,” she accepts his conventional courtesy and, passing him by, enters the room. He stands there, within the aura of her personality as it sweeps past, idiotic with happiness at the encounter, and at the word which has been uttered by her mouth directly for his ear. He follows her, he moves unsteadily to his own table and, sinking into his chair, becomes aware that Clavdia, as she too takes her place, has turned to look at him. He thinks she wears an expression as though musing on their encounter at the door. Oh, unbelievable adventure! Oh, joy, rapture, and boundless exaltation! Ah, no, this drunkenness of fantastic bliss Hans Castorp could never have experienced at the glance of any healthy little goose down in the flat-land, to whom he might have, calmly, correctly, and with most definite intentions, “given his heart,” and devoted the sentiments described in the song. He greets the schoolmistress with feverish sprightliness⁠—she has seen the whole thing, and her downy old cheek wears its dusky signal⁠—and then bombards Miss Robinson with English conversation, so absurdly that she, not versed in the ecstatic, fairly recoils, and measures him with mistrustful eyes.