The first part of the book was finished when the news spread through the village that the Danish ladies had engaged rooms.
I instantly had the trunks packed, and we left for German Switzerland.
[IV]
Lovely Argovia! Sweet Arcady, where the postmaster tends his flocks, where the colonel drives the only cab, where the young girls are virgins when they marry, and the young men shoot at targets and play the drum. Utopia! land of the golden beer and smoked sausages; birthplace of the game of ninepins, the House of Habsburg, William Tell, rustic merry-makings and naïve songs straight from the heart, pastors' wives and vicarage idylls!
Peace returned to our troubled hearts. I recovered, and Marie, weary of strife, wrapped herself in undisguised indifference. We played backgammon as a safety-valve, and our conversations, so fraught with danger, were replaced by the rolling of dice. I drank good, wholesome beer instead of wine and the nerve-shattering absinthe.
The influence of our environment soon made itself felt. I was amazed to find that such serene calm could follow the storms we had weathered, that the elasticity of the mind could withstand so many shocks, that we could forget the past, that I could fancy myself the happiest husband of the most faithful wife.
Marie, deprived of all society and friends, uncomplainingly devoted herself to her children. After a month had elapsed the little ones were dressed in frocks which she had cut out and made with her own hands. She was never impatient with them, and allowed them to absorb her completely.
For the first time now I noticed a certain lassitude in her; her love of pleasure was less pronounced, approaching middle-age made itself felt. How grieved she was when she lost her first tooth! Poor girl! She wept, put her arms round me and implored me never to cease loving her. She was now thirty-seven years old. Her hair had grown thinner, her bosom had sunk like the waves of the sea after a storm, the stairs tired her little feet, her lungs no longer worked with the old pressure.