Kai came up to him and put his arm across his shoulders. Together they walked down to the courtyard, among the crowd of excited comrades, all of whom were discussing the extraordinary event. He looked with loving anxiety into Hanno’s face and said, “Please forgive, Hanno, for translating. It would have been better to keep still and get a mark. It’s so cheap—”
“Didn’t I say what ‘patula Jovis arbore’ meant?” answered Hanno. “Don’t mind, Kai. That doesn’t matter. One just mustn’t mind.”
“I suppose that’s true. Well, the Lord God is going to ruin your career. You may as well resign yourself, Hanno, because if it is His inscrutable will—. Career—what a lovely word ‘career’ is! Herr Modersohn’s career is spoilt too. He will never get to be a master, poor chap! There are assistant masters, you may know, and there are head masters; but never by any chance a plain master. This is a mystery not to be revealed to youthful minds; it is only intended for grown-ups and persons of mature experience. An ordinary intelligence might say that either one is a master or one is not. I might go up to the Lord God or Herr Marotzke and explain this to him. But what would be the result? They would consider it an insult, and I should be punished for insubordination—all for having discovered for them a much higher significance in their calling than they themselves were aware of! No, let’s not talk about them—they’re all thick-skinned brutes!”
They walked about the court; Kai made jokes to help Hanno forget his bad mark, and Hanno listened and enjoyed.
“Look, here is a door, an outer door. It is open, and outside there is the street. How would it be if we were to go out and take a little walk? It is recess, and we have still six minutes. We could easily be back in time. But it is perfectly impossible. You see what I mean? Here is the door. It is open, there is no grating, there is nothing, nothing whatever to prevent us. And yet it is impossible for us to step outside for even a second—it is even impossible for us to think of doing so. Well, let’s not think of it, then. Let’s take another example: we don’t say, for instance, that it is nearly half-past twelve. No, we say, ‘It’s nearly time for the geography period’! You see? Now, I ask, is this any sort of a life to lead? Everything is wrong. Oh, Lord, if the institution would just once let us out of her loving embrace!”
“Well, and what then? No, Kai, we should just have to do something then; here, at least we are taken care of. Since my Father died Herr Stephan Kistenmaker and Pastor Pringsheim have taken over the business of asking me every day what I want to be. I don’t know. I can’t answer. I can’t be anything. I’m afraid of everything—”
“How can anybody talk so dismally? What about your music?”
“What about my music, Kai? There is nothing to it. Shall I travel round and give concerts? In the first place, they wouldn’t let me; and in the second place, I should never really know enough. I can play very little. I can only improvise a little when I am alone. And then, the travelling about must be dreadful, I imagine. It is different with you. You have more courage. You go about laughing at it all—you have something to set against it. You want to write, to tell wonderful stories. Well, that is something. You will surely become famous, you are so clever. The thing is, you are so much livelier. Sometimes in class we look at each other, the way we did when Petersen got marked because he read out of a crib, when all the rest of us did the same. The same thought is in both our minds—but you know how to make a face and let it pass. I can’t. I get so tired of things. I’d like to sleep and never wake up. I’d like to die, Kai! No, I am no good. I can’t want anything. I don’t even want to be famous. I’m afraid of it, just as much as if it were a wrong thing to do. Nothing can come of me, that is perfectly sure. One day, after confirmation-class, I heard Pastor Pringsheim tell somebody that one must just give me up, because I come of a decayed family.”
“Did he say that?” Kai asked with deep interest.
“Yes; he meant my Uncle Christian, in the institution in Hamburg. One must just give me up—oh, I’d be so happy if they would! I have so many worries; everything is so hard for me. If I give myself a little cut or bruise anywhere, and make a wound that would heal in a week with anybody else, it takes a month with me. It gets inflamed and infected and makes me all sorts of trouble. Herr Brecht told me lately that all my teeth are in a dreadful condition—not to mention the ones that have been pulled already. If they are like that now, what will they be when I am thirty or forty years old? I am completely discouraged.”