For several days it had been dull and rainy; but now the sky stretched out over the sea and the land, as clear and luminous as taut light-blue silk. Interlaced and bordered by clouds lit up with red and gold, the disk of the sun rose solemnly above the sparkling ruffled ocean, which seemed to tremble and glow beneath it. … So the day came on; and, confused and happy, Tonio Kröger jumped into his clothes, breakfasted before all the others below on the veranda, afterwards swam out a ways in the sound from the little wooden bathing-house, and then took an hour’s walk along the beach. As he returned, several omnibus-like wagons were standing in front of the hotel; and from the dining-room he observed, both in the adjoining reception room where the piano stood, and also on the veranda and on the terrace in front of it, numerous people of both sexes, in ordinary middle-class dress. They were in lively conversation, and were sitting at round tables enjoying beer and sandwiches. There were whole families, elderly people and young people, and even a few children.
At the second breakfast (the table was heavily laden with cold foods, smoked, salted, and baked) Tonio Kröger inquired what was going on.
“Guests!” said the fish dealer. “Excursionists from Helsingör who have come here for a ball! Yes, God help us, we won’t be able to sleep this night! There will be dancing, dancing and music, and I am afraid it will keep up for a long while. It is a family gathering, a reunion and trip to the country combined—in short, a subscription ball or something of the sort; and they will be happy as the day is long. They came by boat and by carriage, and now they are having breakfast. After a while they will go further into the country, but in the evening they will come back, and then there will be a dance in the hall here. Yes, damn it all, we won’t sleep a wink …”
“That will be pleasant for a change,” Tonio Kröger said.
After this, nothing further was said for quite a while. The proprietress arranged her red fingers, the fish dealer blew through his right nostril in order to get a little air, and the Americans drank hot water and made long faces.
Then of a sudden this happened: Hans Hansen and Ingeborg Holm passed through the room.
Tonio Kröger, pleasantly tired after his bath and his fast walk, was leaning back in his chair eating smoked salmon on toast—he sat facing the veranda and the sea. And suddenly the door opened, and the two came in, hand in hand—sauntering, and without haste. Ingeborg, blonde Inge, was dressed in bright colours, as she used to be at Herr Knaak’s dancing-class. The soft flowery dress reached down to her ankles, and about her shoulders she wore a broad white v-shaped fichu which left her soft pliant neck exposed. Her hat was hanging on her arm by its knotted ribbons. She was perhaps just a little taller than before, and now wore her wonderful plait done up on her head.
But Hans Hansen was just the same as ever. He had on his reefer’s jacket with the gilt buttons, with the broad blue collar lying over it on his back and shoulders. The sailor cap with the short ribbons he held in his loose hand, and was swinging it carelessly back and forth. Ingeborg kept her narrow eyes turned away, perhaps a little embarrassed by the stare of the diners. But Hans Hansen now turned his head straight towards the breakfast table with utter defiance, and his steel-blue eyes measured one person after the other challengingly and with a certain amount of scorn. He even let Ingeborg’s hand go and swung his cap still more briskly back and forth, in order to show just what sort of man he was. So the two of them, with the quiet blue sea as a background, passed before Tonio Kröger’s eyes, went the length of the room, and disappeared through the far door into the music room.
This happened at eleven-thirty in the morning; and while the guests at the Kurhouse were still sitting at breakfast, the company in the adjoining room and on the veranda broke up and left the hotel through the nearby side entrance without anyone’s coming through the dining-hall. They could be heard outside climbing into the wagons amid jokes and laughter; and one vehicle after the other started gratingly along the boulevard and rolled away. …
“So they are coming back?” Tonio Kröger asked. …
“That they are!” said the fish dealer, “and God have mercy. They have arranged for music, you know, and I sleep here above this room.”
“That will be pleasant for a change,” Tonio Kröger repeated. Then he arose and left.
He spent the day as he spent the others, on the beach, in the woods; held a book on his knees and blinked into the sun. He had only one thought: that they would return and hold a dance in the hall as the fish dealer had promised; and he simply felt happy at this, with a sweet uneasy happiness such as he had not experienced for long dead years. Once, through some association of ideas,
