Chapter 5 in the restaurant

The restaurant is brightly lit and looks elegant and cozy.It is located just opposite the reception room on the right side of the hall, and according to Joachim, it is mainly used for meals for newcomers who do not eat on time and for visitors to the sanatorium.However, sometimes birthdays and farewell parties are celebrated there, and when the patient's physical examination results are good, they are also celebrated here.Sometimes it was really lively in the restaurant, said Joachim; people even drank champagne.There was no one else in the dining room at the moment, only a woman about thirty years old was sitting. She was reading a book, humming something, and kept tapping the tablecloth lightly with the middle finger of her left hand.When the young couple sat down, she immediately changed her position, with her back to them.Joachim said softly that the woman was shy when she saw men and always ate in restaurants with a book.It is said that she was a girl when she entered the tuberculosis sanatorium, and has never lived in the outside world since.

"Well, you've only been here five months, and you're no match for her. If you stay another year, you're still no match for her," Hans Castorp said to his expression. brother said.Then Joachim shrugged his shoulders - a gesture he had never had before - and picked up the menu. They sat down at a raised table by the window, the most comfortable place in the restaurant.They sat facing each other close to the cream-coloured curtains, and their faces were flushed red by the lamp with the red shade.Hans Castorp folded his freshly washed hands and rubbed them together comfortably and with a certain expectancy, which was his old habit when he sat down to eat, perhaps because His ancestors prayed thanksgiving before eating.A girl in a black dress and a white dress served them dishes. She had a large face, a very healthy complexion, a very polite attitude, and her voice was a little hoarse.Hans Castorp was amused to learn that the waitresses were called "restaurant girls" here.They ordered a bottle of Gruaud Larose, and Hans Castorp told her to bring it back to warm it up.Food was good, asparagus soup, stuffed tomato, roast meat with lots of toppings, sweets very well prepared, cheese and fruit.Hans Castorp ate heartily, though his appetite was not as great as he had expected.But he always ate a lot, even when he wasn't hungry, just to satisfy his pride.

Joachim didn't think much of these dishes.He said he was tired of the kitchen stuff, the people here in the hills feel that way, it's normal for people to complain about the food, if you have to sit here for a lifetime or three days... But he is still high Drinking happily, trying not to say anything too effusive, while repeatedly expressing his joy at finally having someone around to pour out his heart to. "Ha, it's very kind of you to come!" he said, with excitement in his calm tone. "I might even say it's a big deal for me. It's a change indeed—a break, I see, in the eternal and bottomless monotony and loneliness of life..."

"But time must pass quickly here," Hans Castorp observed. "Time is as fast or as slow as you like," Joachim replied. "I can tell you it's not running at all. There's no time at all, and there's no life at all—no, neither!" He shook his head, holding his glass again. Although Hans Castorp's face was on fire at the moment, he also drank.However, his body was still chilly, and his limbs felt at a loss, which was both pleasant and uncomfortable.He speaks in a hurry, often slips the tongue, and makes a gesture of disdain after speaking.Joachim was also in high spirits by this time, and their conversation became more free and lively when the humming, banging finger on the table suddenly got up and left the dining room.As they ate, they waved their knives and forks and made gestures. They laughed coyly for a while, and nodded and shrugged their shoulders frequently.Joachim wanted to hear about the situation in Hamburg, and the conversation turned to plans for the governance of the Elbe. "This is an epoch-making feat," says Hans Castorp. "This has epoch-making significance for our shipbuilding business. Such an estimate is not excessive at all. We are going to invest 15 million yuan as a budget at once. You have to believe that we know how to do it."

Although he attached great importance to the management plan of the Elbe, he suddenly changed the subject and asked Joachim to talk about "here on the mountain" and other living conditions of the mountain visitors.Joachim chatted cheerfully, glad that he could speak freely.He was obliged to repeat the story of the dead body and the sleigh rides down the mountain, and again expressly assure that what he said was the truth.For Hans Castorp laughed again, and his cousin laughed too, and it seemed that he felt genuine pleasure.He told him some funny things to add to the fun.At this moment there sat at their table a woman named Mrs. Stahl, who was very ill, the wife of a musician in Cannstatt, and such an uneducated woman as he had never seen before.She couldn't even pronounce the word "disinfection" correctly, and she was serious and self-righteous.She called Assistant Physician Krokowski a "straight-bodied gentleman."People had to hold back a snicker at this, without showing any emotion.Besides, she talked in a blah blah blah blah blah blah, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.She also repeatedly said that another woman, Mrs. Iltis, carried a short knife. "She called it the 'Short Blade,'—it was priceless!" They slumped back in their chairs, laughing heartily, throwing themselves back and forth, almost hilariously at the same time.

During this time, Joachim was sometimes saddened and reminded of his fate. "Well, we're sitting here laughing," he said with a worried look on his face, his words sometimes interrupted by the rising and falling of his diaphragm as he breathed, "but I can't even tell when I'm going to get out of here." , because if Behrens said to stay for another half year, it would be considered very tight, and you have to be mentally prepared to stay for a while longer. But life is really difficult. Tell me, it’s hard for me Difficult. I have been granted permission to take the exam next month. Now I have to dangle the thermometer in my mouth and listen to the uneducated Mrs. Steele nagging in my ear, Passing the time in a daze. At our age, how precious a year is, and in this year, life under the mountain has changed so much and made so much progress. As for me, I have to Stagnant as a pool of stagnant water—yes, like a dirty puddle, that's not too much of a metaphor..."

