The Castle《城堡》（上）

卡夫卡（1883-1924），奥地利小说家，生前鲜为人知，其作品也未受到重视，身后却文名鹊起，蜚声世界文坛。他被称为“作家中之作家“。《城堡》是其最具特色、最重要的长篇小说。土地测量员K受命赴某城上任，不料却受阻于城堡大门外，于是主人公K同城堡当局围绕能否进入城堡之事展开了持久烦琐的拉锯战。城堡就位于眼前一座小山上，可它可望而不可即；它是那样冷漠、威严，像一头巨兽俯视着K；它代表了一个庞大的官僚机构，那儿等级森严，有数不尽的部门和数不尽的官吏，可又有数不 尽的文书尘封在那里，长年累月无人过目，得不到处理。面对这座强大的城堡，K很无奈，直到最后也没有进入城堡，也没见到城堡当权者。小说自始至终笼罩着一种神秘的、梦魇般的气氛；寓意深刻，令人回味无穷。
Arriving in a village to take up the position of land surveyor for the mysterious lord of a castle, the character known as K. finds himself in a bitter and baffling struggle to contact his new employer and go about his duties. As the villagers and the Castle officials block his efforts at every turn, K.’s consuming quest–quite possibly a self-imposed one–to penetrate the inaccessible heart of the Castle and take its measure is repeatedly frustrated. Kafka once suggested that the would-be surveyor in The Castle is driven by a wish “to get clear about ultimate things,” an unrealizable desire that provided the driving force behind all of Kafka’s dazzlingly uncanny fictions.
First published in Great Britain by Martin Seeker & Warburg Limited
1930
NOTE KAFKA'S name, so far as I can discover, is almost unknown to
English readers. As he is considered by several of the best German critics
to have been perhaps the most interesting writer of his generation, and at
he is in some ways a strange and disconcerting genius, it has been
suggested that a short introductory note should be provided for this book,
the first of his to be translated into English.' This is the first paragraph of
Edwin Muir's Introduction published in 1930 with the first English
edition of The Castle (in his and Willa Muir's translation) and reprinted in
all later editions. Hardly ever has the work of translators been so amply
rewarded - and indeed on so large a scale of literary fame for the
translated work that the quoted paragraph now reads like a historical
curiosity. In the time between the first publication of The Castle and the
definitive edition, Franz Kafka, although still a 'strange and disconcerting
genius', had risen to the stature of a classic of modern literature. Merely
to list the critical literature his work has evoked would probably mean
compiling a book. In this situation, which in itself is the greatest tribute to
the work of Franz Kafka's devoted friend and editor, Max Brod, and to his
first English translators, the reader no longer requires the help offered to
him by the Introduction and Editor's Note of the previous editions - the
less so as, quite apart from much other literature on the subject, Max
Brod's biography of Franz Kafka has in the meantime become available
in English translation.
However, as The Castle remains unfinished, the following paragraph
from the Editor's Note to the first edition should be preserved : 'Kafka
never wrote the concluding chapter. But he told me about it once when I
asked him how the novel was to end. The ostensible Land Surveyor was
to find partial satisfaction at least. He was not to relax in his struggle, but
was to die worn out by it Round his death-bed the villagers were to
assemble, and from the Castle itself the word was to come that though
K.'s legal claim to live in the village was not valid, yet, taking certain
auxiliary circumstances into account, he was to be permitted to live and
work there.' It is also not unimportant to know 'that The Castle seems to
have been begun as a story in the first person, the earlier chapters being
altered by the author, "K." being inserted everywhere in the place of "I",
and the later chapters written straight out in the third person. In his
postscript to the third German edition Max Brod gratefully acknowledges
the editorial assistance of Heinz Pollitzer. The present English edition is
based on the definitive German edition of Das Schloss, S. Fischer Verlag,
Frankfurt am Main, 1951* Lizenzausgabe von Schocken Books, New
York. Thus it is considerably larger than the previous editions which
followed the text of the first German publication of the novel. The
additions - result of Max Brod's later editing of Franz Kafka's
posthumous writings - are the concluding section of chapter 18 and the
whole of chapters 19 and 20. As the original translators of the novel were
unable to undertake the translation of the new material, Eidine Wilkins
and Ernst Kaiser kindly agreed to complete the work begun by Willa and
Edwin Muir. The translators of the additional material have chosen
'Mayor* rather than 'Superintendent* as a translation of the German
Gemeindevorsteher. The difficulty is diat there is no precise English
equivalent of the tide of the elected head of a village community. 'Clients'
has been replaced throughout by 'applicants'. The Latin 'diens' meant 'one
who is at the call of his patron, and 'client' came to mean someone under
the protection or patronage of another and, more specifically, one who
employs the services of a legal adviser or advocate. The translators
considered that 'applicant* has a more authentic ring, since there is no
question of any payment being made to the officials of the Castle.
Chapter 1
IT was late in the evening when K. arrived, The village was J. deep in
snow. The Castle hill was hidden, veiled in mist and darkness, nor was
there even a glimmer of light to show that a castle was there. On the
wooden bridge leading from the main road to the village K. stood for a
long time gazing into the illusory emptiness above him. Then he went on
to find quarters for the night. The inn was still awake, and although the
landlord could not provide a room and was upset by such a late and
unexpected arrival, he was willing to let K. sleep on a bag of straw in the
parlour. K. accepted the offer. Some peasants were still sitting over their
beer, but he did not want to talk, and after himself fetching the bag of
straw from the attic, lay down beside the stove. It was a warm corner, the
peasants were quiet, and letting his weary eyes stray over them he soon
fell asleep. But very shortly he was awakened. A young man dressed like
a townsman, with the face of an actor, his eyes narrow and his eyebrows
strongly marked, was standing beside him along with the landlord. The
peasants were still in the room, and a few had turned their chairs round so
as to see and hear better. The young man apologized very courteously for
having awakened K., introducing himself as the son of the Castellan, and
then said: 'This village belongs to the Castle, and whoever lives here or
passes the night here does so in a manner of speaking in the Castle itself.
Nobody may do that without the Count's permission. But you have no
such permit, or at least you have produced none.' K. had half raised
himself and now, smoothing down his hair and looking up at the two men,
he said: 'What village is this I have wandered into? Is there a castle here?'
'Most certainly,' replied the young man slowly, while here and there a
head was shaken over K.'s remark, 'the castle of my lord the Count
West-west.' 'And must one have a permit to sleep here?' asked K., as if he
wished to assure himself that what he had heard was not a dream. 'One
must have a permit,' was the reply, and there was an ironical contempt for
K. in the young man's gesture as he stretched out his arm and appealed to
the others, 'Or must one not have a permit?' 'Well, then, I'll have to go and
get one,' said K. yawning and pushing his blanket away as if to rise up.
'And from whom, pray?' asked the young man. 'From the Count,' said K.,
'that's the only thing to be done.' 'A permit from the Count in the middle
of the night!' cried the young man, stepping back a pace. 'Is that
impossible?' inquired K. coolly. 'Then why did you waken me?' At this
the young man flew into a passion. 'None of your guttersnipe manners!'
he cried, 'I insist on respect for the Count's authority I I woke you up to
inform you that you must quit the Count's territory at once.' 'Enough of
this fooling,' said K. in a markedly quiet voice, laying himself down again
and pulling up the blanket. 'You're going a little too far, my good fellow,
and I'll have something to say to-morrow about your conduct. The
landlord here and those other gentlemen will bear me out if necessary. Let
me tell you that I am the Land Surveyor whom the Count is expecting.
My assistants are coming on to-morrow in a carriage with the apparatus. I
did not want to miss the chance of a walk through the snow, but
unfortunately lost my way several times and so arrived very late. That it
was too late to present myself at the Castle I knew very well before you
saw fit to inform me. That is why I have made shift with this bed for the
night, where, to put it mildly, you have had the discourtesy to disturb me.
That is all I have to say. Good night, gentlemen.' And K. turned over on
his side towards the stove. 'Land Surveyor?' he heard the hesitating
question behind his back, and then there was a general silence. But the
young man soon recovered his assurance, and lowering his voice,
sufficiently to appear considerate of K.'s sleep while yet speaking loud
enough to be clearly heard, said to the landlord: 'I'll ring up and 10
inquire.' So there was a telephone in this village inn? They had everything
up to the mark. The particular instance surprised K., but on the whole he
had really expected it. It appeared that the telephone was placed almost
over his head and in his drowsy condition he had overlooked it. If the
young man must needs telephone he could not, even with the best
intentions, avoid disturbing K., the only question was whether K. would
let him do so; he decided to allow it. In that case, however, there was no
sense in pretending to sleep, and so he turned on his back again. He could
sec the peasants putting their heads together; the arrival of a Land
Surveyor was no small event. The door into the kitchen had been opened,
and blocking the whole doorway stood the imposing figure of the
landlady, to whom the landlord was advancing on tiptoe in order to tell
her what was happening. And now the conversation began on the
telephone. The Castellan was asleep, but an under-castellan, one of the
under-castellans, a certain Herr Fritz, was available. The young man,
announcing himself as Schwarzer, reported that he had found K., a
disreputable-looking man in the thirties, sleeping calmly on a bag of
straw with a minute rucksack for pillow and a knotty stick within reach.
He had naturally suspected the fellow, and as the landlord had obviously
neglected his duty he, Schwarzer, had felt bound to investigate the matter.
He had roused the man, questioned him, and duly warned him off the
Count's territory, all of which K. had taken with an ill grace, perhaps with
some justification, as it eventually turned out, for he claimed to be a Land
Surveyor engaged by the Count. Of course, to say the least of it, that was
a statement which required official confirmation, and so Schwarzer
begged Herr Fritz to inquire in the Central Bureau if a Land Surveyor
were really expected, and to telephone the answer at once. Then there was
silence while Fritz was making inquiries up there and the young man was
waiting for the answer. K. did not change his position, did not even once
turn round, seemed quite indifferent and stared into space. Schwarzer's
report, in its combination of malice and prudence, gave him an idea of the
measure of diplomacy in which even underlings in the Castle like
Schwarzer were versed. Nor were they remiss in industry, ii
the Central Office had a night service. And apparently answered
questions quickly, too, for Fritz was already ringing. His reply seemed
brief enough, for Schwarzer hung up the receiver immediately, crying
angrily: 'Just what I said! Not a trace of a Land Surveyor. A common,
lying tramp, and probably worse.' For a moment K. thought that all of
them, Schwarzer, the peasants, the landlord and the landlady, were going
to fall upon him in a body, and to escape at least the first shock of their
assault he crawled right underneath the blanket. But the telephone rang
again, and with a special insistence, it seemed to K. Slowly he put out his
head. Although it was improbable that this message also concerned K.,
they all stopped short and Schwarzer took up the receiver once more. He
listened to a fairly long statement, and then said in a low voice: 'A
mistake, is it? I'm sorry to hear that. The head of the department himself
said so? Very queer, very queer. How am I to explain it all to the Land
Surveyor?' K. pricked up his ears. So the Castle had recognized him as
the Land Surveyor. That was unpropitious for him, on the one hand, for it
meant that the Castle was well informed about him, had estimated all the
probable chances, and was taking up the challenge with a smile. On the
other hand, however, it was quite propitious, for if his interpretation were
right they had underestimated his strength, and he would have more
freedom of action than he had dared to hope. And if they expected to cow
him by their lofty superiority in recognizing him as Land Surveyor, they
were mistaken; it made his skin prickle a little, that was all. He waved off
Schwarzer who was timidly approaching him, and refused an urgent
invitation to transfer himself into the landlord's own room; he only
accepted a warm drink from the landlord and from the landlady a basin to
wash in, a piece of soap, and a towel. He did not even have to ask that the
room should be cleared, for all the men flocked out with averted faces lest
he should recognize them again next day. The lamp was blown out, and
he was left in peace at last. He slept deeply until morning, scarcely
disturbed by rats scuttling past once or twice. After breakfast, which,
according to his host, was to be paid 12
for by the Castle, together with all the other expenses of his board and
lodging, he prepared to go out immediately into the village. But since the
landlord, to whom he had been very curt because of his behaviour the
preceding night, kept circling around him in dumb entreaty, he took pity
on the man and asked him to sit down for a while. 'I haven't met the
Count yet,' said K., "but he pays well for good work, doesn't he? When a
man like me travels so far from home he wants to go back with something
in his pockets.' There's no need for the gentleman to worry about that
kind of thing; nobody complains of being badly paid.' 'Well,' said K., Tm
not one of your timid people, and can give a piece of my mind even to a
Count, but of course it's much better to have everything settled up without
any trouble.' The landlord sat opposite K. on the rim of the window-ledge,
not daring to take a more comfortable seat, and kept on gazing at K. with
an anxious look in his large brown eyes. He had thrust his company on K.
at Erst, but now it seemed that he was eager to escape. Was he afraid of
being cross-questioned about the Count? Was he afraid of some
indiscretion on the part of the 'gentleman* whom he took K. to be? K.
must divert his attention. He looked at the clock, and said: 'My assistants
should be arriving soon. Will you be able to put them up here?' 'Certainly,
sir,' he said, 'but won't they be staying with you up at the Castle?' Was the
landlord so willing, then, to give up prospective customers, and K. in
particular, whom he so unconditionally transferred to the Castle? 'That's
not at all certain yet,' said K. 'I must first find out what work I am
expected to do. If I have to work down here, for instance, it would be
more sensible to lodge down here. I'm afraid, too, that the life at the
Castle wouldn't suit me. I like to be my own master.' 'You don't know the
Castle,' said the landlord quietly. 'Of course,' replied K., 'one shouldn't
judge prematurely. All that I know at present about the Castle is that the
people there know how to choose a good Land Surveyor. Perhaps it has
other attractions as well.' And he stood up in order to rid the landlord 13
of his presence, since the man was biting his lip uneasily. His confidence
was not to be lightly won. As K. was going out he noticed a dark portrait
in a dim frame on the wall. He had already observed it from his couch by
the stove, but from that distance he had not been able to distinguish any
details and had thought that it was only a plain back to the frame. But it
was a picture after all, as now appeared, the bust portrait of a man about
fifty. His head was sunk so low upon his breast that his eyes were
scarcely visible, and the weight of the high, heavy forehead and the
strong hooked nose seemed to have borne the head down. Because of this
pose the man's full beard was pressed in at the chin and spread out farther
down. His left hand was buried in his luxuriant hair, but seemed
incapable of supporting the head. 'Who is that?' asked K., 'the Count?' He
was standing before the portrait and did not look round at the landlord.
