At that moment the door of the hall opened, and a breath of cold air fell in like a moral objection. Through the glass front one saw the white of the snow, the sun, which stood so clear and sharp as if it wanted to make everything that is soft inside hard outside.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m going out,\u201d said Morgenstern suddenly. \u201cInto the outdoor pool. Do you want to\u2026?\u201d<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp hesitated. Outside was the cold. Inside was the blue. Outside was the snow that covers everything \u2013 even the grass that supposedly used to be blue.<\/p>\n
And Hans Castorp had, as we know, a special relationship to everything that lies between the orders.<\/p>\n
\u201cYes,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
They went.<\/p>\n
One must not imagine this, esteemed female reader, esteemed male reader, as a heroic walk, but as what it was: two men in white bathrobes walking over a stone floor from which the warmth rose like a service. They went through an airlock, through a glass door, and suddenly there was air that was so cold that it contracted not only the skin but the thoughts.<\/p>\n
Outside the world lay like a picture.<\/p>\n
Snow on the tables, snow on the chairs, snow on the paths, snow on the trees; and the sun stood above it, large and dazzling, as if it were the logo of the house in cosmic form. In the distance lay mountains, blue\u2011gray, with clouds on them, and the valley below seemed so far away that it was hardly real.<\/p>\n
Amid all this white lay water: a pool, steaming, warm, a piece of summer that had been placed into the winter. The surface, despite the steam, was clear. One saw the edges of stone. One saw ladders of metal. And Hans Castorp felt a thought rise in him that was at once banal and correct: that every lagoon, no matter how much it looks like nature, is always a construction.<\/p>\n
They climbed in.<\/p>\n
The warm water struck their legs, their bellies, their chests; and above the warmth stood the cold of the air, so that when one breathed one saw one\u2019s own breath \u2013 as if one were an animal. The steam settled on the hair, on the eyebrows, and Morgenstern, with his fogged gaze, once again looked like a mask.<\/p>\n
They sat down on one of the stone edges, half in the water, half outside. That was, thought Hans Castorp, the most pleasant position: always between the elements.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou see,\u201d said Morgenstern, and he pointed with a wet hand at the white. \u201cOut there is no grass. And yet yesterday I claimed it was blue.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp looked into the snowfields, into the spruces, and he thought: The grass is not blue. It is only hidden. And it is hidden in a way that has a comforting effect, because it says: Everything keeps growing, even when you don\u2019t see it.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe,\u201d he said, \u201cyou only saw it under the snow.\u201d<\/p>\n
Morgenstern laughed softly.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2026 made it. With words.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp nodded.<\/p>\n
Making words. That is what words do. And sometimes, he thought, they make so well that the one who speaks himself believes what he has made. That is the real danger: not the lie, but the self\u2011conviction.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is bad,\u201d said Morgenstern, and his voice sounded muffled in the steam, \u201cwhen you realize that you are not only making jokes but realities.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp looked at the surface of the water. It reflected the sky, blue, and he thought that in water you can reflect everything, even innocence. And that the water does not lie in doing so; it only shows.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have children,\u201d said Hans Castorp, more as a statement than as a question.<\/p>\n
Morgenstern nodded.<\/p>\n
\u201cYes,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd do you know what the worst thing is? Children learn how to speak. And how to be silent. And how to twist. They learn it without you teaching it to them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp thought of the children at the sweets table, of their greedy innocence, of their reverence for the craft. He thought: Children are bringers of truth. And bringers of truth are dangerous.<\/p>\n
They were silent for a while.<\/p>\n
Then Morgenstern said, suddenly, with a kind of defiance:<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t make these resolutions because I want to be a good person. I made them because I am afraid.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp looked at him.<\/p>\n
\u201cAfraid of what?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n
Morgenstern looked at his hands, which lay in the water, pink from the warmth.<\/p>\n
\u201cOf my wife at some point\u2026\u201d He searched for the word and did not find it. Then he said: \u201c\u2026being gone. Not physically. But inwardly. That she no longer believes me. That she no longer feels safe. That she\u2026\u201d He broke off.<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp thought of the sentence on the wall of the reception hall: Joy to him who comes. Joy to him who goes. He thought: There is a going that is no going. And there is a staying that is no staying.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat is,\u201d he said, \u201ca reasonable fear.\u201d<\/p>\n
Morgenstern looked at him, astonished. \u201cReasonable?\u201d<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp smiled.<\/p>\n
\u201cReasonable,\u201d he said. \u201cBecause it tells you: You are not alone in the world. And that is, strictly speaking, the only morality.\u201d<\/p>\n
Morgenstern closed his eyes as if he wanted to store this sentence.<\/p>\n
At that moment, at the edge of the steaming pool, between snow and blue, Hans Castorp felt a strange shift within himself. It was not that he had suddenly become a better person \u2013 such things do not happen in a thermal pool \u2013 but that, for a moment, he felt the nearness of another life: a life with a wife, with children, with a guilt that is not political but private; with resolutions that do not make history but breakfast.<\/p>\n
It was a Tonio\u2011like feeling: longing for normality that at the same time moves and humbles you.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou won\u2019t do it perfectly,\u201d said Hans Castorp.<\/p>\n
Morgenstern opened his eyes. \u201cI know.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBut maybe,\u201d Hans Castorp continued, \u201cyou will do it\u2026 honestly. And that is, if you will, already a kind of art.\u201d<\/p>\n
Morgenstern smiled crookedly.<\/p>\n
\u201cArt,\u201d he said. \u201cI thought art was something else. Something with\u2026 talent.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp thought of Kautsonik: That is my talent. I stay.<\/p>\n
\u201cTalent,\u201d he said, \u201cis sometimes only the ability to keep trying something even though you know you will fail.\u201d<\/p>\n
Morgenstern looked at him, and one could tell how much he needed this sentence.<\/p>\n
They climbed out of the water again, at some point.<\/p>\n
The cold hit them like a reprimand. They walked, steaming, along the snow\u2011lined path, and Hans Castorp felt how his skin, which had just been soft, contracted; and he thought: That is how it is with morality. Warm inside, cold outside.<\/p>\n
Morgenstern pointed to a small path that led through snow\u2011covered bushes. There stood low lamps that shone despite the day, as if one wanted to give the path a security that nature lacks.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is the hut,\u201d said Morgenstern.<\/p>\n
They went there.<\/p>\n
The path led through snow that lay high at the edges like frozen waves. Spruces bent under the load. And at the end stood a small wooden house, simple, with a roof on which the snow lay thick; warmth seemed to come from the cracks, and the door looked like the door to a secret. A rope limited access, as if one also had to give excess a kind of order.<\/p>\n
In front of the hut stood a figure, in a bathrobe, waiting. She looked like a patient who is being called in. Hans Castorp thought: The sauna too has its waiting room.<\/p>\n
Morgenstern stopped.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn there,\u201d he said softly, \u201cit is very hot.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat is the point,\u201d said Hans Castorp.<\/p>\n
Morgenstern nodded.<\/p>\n
\u201cYes,\u201d he said. \u201cHeat is\u2026 truth. You can\u2019t lie well in it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp thought of his own past and felt how unedifying it is when a sentence is so right.<\/p>\n
They did not go in.<\/p>\n
Not because they were afraid of the heat, but because the presence of those waiting suddenly made them aware that this too is a stage. One does not like to confess when others are waiting for their cue.<\/p>\n
Instead they went back into the house, into those rooms that are dedicated to resting.<\/p>\n