The poor imbecile Heinzen said he heard a whispering; always in his ears. He shook like a leaf and his face was green.
Niels Heinrich kicked him under the table.
Whenever the door was opened the laughter and the screeching of women leapt out into the fog. Also one could see the building lots at the edge of which this drinking shanty had been erected. A new quarter was springing up here. Beams and scaffoldings and cranes presented a confusion like a forest struck by a tornado. Walled foundations, pits, construction huts, trenches, bridges, hills of bricks and sand, carts—everything was dimly lit by the arc-lamps, which seemed to be hidden in grey wadding.
When the door was closed one was in a cave.
There was a whispering in his ears, Joachim Heinzen insisted. Without understanding he listened to the filthy witticisms with which an old stone-mason regaled the company. Niels Heinrich threw a dark glance at Joachim and forbade the publican to fill his glass. The fellow, he said, was crazy enough now.
Gradually the room grew empty. One o’clock was approaching. Three steady topers still stood by the bar. The nightwatchman had just looked in on his rounds and drunk a nip of kümmel. The innkeeper regarded his late guests morosely, sat down, and nodded.
Niels Heinrich said to the simpleton that he would give him five talers to clear out. “If you don’t fade away you’ll catch hell, my boy,” he said. His reddish beard rose and fell. About his neck he had wound a yellow shawl so many times that his head seemed to be resting on a cushion. His sallow, freckled face seemed a mere mass of bone.
Joachim’s limbs trembled. Outside the women of the streets were passing by, and their laughter sounded like the clatter of crockery. “Five talers,” said the imbecile and grinned. “That’s all right.” But he was still trembling. He had trembled just so the whole day, and the day before, and the day before that. “I’d like to buy a black-haired wench,” he murmured.
“For money you can see the very devil dance,” Niels Heinrich replied.
Now even those at the bar got ready to leave. “Closing time, gentlemen,” the innkeeper called out. He repeated his warning three times. A clock rattled.