In the salon \u2013 they did not call it a salon here, but something between \u201cBreakfast Lounge\u201d and \u201cSala delle Colazioni\u201d, a name that was meant to radiate worldliness and non-commitment at the same time \u2013 the light was soft and cool. The large windows let the lagoon in, but only as a picture, as through a glass that translates reality into comfort.<\/p>\n
It smelled of coffee, of citrus, of polished wood \u2013 and, very faintly, beneath it all, of something else: of disinfection.<\/p>\n
This smell, esteemed female reader, esteemed male reader, is a very modern smell. It is not like smoke, not like blood, not like sweat; it is clean, friendly, rational. And yet, if one once takes it seriously, it is a smell of fear.<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp sat down at his table.<\/p>\n
He was \u2013 that must be said \u2013 not alone. Gustav von A. was already sitting there, a little off to the side, so that one could see him without his being part of the general bustle. He had that gift that some people possess: to be invisible and yet, when one looks, to form the center.<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp went over to him.<\/p>\n
\u201cGood morning,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Gustav von A. raised his gaze.<\/p>\n
\u201cMorning,\u201d he said. It did not sound like a greeting, but like a statement.<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp sat down.<\/p>\n
He looked at Gustav. And he saw, with a mixture of aversion and fascination, that Gustav had once again \u201cmade himself up\u201d. Not groomed like a hotel guest; but masked like someone who knows he is being observed. There was a hint of color on his cheeks, a hint of darkness in his brows, a shine on his lips that was not just moisture. It was very little. It was just enough.<\/p>\n
And just enough is, as one knows, the most dangerous amount.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have\u2026\u201d Hans Castorp began.<\/p>\n
Gustav von A. did not interrupt him, but he let his gaze rest a fraction longer on Hans\u2019s face, as if to say: Let us spare ourselves the judgment.<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp fell silent.<\/p>\n
A waiter brought water. It was in a carafe in which a slice of lemon floated, as if one had to prove to the water that it was healthy. Next to it stood \u2013 quite unobtrusively \u2013 a small bottle, sealed, made of glass.<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp looked at it.<\/p>\n
\u201cOnly bottled,\u201d said the waiter, and he said it in a tone as if he were speaking about wine.<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp looked at him.<\/p>\n
\u201cPardon?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n
The waiter smiled \u2013 friendly, empty.<\/p>\n
\u201cRecommendation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Recommendation.<\/p>\n
This word, which in the highlands had the form of care, suddenly took on a different sound here: not wellness, but warning.<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp looked toward the entrance. There hung a sign, small, neat, in three languages; it was so inconspicuous that it looked like decor.<\/p>\n
It is recommended not to drink tap water.<\/p>\n
Si raccomanda di non bere acqua del rubinetto.<\/p>\n
It is recommended not to drink tap water.<\/p>\n
Recommended.<\/p>\n
Not forbidden.<\/p>\n
Prohibition is crude. Recommendation is polite \u2013 and thus evades responsibility.<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp felt something rise up in him, a restless mixture of system two and system one: the slow, deliberate thinking and the quick, impulsive mistrust.<\/p>\n
He looked at Gustav.<\/p>\n
Gustav von A. had not read the sign. Or, more precisely: he might have read it, but it was not interesting enough for him to take note of it.<\/p>\n
\u201cHow is it?\u201d Hans Castorp asked cautiously.<\/p>\n
\u201cHow is what?\u201d said Gustav.<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp indicated the sign with a small glance.<\/p>\n
Gustav von A. followed the glance without turning his head, read it as if he were reading a weather report.<\/p>\n
\u201cAh,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
This \u201cAh\u201d was an entire worldview: the world as stage, danger as background, truth as something one takes note of without believing it.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt smells like\u2026 clinic in here,\u201d said Hans Castorp.<\/p>\n
Gustav von A. pulled his mouth.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou say that as if it were something new,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp smiled briefly.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor me it is not new,\u201d he said. \u201cBut for Venice it is\u2026 dispiriting.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gustav nodded.<\/p>\n
\u201cVenice,\u201d he said, \u201cis always dispiriting. You just have to notice it in the right order.\u201d<\/p>\n
A waiter brought fruit.<\/p>\n
It lay there, groomed, shiny, cut: melon, pineapple, berries. It looked like a color theory of health.<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp thought, involuntarily, of another sign, in another novel: Avoid raw fruit. And he thought how much literature sometimes strives not to become true \u2013 and how stubbornly it still does.<\/p>\n
\u201cEat,\u201d said Gustav.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2026\u201d Hans Castorp hesitated.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou are usually so\u2026\u201d Gustav made a small, indeterminate hand movement that was at once praise and mockery. \u201c\u2026hygienic.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp felt the word \u201chygiene\u201d suddenly become too big for him. Hygiene was, as Dr. Porsche had said, the new morality; but morality in the South has a different temperature.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is recommended\u2026\u201d he began.<\/p>\n
Gustav von A. did not laugh. He just looked at Hans.<\/p>\n
\u201cRecommended,\u201d he repeated. \u201cYou believe very much in recommendations.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp blushed a little, and he was annoyed by it, because blushing is childish.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou don\u2019t?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n
Gustav von A. lowered his gaze to his notebook, which lay next to the plate as if it were a knife.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe in sentences,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp felt this answer hit him in the gut; for in it he sensed that old, bourgeois wound that Tonio Kr\u00f6ger once described with such melancholy: the longing for order and the shame of having it.<\/p>\n
\u201cSentences,\u201d Hans Castorp repeated.<\/p>\n
\u201cYes,\u201d said Gustav, and now there was something in his voice that was almost soft. \u201cIf I don\u2019t write a sentence, I die.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp raised his eyebrows.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat bad?\u201d<\/p>\n
Gustav von A. looked at him.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat simple,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Hans Castorp fell silent.<\/p>\n
He finally took a piece of melon. He did it slowly, as if it were a decision. He chewed. The taste was sweet, watery, foreign. He thought: One can die from a melon. And at the same time he thought: One can die from a sentence. Both are absurd. And both are true.<\/p>\n