"If it is possible because of such things it must also be possible here, where you are district councillor and the people are obliged to do your bidding and many even owe you a debt of gratitude. Gieshübler would certainly help us, even if only for my sake, for he will sympathize with me. And now say, Geert, shall we give up this abominable house, this house with the—"
"Chinaman, you mean. You see, Effi, one can pronounce the fearful word without his appearing. What you saw or what, as you think, slipped past your bed, was the little Chinaman that the maids pasted on the back of the chair upstairs. I'll wager he had a blue coat on and a very flat-crowned hat, with a shining button on top."
She nodded.
"Now you see, a dream, a hallucination. And then, I presume, Johanna told you something last night, about the wedding upstairs."
"No."
"So much the better."
"She didn't tell me a word. But from all this I can see that there is something queer here. And then the crocodile; everything is so uncanny here."
"The first evening, when you saw the crocodile, you considered it fairy-like—"
"Yes, then."
"And then, Effi, I can't well leave here now, even if it were possible to sell the house or make an exchange. It is with this exactly as with declining an invitation to Varzin. I can't have the people here in the city saying that District Councillor Innstetten is selling his house because his wife saw the little pasted-up picture of a Chinaman as a ghost by her bed. I should be lost, Effi. One can never recover from such ridiculousness."