Ulrich received her cheerful gaze and let his eyes rest on her face, which, above the slightly wrinkled dress she had traveled in, suddenly appeared smooth as silver and so wondrously present that it could just as well be close or far away; or rather, far and near canceled each other out in this presence, just as the moon in its depthless sky will suddenly appear behind a neighbor’s roof. “Why I did it?” he replied with a smile. “I don’t remember. Probably because it could just as well have been done differently. I felt no responsibility. I would be on less certain ground if I were to tell you that the irresponsibility with which we lead our lives today could be a step toward a new sense of responsibility.”

“How so?”

“Oh, in many ways. As you know: An individual life may be no more than a slight divergence from the most probable average value in a series. And so on.”

Agathe had heard only what made sense to her. She said: “What this adds up to is ‘quite nice’ and ‘very nice.’ Pretty soon one no longer has any sense of how abominably one is living. But it can get gruesome sometimes, sort of like waking up on a slab in a morgue!”

“So what was your home like?” Ulrich asked.

“Philistine. Hagauerish. ‘Quite nice.’ Just as fake as yours.”

Ulrich meanwhile had picked up a pencil and was sketching the floor plan of the house on the tablecloth and reassigning the rooms. That was easy and so quickly done that Agathe’s housewifely gesture in defense of the tablecloth came too late and aimlessly ended with her hand settling on his. The difficulties arose again only when it came to the principles by which the house was to be furnished. “We happen to have a house,” Ulrich argued, “and need to rearrange things for the two of us, but by and large it’s an outdated and idle question. ‘Setting up house’ is setting up a facade with nothing behind it. Social conditions and personal relations are no longer solid enough for houses. Putting on an appearance of permanence and continuity no longer gives anyone genuine pleasure. People used to do this, showing who they were by the number of their rooms, servants, and guests. Now almost everyone feels that a formless life is the only form that is in keeping with the diverse purposes and possibilities life is filled with, and young people either love bare simplicity, which is like a theater without props, or else they dream of wardrobe trunks and bobsled championships, of tennis cups and a luxury hotel by a highway jammed with cars and golf-course scenery and music in the rooms that can be turned on and off like running water.” He was making conversation, as if entertaining a stranger; but actually he was talking himself up to the surface, because the combination of finality and dawning in their being together made him uneasy.