Strangely, Hans Castorp's answer to this was simply to ask whether a waiter could be called here.When his cousin looked at him with a little surprise, he could see that the other party was drowsy-he was really fast asleep. "You're going to bed!" said Joachim. "Come on, it's time for the two of us to go to bed together." "It's not time yet," said Hans Castorp vaguely.But he followed him with hunched back and stiff legs, exactly like a man who walks with his feet on the ground due to sleepiness.But he cheered up when he heard Joachim's voice in the half-dark corridor.Joachim says:

"Krokowski is sitting over there. I think I should introduce you to him soon." Dr. Krokowski was sitting near a folding door in a bright corner of a drawing-room by the fireplace, reading a newspaper.He stood up when the two young men came towards him.Then Joachim assumed a soldier's air and said: "Doctor, let me introduce you to my cousin Hans Castorp from Hamburg. He has just arrived here." Dr. Krokowski greeted the new resident with a certain openness, firmness, and buoyant fortitude, as if he wished to show that with him there was nothing restrained about being with him, but a pleasant mutual confidence.He was about thirty-five, stout, broad-shouldered, and much shorter than the two men standing in front of him, so that he had to tilt his head back a little to see their faces.His face was extremely pale, so white that it was a little transparent, even emitting a phosphorescent blue color.His eyes were dark brown, his eyebrows were black, and he had two long and dense beards (there were already a few white strands on the beard), which made his face extremely pale.He wore a rather old black double-breasted jacket, black perforated sandals, thick gray woolen socks, and a soft tie turned down around his neck, which This kind of necktie, which Hans Castorp had only seen in the past at a photographer in Danzig, gave Dr. Krokowski a certain studio air.He smiled warmly, showing a row of yellow teeth between his mustache.Holding the young man's hand, he said in a drawn-out baritone with a slightly foreign accent:

"You are very welcome to come to our place, Mr. Castorp! I hope you will get used to life here quickly and live to your liking. Allow me to ask, are you sick and hospitalized here?" It was touching to see Hans Castorp trying to keep himself from the Sandman while at the same time trying to be polite.It annoyed him now that he was in such a state of distress; and in the suspicious nature of youth he saw in the assistant physician's laughter and unrestrained air a certain pitiful irony.In reply, he told the other party that he was only staying for three weeks, and he also talked about his exams, and finally added that, thank God, he was in very good health and had no illness at all. "Really?" asked Dr. Krokowski, tilting his head mockingly forward, and smiling more deeply. "In this way, you are an outstanding person worthy of study! I have never seen a healthy person who has no defects in my life. May I ask what subject you took?"

"Doctor, I'm an engineer," answered Hans Castorp with modesty and dignity. "Ah, engineer!" Dr. Krokowski seemed to hold back his smile, losing some strength and enthusiasm for a moment. "It's a good job. So you don't need any therapy here, either physically or mentally?" "No, thank you very much!" said Hans Castorp, almost taking a step backwards. This made Dr. Krokowski smile triumphantly again.He shook the young man's hand again, and raised his voice and said: "Well, Mr. Castorp, sleep well and enjoy your perfect health! Sleep well, and good-bye!" So he dismissed the young couple, and continued to sit down and read the newspaper. .

At this time the elevator was unmanned, so they had to walk upstairs.They said nothing, irritated by their encounter with Dr. Krokowski.Joachim escorted Hans Castorp to room 34, while the crippled man had packed the visitor's luggage into the room.They talked for another quarter of an hour, while Hans Castorp sorted out the night and toilet things while talking, smoking a strong, mild cigarette.Today he was surprised and surprised that he could not bear a cigarette. "He looks like a fine man," he said, blowing out his smoke. "His face was as white as wax. But God, he had horrible shoes and socks. Gray wool socks, and wind sandals. Have we offended him?" "He's a little sensitive," Joachim admits. "You shouldn't say no so violently in therapy, at least in psychotherapy. He doesn't like it when someone avoids it. He's not the best with me either, because I don't trust him enough. But Sometimes I tell him about the dream, so he has something to analyze." "Well, then I must have offended him," said Hans Castorp angrily, because offending anyone always makes him old.So the fatigue hit him more and more. "Good night," he said, "I'm dying of exhaustion." "I'll invite you to breakfast at eight o'clock," said Joachim, and left. Hans Castorp hurriedly made his evening toilet.As soon as he turned off the lamp, the Sandman overwhelmed him; but he sprang up again because he remembered that someone had died in this very bed just the day before yesterday. "This isn't the first time," he thought to himself, as if thinking about it would be reassuring. "It's just a dead man's bed, a common dead man's bed." And he fell asleep. But as soon as he fell asleep, he began to dream, and it did not stop almost until the next morning.He dreamed mainly of Joachim Ziemsen lying in a disfigured state on a sled, sliding down a steep mountain road.His face was as pale and phosphorescent as Dr. Krokowski's.In front sat the rider, his face blurred like the coughing fellow. "That's the way they are all here on the hills," said the transfigured Joachim.And now it was no longer the rider, but Joachim, who was coughing horribly and mucous.Hans Castorp burst into tears, thinking he must go to the pharmacy and buy some cold cream.But Mrs. Iltis, with her big, pointed nose, was sitting by the side of the road, holding something in her hand, which was apparently her so-called "short blade," but which was really his safety razor.This made Hans Castorp laugh out loud.In this way, he tossed and turned in the intricate emotions until the morning light came in through the half-open French windows and woke him up.