Page:The Dial (Volume 73).djvu/700

598 piece of a baby, asserted and maintained his station in life with a frightful emphasis and lack of consideration As has been said before, it was the trachea, a word which, in Dr Hinzpeter's mouth, exercised an astonishingly consoling, reassuring, an almost hilarious effect on everyone. But although it was not the lungs, the doctor had eventually thought it highly advisable in accelerating her convalescence to try the influence of a milder climate and of a few months in some regular institute. The reputation of Einfried and its director had done the rest.

That was the way things stood; and Herr Klöterjahn in person told it to everyone who manifested the least interest. He spoke in a loud boisterous manner, and with the good humour of a man whose digestion is in as perfect order as his purse—with vastly explosive movements of his lips, in the broad, yet rapid fashion of people along the north coast. Many of his words were hurled out, so that each sound came like a discharge; and he would laugh about it as an excellent joke.

He was of medium height, broad, strong, and short-legged, and possessed a full red face with water-blue eyes shaded by light blond lashes, large nostrils and moist lips. He had English side-whiskers, wore English clothing, and was enchanted to find at Einfried an English family, father, mother, and three pretty children with their nurse, who were stopping here for the simple reason that they did not know where else to stop; he ate an English breakfast with them every morning. He was especially fond of his food and drink, displayed himself as a true connoisseur of both the cuisine and the wine cellar, and entertained the company most rousingly with accounts of the dinners which were given back home among his own circle, and with descriptions of certain choice dishes which were unknown here. At such times his eyes would squint with a kindly expression and his speech contained some palatal and nasal element, to an accompaniment of soft smacking noises deep in his gullet. As evidence that he was not fundamentally inimical to other earthly enjoyments, there was the evening when a patient at Einfried, an author by profession, came upon him in one of the corridors joking with a chambermaid in a somewhat inappropriate manner—a trifling bit of sport which caused the author concerned to show a most ridiculous expression of disgust.

As to Herr Klöterjahn's wife, it was more than plain that she was attached to him with all her heart. She followed his words