'No,' said the latter, 'the Castellan.' 'A handsome castellan, indeed,' said K.,
'a pity that he had such an ill-bred son.' 'No, no,' said the landlord,
drawing K. a little towards him and whispering in his ear, 'Schwarzer
exaggerated yesterday, his father is only an under-castellan, and one of
the lowest, too.' At that moment the landlord struck K. as a very child.
'The villain!' said K. with a laugh, but the landlord instead of laughing
said, 'Even his father is powerful.' 'Get along with you,' said K., 'you
think everyone powerful. Me too, perhaps?' 'No,' he replied, timidly yet
seriously, 'I don't think you powerful.' 'You're a keen observer,' said K.,
'for between you and me I'm not really powerful. And consequently I
suppose I have no less respect for the powerful than you have, only I'm
not so honest as you and am not always willing to acknowledge it.' And K.
gave the landlord a tap on the cheek to hearten him and awaken his
friendliness. It made him smile a little. He was actually young, with that
soft and almost beardless face of his; how had he come to have that
massive, elderly wife, who could be seen through a small window
bustling about the kitchen with her elbows sticking out? K. did not want
to force his confidence any further, however, nor to scare away the smile
he had at last evoked. So he only signed to him to open the door, and
went out into the brilliant winter morning. 14
Now, he could see the Castle above him clearly defined in the glittering
air, its outline made still more definite by the moulding of snow covering
it in a thin layer. There seemed to be much less snow up there on the hill
than down in the village, where K. found progress as laborious as on the
main road the previous day. Here the heavy snowdrifts reached right up to
the cottage windows and began again on the low roofs, but up on the hill
everything soared light and free into the air, or at least so it appeared from
down below. On the whole this distant prospect of the Castle satisfied
K.'s expectations. It was neither an old stronghold nor a new mansion, but
a rambling pile consisting of innumerable small buildings closely packed
together and of one or two storeys; if K. had not known that it was a
castle he might have taken it for a little town. There was only one tower
as far as he could see, whether it belonged to a dwelling-house or a
church he could not determine. Swarms of crows were circling round it.
With his eyes fixed on the Castle K. went on farther, thinking of nothing
else at all. But on approaching it he was disappointed in the Castle; it was
after all only a wretched-looking town, a huddle of village houses, whose
sole merit, if any, lay in being built of stone, but the plaster had long since
flaked off and the stone seemed to be crumbling away. K. had a fleeting
recollection of his native town. It was hardly inferior to this so-called
Castle, and if it were merely a question of enjoying the view it was a pity
to have come so far. K. would have done better to visit his native town
again, which he had not seen for such a long time. And in his mind he
compared the church tower at home with the tower above him. The
church tower, firm in line, soaring unfalteringly to its tapering point,
topped with red tiles and broad in the roof, an earthly building-what else
can men build? -but with a loftier goal than the humble dwellinghouses,
and a clearer meaning than the muddle of everyday life. The tower above
him here-the only one visible-the tower of a house, as was now apparent,
perhaps of the main building, was uniformly round, part of it graciously
mantled with ivy, pierced by small windows that glittered in the sun, a
somewhat maniacal glitter, and topped by what looked like an attic, with
battlements that were irregular, broken, fumbling, as if designed by the
trembling or careless hand of a child, clearly outlined against the blue. It
was as if a melancholy-mad tenant who ought to have been kept locked in
the topmost chamber of his house had burst through the roof and lifted
himself up to the gaze of the world. Again K. came to a stop, as if in
standing still he had more power of judgement. But he was disturbed.
Behind the village church where he had stopped-it was really only a
chapel widened with barn-like additions so as to accommodate the
parishioners - was the school. A long, low building, combining
remarkably a look of great age with a provincial appearance, it lay behind
a fenced-in garden which was now a field of snow. The children were just
coming out with their teacher. They thronged round him, all gazing up at
him and chattering without a break so rapidly that K. could not follow
what they said. The teacher, a small young man with narrow shoulders
and a very upright carriage which yet did not make him ridiculous, had
already fixed K. with his eyes from the distance, naturally enough, for
apart from the school-children there was not another human being in sight.
Being the stranger, K. made the first advance, especially as the other was
an authoritative-looking little man, and said: 'Good morning, sir.' As if by
one accord the children fell silent, perhaps the master liked to have a
sudden stillness as a preparation for his words. 'You are looking at the
Castle?' he asked more gently than K. had expected, but with the
inflexion that denoted disapproval of K.'s occupation. 'Yes,' said K. 'I am
a stranger here, I came to the village only last night.' 'You don't like the
Castle?' returned the teacher quickly. 'What?' countered K., a little taken
aback, and repeated the question in a modified form. 'Do I like the Casde?
Why do you assume that I don't like it?' 'Strangers never do,' said the
teacher. To avoid saying the wrong thing K. changed the subject and
asked: 'I suppose you know the Count?' 'No,' said the teacher turning
away. But K. would not be put off and asked again: 'What, you don't
know the Count?' 'Why should I?' replied the teacher in a low tone, and
added aloud in French: 'Please remember that there are innocent children
present.' K. 16
took this as a justification for asking: 'Might I come to pay you a visit one
day, sir? I am to be staying here for some time and already feel a little
lonely. I don't fit in with the peasants nor, I imagine, with the Castle.'
'There is no difference between the peasantry and the Castle,' said the
teacher. 'Maybe,' said K.., 'that doesn't alter my position. Can I pay you a
visit one day?' 'I live in Swan Street at the butcher's.' That was assuredly
more of a statement than an invitation, but K. said: 'Right, I'll come.' The
teacher nodded and moved on with his batch of children, who began to
scream again immediately. They soon vanished in a steeply descending
by-street. But K. was disconcerted, irritated by the conversation. For the
first time since his arrival he felt really tired. The long journey he had
made seemed at first to have imposed no strain upon him - how quietly he
had sauntered through the days, step by step i - but now the consequences
of his exertion were making themselves felt, and at the wrong time, too.
He felt irresistibly drawn to seek out new acquaintances, but each new
acquaintance only seemed to increase his weariness. If he forced himself
in his present condition to go on at least as far as the Castle entrance, he
would have done more than enough. So he resumed his walk, but the way
proved long. For the street he was in, the main street of the village, did
not lead up to the Castle hill, it only made towards it and then, as if
deliberately, turned aside, and though it did not lead away from the Castle
it got no nearer to it either. At every turn K. expected the road to double
back to the Castle, and only because of this expectation did he go on; he
was flatly unwilling, tired as he was, to leave the street, and he was also
amazed at the length of the village, which seemed to have no end; again
and again the same little houses, and frost-bound window-panes and
snow and the entire absence of human beings-but at last he tore himself
away from the obsession of the street and escaped into a small side-lane,
where the snow was still deeper and the exertion of lifting one's feet clear
was fatiguing; he broke into a sweat, suddenly came to a stop, and could
not go on. Well, he was not on a desert island, there were cottages to right
and left of him. He made a snowball and threw it at a '7
window. The door opened immediately-the first door that had opened
during the whole length of the village-and there appeared an old peasant
in a brown fur jacket, with his head cocked to one side, a frail and kindly
figure. 'May I come into your house for a little?' asked K., Tin very tired.'
He did not hear the old man's reply, but thankfully observed that a plank
was pushed out towards him to rescue him from the snow, and in a few
steps he was in the kitchen. A large kitchen, dimly lit Anyone coming in
from outside could make out nothing at first. K. stumbled over a washing'
tub, a woman's hand steadied him. The crying of children came loudly
from one corner. From another steam was welling out and turning the dim
light into darkness. K. stood as if in the clouds. 'He must be drunk,' said
somebody. 'Who are you?' cried a hectoring voice, and then obviously to
the old man: 'Why did you let him in? Are we to let in everybody that
wanders about in the street?' 'I am the Count's Land Surveyor/ said K.,
trying to justify himself before this still invisible personage. 'Oh, it's the
Land Surveyor,' said a woman's voice, and then came a complete silence.
'You know me, then?' asked K. 'Of course,' said the same voice curtly.
The fact that he was known did not seem to be a recommendation. At last
the steam thinned a little, and K. was able gradually to make things out. It
seemed to be a general washing-day. Near the door clothes were being
washed. But the steam was coming from another corner, where in a
wooden tub larger than any K. had ever seen, as wide as two beds, two
men were bathing in steaming water. But still more astonishing, although
one could not say what was so astonishing about it, was the scene in the
right-hand corner. From a large opening, the only one in the back wall, a
pale snowy light came in, apparently from the courtyard, and gave a
gleam as of silk to the dress of a woman who was almost reclining in a
high arm-chair. She was suckling an infant at her breast. Several children
were playing around her, peasant children, as was obvious, but she
seemed to be of another class, although of course illness and weariness
give even peasants a look of refinement. 'Sit downP said one of the men,
who had a full beard and 18
breathed heavily through his mouth which always hung open, pointing-it
was a funny sight-with his wet hand over the edge of the tub towards a
settle, and showering drops of warm water all over K.'s face as he did so.
On the settle the old man who had admitted K. was already sitting, sunk
in vacancy. K. was thankful to find a seat at last. Nobody paid any further
attention to him. The woman at the washing-tub, young, plump, and fair,
sang in a low voice as she worked, the men stamped and rolled about in
the bath, the children tried to get closer to them but were constantly
driven back by mighty splashes of water which fell on K., too, and the
woman in the arm-chair lay as if lifeless staring at the roof without even a
glance towards the child at her bosom. She made a beautiful, sad, fixed
picture, and K. looked at her for what must have been a long time; then
he must have fallen asleep, for when a loud voice roused him he found
that his head was lying on the old man's shoulder. The men had finished
with the tub-in which the children were now wallowing in charge of the
fair-haired woman-and were standing fully dressed before K. It appeared
that the hectoring one with the full beard was the less important of the
two. The other, a still, slow-thinking man who kept his head bent, was not
taller than his companion and had a much smaller beard, but he was
broader in the shoulders and had a broad face as well, and he it was who
said: 'You can't stay here, sir. Excuse the discourtesy.' 'I don't want to
stay,' said K,., 'I only wanted to rest a little. I have rested, and now I shall
go.' 'You're probably surprised at our lack of hospitality,' said the man,
'but hospitality is not our custom here, we have no use for visitors.'
Somewhat refreshed by his sleep, his perceptions somewhat quickened, K.
was pleased by the man's frankness. He felt less constrained, poked with
his stick here and there, approached the woman in the arm-chair, and
noted that he was physically the biggest man in the room. 'To be sure,'
said K., 'what use would you have for visitors? But still you need one
now and then, me, for example, the Lane Surveyor.' 'I don't know about
that,' replied the man slowly. 'If you've been asked to come you're
probably needed, that's an 19
exceptional case, but we small people stick to our tradition, and you can't
blame us for that.' 'No, no,' said K., 'I am only grateful to you and
everybody here.' And taking them all by surprise he made an adroit turn
and stood before the reclining woman. Out of weary blue eyes she looked
at him, a transparent silk kerchief hung down to the middle of her
forehead, die infant was asleep on her bosom. 'Whoare you?' asked K.,
and disdainfully - whether contemptuous of K. or her own answer was
not clear - she replied: 'A girl from the Castle.' It had only taken a second
or so, but already the two men were at either side of K. and were pushing
him towards the door, as if there were no other means of persuasion,
silently, but putting out all their strength. Something in this procedure
delighted the old man, and he clapped his hands. The woman at the
bath-tub laughed too, and the children suddenly shouted like mad. K. was
soon out in the street, and from the threshold the two men surveyed him.
Snow was again falling, yet the sky seemed a little brighter. The bearded
man cried impatiently: 'Where do you want to go? This is the way to the
Castle, and that to the village.' K. made no reply to him, but turned to the
other, who in spite of his shyness seemed to him the more amiable of the
two, and said: 'Who are you? Whom have I to thank for sheltering me?' 'I
am the tanner Lasemann,' was the answer, 'but you owe thanks to
nobody.' 'All right,' said K., 'perhaps we'll meet again.' 'I don't suppose
so,' said the man. At that moment the other cried, with a wave of his hand:
'Good morning, Arthur; good morning, Jeremiah!' K. turned round; so
there were really people to be seen in the village streets I From the
direction of the Castle came two young men of medium height, both very
slim, in tight-fitting clothes, and like each other in their features.
Although their skin was a dusky brown the blackness of their little
pointed beards was actually striking by contrast. Considering the state of
the road, they were walking at a great pace, their slim legs keeping time.
