The only one among all of them who really struck me was Brecht, thanks to his proletarian costume. He was very lean, with a hungry face to which his cap gave a slightly crooked look; his words were wooden and clipped. Under his gaze you felt like a worthless heirloom, and he, the pawnbroker with his piercing eyes, was appraising you. He said little; you never learned the result of his appraisal. It seemed unbelievable that he was only thirty . . . I grumbled about the advertisements with which Berlin was infested. They didn't bother him, he said; advertising had its good side. He had written a poem about Steyr cars, and got a car for i t . . . With this confession, produced as though it were a boast, he brought me down and silenced me . . . 'He likes driving,' said Ibby, as though it were nothing. To me . . . he seemed like a murderer; I was remembering 'Die Legende vom toten Soldaten', and he had taken part in a copy-writing contest for Steyr cars! 'He's still flattering his car,' said Ibby, 'he talks about it as though it were a lover. Why shouldn't he flatter it beforehand, so he can get one?'