He laughed belatedly, and said: “He called it home? That is sentimental, as you say. You know no end of stories. I was still thinking of what we said about hardness and cruelty; the same idea has gone through my head a number of times in these days. You see, a person has to have a rather thick skin to find it natural, the way they have of thinking and talking down there, the ‘has he got any money?’ and the face they make when they say it. It never came quite natural to me, though I am no homo humanus . I can see, now I look back, that I was always struck by it. Perhaps that had to do with my tendency to illness, though I did not know about it at the time⁠—those old places which I heard myself the other day. And now Behrens has found a fresh place. That, I must say, was a surprise to me⁠—and yet, in a way, I don’t know that it was, after all. I never have felt myself as firm as a rock, and my parents, both of them, dying so young⁠—for I have been doubly orphaned from youth up, you know⁠—”

Herr Settembrini described a single gesture, with head, hand, and shoulders. Pleasantly, courteously, it put the question: “Well, and what of it?”