In Monteport he paid his respects to the former Music Master, who in his younger years had himself once been a guest at Mariafels and studied Benedictine music there. He plied Joseph with many questions about the place. Joseph found the old man somewhat more subdued and withdrawn, but stronger and gayer in appearance than he had been at their last meeting. The fatigue had departed from his face; it was not that he had grown younger since resigning his office, but he definitely looked handsomer and more spiritualized. Knecht was struck by the fact that though he inquired about the organ, the chests of music manuscripts, and the choral singing in Mariafels, and even wanted to hear whether the tree in the cloister garden was still standing, he seemed to have no curiosity about Knecht’s work there, the Glass Bead Game course, or the purpose of his present leave. Before he continued his journey, however, the old man gave him a valuable hint. “I have heard,” he said with seeming jocularity, “that you have become something of a diplomat. Not really a very nice occupation, but it seems our people are satisfied with you. Interpret that as you like. But if it doesn’t happen to be your ambition to stay in this occupation forever, then be on your guard, Joseph. I think they want to capture you for it. Defend yourself; you have the right to… No, ask me no questions; I shall not say a word more. You will see.”
In spite of this warning, which he carried with him like a thorn in his flesh, Joseph felt something like rapture on returning to Waldzell. It was as if Waldzell were not only home and the most beautiful place in the world, but as if it had become even lovelier and more interesting in the meanwhile; or else he was returning with fresh and keener eyes. And this applied not only to the gates, towers, trees, and river, to the courtyards and halls and familiar faces. During this furlough he felt a heightened receptivity to the spirit of Waldzell, to the Order and the Glass Bead Game. It was the grateful understanding of the homecoming traveler now grown matured and wiser. “I feel,” he said to his friend Tegularius at the end of an enthusiastic eulogy on Waldzell and Castalia, “I feel as if I spent all my years here asleep, happy enough, to be sure, but unconscious. Now I feel awake and see everything sharply and clearly, indubitable reality. To think that two years abroad can so sharpen one’s vision.”
He enjoyed his vacation as if it were a prolonged festival. His greatest pleasure came from the games and discussions with his fellow members of the elite at the Vicus Lusorum, from seeing friends again, and from the
The Magister Ludi asked fewer questions than Knecht had anticipated. He scarcely mentioned the Game course for beginners and Joseph’s studies in the music archives. On the other hand, he could not hear enough about Father Jacobus, referred back to him again and again, and was interested in every morsel Joseph could tell him about this man. From the Magister’s great friendliness Joseph concluded that they were satisfied with him and his mission among the Benedictines, very satisfied indeed. His conclusion was confirmed by the conduct of Monsieur Dubois, to whom he was promptly sent by Magister Thomas. “You’ve done a splendid job,” Dubois said. With a low laugh, he added: “My instinct was certainly at fault when I advised against your being sent to the monastery. Your winning over the great Father Jacobus in addition to the Abbot, and making him more favorable toward Castalia, is a great deal more than anyone dared to hope for.”
Two days later Magister Thomas invited Joseph, together with Dubois and the current head of the Waldzell elite school, Zbinden’s successor, to dinner. During the conversation hour after dinner the new Music Master unexpectedly turned up, as did the Archivist of the Order — two more members of the Supreme Board. One of them took Joseph along to the guest house for a lengthy talk. This invitation for the first time moved Knecht publicly into the most intimate circle of candidates for high office, and set up between himself and the average member of the Game elite a barrier which Knecht, now keenly alert to such matters, at once felt acutely.
