Klemmer was repeating –senseless, because he was understood the first time- that Erika stinks so horribly that the whole small room reeks of her, it’s disgusting. She wrote him a letter, and now his reply is: He wants nothing from her, and besides, she stinks to high heaven. Klemmer pulls Erika’s hair. She should leave town, so his young, fresh nostrils won’t have to smell that peculiar, repulsive stench, that animal emanation of putrescence.