It would not be safe now for him to delay a single day longer.

So the little postman armed himself with courage.
Waerli's brain was muddled that day.

He who prided himself upon knowing the names of all the guests in Petershof, made the most absurd mistakes about people and letters too; and received in acknowledgment of his stupidity a series of scoldings which would have unnerved a stronger person than the little hunchback postman.
In fact, he ceased to care how he gave out the letters: all the envelopes seemed to have the same name on them: _Marie Truog_.

Every word which he tried to decipher turned to that; so finally he tried no more, leaving the destination of the letter to be decided by the impulse of the moment.

At last he arrived at that quarter of the Kurhaus where Marie held sway.