'Where are you off to?' shouted the bearded man. One had to shout to
them, they were going so fast and they would not stop. 'On business,' they
shouted back, laughing. 'Where?' 'At the inn.' Tm going there 20
too,' yelled K. suddenly, louder than all the rest; he felt a strong desire to
accompany them, not that he expected much from their acquaintance, but
they were obviously good and jolly companions. They heard him, but
only nodded, and were already out of sight. K. was still standing in the
snow, and was little inclined to extricate his feet only for the sake of
plunging them in again; the tanner and his comrade, satisfied with having
finally got rid of him, edged slowly into the house through the door which
was now barely ajar, casting backward glances at K., and he was left
alone in the falling snow. 'A fine setting for a fit of despair,' it occurred to
him, 'if I were only standing here by accident instead of design.' Just then
in the hut on his left hand a tiny window was opened, which had seemed
quite blue when shut, perhaps from the reflexion of the snow, and was so
tiny that when opened it did not permit the whole face of the person
behind it to be seen, but only the eyes, old brown eyes. 'There he is,' K.
heard a woman's trembling voice say. 'It's the Land Surveyor,' answered a
man's voice. Then the man came to the window and asked, not unamiably,
but still as if he were anxious to have no cornplications in front of his
house: 'Are you waiting for somebody?' 'For a sledge, to pick me up,' said
K. 'No sledges will pass here,' said the man, 'there's no traffic here.' 'But
it's the road leading to the Castle,' objected K. 'All the same, all the same,'
said the man with a certain finality, 'there's no traffic here.' Then they
were both silent. But the man was obviously thinking of something, for
he kept the window open. 'It's a bad road,' said K., to help him out. The
only answer he got, however, was: 'Oh yes.' But after a little the man
volunteered: 'If you like, I'll take you in my sledge.' 'Please do,' said K.
delighted, 'what is your charge?' 'Nothing,' said the man. K. was very
surprised. 'Well, you're the Land Surveyor,' explained the man, 'and you
belong to the Castle. Where do you want to be taken?' To the Castle,'
returned K. quickly. 'I won't take you there,' said the man without
hesitation. 'But I belong to the Castle,' said K., repeating the other's very
words. 'Maybe,' said the man shortly. 'Oh, well, take me to the inn,' said K.
'All 21
right,' said the man, Til be out with the sledge in a moment' His whole
behaviour had the appearance of springing not from any special desire to
be friendly but rather from a kind of selfish, worried, and almost pedantic
insistence on shifting K. away from the front of the house. The gate of the
courtyard opened, and a small light sledge, quite flat, without a seat of
any kind, appeared, drawn by a feeble little horse, and behind it limped
the man, a weakly stooped figure with a gaunt red snuffling face that
looked peculiarly small beneath a tightly swathed woollen scarf. He was
obviously ailing, and yet only to transport K. he had dragged himself out
K. ventured to mention it, but the man waved him aside. All that K.
elicited was that he was a coachman called Gerstacker, and that he had
taken this uncomfortable sledge because it was standing ready, and to get
out one of the others would have wasted too much time. 'Sit down,' he
said, pointing to the sledge. Til sit beside you,' said K. Tm going to walk,'
said Gerstacker. 'But why?' asked K. Tm going to walk,' repeated
Gerstacker, and was seized with a fit of coughing which shook him so
severely that he had to brace his legs in the snow and hold on to the rim
of the sledge. K. said no more, but sat down on the sledge, the man's
cough slowly abated, and they drove off. The Castle above them, which K.
had hoped to reach that very day, was already beginning to grow dark,
and retreated again into the distance. But as if to give him a parting sign
till their next encounter a bell began to ring merrily up there, a bell which
for at least a second made his heart palpitate for its tone was menacing,
too, as if it threatened him with the fulfilment of his vague desire. This
great bell soon died away, however, and its place was taken by a feeble
monotonous little tinkle which might have come from the Castle, but
might have been somewhere in the village. It certainly harmonized better
with the slow-going journey, with the wretched-looking yet inexorable
driver. 'I say,' cried K. suddenly-they were already near the church, the
inn was not far oft, and K. felt he could risk something Tm surprised that
you have the nerve to drive me round on your 22
own responsibility; are you allowed to do that?' Gerstacker paid no
attention, but went on walking quietly beside the little horse. 'Hi 1' cried
K., scraping some snow from the sledge and flinging a snowball which
hit Gerstacker full in the ear. That made him stop and turn round; but
when K. saw him at such close quarters- the sledge had slid forward a
little-this stooping and somehow ill-used figure with the thin red tired
face and cheeks that were different-one being flat and the other fallen
instanding listening with his mouth open, displaying only a few isolated
teeth, he found that what he had just said out of malice had to be repeated
out of pity, that is, whether Gerstacker was likely to be penalized for
driving him about. 'What do you mean?' asked Gerstacker
uncomprehendingly, but without waiting for an answer he spoke to the
horse and they moved on again. WHEN by a turn in the road K.
recognized that they were near the inn, he was greatly surprised to see
that darkness had already set in. Had he been gone for such a long time?
Surely not for more than an hour or two, by his reckoning. And it had
been morning when he left. And he had not felt any need of food. And
just a short time ago it had been uniform daylight, and now the darkness
of night was upon them. 'Short days, short days,' he said to himself,
slipped off the sledge, and went towards the inn. At the top of the little
flight of steps leading into the house stood the landlord, a welcome figure,
holding up a lighted lantern. Remembering his conductor for a fleeting
moment K. stood still, there was a cough in the darkness behind him, that
was he. Well, he would see him again soon. Not until he was level with
the landlord, who greeted him humbly, did he notice two men, one on
either side of the doorway. He took the lantern from his host's hand and
turned the light upon them; it was the men he had already met, who were
called Arthur and Jeremiah. They now saluted him. That reminded him of
his soldiering days, happy days for him, and he laughed. 'Who are you?'
he
asked, looking from one to die other. 'Your assistants,* they answered.
'It's your assistants,' corroborated the landlord in a low voice. 'What?' said
K., 'are you my old assistants whom I told to follow me and whom I am
expecting?' They answered in the affirmative. 'That's good,' observed K.
after a short pause. 'I'm glad you've come.' 'Well,' he said, after another
pause, 'you've come very late, you're very slack.' 'It was a long way to
come,' said one of them. 'A long way?' repeated K., 'but I met you just
now coming from the Castle.' 'Yes,' said they without further explanation.
'Where is the apparatus?' asked K. 'We haven't any,' said they. 'The
apparatus I gave you?' said K. 'We haven't any,' they reiterated. 'Oh, you
are fine fellows 1* said K., 'do you know anything about surveying?' 'No,'
said they. 'But if you are my old assistants you must know something
about it/ said K. They made no reply. 'Well, come in,' said K., pushing
them before him into the house. They sat down then all three together
over their beer at a small table, saying little, K. in the middle with an
assistant on each side. As on the other evening, there was only one other
table occupied by a few peasants. "You're a difficult problem,' said K.,
comparing them, as he had already done several times. 'How am I to
know one of you from the other? The only difference between you is your
names, otherwise you're as like as ...' He stopped, and then went on
involuntarily, 'You're as like as two snakes.' They smiled. 'People usually
manage to distinguish us quite well,' they said in self-justification. 'I am
sure they do,' said K., 'I was a witness of that myself, but I can only see
with my own eyes, and with them I can't distinguish you. So I shall treat
you as if you were one man and call you both Arthur, that's one of your
names, yours, isn't it?' he asked one of them. 'No,' said the man, 'I'm
Jeremiah.' 'It doesn't matter,' said K. Til call you both Arthur. If I tell
Arthur to go anywhere you must both go. If I give Arthur something to do
you must both do it, that has the great disadvantage for me of preventing
me from employing you on separate jobs, but the advantage that you will
both be equally responsible for anything I tell you to do. How you divide
the work between you doesn't matter to me, only you're not to excuse
yourselves by blaming
each other, for me you're only one man.' They considered this, and said:
'We shouldn't like that at all.' 'I don't suppose so,' said K.; 'of course you
won't like it, but that's how it has to be.' For some little time one of the
peasants had been sneaking round the table and K. had noticed him; now
the fellow took courage and went up to one of the assistants to whisper
something. 'Excuse me,' said K., bringing his band down on the table and
rising to his feet, 'these are my assistants and we're discussing private
business. Nobody is entitled to disturb us.* 'Sorry, sir, sorry,' muttered the
peasant anxiously, retreating backwards towards his friends. 'And this is
my most important charge to you,' said K., sitting down again. Tou're not
to speak to anyone without my permission. I am a stranger here, and if
you are my old assistants you are strangers too. We three strangers must
stand by each other therefore, give me your hands on that.' All too eagerly
they stretched out their hands to K. 'Never mind the trimming,' said he,
'but remember that my command holds good. I shall go to bed now and I
recommend you to do the same. To-day we have missed a day's work, and
to-morrow we must begin very early. You must get hold of a sleigh for
taking me to the Castle and have it ready outside the house at six o'clock.'
'Very well,' said one. But the other interrupted him. 'You say "very well",
and yet you know it can't be done.' 'Silence,' said K. Tou're trying already
to dissociate yourselves from each other.' But then the first man broke in:
'He's right, it can't be done, no stranger can get into the Castle without a
permit' 'Where does one apply for a permit?' 'I don't know, perhaps to the
Castellan.' 'Then we'll apply by telephone, go and telephone to the
Castellan at once, both of you.' They rushed to the instrument, asked for
the connexion - how eager they were about it! in externals they were
absurdly docile - and inquired if K. could come with them next morning
into the Castle. The 'No* of the answer was audible even to K. at his table.
But the answer went on and was still more explicit, it ran as follows:
'Neither to-morrow nor at any other time.' 'I shall telephone myself,' said
K., and got up. While K. and his assistants hitherto had passed nearly
unremarked except for the incident with the one peasant, his last
statement aroused general
attention. They all got up when K. did, and although the landlord tried to
drive them away, crowded round him in a close semicircle at the
telephone. The general opinion among them was that K. would get no
answer at all. K. had to beg them to be quiet, saying he did not want to
hear their opinion. The receiver gave out a buzz of a kind that K. had
never before heard on a telephone. It was like the hum of countless
children's voices - but yet not a hum, the echo rather of voices singing at
an infinite distance - blended by sheer impossibility into one high but
resonant sound which vibrated on the ear as if it were trying to penetrate
beyond mere hearing. K. listened without attempting to telephone,
leaning his left arm on the telephone shelf. He did not know how long he
had stood there, but he stood until the landlord pulled at his coat saying
that a messenger had come to speak with him. 'Go away!' yelled K. in an
access of rage, perhaps into the mouthpiece, for someone immediately
answered from the other end. The following conversation ensued:
'Oswald speaking, who's there?' cried a severe arrogant voice with a small
defect in its speech, as seemed to K., which its owner tried to cover by an
exaggerated severity. K. hesitated to announce himself, for he was at the
mercy of the telephone, the other could shout him down or hang up the
receiver, and that might mean the blocking of a not unimportant way of
access. K.'s hesitation made the man impatient. 'Who's there?' he repeated,
adding, 'I should be obliged if there was less telephoning from down there,
only a minute ago somebody rang up.' K. ignored this remark, and
announced with sudden decision: The Land Surveyor's assistant
speaking/'WhatLand Surveyor? What assistant?' K. recollected
yesterday's telephone conversation, and said briefly, 'Ask Fritz.' This
succeeded, to his own astonishment But even more than at his success he
was astonished at the organization of the Castle service. The answer came:
'Oh, yes. That everlasting Land Surveyor. Quite so. What about it? What
assistant?' 'Joseph,' said K. He was a little put out by the murmuring of
the peasants behind his back, obviously they disapproved of his ruse. He
had no time to bother about them, however, for the conversation absorbed
all his at- 26
tention. 'Joseph?' came the question. 'But the assistants arc called ..." there
was a short pause, evidently to inquire the names from somebody else,
'Arthur and Jeremiah.* 'These are the new assistants,' said K. 'No, they
are the old ones.' 'They arc the new ones, I am the old assistant; I came
to-day after the Land Surveyor.' 'No,' was shouted back. 'Then who am I?'
asked K. as blandly as before. And after a pause the same voice with the
same defect answered him, yet with a deeper and more authoritative tone:
'You are the old assistant.' K. was listening to the new note, and almost
missed the question: 'What is it you want?' He felt like laying down the
receiver. He had ceased to expect anything from this conversation. But
being pressed, he replied quickly: 'When can my master come to the
Castle?' 'Never,' was the answer. 'Very well,' said K., and hung the
receiver up. Behind him the peasants had crowded quite close. His
assistants, with many side glances in his direction, were trying to keep
them back. But they seemed not to take the matter very seriously, and in
any case the peasants, satisfied with the result of the conversation, were
beginning to give ground. A man came cleaving his way with rapid steps
through the group, bowed before K., and handed him a letter. K. took it,
but looked at the man, who for the moment seemed to him the more
important. There was a great resemblance between this new-comer and
the assistants, he was slim like them and clad in the same tightfitting
garments, had the same suppleness and agility, and yet he was quite
different. How much K. would have preferred him as an assistant 1 He
reminded K. a little of the girl with the infant whom he had seen at the
tanner's. He was clothed nearly all in white, not in silk, of course; he was
in winter clothes like all the others, but the material he was wearing had
the softness and dignity of silk. His face was clear and frank, his eyes
larger than ordinary. His smile was unusually joyous; he drew his hand
over his face as if to conceal the smile, but in vain. 'Who are you?' asked
K. 'My name is Barnabas,' said he, 'I am a messenger.' His lips were
strong and yet gentle as he spoke. 'Do you approve of this kind of thing?'
