It would be more difficult to explain why he wanted
to take away the broken puppet with him. Possibly he felt that in removing
it from the shop, he was taking with it even the memory of the transaction
of which the blame had been so bitterly thrown on him; or, possibly, he
was really attached to the toy for its associations, or, lastly, he may
have felt impelled to save it from Akulina's destroying wrath, so far as
it yet could be said to be saved.
As has been said, he had not dined on that day, and he would very probably
have forgotten to eat, even after being reminded of the meal by the
tobacconist, had he not passed, on his way homeward, the obscure
restaurant in which he and the other men who worked for Fischelowitz were
accustomed to get their food and drink. This fifth-rate eating-house
rejoiced in the attractive name of the "Green Wreath," a designation
painted in large dusty green Gothic letters upon the grey walls of the
dilapidated house in which it was situated. There are not to be found in
respectable Munich those dens of filth and drunkenness which belong to
greater cities whose vices are in proportion greater also. In Munich the
strength of fiery spirits is drowned in oceans of mild beer, a liquid of
which the head will stand more than the waistband and which, instead of
exciting to crime, predisposes the consumer to peaceful and lengthened
sleep. The worst that can be said of the poorer public-houses in Munich,
is that they are frequented by the poorer people, and that as the
customers bring less money than elsewhere, there is less drinking in
proportion, and a greater demand for large quantities of very filling food
at very low rates.
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