An empty room, a room that had been “vacated”⁠—with its furniture turned topsy-turvy, and both doors standing wide, as one saw it in passing, on the way to the dining-room or one’s daily walks⁠—was a most significant, and yet withal such an accustomed sight that one thought little of it, especially when one had, in one’s time, taken possession of just such a “vacated” room, and settled down to feel at home in it. Sometimes you knew whose room it had been, and that indeed gave you to think. Thus a week later Hans Castorp passed by and saw Leila Gerngross’s room in just that condition; and in this instance his understanding rebelled for the moment against what he saw. He stood and looked, perplexed and startled, and the Hofrat came that way, to whom he spoke.

“I see it is being turned out here. Good morning, Herr Hofrat. Then little Leila⁠—”