asked K., pointing to the
peasants for whom he was still an object of curiosity, and who stood
gaping at him with their open mouths, coarse lips, and literally tortured
faces - their heads looked as if they had been beaten flat on top and their
features as if the pain of the beating had twisted them to the present shape
- and yet they were not exactly gaping at him, for their eyes often flitted
away and studied some indifferent object in the room before fixing on
him again, and then K. pointed also to his assistants who stood linked
together, cheek against cheek, and smiling, but whether submissively or
mockingly could not be determined. All these he pointed out as if
presenting a train of followers forced upon him by circumstances, and as
if he expected Barnabas - that indicated intimacy, it occurred to K. -
always to discriminate between him and them. But Barnabas - quite
innocently, it was clear - ignored the question, letting it pass as a
well-bred servant ignores some remark of his master only apparently
addressed to him, and merely surveyed the room in obedience to the
question, greeting by a pressure of the hand various acquaintances among
the peasants and exchanging a few words with the assistants, all with a
free independence which set him apart from the others. Rebuffed but not
mortified, K. returned to the letter in his hand and opened it. Its contents
were as follows: 'My dear Sir, As you know, you have been engaged for
the Count's service. Your immediate superior is the Superintendent of the
village, who will give you all particulars about your work and the terms
of your employment, and to whom you are responsible. I myself, however,
will try not to lose sight of you. Barnabas, the bearer of this letter, will
report himself to you from rime to time to learn your wishes and
communicate them to me. You will find me always ready to oblige you, in
so far as that is possible. I desire my workers to be contented.' The
signature was illegible, but stamped beside it was 'Chief of Department
X.' 'Wait a little!' said K. to Barnabas, who bowed before him, then he
commanded the landlord to show him to his room, for he wanted to be
alone with the letter for a while. At the same time he reflected that
Barnabas, although so attractive, was still only a messenger, and ordered
a mug of beer for him. He looked to see how Barnabas would take it, but
Barnabas was obviously 28
quite pleased and began to drink the beer at once. Then K. went off with
the landlord. The house was so small that nothing was available for K.
but a little attic room, and even'that had caused some difficulty, for two
maids who had hitherto slept in it had had to be quartered elsewhere.
Nothing indeed had been done but to clear the maids out, the room was
otherwise quite unprepared, no sheets on the single bed, only some
pillows and a horse-blanket still in the same rumpled state as in the
morning. A few sacred pictures and photographs of soldiers were on the
walls, the room had not even been aired; obviously they hoped that the
new guest would not stay long, and were doing nothing to encourage him.
K. felt no resentment, however, wrapped himself in the blanket, sat down
at the table, and began to read the letter again by the light of a candle. It
was not a consistent letter, in part it dealt with him as with a free man
whose independence was recognized, the mode of address, for example,
and the reference to his wishes. But there were other places in which he
was directly or indirectly treated as a minor employee, hardly visible to
the Heads of Departments; the writer would try to make an effort 'not to
lose sight* of him, his superior was only the village Superintendent to
whom he was actually responsible, probably his sole colleague would be
the village policeman. These were inconsistencies, no doubt about it.
They were so obvious that they had to be faced. It hardly occurred to K.
that they might be due to indecision; that seemed a mad idea in connexion
with such an organization. He was much more inclined to read into them
a frankly offered choice, which left it to- him to make what he liked out
of the letter, whether he preferred to become a village worker with a
distinctive but merely apparent connexion with the Castle, or an
ostensible village worker whose real occupation was determined through
the medium of Barnabas. K. did not hesitate in his choice, and would not
have hesitated even had he lacked the experience which had befallen him
since his arrival. Only as a worker in the village, removed as far as
possible from the sphere of the Castle, could he hope to achieve anything
in the Castle itself; the village folk, who were now so suspicious of him,
would begin to talk to him once he was their fellow-citizen, if 29
not exactly their friend; and if he were to become indistinguishable from
Gerstacker or Lasemann - and that must happen as soon as possible,
everything depended on that - then all kinds of paths would be thrown
open to him, which would remain not only for ever closed to him but
quite invisible were he to depend merely on the favour of the gentlemen
in the Castle. There was of course a danger, and that was sufficiently
emphasized in the letter, even elaborated with a certain satisfaction, as if
it were unavoidable. That was sinking to the workman's level - service,
superior work, terms of employment, responsible workers - theletter
fairly reeked of it, and even though more personal messages were
included they were written from the standpoint of an employer. If K. were
willing to become a workman he could do so, but he would have to do it
in grim earnest, without any other prospect. K. knew that he had no real
compulsory discipline to fear, he was not afraid of that, and in this case
least of all, but the pressure of a discouraging environment, of a growing
resignation to disappointment, the pressure of the imperceptible
influences of every moment, these things he did fear, but that was a
danger he would have to guard against Nor did the letter pass over the
fact that if it should come to a struggle K. had had the hardihood to make
the first advances; it was very subtly indicated and only to be sensed by
an uneasy conscience - an uneasy conscience, not a bad one - it lay in the
three words, 'as you know', referring to his engagement in the Count's
service. K. had reported his arrival, and only after that, as the letter
pointed out, had he known that he was engaged. K. took down a picture
from the wall and stuck the letter on the nail, this was the room he was to
live in and the letter should hang there. Then he went down to the inn
parlour. Barnabas was sitting at a table with the assistants. 'Oh, there you
are,' said K. without any reason, only because he was glad to see
Barnabas, who jumped to his feet at once. Hardly had K. shown his face
when the peasants got up and gathered round him - it had become a habit
of theirs to follow him around. 'What are you always following me about
for?* cried K. They were not offended, and slowly drifted back to their
seats again. One of them in passing
said casually in apology, with an enigmatic smile which was reflected on
several of the others' faces: 'There's always something new to listen to,'
and he licked his lips as if news were meat and drink to him. K. said
nothing conciliatory, it was good for them to have a little respect for him,
but hardly had he reached Barnabas when he felt a peasant breathing
down the back of his neck. He had only come, he said, for the salt-cellar,
but K. stamped his foot with rage and the peasant scuttled away without
the salt-cellar. It was really easy to get at K., all one had to do was to egg
on the peasants against him, their persistent interference seemed much
more objectionable to him than the reserve of the others, nor were they
free from reserve either, for if he had sat down at their table they would
not have stayed. Only the presence of Barnabas restrained him from
making a scene. But he turned round to scowl at them, and found that
they, too, were all looking at htm. When he saw them sitting like that,
however, each man in his own place, not speaking to one another and
without any apparent mutual understanding, united only by the fact that
they were all gazing at him, he concluded that it was not out of malice
that they pursued him, perhaps they really wanted something from him
and were only incapable of expressing it, if not that, it might be pure
childishness, which seemed to be in fashion at the inn; was not the
landlord himself childish, standing there stock-still gazing at K. with a
glass of beer in his hand which he should have been carrying to a
customer, and oblivious of his wife, who was leaning out of the kitchen
hatch calling to him? With a quieter mind K. turned to Barnabas; he
would have liked to dismiss his assistants, but could not think of an
excuse. Besides, they were brooding peacefully over their beer. 'The
letter,' began K., 'I have read it. Do you know the contents?' 'No,' said
Barnabas, whose look seemed to imply more than his words. Perhaps K.
was as mistaken in Barnabas's goodness as in the malice of the peasants,
but his presence remained a cornfort. 'You are mentioned in the letter, too,
you are supposed to carry messages now and then from me to the Chief,
that's why I thought you might know the contents.' 'I was only told,' said
Barnabas, 'to give you the letter, to wait until you had read it, 3*
and then to bring back a verbal or written answer if you thought it
needful.' 'Very well,' said K., 'there's no need to write anything; convey to
the Chief - by the way, what's his name? I couldn't read his signature.'
'Klamm,' said Barnabas. 'Well, convey to Herr Klamm my thanks for his
recognition and for his great kindness, which 1 appreciate, being as I am
one who has not yet proved his worth here. I shall follow his instructions
faithfully. I have no particular requests to make for to-day.' Barnabas,
who had listened with close attention, asked to be allowed to recapitulate
the message. K. assented, Barnabas repeated it word for word. Then he
rose to take his leave. K. had been studying his face the whole time, and
now he gave it a last survey. Barnabas was about the same height as K.,
but his eyes seemed to look down on K., yet that was almost in a kind of
humility, it was impossible to think that this man could put anyone to
shame. Of course he was only a messenger, and did not know the contents
of the letters he carried, but the expression in his eyes, his smile, his
bearing, seemed also to convey a message', however little he might know
about it. And K. shook him by the hand, which seemed obviously to
surprise him, for he had been going to content himself with a bow. As
soon as he had gone - before opening the door he had leaned his shoulder
against it for a moment and embraced the room generally in a final glance
- K. said to the assistants: Til bring down the plans from my room, and
then we'll discuss what work is to be done first.' They wanted to
accompany him. 'Stay here,' said K. Still they tried to accompany him. K.
had to repeat his command more authoritatively. Barnabas was no longer
in the hall. But he had only just gone out. Yet in front of the house - fresh
snow was falling - K. could not see him either. He called out: 'Barnabas!'
No answer. Could he still be in the house? Nothing else seemed possible.
None the less K. yelled the name with the full force of his lungs. It
thundered through the night. And from the distance came a faint response,
so far away was Barnabas already. K. called him back, and at the same
time went to meet him; the spot where they encountered each other was
no longer visible from the inn. 'Barnabas,' said K., and could not keep his
voice from trem- 32
bling, 'I have something else to say to you. And that reminds me that it's a
bad arrangement to leave me dependent on your chance comings for
sending a message to the Castle. If I hadn't happened to catch you just
now - how you fly along, I thought you were still in the house - who
knows how long I might have had to wait for your next appearance.' 'You
can ask the Chief,' said Barnabas, 'to send me at definite times appointed
by yourself.' 'Even that would not suffice,' said K., 'I might have nothing
to say for a year at a time, but something of urgent importance might
occur to me a quarter of an hour after you had gone.' 'Well,' said Barnabas,
'shall I report to the Chief that between him and you some other means of
communication should be established instead of me?' 'No, no,' said K.,
'not at all, I only mention the matter in passing, for this time I have been
lucky enough to catch you.' 'Shall we go back to the inn,' said Barnabas,
'so that you can give me the new message there?' He had already taken a
step in the direction of the inn. 'Barnabas,' said K., 'it isn't necessary, I'll
go a part of the way with you.' 'Why don't you want to go to the inn?'
asked Barnabas. 'The people there annoy me,' said K.; 'you saw for
yourself how persistent the peasants are.' 'We could go into your room,'
said Barnabas. 'It's the maids' room,' said K., 'dirty and stuffy - it's to
avoid staying there that I want to accompany you for a little, only,' he
added, in order finally to overcome Barnabas's reluctance, 'you must let
me take your arm, for you are surer of foot than I am.' And K. took his
arm. It was quite dark, K. could not see Barnabas's face, his figure was
only vaguely discernible, he had had to grope for his arm a minute or two.
Barnabas yielded and they moved away from the inn. K. realized, indeed,
that his utmost efforts could not enable him to keep pace with Barnabas,
that he was a drag on him, and that even in ordinary circumstances this
trivial accident might be enough to ruin everything, not to speak of
side-streets like the one in which he had got stuck that morning, out of
which he could never struggle unless Barnabas were to carry him. But he
banished all such anxieties, and was comforted by Barnabas's silence; for
if they went on in silence then Barnabas, too, must 33
feel that their excursion together was the sole reason for their association.
They went on, but K. did not know whither, he could discern nothing, not
even whether they had already passed the church or not. The effort which
it cost him merely to keep going made him lose control of his thoughts.
Instead of remaining fixed on their goal they strayed. Memories of his
home kept recurring and filled his mind. There, too, a church stood in the
marketplace, partly surrounded by an old graveyard which was again
surrounded by a high wall. Very few boys had managed to climb that wall,
and for some time K., too, had failed. It was not curiosity which had
urged them on. The graveyard had been no mystery to them. They had
often entered it through a small wicket-gate, it was only the smooth high
wall that they had wanted to conquer. But one morning - the empty, quiet
marketplace had been flooded with sunshine, when had K. ever seen it
like that either before or since? - he had succeeded in climbing it with
astonishing ease; at a place where he had already slipped down many a
time he had clambered with a small flag between his teeth right to the top
at the first attempt. Stones were still rattling down under his feet, but he
was at the top. He stuck the flag in, it flew in the wind, he looked down
and round about him, over his shoulder, too, at the crosses mouldering in
the ground, nobody was greater than he at that place and that moment By
chance the teacher had come past and with a stern face had made K.
descend. In jumping down he had hurt his knee and had found some
difficulty in getting home, but still he had been on the top of the wall. The
sense of that triumph had seemed to him then a victory for life, which
was not altogether foolish, for now so many years later on the arm of
Barnabas in the snowy night the memory of it came to succour him. He
took a firmer hold, Barnabas was almost dragging him along, the silence
was unbroken. Of the road they were following all that K. knew was that
to judge from its surface they had not yet turned aside into a by-street. He
vowed to himself that, however difficult the way and however doubtful
even the prospect of his being able to get back, he would not cease from
going on. He would surely have strength enough to let himself 34
be dragged. And the road must come to an end some time. By day the
Castle had looked within easy reach, and, of course, the messenger would
take the shortest cut. At that moment Barnabas stopped. Where were they?
