They went out later.
One must, esteemed female reader, esteemed male reader, in a city like this walk; if only because walking here is not just locomotion, but participation. Whoever drives here, sees; whoever walks, is seen. And being seen is, as Gustav von A. knew, one of the conditions under which the mask makes sense.
Hans Castorp walked beside him.
The air was warm, but not hot; it was soft, as if it had decided not to hurt anyone. And yet in this softness there was something oppressive: a damp pressure that lays itself on the forehead like a hand.
In the alleys it smelled, in some places, more strongly of disinfectant.
One saw men – one would like to say: workers, but the word is in a city of female and male tourists almost obscene already –, who sprayed with hoses as if they were washing the stones. The liquid gleamed briefly, then it evaporated. They wore gloves. They wore masks. It was as if the city itself had become the patient.
Hans Castorp thought of the Berghof.
Back then, in Davos, they had not hidden the illness. They had cultivated it; they had given it spaces, times, rituals. Here they hid it. And hiding is, as is known, a form of recognition: one hides only what one fears.
“You see”, said Hans Castorp, “that is…”
“Yes”, said Gustav von A. and did not let the sentence be finished.
They passed a small shop, in whose door a man stood who sold cigarettes, postcards, water. He looked tired. His hands were brown, his eyes light.
As Hans Castorp walked past, the man said something in Italian, and it did not sound like advertising.
Gustav stopped, turned around.
“What did he say?” asked Hans.
Gustav did not answer immediately. He listened again, as if he did not only want to understand the language, but taste it.
The man said it once more, a little louder, as if he noticed that here are two strangers who in truth have long since belonged.
“Acqua cattiva”, he said. “Non bere.”
Bad water. Do not drink.
Hans Castorp felt himself grow cold, although it was warm.
“Bad water”, he repeated.
Gustav von A. shrugged his shoulders.
“Water is always bad”, he said. “It is old.”
Hans Castorp looked at him.
“You are strangely calm”, he said.
Gustav von A. smiled – barely visible.
“I am not calm”, he said. “I am busy.”
Hans Castorp understood.
Being busy is a modern form of not-feeling. And not-feeling is an old form of survival.
They walked on.
On a square there was a small group of people standing around a woman in uniform. One heard words like “Hospital”, “controllo”, “precauzione”. Hans Castorp did not understand everything, but he understood enough: control, precaution. Terms that in the highlands mean wellness – and here suddenly something else.
Gustav von A. stopped briefly, looked over.
“Do you want to…?” began Hans.
“No”, said Gustav.
It was a very short no.
Hans Castorp thought of the fable of the donkey and the tiger, which had so occupied Morgenstern. The tiger was right, but he had, as the lion said, committed the greater stupidity: wasted time.
Here, thought Hans, it is the other way round: one does not waste time by discussing; one wastes it by not looking.
And yet, esteemed female reader, esteemed male reader, one cannot always look. One cannot constantly switch on system two, this slow, deliberate thinking that takes effort. One does not live in effort. One lives in automatisms.
Hans Castorp noticed how his head began to calculate: probability, risk, incubation period – lots of terms that, when you say them, pretend that life is calculable.
He looked at his ring.
The ring showed nothing that one could call “danger”. It showed, on the contrary, something like approval: steps, pulse, temperature – all within range.
The ring, thought Hans Castorp, is a notoriously bad philosopher.
