tuberculosis pulmonum
, and build up your protein a little. It’s very curious, you see, the way protein is metabolized up here. Although one’s general metabolism increases, the body stores the protein. Well, and you slept well, did you, Ziemssen? Fine, fine. But now, do get on with your promenade! But no more than half an hour. And make sure you stick the old mercury cigar in your mouth afterward. And always jot down the results, right, Ziemssen? Conscientiously doing one’s duty. I’ll want to see your chart come Saturday. And your good cousin should measure, too. Measuring never hurts. Morning, gentlemen. Have a good time. Morning, morning . . .” And Dr. Krokowski joined him as he sailed off, swinging his arms, palms turned clear around to the back, tossing his question right and left as to whether people had slept well, which was universally answered in the affirmative.