Was this the end? Would Barnabas try to leave him? He wouldn't succeed.
K. clutched his arm so firmly that it almost made his hand ache. Or had
the incredible happened, and were they already in the Castle or at its gates?
But they had not done any climbing so far as K. could tell. Or had
Barnabas taken him up by an imperceptibly mounting road? 'Where are
we?' said K. in a low voice, more to himself than to Barnabas. 'At home,'
said Barnabas in the same tone. 'At home?' 'Be careful now, sir, or you'll
slip. We go down here.' 'Down?' 'Only a step or two,' added Barnabas, and
was already knocking at a door. A girl opened it, and they were on the
threshold of a large room almost in darkness, for there was no light save
for a tiny oil lamp hanging over a table in the background. 'Who is with
you, Barnabas?' asked the girl. 'The Land Surveyor,' said he. 'The Land
Surveyor,' repeated the girl in a louder voice, turning towards the table.
Two old people there rose to their feet, a man and a woman, as well as
another girl. They greeted K. Barnabas introduced the whole family, his
parents and his sisters Olga and Amalia. K. scarcely glanced at them and
let them take his wet coat off to dry at the stove. So it was only Barnabas
who was at home, not he himself. But why had they come here? K. drew
Barnabas aside and asked: 'Why have you come here? Or do you live in
the Castle precincts?' 'The Castle precincts?' repeated Barnabas, as if he
did not understand. 'Barnabas,' said K., 'you left the inn to go to the
Castle.' 'No,' said Barnabas, 'I left it to come home, I don't go to the
Castle till the early morning, I never sleep there.' 'Oh,' said K., 'so you
weren't going to the Castle, but only here* - the man's smile seemed less
brilliant, and his person more insignificant - 'Why didn't you say so?' 'You
didn't ask me, sir,' said Barnabas, 'you only said you had a message to
give me, but you wouldn't give it in the inn parlour, or in your room, so I
thought you could speak to me quietly here in my parents' house. The
others will all leave us if you wish - and, if you prefer, you 35
could spend the night here. Haven't I done the right thing?' K. could not
reply. It had been simply a misunderstanding, a cornmon, vulgar
misunderstanding, and K. had been completely taken in by it. He had
been bewitched by Barnabas's closefitting, silken-gleaming jacket, which,
now that it was unbuttoned, displayed a coarse, dirty grey shirt patched
all over, and beneath that the huge muscular chest of a labourer. His
surroundings not only corroborated all this but even emphasized it, the
old gouty father who progressed more by the help of his groping hands
than by the slow movements of his stiff legs, and the mother with her
hands folded on her bosom, who was equally incapable of any but the
smallest steps by reason of her stoutness. Both of them, father and mother,
had been advancing from their corner towards K. ever since he had come
in, and were still a long way off. The yellow-haired sisters, very like each
other and very like Barnabas, but with harder features than their brother,
great strapping wenches, hovered round their parents and waited for some
word of greeting from K. But he could not utter it. He had been persuaded
that in this village everybody meant something to him, and indeed he was
not mistaken, it was only for these people here that he could feel not the
slightest interest. If he had been fit to struggle back to the inn alone he
would have left at once. The possibility of accompanying Barnabas to the
Castle early in the morning did not attract him. He had hoped to penetrate
into the Castle unremarked in the night on the arm of Barnabas, but on
the arm of the Barnabas he had imagined, a man who was more to him
than anyone else, the Barnabas he had conceived to be far above his
apparent rank and in the intimate confidence of the Castle. With the son
of such a family, however, a son who integrally belonged to it, and who
was already sitting at table with the others, a man who was not even
allowed to sleep in the Castle, he could not possibly go to the Castle in
the broad light of day, it would be a ridiculous and hopeless undertaking.
K. sat down on a window-seat where he determined to pass the night
without accepting any other favour. The other people in the village, who
turned him away or were afraid of him, seemed much less dangerous, for
all that they did was to throw 36
him back on his own resources, helping him to concentrate his powers,
but such ostensible helpers as these who on the strength of a petty
masquerade brought him into their homes instead of into the Castle,
deflected him, whether intentionally or not, from his goal and only helped
to destroy him. An invitation to join the family at table he ignored
completely, stubbornly sitting with bent head on his bench. Then Olga,
the gentler of the sisters, got up, not without a trace of maidenly
embarrassment, came over to K. and asked him to join the family meal of
bread and bacon, saying that she was going to fetch some beer. 'Where
from?' asked K. 'From the inn,' she said. That was welcome news to K.
He begged her instead of fetching beer to accompany him back to the inn,
where he had important work waiting to be done. But the fact now
emerged that she was not going so far as his inn, she was going to one
much nearer, called the Herrenhof. None the less K. begged to be allowed
to accompany her, thinking that there perhaps he might find a lodging for
the night; however wretched it might be he would prefer it to the best bed
these peqple could offer him. Olga did not reply at once, but glanced
towards the table. Her brother stood up, nodded obligingly and said: 'If
the gentleman wishes.' This assent was almost enough to make K.
withdraw his request, nothing could be of much value if Barnabas
assented to it. But since they were already wondering whether K. would
be admitted into that inn and doubting its possibility, he insisted
emphatically upon going, without taking the trouble to give a colourable
excuse for his eagerness; this family would have to accept him as he was,
he had no feeling of shame where they were concerned. Yet he was
somewhat disturbed by Amalia's direct and serious gaze, which was
unflinching and perhaps a little stupid. On their short walk to the inn - K.
had taken Olga's arm and was leaning his whole weight on her as earlier
on Barnabas, he could not get along otherwise - he learned that it was an
inn exclusively reserved for gentlemen from the Castle, who took their
meals there and sometimes slept there whenever they had business in the
village. Olga spoke to K. in a low and confidential tone; to walk with her
was pleasant, almost as pleasant as 37
walking with her brother. K. struggled against the feeling of comfort she
gave him, but it persisted. From outside the new inn looked very like the
inn where K. was staying. All the houses in the village resembled one
another more or less, but still a few small differences were immediately
apparent here; the front steps had a balustrade, and a fine lantern was
fixed over the doorway. Something fluttered over their heads as they
entered, it was a flag with the Count's colours. In the hall they were at
once met by the landlord, who was obviously on a tour of inspection; he
glanced at K. in passing with small eyes that were cither screwed up
critically, or half-asleep, and said: "The Land Surveyor mustn't go
anywhere but into the bar.' 'Certainly,' said Olga, who took K.'s part at
once, 'he's only escorting me.' But K. ungratefully let go her arm and
drew the landlord aside. Olga meanwhile waited patiently at the end of
the hall. 'I should like to spend the night here,' said K. 'I'm afraid that's
impossible,' said the landlord. 'You don't seem to be aware that this house
is reserved exclusively for gentlemen from the Castle.' 'Well, that may be
the rule,' said K., 'but it's surely possible to let me sleep in a corner
somewhere.' 'I should be only too glad to oblige you,' said the landlord,
'but besides the strictness with which the rule is enforced - and you speak
about it as only a stranger could - it's quite out of the question for another
reason; the Castle gentlemen are so sensitive that I'm convinced they
couldn't bear the sight of a stranger, at least unless they were prepared for
it; and if I were to let you sleep here, and by some chance or other - and
chances are always on the side of the gentlemen - you were discovered,
not only would it mean my ruin but yours too. That sounds ridiculous, but
it's true.' This tall and closely-buttoned man who stood with his legs
crossed, one hand braced against the wall and the other on his hip,
bending down a little towards K. and speaking confidentially to him,
seemed to have hardly anything in common with the village, even
although his dark clothes looked like a peasant's finery. 'I believe you
absolutely,' said K., 'and I didn't mean to belittle the rule, although I
expressed myself badly. Only there's something I'd like to point out, I
have some influence in the Castle, and shall have still more, and that
secures you against 38
any danger arising out of my stay here overnight, and is a guarantee that I
am able fully to recompense any small favour you may do me.' 'Oh, I
know,' said the landlord, and repeated again, 'I know all that.' Now was
the time for K. to state his wishes more clearly, but this reply of the
landlord's disconcerted him, and so he merely asked, 'Are there many of
the Castle gentlemen staying in the house to-night?' 'As far as that goes,
to-night is favourable,' returned the landlord, as if in encouragement,
'there's only one gentleman.' Still K. felt incapable of urging the matter,
but being in hopes that he was as good as accepted, he contented himself
by asking the name of the gentleman. 'Kiamm,' said the landlord casually,
turning meanwhile to his wife who came rustling towards them in a
remarkably shabby, old-fashioned gown overloaded with pleats and frills,
but of a fine city cut She came to summon the landlord, for the Chief
wanted something or other. Before the landlord complied, however, he
turned once more to K., as if it lay with K. to make the decision about
staying all night. But K. could not utter a word, overwhelmed as he was
by the discovery that it was his patron who was in the house. Without
being able to explain it completely to himself he did not feel the same
freedom of action in relation to Klamm as he did to the rest of the Castle,
and the idea of being caught in the inn by Klamm, although it did not
terrify him as it did the landlord, gave him a twinge of uneasiness, much
as if he were thoughtlessly to hurt the feelings of someone to whom he
was bound by gratitude; at the same time, however, it vexed him to
recognize already in these qualms the obvious effects of that degradation
to an inferior status which he had feared, and to realize that although they
were so obvious he was not even in a position to counteract them. So he
stood there biting his lips and said nothing. Once more the landlord
looked back at him before disappearing through a doorway, and K.
returned the look without moving from the spot, until Olga came up and
drew him away. 'What did you want with the landlord?' she asked. 'I
wanted a bed for the night,' said K. 'But you're staying with us!' said Olga
in surprise. 'Of course,' said K., leaving her to make what she liked of it.
3 IN the bar, which was a large room with a vacant space in the middle,
there were several peasants sitting by the wall on the tops of some casks,
but they Ictoked different from those in K.'s inn. They were more neatly
and uniformly dressed in coarse yellowish-grey cloth, with loose jackets
and tightly-fitting trousers. They were smallish men with at first sight a
strong mutual resemblance, having flat bony faces, but rounded cheeks.
They were all quiet, and sat with hardly a movement, except that they
followed the newcomers with their eyes, but they did even that slowly
and indifferently. Yet because of their numbers and their quietness they
had a certain effect on K. He took Olga's arm again as if to explain his
presence there. A man rose up from one corner, an acquaintance of Olga's,
and made towards her, but K. wheeled her round by the arm in another
direction. His action was perceptible to nobody but Olga, and she
tolerated it with a smiling side-glance. The beer was drawn off by a
young girl called Frieda. An unobtrusive little girl with fair hair, sad eyes,
and hollow cheeks, with a striking look of conscious superiority. As soon
as her eye met K's it seemed to him that her look decided something
concerning himself, something which he had not known to exist, but
which her look assured him did exist. He kept on studying her from the
side, even while she was speaking to Olga. Olga and Frieda were
apparently not intimate, they exchanged only a few cold words. K.
wanted to hear more, and so interposed with a question on his own
account: 'Do you know Herr Klamm?' Olga laughed out loud. 'What are
you laughing at?' asked K. irritably. Tm not laughing,' she protested, but
went on laughing. 'Olga is a childish creature,' said K. bending far over
the counter in order to attract Frieda's gaze again. But she kept her eyes
lowered and laughed shyly. 'Would you like to see Herr Klamm?' K.
begged for a sight of him. She pointed to a door just on her left. 'There's a
little peephole there, you can look through.' 'What about the others?'
asked K. She curled her underlip and pulled K.. to the door with a hand
that was un- 40
usually soft. The little hole had obviously been bored for spying through,
and commanded almost the whole of the neighbouring room. At a desk in
the middle of the room in a comfortable arm-chair sat Herr Klamm, his
face brilliantly lit up by an incandescent lamp which hung low before him.
A middle-sized, plump, and ponderous man. His face was still smooth,
but his cheeks were already somewhat flabby with age. His black
moustache had long points, his eyes were hidden behind glittering
pince-nez that sat awry. If he had been planted squarely before his desk K.
would only have seen his profile, but since he was turned directly towards
K. his whole face was visible. His left elbow lay on the desk, his right
hand, in which was a Virginia cigar, rested on his knee. A beer-glass was
standing on the desk, but there was a rim round the desk which prevented
K. from seeing whether any papers were lying on it; he had the idea,
however, that there were none. To make it certain he asked Frieda to look
through the hole and tell him if there were any. But since she had been in
that room a short time ago, she was able to inform him without further
ado that the desk was empty. K. asked Frieda if his time was up, but she
told him to go on looking as long as he liked. K. was now alone with
Frieda. Olga, as a hasty glance assured him, had found her way to her
acquaintance, and was sitting high on a cask swinging her legs. 'Frieda,'
said K. in a whisper, 'do you know Herr Klamm well?' 'Oh, yes,' she said,
'very well.' She leaned over to K. and he became aware that she was
coquettishly fingering the lowcut cream-coloured blouse which sat oddly
on her poor thin body. Then she said: 'Didn't you notice how Olga
laughed?' 'Yes, the rude creature,' said K. 'Well,' she said extenuatingly,
'there was a reason for laughing. You asked if I knew Klamm, and you see
I* - here she involuntarily lifted her chin a little, and again her triumphant
glance, which had no connexion whatever with what she was saying,
swept over K. - 'I am his mistress.' 'Klamm's mistress,' said K. She
nodded. 'Then,' said K. smiling, to prevent the atmosphere from being too
charged with seriousness, 'you are for me a highly respectable person.'
