The cool night air felt refreshing
after the heat of the small room. Dorfling declined the offers his
friends made to accompany him home. They all wished him "Farewell."
"Die well, would be a better wish," replied Dorfling, and with these
strange words in their ears they left him.
Schrotter and Wilhelm went a part of the way with Paul, who had the
furthest to go. For a little while he was silent, then he broke out:
"I declare this is beyond my comprehension. The whole time I was
there I felt as if I were in a vault with a lot of ghosts. You, Herr
Doctor, were the only living being among them; I breathed again when
I heard you talking. If I had not head the sounds from next door,
and had not had the realities of our dinner before me, I should have
thought I was dreaming."
"What has put you out so, my dear Paul?" said Wilhelm.
"What! Are you men of flesh and blood? Are you really alive? There
we sat for four mortal hours, and the talk was wearisome to a
degree, never one sensible word."
"Now! now!" protested Schrotter.
"Herr Doctor, forgive me, but I must repeat it, never one sensible
word. Do you call Dorfling's 'Philosophy of Deliverance' sensible?
or, Wilhelm, your philosophy of self-culture, which, with all
deference to you, I call philosophical onanism? Only six men, two of
them under thirty-five, and the whole blessed evening not one word
about either pleasure or love.
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