“Surely, surely,” Hans Castorp said. “I’m sure I shall. I already feel great interest in the life up here, and when one is interested, the understanding follows.⁠—But what is the matter with me⁠—it doesn’t taste good,” he said, and took his cigar out of his mouth to look at it. “I’ve been asking myself all this time what the matter was, and now I see it is Maria. She tastes like papier mâché, I do assure you⁠—precisely as when one has a spoilt digestion. I can’t understand it. I did eat more than usual for breakfast, but that cannot be the reason, for she usually tastes particularly good after a too hearty meal. Do you think it is because I had such a disturbed night? Perhaps that is how I got out of order. No, I really can’t stick it,” he said, after another attempt. “Every pull is a disappointment, there is no sense in forcing it.” And after a hesitating moment he tossed the cigar off down the slope, among the wet pine-boughs. “Do you know what I think it has to do with?” he asked. “I feel convinced it is connected with this damned heat I feel all the time in my face. I have suffered from it ever since I got up. I feel as though I were blushing the whole time, deuce take it! Did you have anything like that when you first came?”