'Not only for you,' said Frieda amiably, but without returning his smile. K.
had a weapon for bringing down her pride, and he
tried it: 'Have you ever been in the Castle?' But it missed the mark, for
she answered: 'No, but isn't it enough for me to be here in the bar?' Her
vanity was obviously boundless, and she was trying, it seemed, to get K.
in particular to minister to it. 'Of course,' said K., 'here in the bar you're
taking the landlord's place.' "That's so,' she assented, 'and I began as a
byre-maid at the inn by the bridge.' 'With those delicate hands,' said K.
halfquestioningly, without knowing himself whether he was only
flattering her or was compelled by something in her. Her hands were
certainly small and delicate, but they could quite as well have been called
weak and characterless. 'Nobody bothered about them then,' she said, 'and
even now ...' K. looked at her inquiringly. She shook her head and would
say no more. 'You have your secrets, naturally,' said K., 'and you're not
likely to give them away to somebody you've known for only half an hour,
and who hasn't had the chance yet to tell you anything about himself.'
This remark proved to be ill-chosen, for it seemed to arouse Frieda as
from a trance that was favourable to him. Out of ihe leather bag hanging
at her girdle she took a small piece of wood, stopped up the peephole
with it, and said to K. with an obvious attempt to conceal the change in
her attitude: 'Oh, I know all about you, you're the Land Surveyor,' and
then adding: 'but now I must go back to my work,' she returned to her
place behind the bar counter, while a man here and there came up to get
his empty glass refilled. K. wanted to speak to her again, so he took an
empty glass from a stand and went up to her, saying: 'One thing more,
Fraulein Frieda, it's an extraordinary feat and a sign of great strength of
mind to have worked your way up from byre-maid to this position in the
bar, but can it be the end of all ambition for a person like you? An absurd
idea. Your eyes - don't laugh at me, Fraulein Frieda - speak to me far
more of conquests still to come than of conquests past. But the opposition
one meets in the world is great, and becomes greater the higher one aims,
and it's no disgrace to accept the help of a man who's fighting his way up
too, even though he's a small and uninfluential man. Perhaps we could
have a quiet talk together sometime, without so many onlookers?' 'I don't
know what you're after,' she said, and in her
tone this time there seemed to be, against her will, an echo rather of
countless disappointments than of past triumphs. 'Do you want to take me
away from Klamm perhaps? O heavens!' and she clapped her hands.
'You've seen through me,' said K., as if wearied by so much mistrust,
'that's exactly my real secret intention. You ought to leave Klamm and
become my sweetheart. And now I can go. Olga!' he cried, 'we're going
home.' Obediently Olga slid down from her cask but did not succeed
immediately in breaking through her ring of friends. Then Frieda said in a
low voice with a hectoring look at K.: 'When can I talk to you?' 'Can I
spend the night here?' asked K. 'Yes,' said Frieda. 'Can I stay now?' 'Go
out first with Olga, so that I can clear out all the others. Then you can
come back in a little.' 'Right,' said K., and he waited impatiently for Olga.
But the peasants would not let her go; they made up a dance in which she
was the central figure, they circled round her yelling all together and
every now and then one of them left the ring, seized Olga firmly round
the waist and whirled her round and round; the pace grew faster and faster,
the yells more hungry, more raucous, until they were insensibly blended
into one continuous howl. Olga, who had begun laughingly by trying to
break out of the ring, was now merely reeling with flying hair from one
man to the other. 'That's the kind of people I'm saddled with,' said Frieda,
biting her thin lips in scorn. 'Who are they?' asked K. 'Klamm's servants,'
said Frieda, 'he keeps on bringing those people with him, and they upset
me. I can hardly tell what I've been saying to you, but please forgive me
if I've offended you, it's these people who are to blame, they're the most
contemptible and objectionable creatures I know, and I have to fill their
glasses up with beer for them. How often I've implored Klamm to leave
them behind him, for though I have to put up with the other gentlemen's
servants, he could surely have some consideration for me; but it's all no
use, an hour before his arrival they always come bursting in like cattle
into their stalls. But now they've really got to get into the stalls, where
they belong. If you weren't here I'd fling open this door and Klamm
would be forced to drive them out himself.' 'Can't he hear them, then?'
asked K. 'No,' said Frieda, 'he's asleep.' 'Asleep?' cried K. 43
'But when I peeped in he was awake and sitting at the desk.' 'He always
sits like that,' said Frieda, 'he was sleeping when you saw him. Would I
have let you look in if he hadn't been asleep? That's how he sleeps, the
gentlemen do sleep a great deal, it's hard to understand. Anyhow, if he
didn't sleep so much, he wouldn't be able to put up with his servants. But
now I'll have to turn them out myself.' She took a whip from a corner and
sprang among the dancers with a single bound, a little uncertainly, as a
young lamb might spring. At first they faced her as if she were merely a
new partner, and actually for a moment Frieda seemed inclined to let the
whip fall, but she soon raised it again, crying: 'In the name of Klamm into
the stall with you, into the stall, all of you!' When they saw that she was
in earnest they began to press towards the back wall in a kind of panic
incomprehensible to K.., and under the impact of the first few a door shot
open, letting in a current of night air through which they all vanished with
Frieda behind them openly driving them across the courtyard into the
stalls. In the sudden silence which ensued K. heard steps in the vestibule.
With some idea of securing his position he dodged behind the bar counter,
which afforded the only possible cover in the room. He had an admitted
right to be in the bar, but since he meant to spend the night there he had to
avoid being seen. So when the door was actually opened he slid under the
counter. To be discovered there of course would have its dangers too, yet
he could explain plausibly enough that he had only taken refuge from the
wild licence of the peasants. It was the landlord who came in. 'Frieda 1'
he called, and walked up and down the room several times. Fortunately
Frieda soon came back, she did not mention K., she only complained
about the peasants, and in the course of looking round for K. went behind
the counter, so that he was able to touch her foot. From that moment he
felt safe. Since Frieda made no reference to K., however, the landlord was
cornpelled to do it. 'And where is the Land Surveyor?' he asked. He was
probably courteous by nature, refined by constant and relatively free
intercourse with men who were much his superior, but .there was
remarkable consideration in his tone to Frieda, 44
which was all the more striking because in his conversation he did not
cease to be an employer addressing a servant, and a saucy servant at that.
The Land Surveyor - I forgot all about him,' said Frieda, setting her small
foot on K.'s chest. 'He must have gone out long ago.' 'But I haven't seen
him,' said the landlord, 'and I was in the hall nearly the whole time.' 'Well,
he isn't in here,' said Frieda coolly. 'Perhaps he's hidden somewhere,' went
on the landlord. 'From the impression I had of him he's capable of a good
deal.' 'He would hardly have the cheek to do that,' said Frieda, pressing
her foot down on K. There was a certain mirth and freedom about her
which K. had not previously remarked, and quite unexpectedly it took the
upper hand, for suddenly laughing she bent down to K. with the words:
'Perhaps he's hidden underneath here,' kissed him lightly and sprang up
again saying with a troubled air: 'No, he's not there.' Then the landlord,
too, surprised K. when he said: 'It bothers me not to know for certain that
he's gone. Not only because of Herr Klamm, but because of the rule of
the house. And the rule applies to you, Fraulein Frieda, just as much as to
me. Well, if you answer for the bar, I'll go through the rest of the rooms.
Good night I Sleep well!' He could hardly have left the room before
Frieda had turned out the electric light and was under the counter beside
K. 'My darling! My darling 1* she whispered, but she did not touch him.
As if swooning with love she lay on her back and stretched out her arms;
time must have seemed endless to her in the prospect of her happiness,
and she sighed rather than sang some little song or other. Then as K. still
lay absorbed in thought, she started up and began to tug at him like a
child: 'Come on, it's too close down here,' and they embraced each other,
her little body burned in K.'s hands, in a state of unconsciousness which
K. tried again and again but in vain to master as they rolled a little way,
landing with a thud on Klamm's door, where they lay among the small
puddles of beer and other refuse gathered on the floor. There, hours went
past, hours in which they breathed as one, in which their hearts beat as
one, hours in which K. was haunted by the feeling that he was losing
himself or wandering into strange country, farther than ever man had
wandered 45
before, a country so strange that not even the air had anything in common
with his native air, where one might die of strangeness, and yet whose
enchantment was such that one could only go on and lose oneself further.
So it came to him not as a shock but as a faint glimmer of comfort when
from Klamm's room a deep, authoritative impersonal voice called for
Frieda. 'Frieda,' whispered K. in Frieda's ear, passing on the summons.
With a mechanical instinct of obedience Frieda made as if to spring to her
feet, then she remembered where she was, stretched herself, laughing
quietly, and said: 'I'm not going, I'm never going to him again.' K. wanted
to object, to urge her to go to Klamm, and began to fasten up her
disordered blouse, but he could not bring himself to speak, he was too
happy to have Frieda in his arms, too troubled also in his happiness, for it
seemed to him that in letting Frieda go he would lose all he had. And as if
his support had strengthened her Frieda clenched her fist and beat upon
the door, crying: Tm with the Land Surveyor I* That silenced Klamm at
any rate, but K. started up, and on his knees beside Frieda gazed round
him in the uncertain light of dawn. What had happened? Where were his
hopes? What could he expect from Frieda now that she had betrayed
everything? Instead of feeling his way with the prudence befitting the
greatness of his enemy and of his ambition, he had spent a whole night
wallowing in puddles of beer, the smell of which was nearly
overpowering. 'What have you done?' he said as if to himself. 'We are
both ruined.' 'No,' said Frieda, 'it's only me that's ruined, but then I've won
you. Don't worry. But just look how these two are laughing.' 'Who?' asked
K., and turned round. There on the bar counter sat his two assistants, a
little heavy-eyed for lack of sleep, but cheerful. It was a cheerfulness
arising from a sense of duty well done. 'What are you doing here?' cried
K. as if they were to blame for everything. 'We had to search for you,'
explained the assistants, 'since you didn't come back to the inn; we looked
for you at Barnabas's and finally found you here. We have been sitting
here all night. Ours is no easy job.' 'It's in the day-time I need you,' said
K., 'not in the night, clear out.' But it's day-time now,' said they without
moving. It was really day, the doors into the courtyard were 46
opened, the peasants came streaming in and with them Olga, whom K.
had completely forgotten. Although her hair and clothes were in disorder
Olga was as alert as on the previous evening, and her eyes flew to K.
before she was well over the threshold. 'Why did you not come home
with me?' she asked, almost weeping. 'All for a creature like that!' she
said then, and repeated the remark several times. Frieda, who had
vanished for a moment, came back with a small bundle of clothing, and
Olga moved sadly to one side. 'Now we can be off,' said Frieda, it was
obvious she meant that they should go back to the inn by the bridge. K.
walked with Frieda, and behind them the assistants; that was the little
procession. The peasants displayed a great contempt for Frieda, which
was understandable, for she had lorded it over them hitherto; one of them
even took a stick and held it as if to prevent her from going out until she
had jumped over it, but a look from her sufficed to quell him. When they
were out in the snow K. breathed a little more freely. It was such a relief
to be in the open air that the journey seemed less laborious; if he had been
alone he would have got on still better. When he reached the inn he went
straight to his room and lay down on the bed. Frieda prepared a couch for
herself on the floor beside him. The assistants had pushed their way in too,
and on being driven out came back through the window. K. was too
weary to drive them out again. The landlady came up specially to
welcome Frieda, who hailed her as 'mother'; their meeting was
inexplicably affectionate, with kisses and long embracings. There was
little peace and quietness to be had in the room, for the maids too came
clumping in with their heavy boots, bringing or seeking various articles,
and whenever they wanted anything from the miscellaneous assortment
on the bed they simply pulled it out from under K. They greeted Frieda as
one of themselves. In spite of all this coming and going K. stayed in bed
the whole day through, and the whole night. Frieda performed little
offices for him. When he got up at last on the following morning he was
much refreshed, and it was the fourth day since his arrival in the village.
HE would have liked an intimate talk with Frieda, but the assistants
hindered this simply by their importunate presence, and Frieda, too,
laughed and joked with them from time to time. Otherwise they were not
at all exacting, they had simply settled down in a corner on two old skirts
spread out on the floor. They made it a point of honour, as they repeatedly
assured Frieda, not to disturb the Land Surveyor and to take up as little
room as possible, and in pursuit of this intention,, although with a good
deal of whispering and giggling, they kept on trying to squeeze
themselves into a smaller compass, crouching together in the corner so
that in the dim light they looked like one large bundle. From his
experience of them by daylight, however, K. was all too conscious that
they were acute observers and never took their eyes off him, whether they
were fooling like children and using their hands as spyglasses, or merely
glancing at him while apparently completely absorbed in grooming their
beards, on which they spent much thought and which they were for ever
comparing in length and thickness, calling on Frieda to decide between
them. From his bed K. often watched the antics of all three with the
completest indifference. When he felt himself well enough to leave his
bed, they all ran to serve him. He was not yet strong enough to ward off
their services, and noted that that brought him into a state of dependence
on them which might have evil consequences, but he could not help it.
