It was about eight o’clock, and still daylight. A lake was visible in the distant landscape, its waters grey, its shores covered with black fir-forests that climbed the surrounding heights, thinned out, and gave place to bare, mist-wreathed rock. They stopped at a small station. Hans Castorp heard the name called out: it was “Davos-Dorf.” Soon he would be at his journey’s end. And suddenly, close to him, he heard a voice, the comfortable Hamburg voice of his cousin, Joachim Ziemssen, saying: “Hullo, there you are! Here’s where you get out!” and peering through the window saw his cousin himself, standing below on the platform, in a brown ulster, bareheaded, and looking more robust than ever in his life before. He laughed and said again: “Come along out, it’s all right!”

“But I’m not there yet!” said Hans Castorp, taken aback, and still seated.

“Oh, yes, you are. This is the village. It is nearer to the sanatorium from here. I have a carriage. Just give us your things.”