Hans Castorp remained seated.
He looked at his notebook. He looked at the ring. He looked, down below, at the hall, at Kautsonik, who was moving like clockwork.
He thought: So go.
And at the same time he thought: So another recommendation.
For was that not exactly what this world had perfected? That it even sells leaving as a program? That even the break itself is organized as a service?
He stood up.
It is disheartening, esteemed reader, dear reader, how quickly one sets oneself in motion as soon as a plan exists. The plan acts like a relief; it takes away the responsibility of wanting something oneself. Hans Castorp walked toward the stairs, this time not hesitating.
On the way down he saw the chandelier from the side. He saw how it consisted of individual pieces of glass, of many small, perfect parts that together make a great light – and he thought that this might be the image of optimization: improving individual parts until the whole shines.
But to shine, he thought, does not mean to live.
He reached the bottom.
Kautsonik was there.
Of course.
“You are leaving,” said Kautsonik, without asking.
“Yes,” said Hans Castorp.
Kautsonik nodded.
“Joy to him who goes,” he said, and this time it did not sound like routine, but like a sentence one says to someone who is doing something improper: withdrawing.
Hans Castorp pulled the envelope out of his pocket once more, as if he had to prove that it was not his own idea.
Kautsonik looked at him.
“You don’t need to show anything,” he said. “I believe you anyway that you are leaving.”
Hans Castorp smiled.
“You believe a lot,” he said.
“I see a lot,” replied Kautsonik.
Hans Castorp felt himself grow cold, although the hall was warm. He thought of registers, of entries, of names.
Kautsonik did not take the envelope from him. He did not take his luggage from him. He only took from him, with a look, a part of the fear – or he pretended to.
“You are traveling with Mr. Gustav,” said Kautsonik.
“Yes,” said Hans Castorp.
“A creator,” said Kautsonik, and the word sounded in his mouth like a mixture of respect and mockery.
Hans Castorp looked at him.
“You know him?”
Kautsonik shrugged his shoulders.
“In hotels,” he said, “one does not know the people. One knows their habits. He drinks his coffee black. He always sits at the edge. He pays on time. And he has…” – Kautsonik made a small pause – “a way of looking as if everything he sees were already the past.”
Hans Castorp swallowed.
“And I?” he asked, almost childlike.
Kautsonik looked at him.
“You,” he said, “wear your name like a mask. And you wear your ring like a guardian angel. That is a modern combination.”
Hans Castorp wanted to say something, but then he heard a voice behind him.
“Doctor!”
He turned around.
Dr. AuDHS was standing in the hall, dapper, inconspicuously expensive, with that smooth calm that says: I am not here privately – and which, if you look more closely, does have a crack, a slight restlessness, as if he were never entirely there, but always already in a thought.
Hans Castorp stepped up to him.
“Doctor,” he said, and he noticed how much this form of address was a support to him.
Dr. AuDHS smiled.
“You are leaving,” he said.
It was strange how everyone in this house could say “You are leaving” without Hans Castorp having told them. As if leaving, once it is in the air, were a rumor that immediately becomes true.
“Recommendation,” said Hans Castorp.
Dr. AuDHS raised his eyebrows.
“Whose?” he asked.
Hans Castorp hesitated.
“Gustav,” he said.
Dr. AuDHS nodded slowly.
“Ah,” he said. “South.”
Hans Castorp looked at him.
“You know everything,” he said, half reproachful, half relieved.
Dr. AuDHS smiled, and the smile had, very briefly, something like tiredness.
“I don’t know everything,” he said. “I only know patterns.”
“And what is this pattern?” asked Hans Castorp.
Dr. AuDHS looked up at the chandelier, as if he wanted to look at the circle.
“The pattern,” he said, “is that when people improve themselves, at some point they believe they must also change. And change always sounds like movement.”
Hans Castorp was silent.
“You will wear your ring,” said Dr. AuDHS, and it was not a question.
Hans Castorp looked at the ring.
“Yes,” he said, and he did not know whether it was agreement or dependence.
“Good,” said Dr. AuDHS. “Then do me a favor.”
Hans Castorp looked at him.
“Which?” he asked.
Dr. AuDHS leaned forward a little, and at this closeness one could feel the crack: the private tone in the professional voice.
“Don’t believe everything the ring tells you,” he said softly. “And don’t believe everything the South tells you.”
Hans Castorp smiled.
“And what should I believe?” he asked.
Dr. AuDHS looked at him for a moment, and this look, esteemed reader, dear reader, was again remarkable: not stern, not soft, but both at once.
“Believe,” he said, “that you were up there as well. That the mountain remains in you. And that what you will see down there is not automatically truth just because it is beautiful.”
“Beautiful and disheartening,” murmured Hans Castorp.
Dr. AuDHS nodded.
“Exactly,” he said. “And one more thing.”
Hans Castorp waited.
“When you begin to tell yourself about yourself,” said Dr. AuDHS, “then do not tell it in numbers. Tell it in sentences. Otherwise everything becomes…”
He made a small pause, searching for a word.
“…bestforming,” he finally said.
Hans Castorp laughed briefly.
“You are making fun of me,” he said.
“No,” said Dr. AuDHS. “I am diagnosing.”
Then he stepped back, as if he had to turn the closeness back into duty.
“Have a good trip,” he said. “And: stay slow.”
Hans Castorp nodded.
Slow.
System 2.
He left.