Nor was it really unpleasant to drink at the table the good coffee which
Frieda had brought, to warm himself at the stove which Frieda had lit,
and to have the assistants racing ten times up and down the stairs in their
awkwardness and zeal to fetch him soap and water, comb and looking-
glass, and eventually even a small glass of rum because he had hinted in a
low voice at his desire for one. Among all this giving of orders and being
waited on, K. said, more out of good humour than any hope of being
obeyed: 'Go away now, you two, I need nothing more for the present, and
I want to speak to Fraulein Frieda by herself.' And when he 48
saw no direct opposition on their faces he added, by way of excusing
them: 'We three shall go to the village Superintendent afterwards, so wait
downstairs in the bar for me.' Strangely enough they obeyed him, only
turning to say before going: 'We could wait here.' But K. answered: 'I
know, but I don't want you to wait here.' It annoyed him, however, and
yet in a sense pleased him when Frieda, who had settled on his knee as
soon as the assistants were gone, said: 'What's your objection to the
assistants, darling? We don't need to have any mysteries before them.
They are true friends.' 'Oh, true friends,' said K., 'they keep spying on me
the whole time, it's nonsensical but abominable.' 'I believe I know what
you mean,' she said, and she clung to his neck and tried to say something
else but could not go on speaking, and since their chair was close to it
they reeled over and fell on the bed. There they lay, but not in the
forgetfulness of the previous night. She was seeking and he was seeking,
they raged and contorted their faces and bored their heads into each
other's bosoms in the urgency of seeking something, and their embraces
and their tossing limbs did not avail to make them forget, but only
reminded them of what they sought; like dogs desperately tearing up the
ground they tore at each other's bodies, and often, helplessly baffled, in a
final effort to attain happiness they nuzzled and tongued each other's face.
Sheer weariness stilled them at last and brought them gratitude to each
other. Then the maids came in. 'Look how they're lying there,' said one,
and sympathetically cast a coverlet over them. When somewhat later K.
freed himself from the coverlet and looked round, the two assistants - and
he was not surprised at that-were again in their corner, and with a finger
jerked towards K. nudged each other to a formal salute, but besides them
the landlady was sitting near the bed knitting away at a stocking, an
infinitesimal piece of work hardly suited to her enormous bulk which
almost darkened the room. 'I've been here a long time,' she said, lifting up
her broad and much furrowed face which was, however, still rounded and
might once have been beautiful. The words sounded like a reproach, an
ill-timed reproach, for K. had not desired her to come. So he merely 49
acknowledged them by a nod, and sat up. Frieda also got up, but left K. to
lean over the landlady's chair. 'If you want to speak to me,' said K. in
bewilderment, 'couldn't you put it off until after I come back from visiting
the Superintendent? I have important business with him.' "This is
important, believe me, sir,' said the landlady, 'your other business is
probably only a question of work, but this concerns a living person,
Frieda, my dear maid.' 'Oh, if that's it,' said K., 'then of course you're right,
but I don't see why we can't be left to settle our own affairs.' 'Because I
love her and care for her,' said the landlady, drawing Frieda's head
towards her, for Frieda as she stood only reached up to the landlady's
shoulder. 'Since Frieda puts such confidence in you,' cried K., 'I must do
the same, and since not long ago Frieda called my assistants true friends
we are all friends together. So I can tell you that what I would like best
would be for Frieda and myself to get married, the sooner the better. I
know, oh, I know that I'll never be able to make up to Frieda for all she
has lost for my sake, her position in the Herrenhof and her friendship with
Klamm.' Frieda lifted up her face, her eyes were full of tears and had not
a trace of triumph. 'Why? Why am I chosen out from other people?'
'What?' asked K. and the landlady simultaneously. 'She's upset, poor
child,' said the landlady, 'upset by the conjunction of too much happiness
and unhappiness.' And as if in confirmation of those words Frieda now
flung herself upon K., kissing him wildly as if there were nobody else in
the room, and then weeping, but still clinging to him, fell on her knees
before him. While he caressed Frieda's hair with both hands K. asked the
landlady: 'You seem to have no objection?' 'You are a man of j honour,'
said the landlady, who also had tears in her eyes. Shei looked a little worn
and breathed with difficulty, but she found 1 strength enough to say:
'There's only the question now of what! guarantees you are to give Frieda,
for great as is my respect forj you, you're a stranger here; there's nobody
here who can speat for you, your family circumstances aren't known here,
so some guarantee is necessary. You must see that, my dear sir, anc
indeed you touched on it yourself when you mentioned ho\ much Frieda
must lose through her association with you.' 'Ol 5
course, guarantees, most certainly,' said K., 'but they'll be best given
before the notary, and at the same time other officials of the Count's will
perhaps be concerned. Besides, before I'm married there's something I
must do. I must have a talk with Klamm.' 'That's impossible,' said Frieda,
raising herself a little and pressing close to K., 'what an idea I* 'But it
must be done,' said K., 'if it's impossible for me to manage it, you must* 'I
can't, K..; I can't,' said Frieda. 'Klamm will never talk to you. How can
you even think of such a thing I' 'And won't he talk to you?' asked K. 'Not
to me either,' said Frieda, 'neither to you nor to me, it's simply
impossible.' She turned to the landlady with outstretched arms: *You see
what he's asking for I* 'You're a strange person,' said the landlady, and
she was an awe-inspiring figure now that she sat more upright, her legs
spread out and her enormous knees projecting under her thin skirt, 'you
ask for the impossible.' 'Why is it impossible?' said K. 'That's what I'm
going to tell you,' said the landlady in a tone which sounded as if her
explanation were less a final concession to friendship than the first item
in a score of penalties she was enumerating, 'that's what I shall be glad to
let you know. Although I don't belong to the Castle, and am only a
woman, only a landlady here in an inn of the lowest kind - it's not of the
very lowest but not far from it - and on that account you may not perhaps
set much store by my explanation, still I've kept my eyes open all my life
and met many kinds of people and taken the whole burden of the inn on
my own shoulders, for Martin is no landlord although he's a good man,
and responsibility is a thing he'll never understand. It's only his
carelessness, for instance, that you've got to thank - for I was tired to
death on that evening - for being here in the village at all, for sitting here
on this bed in peace and comfort.' 'What?' said K., waking from a kind of
absent-minded distraction, pricked more by curiosity than by anger. 'It's
only his carelessness you've got to thank for it,' cried the landlady again,
pointing with her forefinger at K. Frieda tried to silence her. 'I can't help
it,' said the landlady with a swift turn of her whole body. 'The Land
Surveyor asked me a question and I must answer it. There's no other way
of making him understand what we take for granted, that Herr 5'
Klamm will never speak to him - will never speak, did I say? can never
speak to him. Just listen to me, sir. Herr Klamm is a gentleman from the
Castle, and that in itself, without considering Klamm's position there at
all, means that he is of very high rank. But what are you, for whose
marriage we are humbly considering here ways and means of getting
permission? You are not from the Castle, you are not from the village,
you aren't anything. Or rather, unfortunately, you are
something, a stranger, a man who isn't wanted and is in everybody's
way, a man who's always causing trouble, a man who takes up the maids'
room, a man whose intentions are obscure, a man who has ruined our
dear little Frieda and whom we must unfortunately accept as her husband.
I don't hold all that up against you. You are what you are, and I have seen
enough in my lifetime to be able to face facts. But now consider what it is
you ask. A man like Klamm is to talk with you. It vexed me to hear that
Frieda let you look through the peephole, when she did that she was
already corrupted by you. But just tell me, how did you have the face to
look at Klamm? You needn't answer, I know you think you were quite
equal to the occasion. You're not even capable of seeing Klamm as he
really is, that's not merely an exaggeration, for I myself am not capable of
it cither. Klamm is to talk to you, and yet Klamm doesn't talk even to
people from the village, never yet has he spoken a word himself to
anyone in the village. It was Frieda's great distinction, a distinction I'll be
proud of to my dying day, that he used at least to call out her name, and
that she could speak to him whenever she liked and was permitted the
freedom of the peephole, but even to her he never talked. And the fact
that he called her name didn't mean of necessity what one might think, he
simply mentioned the name Frieda - who can tell what he was thinking of?
- and that Frieda naturally came to him at once was her affair,] and that
she was admitted without let or hindrance was an act] of grace on
Klamm's part, but that he deliberately summoned her is more than one
can maintain. Of course that's all over now for good. Klamm may perhaps
call "Frieda" as before, that'l possible, but she'll never again be admitted
to his presence, 1 girl who has thrown herself away upon you. And there's
jir > one thing, one thing my poor head can't understand, that a girl who
had the honour of being known as Klamm's mistress - a wild
exaggeration in my opinion - should have allowed you even to Jay a
finger on her.' 'Most certainly, that's remarkable,' said K., drawing Frieda
to his bosom - she submitted at once although with bent head 'but in my
opinion that only proves the possibility of your being mistaken in some
respects. You're quite right, for instance, in saying that I'm a mere nothing
compared with Klamm, and even though I insist on speaking to Klamm in
spite of that, and am not dissuaded even by your arguments, that does not
mean at all that I'm able to face Klamm without a door between us, or
that I mayn't run from the room at the very sight of him. But such a
conjecture, even though well founded, is no valid reason in my eyes for
refraining from the attempt. If I only succeed in holding my ground
there's no need for him to speak to me at all, it will be sufficient for me to
see what effect my words have on him, and if they have no effect or if he
simply ignores them, I shall at any rate have the satisfaction of having
spoken my mind freely to a great man. But you, with your wide
knowledge of men and affairs, and Frieda, who was only yesterday
Klamm's mistress - I see no reason for questioning that tide - could
certainly procure me an interview with Klamm quite easily; if it could be
done in no other way I could surely see him in the Herrenhof, perhaps
he's still there.' 'It's impossible,' said the landlady, 'and I can see that
you're incapable of understanding why. But just tell me what you want to
speak to Klamm about?' 'About Frieda, of course,' said K. 'About Frieda?'
repeated the landlady, uncomprehendingly, and turned to Frieda. 'Do you
hear that, Frieda, it's about you that he, he, wants to speak to Klamm, to
Klamm I' 'Oh,' said K., 'you're a clever and admirable woman, and yet
every trifle upsets you. Well, there it is, I want to speak to him about
Frieda; that's not monstrous, it's only natural. And you're quite wrong, too,
in supposing that from the moment of my appearance Frieda has ceased
to be of any importance to Klamm. You underestimate him if you suppose
that. I'm well aware that 53
it's impertinence in me to lay down the law to you in this matter, but I
must do it. I can't be the cause of any alteration in Klamm's relation to
Frieda. Either there was no essential relationship between them - and
that's what it amounts to if people deny that he was her honoured lover -
in which case there is still no relationship between them, or else there was
a relationship, and then how could I, a cipher in Klamm's eyes, as you
rightly point out, how could I make any difference to it? One flies to such
suppositions in the first moment of alarm, but the smallest reflection must
correct one's bias. Anyhow, let us hear what Frieda herself thinks about
it* With a far-away look in her eyes and her cheek on K.'s breast, Frieda
said: 'It's certain, as mother says, that Klamm will have nothing more to
do with me. But I agree that it's not because of you, darling, nothing of
that kind could upset him. I think on the other hand that it was entirely his
work that we found each other under, the bar counter, we should bless
that hour and not curse it.' 'If that is so,' said K. slowly, for Frieda's words
were sweet, and he shut his eyes a moment or two to let their sweetness
penetrate him, 'if that is so, there is less ground than ever to flinch from
an interview with Klamm.' 'Upon my word,' said the landlady, with her
nose in the air, 'you put me in mind of my own husband, you're just as
childish and obstinate as he is. You've been only a few days in the village
and already you think you know everything better than people who have
spent their lives here, better than an old woman like me, and better than
Frieda who has seen and heard so much in the Herrenhof. I don't deny
that it's possible once in a while to achieve something in the teeth of
every rule and tradition. I've never experienced anything of that kind
myself, but I believe there are precedents for it. That may well be, but it
certainly doesn't happen in the way you're trying to do it, simply by
saying "no, no", and sticking to your own opinions and flouting the most
well-meant advice. Do you think it's you I'm anxious about? Did I bother
about you in the least so long as' you were by yourself? Even though it
would have been a good thing and saved a lot of trouble? The only thing I
ever said to my husband 54
about you was: "Keep your distance where he's concerned." And I should
have done that myself to this very day if Frieda hadn't got mixed up with
your affairs. It's her you have to thank - whether you like it or not - for
my interest in you, even for my noticing your existence at all. And you
can't simply shake me off, for I'm the only person who looks after little
Frieda, and you're strictly answerable to me. Maybe Frieda is right, and
all that has happened is Klamm's will, but I have nothing to do with
Klamm here and now. I shall never speak to him, he's quite beyond my
reach. But you're sitting here, keeping my Frieda, and being kept yourself
- I don't see why I shouldn't tell you - by me. Yes, by me, young man, for
let me see you find a lodging anywhere in this village if I throw you out,
even it were only a dog-kennel.' "Thank you,' said K., 'that's frank and I
believe you absolutely. So my position is as uncertain as that, is it, and
Frieda's position, too?' 'No 1' interrupted the landlady furiously. 'Frieda's
position in this respect has nothing at all to do with yours. Frieda belongs
to my house, and nobody is entitled to call her position here uncertain.'
