Chapter 11 of 30 · 4'47"
Candy is recovering in a Berlin hospital after the duel, and Edith comes to visit. They agree to tell his aunt the wound was a "hunting accident," and discover that his opponent is being treated in the same place. Hospital rules, visitors' days, and jokes about moustaches fill the rest of the visit.
Soldiers Cause Military Incidents
Germans Show Their Scars
In the hospital after the duel, Candy is visited by Edith. They decide to tell his English family that his wound came from a "hunting accident," and learn that his German opponent, Kretschmar-Schuldorff, is a patient too. The visit follows hospital routine — visitors' day, fixed hours, a bell at five — and Candy fills it with jokes about moustaches and soldiers.
Under the hospital routine, the scene is really about two people beginning to like each other. The cover story — Candy's wound is a "hunting accident" — protects his family and the story, but the visit is full of private jokes, and the ward keeps interrupting them: a bell at five, a nurse tidying things away. Much of the humour is national. A German officer would shave off his moustache to show a scar; British officers, Candy claims, simply grow bigger ones and joke their way through: "My dear Miss Hunter, soldiers cause military incidents. They leave diplomacy to the diplomats." Even the card game at the end, with its "double or quits," is courtship in disguise, a way of being close without saying so.
A1–C2 is the CEFR scale. Cards above the level you pick fade, and playback will not auto-pause on them.
“A German officer would shave off his moustache to show that he had a scar.”
It flips the usual vanity: a scar matters more than a moustache, and the difference is national habit.
Neutral
“My dear Miss Hunter, soldiers cause military incidents.”
It turns reckless behaviour into a job description, so the excuse is also a boast.
Neutral
“I saw them cross the vestibule, preceded by their moustaches.”
It makes the moustaches lead the men, so the image arrives before the people do.
literary
“That's just one of the points where we differ, my dear Nurse Erna.”
It names a disagreement and still keeps the warmth, which is exactly how polite friction sounds.
Neutral
Up next · 12took part inThe scene: Edith and Candy Meet TheoTo give his family, and the outside world, a harmless reason for the wound. The duel would cause a scandal, so the cover story keeps everyone's reputation intact.
The German officer Candy fought, Kretschmar-Schuldorff. He is in the same hospital, with a bad cut on his forehead that needed eight or twelve stitches.
Visitors' day is Wednesday, from three in the afternoon until five, and a bell rings at five to mark the end of visiting hours.
She is doing her job and tidying up, but her interruptions also tease out the flirtation — she takes things away, jokes with Candy, and sets up the card game.
It is a national difference. A German officer would shave his moustache to show a duelling scar; British officers, as Candy puts it, would rather grow a bigger moustache.
