The Magic Mountain (46 page)

And thank God, he had shown sufficient feverish presence of mind to reply, “
Pas de quai, madame!
”

What a godsend, he thought, that you could be certain mail would be distributed in the lobby every Sunday afternoon. One can say that he consumed one whole week waiting for the return of that single hour every seven days—and waiting means racing ahead, means seeing time and the present not as a gift, but as a barrier, denying and negating their value, vaulting over them in your mind. Waiting, people say, is boring. But in actuality, it can just as easily be diverting, because it devours quantities of time without our ever experiencing or using them for their own sake. One could say that someone who does nothing but wait is like a glutton whose digestive system processes great masses of food without extracting any useful nourishment. One could go further and say that just as undigested food does not strengthen a man, time spent in waiting does not age him. Granted, such pure and unalloyed waiting practically never happens.

And so the week had been devoured, it was Sunday afternoon and the distribution of the mail was proceeding as if this were still the Sunday of seven days before. The procedure continued to provide the most exciting opportunities; each minute concealed and offered possibilities of coming into social contact with Frau Chauchat—and Hans Castorp let those possibilities squeeze his heart and make it flutter, but never actually let them become reality. Certain inhibitions stood in the way, some military, some civilian—which is to say, some that were due to Joachim’s honorable presence and Hans Castorp’s own sense of honor and duty; some, however, were based in the feeling that social contact with Clavdia Chauchat—a
civilized
relationship, with formal pronouns and bows and conversation in French perhaps—was not necessary, not desirable, not the right thing at all. He stood there and watched her smile and talk, just as Pribislav Hippe had smiled and talked in the schoolyard years before, her mouth open rather wide and her slanting gray-green eyes above her strong cheekbones narrowing to little slits. The effect was not “beautiful” at all; but it was what it was, and when a man is in love his aesthetic opinions are no more valid than his moral judgments.

“You are also waiting for dispatches, are you, my good engineer?” Only one person talked like that, one bothersome person. Hans Castorp winced and turned toward Herr Settembrini, who stood smiling before him. It was his delicate, humanist smile, the one with which he had first greeted the newcomer on the bench beside the water trough—and just as on that day, Hans Castorp now felt ashamed of himself. But despite the many times he had tried to push the “organ-grinder” away for bothering him in his dreams, the waking man proved a better person than the dreaming. The sight of that smile not only shamed and sobered Hans Castorp, but also awakened a sense of gratitude for needs met.

“Dispatches?” he said. “Good God, Herr Settembrini, I’m not an ambassador. There may be a postcard there for one of us. My cousin is checking right now.”

“That little limping devil up front already handed me my paltry correspondence,” Settembrini said, shoving a hand down into the side pocket of his ineluctable petersham coat. “Interesting matters. Matters of literary and social consequence, I cannot deny it. It is about an encyclopedia—to which a philanthropic institution has done me the honor of asking me to contribute. In short, a fine offer of work.” Herr Settembrini paused. “But what about your affairs?” he asked. “How are things in that regard? How are you getting along with your acclimatization, for example? You have not been residing here among us for so long now that, taken all in all, the question can be removed just yet from the agenda.”

“Thank you for asking, Herr Settembrini. As before, I am having my difficulties. I think it possible I may very well continue to have them until my last day here. Some people never get used to the air here, my cousin told me the day I arrived. But one gets used to not getting used to it.”

“A convoluted process,” the Italian said with a laugh. “A strange sort of naturalization. But of course, youth is capable of most anything. It may not get used to things, but it does take root.”

“And after all, this isn’t a Siberian salt mine.”

“No. . . . Ah, you prefer Oriental metaphors. Quite understandable. Asia is devouring us. Tartar faces in every direction you look.” And Herr Settembrini discreetly turned his head to glance over his shoulder. “Genghis Khan,” he said, “lone wolves on dusky steppes, snow and schnapps, whips and knouts, Schlüsselburg prison and Holy Orthodoxy. They ought to erect a statue of Pallas Athena here in the lobby—as a kind of self-defense. Look there—one of your Ivan Ivanovitches, without cuff or collar, has got into a fight with Prosecutor Paravant. Each claims he should be ahead of the other in the mail line. I don’t know who is right, but to my mind, the goddess fights on the prosecutor’s side. He’s an ass, of course, but at least he knows his Latin.”

