The frenzied strains of a piano burst out of a neighbouring apartment. Gurdweill recognised it immediately as a highly sentimental Chopin waltz. In wild pursuit and flight, the notes broke into the silent room, as if deliberately invading it through some hidden crack in the ceiling; they whirled about the room, clashing with one another and mingling with the dense dusk air and the smoke of Gurdweill’s pipe. And suddenly the figures of Thea and the child began spinning giddily before his eyes. Thea’s hair streamed wildly through the air, touching him as she came closer and whipping his face, which gave him great pleasure. And the child, his and Thea’s son, golden-haired like her, gold as the skin of an onion, danced with his mother, his round face flushed with excitement, laughing aloud with delight. Gurdweill suddenly remembered that he had bought a little motorcar for the baby and left it in the kitchen — how could he have forgotten it until now? And so he got up and went into the kitchen, the kitchen of his father’s house, and discovered to his astonishment that the little car had disappeared. He was certain that he had left it there, in the left-hand corner, between the dresser and the wall, and now it was gone. Gurdweill searched all the other corners too; he even opened the doors of the dresser — but all in vain. An inexpressible sorrow overwhelmed him. Suddenly he knew that he would die of this sorrow, and the knowledge in itself did not depress him: all he wanted was for it to happen as quickly as possible, for he could not bear the terrible sorrow for another second. And then it suddenly occurred to him that he had seen a fine long black radish in the dresser, and he could give this radish to the baby … surely it would make him happy, such a fine black radish! Gurdweill opened the dresser again — yes, it was still there! He took it and felt it and weighed it in his palm: it was hard, firm, and heavy — an excellent radish! But as he continued to examine it, he saw that the tail of the radish was wagging to and fro, slowly but steadily, just like an animal’s tail, and suddenly the tail turned into two, three, innumerable tails, all wagging away, and getting entangled with one another, and tickling his palm until he burst out laughing. And suddenly Thea was standing before him, seething with fury. She snatched the radish out of his hand and cried: ‘What, were you going to give him a radish? The baby’s dying of thirst and you were going to give him a sharp-tasting radish? And what do you think Dozent Schramek would say?’ She began pushing the long radish into his mouth, shouting as she did so, ‘You eat it yourself, yourself, yourself!’ Gurdweill felt as if he were going to choke: his mouth was full of radish and he couldn’t breathe. ‘This is the end of me,’ he thought …