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His blood stopped, for he had understood who was dead. He listened and held his breath. His parents cried out. Melchior's booming voice said: "Jean-Christophe, do you hear? Poor Fritz is dead." Jean-Christophe made an effort, and replied quietly: "Yes, papa." His bosom was drawn tight as in a vise. Melchior went on: "'Yes, papa. Is that all you say? You are not grieved by it."
But that did not keep her from speaking harshly to her a few hours later, when Frida did not come at once on the sound of the bell. And Jean-Christophe, who was consumed with love for all humanity, and would turn aside so as not to crush an insect, was entirely indifferent to his own family.
These first days come buzzing up in his mind like a field of corn or a wood stirred by the wind, and cast in shadow by the great fleeting clouds.... The shadows pass; the sun penetrates the forest. Jean-Christophe begins to find his way through the labyrinth of the day. It is morning. His parents are asleep. He is in his little bed, lying on his back.
There were now times of extremely straitened circumstances at home. They became more and more frequent. They lived meagerly then. No one was more sensible of it than Jean-Christophe. His father saw nothing. He was served first, and there was always enough for him.
What was it all to him? Melchior in despair, Jean Michel agitated, all the busy world, the audience, the Grand Duke, little Jean-Christophe. What had. he to do with all these? What lay between them and him? Was that he he, himself?... He was given up to the furious will that carried him headlong.
I only said what everybody thinks, and what you think yourself." "No!" cried Jean-Christophe angrily. "What! you don't think so? You don't think that he drinks?" "It is not true!" said Jean-Christophe. He stamped his foot. The clerk shrugged his shoulders. "In that case, why did he write this letter?" It is no good our both putting ourselves out.... My father is very busy."
Jean-Christophe would sit in the great armchair by the window, with a book on his knees, bending over the pictures and losing himself in them. The day would die down, his eyes would grow weary, and then he would look no more, and fall into vague dreaming.
While Jean-Christophe was busy with his work he hardly had time to think of his parting from Minna; he was living with her. Minna was no longer in Minna; she was in himself. But when he had finished he found that he was alone, more alone than before, more weary, exhausted by the effort; he remembered that it was a fortnight since he had written to Minna and that she had not replied.
One evening one of their neighbors, a friend of his grandfather, Fischer, the furniture dealer, came in to smoke and chat with Melchior after dinner as he often did. Jean-Christophe, in torment, was going up to his room after waiting for the postman to pass when a word made him tremble. Fischer said that next day he had to go early in the morning to the Kerichs' to hang up the curtains.
He remained glued to the wall, looking at his father stretched there at his feet, and he cried for help. His fall sobered Melchior a little. He cursed and swore, and thumped on the chair that had played him such a trick. He tried vainly to get up, and then did manage to sit up with his back resting against the table, and he recognized his surroundings. He saw Jean-Christophe crying; he called him.
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