Hans Castorp laughed—something Herr Settembrini never did. One could not even imagine his ever laughing heartily; he managed little more than a dry, delicate tightness at one corner of his mouth. He watched the young man laugh and then asked, “And the copy of your X-ray—have you received it?”

“I did indeed receive it,” Hans Castorp confirmed with importance. “Just recently. Here it is.” And he reached for his inside breast pocket.

“Ah, you carry it in your wallet. As a kind of identification, like a passport or membership card. Very good. Let me see.” And Herr Settembrini raised the little glass plate framed with black paper up to the light, holding it between the thumb and forefinger of his left hand—a gesture one saw quite frequently up here. As he examined the funereal photograph, a little scowl passed over his face with its black almond-shaped eyes—though it was not clear if his scowl was an attempt to see better or if there were other reasons for it.

“Yes, yes,” he said at last. “Here you have your legitimation—thank you so much.” And he handed the piece of glass back to its owner, but in sidelong fashion, passing it across his other arm and turning his face away.

“Did you see the strands?” Hans Castorp asked. “And the nodules?”

“You are aware,” Herr Settembrini replied languidly, “what store I set by these artifacts. You know, too, that the spots and shadows inside you are for the most part matters of physiology. I have seen hundreds of pictures that looked about the same as yours, and the decision whether they are truly a ‘passport’ or not lies more or less in the eyes of the beholder. I speak as a layman, but as a layman of many years’ experience.”

“Does your passport look worse?”

“Yes, somewhat worse. I also know, by the way, that our lords and masters never base a diagnosis solely on such playthings. And so you propose to spend the winter with us, do you?”

“Yes, dear God, I’m beginning to get used to the idea that until my cousin leaves, I won’t be leaving, either.”

“Which means you’re getting used to not getting . . .You did put that very wittily. I hope you’ve been sent your winter things—warm clothes, sturdy footwear?”

“Everything. Everything nicely taken care of, Herr Settembrini. I informed my relatives, and our housekeeper sent it all express. I can manage here now.”

“That eases my mind. But wait—you’ll need a sleeping bag, one with fur lining. Where are our minds? This late-summer weather is deceptive. It can be deepest winter within an hour. You’ll be spending the coldest months here.”

“Yes, the sleeping bag,” Hans Castorp said, “that’s probably a necessary piece of gear. It has crossed my mind that we—my cousin and I—should go down into town sometime soon and buy one. It’s something I’ll never use again later, but it’s worth it, after all, for four to six months.”

“Yes, it is worth it, it is worth it, my good engineer,” Herr Settembrini said softly, stepping closer to the young man. “It is truly hideous, you know, the way you are throwing the months around. Hideous, I say, because it is so unnatural, so foreign to your nature, purely a matter of a receptive young mind. Ah, the immoderate receptivity of youth—it can drive an educator to despair, because it is always ready to apply itself to bad ends. Do not ape the words you hear floating in the air around you, young man, but speak a language appropriate to your civilized European life. A great deal of Asia hangs in the air here. It is not for nothing that the place teems with Mongolian Muscovites—people like these.” And Herr Settembrini pointed back over his shoulder with his chin. “Do not model yourself on them, do not let them infect you with their ideas, but instead compare you own nature, your
higher
nature to theirs, and as a son of the West, of the divine West, hold sacred those things that by both nature and heritage are sacred to you. Time, for instance. This liberality, this barbaric extravagance in the use of time is the Asian style—that may be the reason why the children of the East feel so at home here. Have you never noticed that when a Russian says ‘four hours’ it means no more to him than ‘one hour’ does to us? The idea comes easily to mind that the nonchalance with which these people treat time has something to do with the savage expanse of their land. Too much room—too much time. It has been said that they are a nation with time on their hands—they can afford to wait. We Europeans can’t wait. We have just as little time as our noble, tidily segmented continent has space; we must carefully husband the resources of the former just as we do those of the latter—put them to use, good use, engineer! Our great cities are the perfect symbol—these centers and focal points of civilization, these crucibles of thought. Just as land values rise in cities and wasted space becomes an impossibility, in the same measure, please note, time becomes more precious there, too.
Carpe diem!
An urbanite sang that song. Time is a gift of the gods to humankind, that we may use it—use it, my good engineer, in the service of human progress.”

Whatever difficulties certain phrases presented to Herr Settembrini’s Mediterranean tongue, he had expressed himself in the most delightful fashion—clearly, euphoniously, and, one may well say, graphically. Hans Castorp could only respond with the brief, stiff, and uneasy bow of a schoolboy on the receiving end of a critical lecture. What could he possibly have replied? This private homily, which Herr Settembrini had delivered surreptitiously, almost in a whisper, behind the backs of the other guests, had been too businesslike, too unsocial, too little like conversation, for him to have expressed approval in any tactful way. One does not respond to a teacher with: “You said that beautifully.” Hans Castorp had indeed done that on several previous occasions, if only to preserve some kind of social equality—but the humanist had never before spoken with such pedagogic urgency. There was nothing for him to do but swallow this scolding—like a schoolboy dazed by too much moralizing.

One could tell from Herr Settembrini’s expression that he was still busy pursuing his train of thought even after he fell silent. He was still standing so close to Hans Castorp that the latter was forced to bend back just a little. His black eyes were focused in a fixed, thoughtful stare at the young man’s face.

“You are suffering, my good engineer,” he continued. “And you are suffering in great confusion—who would not notice it just by looking at you? But your attitude to suffering should be a European attitude—not that of the East, which precisely because it
is
weak and prone to illness, is so amply represented here. The East treats suffering with pity and infinite patience. We dare not, we cannot, do the same. We were speaking of my mail. Look here . . . or even better, come with me now. This is impossible. Let us get away from this spot, we’ll step in there. I have something to disclose to you that . . . Come along.”

And turning on his heels, he pulled Hans Castorp out of the lobby and into the social room nearest the main entrance, which was set up for reading and writing, but was empty at the moment. It had a bright, vaulted ceiling and was paneled in oak; its furnishings included bookcases, a central table covered with newspapers in holders and surrounded by chairs, and desks in nooks beneath window arches. Herr Settembrini strode across the room to a window. Hans Castorp followed him. The door remained open.

“These papers,” the Italian said, swiftly extracting a package from the pouchlike side pocket of his petersham coat—an oversize opened envelope, which contained several flyers and a letter that he ran through his fingers for Hans Castorp to see—“these papers bear a letterhead in the French language: ‘International League for the Organization of Progress.’ They have been sent to me from Lugano, where the league has a branch office. You ask me: What are its principles, its goals? I can tell you in two words. Working from Darwin’s theory of evolution, the League for the Organization of Progress advances the philosophical viewpoint that humankind’s innermost natural purpose is its own self-perfection. It concludes further that it is the duty of every person who desires to satisfy that natural purpose to cooperate in the cause of human progress. Many have followed that call; there are significant numbers of them in France, Italy, Spain, Turkey, even in Germany. I, too, have the honor to be on the league’s membership rolls. A large-scale scientific program of reform has been drawn up, embracing all presently known possibilities for perfecting the human organism. The problem of the health of our race is being studied, including the examination of methods for combating its degeneration, which doubtless is one lamentable side effect of increasing industrialization. Moreover, the league is engaged in founding popular universities, in working to overcome class struggle by every means of social improvement that commends itself for the purpose, and, finally, in eliminating conflict between nations, war itself, by fostering international law. As you can see, the efforts of the league are high-minded and all-embracing. Several international periodicals bear witness to its activities—monthly reviews, which appear in three or four important languages and report in very exciting articles about the progressive development of civilized humankind. Countless local chapters have been established in various countries, their purpose being to inform and educate by means of public lectures and Sunday festivities. Above all the league endeavors to supply materials to progressive political parties everywhere. Do you follow me, my good engineer?”