'All right, all right,' said K., 'I'll grant you that, too, especially since
Frieda for some reason I'm not able to fathom seems to be too afraid of
you to interrupt. Stick to me then for the present. My position is quite
uncertain, you don't deny that, indeed you rather go out of your way to
emphasize it. Like everything else you say, that has a fair proportion of
truth in it, but it isn't absolutely true. For instance, I know where I could
get a very good bed if I wanted it.' 'Where? Where?' cried Frieda and the
landlady simultaneously and so eagerly that they might have had the
same motive for asking. 'At Barnabas's,' said K. 'That scum!' cried the
landlady. "That rascally scum I At Barnabas's! Do you hear -' and she
turned towards the corner, but the assistants had long quitted it and were
now standing arm-in-arm behind her. And so now, as if she needed
support, sne seized one of them by the hand: 'Do you near where the 55
man goes hob-nobbing, with the family of Barnabas. Oh, certainly he'd
get a bed there; I only wished he'd stay'd there overnight instead of in the
Herrenhof. But where were you two?' 'Madam,' said K., before the
assistants had time to answer, 'these are my assistants. But you're treating
them as if they were your assistants and my keepers. In every other
respect I'm willing at least to argue the point with you courteously, but
not where my assistants are concerned, that's too obvious a matter. I
request you therefore not to speak to my assistants, and if my request
proves ineffective I shall forbid my assistants to answer you.' 'So I'm not
allowed to speak to you/ said the landlady, and they laughed all three, the
landlady scornfully, but with less anger than K. had expected, and the
assistants in their usual manner, which meant both much and little and
disclaimed all responsibility. 'Don't get angry,' said Frieda, 'you must try
to understand why we're upset. I can put it in this way, it's all owing to
Barnabas that we belong to each other now. When I saw you for the first
time in the bar - when you came in arm-in-arm with Olga - well, I knew
something about you, but I was quite indifferent to you. I was indifferent
not only to you but to nearly everything, yes, nearly everything. For at
that time I was discontented about lots of things, and often annoyed, but it
was a queer discontent and a queer annoyance. For instance, if one of the
customers in the bar insulted me - and they were always after me - you
saw what kind of creatures they were, but there were many worse than
that, Klamm's servants weren't the worst - well, if one of them insulted
me, what did that matter to me? I regarded it as if it had happened years
before, or as if it had happened to someone else, or as if I had only heard
tell of it, or as if I had already forgotten about it. But I can't describe it, I
can hardly imagine it now, so different has everything become since
losing Klamm.* And Frieda broke off short, letting her head drop sadly,
folding her hands on her bosom. 'You see,' cried the landlady, and she
spoke not as if in her own person but as if she had merely lent Frieda her
voice; she 56
moved nearer, too, and sat close beside Frieda, 'you see, sir, the results of
your actions, and your assistants too, whom I am not allowed to speak to,
can profit by looking on at them. You've snatched Frieda from the
happiest state she had ever known, and you managed to do that largely
because in her childish susceptibility she could not bear to see you
arm-in-arm with Olga, and so apparently delivered hand and foot to the
Barnabas family. She rescued you from that and sacrificed herself in
doing 50. And now that it's done, and Frieda has given up all she had for
the pleasure of sitting on your knee, you come out with this fine trump
card that once you had the chance of getting a bed from Barnabas. That's
by way of showing me that you're independent of me. I assure you, if you
had slept in that house you would be so independent of me that in the
twinkling of an eye you would be put out of this one.' 'I don't know what
sins the family of Barnabas have cornmitted/ said K., carefully raising
Frieda - who drooped as if lifeless - setting her slowly down on the bed
and standing up himself, 'you may be right about them, but I know that I
was right in asking you to leave Frieda and me to settle our own affairs.
You talked then about your care and affection, yet I haven't seen much of
that, but a great deal of hatred and scorn and forbidding me your house. If
it was your intention to separate Frieda from me or me from Frieda it was
quite a good move, but all the same I think it won't succeed, and if it does
succeed - it's my turn now to issue vague threats you'll repent it As for the
lodging you favour me with - you can only mean this abominable hole -
it's not at all certain that you do it of your own free will, it's much more
likely that the authorities insist upon it I shall now inform them that I
have been told to go - and if I am allotted other quarters you'll probably
feel relieved, but not so much as I will myself. And now I'm going to
discuss this and other business with the Superintendent, please be so good
as to look after Frieda at least, whom you have reduced to a bad enough
state with your so-called motherly counsel.' Then he turned to the
assistants. 'Come along,' he said, taking Klamm's letter from its nail and
making for the door. The land- 57
lady looked at him in silence, and only when his hand was on the latch
did she say: 'There's something else to take away with you, for whatever
you say and however you insult an old woman like me, you're after all
Frieda's future husband. That's my sole reason for telling you now that
your ignorance of the local situation is so appalling that it makes my head
go round to listen to you and compare your ideas and opinions with the
real state of things. It's a kind of ignorance which can't be enlight-; ened
at one attempt, and perhaps never can be, but there's a lot; you could learn
if you would only believe me a little and keep; your own ignorance
constantly hi mind. For instance, you] would at once be less unjust to me,
and you would begin to have] an inkling of the shock it was to me - a
shock from which I'm still suffering - when I realized that my dear little
Frieda had, so to speak, deserted the eagle for the snake in the grass, only
the real situation is much worse even than that, and I have to keep on
trying to forget it so as to be able to speak civilly to you at all. Oh, now
you're angry again! No, don't go away yet, listen to this one appeal;
wherever you may be, never forget that you're the most ignorant person in
the village, and be cautious; here in this house where Frieda's presence
saves you from harm you can drivel on to your heart's content, for
instance, here you can explain to us how you mean to get an interview
with Klamm, but I entreat you, I entreat you, don't do it in earnest.' She
stood up, tottering a little with agitation, went over to K., took his hand
and looked at him imploringly. 'Madam,' said K., 'I don't understand why
you should stoop to entreat me about a thing like this. If as you say, it's
impossible for me to speak to Klamm, I won't manage it in any case
whether I'm entreated or not. But if it proves to be possible, why shouldn't
I do it, especially as that would remove your main objection and so make
your other premises questionable. Of course, I'm ignorant, that's an
unshaken truth and a sad truth for me, but it gives me all the advantage of
ignorance, which is greater daring, and so I'm prepared to put up with my
ignorance, evil consequences and all, for some time to come, so long as
-my strength holds out. But these consequences really affect nobody but
myself, and that's why I simply can't understand your pleading. I'm
certain 58
you would always look after Frieda, and if I were to vanish from Frieda's
ken you couldn't regard that as anything but good luck. So what are you
afraid of? Surely you're not afraid _ an ignorant man thinks everything
possible' - here K. flung the door open - 'surely you're not afraid for
Klamm?' The landlady gazed after him in silence as he ran down the
staircase with the assistants following him. 5 >-|-o his own surprise K.
had little difficulty in obtaining an J. interview with the Superintendent.
He sought to explain this to himself by the fact that, going by his
experience hitherto, official intercourse with the authorities for him was
always very easy. This was caused on the one hand by the fact that the
word had obviously gone out once and for all to treat his case with the
external marks of indulgence, and on the other, by the admirable
autonomy of the service, which one divined to be peculiarly effective
precisely where it was not visibly present. At the mere thought of those
facts, K. was often in danger of considering his situation hopeful;
nevertheless, after such fits of easy confidence, he would hasten to tell
himself that just there lay his danger. Direct intercourse with the
authorities was not particularly difficult then, for well organized as they
might be, all they did was to guard the distant and invisible interests of
distant and invisible masters, while K. fought for something vitally near
to him, for himself, and moreover, at least at the very beginning, on his
own initiative, for he was the attacker; and besides he fought not only for
himself, but clearly for other powers as well which he did not know, but
in which, without infringing the regulations of the authorities, he was
permitted to believe. But now by the fact that they had at once amply met
his wishes in all unimportant matters - and hitherto only unimportant
matters had come up - they had robbed him of the possibility of light and
easy victories, and with that of the satisfaction which must accompany
them and the well-grounded confidence for 59
( further and greater struggles which must result from them. In- j stead,
they let K. go anywhere he liked - of course only within. the village - and
thus pampered and enervated him, ruled out] all possibility of conflict,
and transported him to an unofficial totally unrecognized, troubled, and
alien existence. In this life i| might easily happen, if he were not always
on his guard, tl one day or other, in spite of the amiability of the
authorities the scrupulous fulfilment of all his exaggeratedly light duties,
might - deceived by the apparent favour shown him - conduc himself so
imprudently that he might get a fall; and the authorij ties, still ever mild
and friendly, and as it were against their wil but in the name of some
public regulation unknown to hit might have to come and clear him out of
the way. And whs was it, this other life to which he was consigned?
Never yet ha< K. seen vocation and life so interlaced as here, so
interlaced sometimes one might think that they had exchanged places*
What importance, for example, had the power, merely formal] up till now,
which Klamm exercised over K.'s services, cor pared with the very real
power which Klamm possessed in K.'sl bedroom? So it came about that
while a light and frivolous bearing, a certain deliberate carelessness was
sufficient when one came in direct contact with the authorities, one
needed in everything else the greatest caution, and had to look round on
every side before one made a single step. K. soon found his opinion of the
authorities of the place confirmed when he went to see the Superintendent.
The Superintendent, a kindly, stout, clean-shaven man, was laid up; he
was suffering from a severe attack of gout, and received K. in bed. 'So
here is our Land Surveyor,' he said, and tried to sit up, failed! in the
attempt, and flung himself back again on die cushions,! pointing
apologetically to his leg. In the faint light of the room,! where the tiny
windows were still further darkened by curtains,! a noiseless, almost
shadowing woman pushed forward a chair] for K. and placed it beside the
bed. Take a seat, Land Sur-l veyor, take a seat,' said the Superintendent,
'and let me know] your wishes.' K. read out Klamm's letter and adjoined a
few! remarks to it. Again he had this sense of extraordinary ease in!
intercourse with the authorities. They seemed literally to bear 60
every burden, one could lay everything on their shoulders and rernain free
and untouched oneself. As if he, too, felt .this in his yvay, the
Superintendent made a movement of discomfort on the bed. At length he
said: CI know about the whole business as, indeed, you have remarked.
The reason why I've done nothing is, firstly, that I've been unwell, and
secondly, that you've been so long in coming; I thought finally that you
had given up the business. But now that you've been so kind as to look
me up, really I must tell you the plain unvarnished truth of the matter.
You've been taken on as Land Surveyor, as you say, but, unfortunately,
we have no need of a Land Surveyor. There wouldn't be the least use for
one here. The frontiers of our little state are marked out and all officially
recorded. So what should we do with a Land Surveyor?' Though he had
not given the matter a moment's thought before, K. was convinced now at
the bottom of his heart that he had expected some such response as this.
Exactly for that reason he was able to reply immediately: 'This is a great
surprise for me. It throws all my calculations out. I can only hope that
there's some misunderstanding.' 'No, unfortunately,' said the
Superintendent, 'it's as I've said.' 'But how is that possible?' cried K.
'Surely I haven't made this endless journey just to be sent back again.'
'That's another question,' replied the Superintendent, 'which isn't for me to
decide, but how this misunderstanding became possible, I can certainly
explain that. In such a large governmental office as the Count's, it may
occasionally happen that one department ordains this, another that;
neither knows of the other, and though the supreme control is absolutely
efficient, it comes by its nature too late, and so every now and then a
trifling miscalculation arises. Of course that applies only to the pettiest
little affairs, as for example your case. In great matters I've never known
of any error yet, but even little affairs are often painful enough. Now as
for your case, I'll be open with you about its history, and make no official
mystery of it - I'm not enough of the official for that, I'm a farmer and
always will remain one. A long time ago - I had only been Superintendent
for a few months - there came an order, I can't remember from what
department, in which in the usual categorical way of the gentlemen up
there, it was made 61
known that a Land Surveyor was to be called in, and the municipality
were instructed to hold themselves ready for the plans and measurements
necessary for his work. This order obviously couldn't have concerned you,
for it was many years ago, and I shouldn't have remembered it if I weren't
ill just now and with ample time in bed to think of the most absurd things
- Mizzi,' he said, suddenly interrupting his narrative, to the woman who
was still flitting about the room in incomprehensible activity, 'please have
a look in the cabinet, perhaps you'll find the order.' 'You see, it belongs to
my first months here,' he explained to K., 'at that time I still filed
everything away.' The woman opened the cabinet at once. K. and the
Superintendent looked on. The cabinet was crammed full of papers.
When it was opened two large packages of papers rolled out, tied in
round bundles, as one usually binds firewood; the woman sprang back in
alarm. 'It must be down below, at the bottom,' said the Superintendent,
directing operations from the bed. Gathering the papers in both arms the
woman obediently threw them all out of the cabinet so as to read those at
the bottom. The papers now covered half the floor. 'A great deal of work
is got through here,' said the Superintendent nodding his head, 'and that's
only a small fraction of it. I've put away the most important pile hi the
shed, but; the great mass of it has simply gone astray. Who could keep it
all together? But there's piles and piles more in the shed.' 'Will you be
able to find the order?' he said, turning again to his wife; 'you must look
for a document with the word Land Surveyor underlined in blue pencil.'
'It's too dark,' said the woman, Til fetch a candle,' and she stamped
through the papers to the door. 'My wife is a great help to me,' said the
Superintendent, 'in these difficult official affairs, and yet we can never
quite keep up with them. True, I have another assistant for the writing that]
has to be done, the teacher; but all the same it's impossible to get things
shipshape, there's always a lot of business that has to be left lying, it has
been put away in that chest there,' and he pointed to another cabinet. 'And
just now, when I'm laid up, it has got the upper hand,' he said, and lay
back with a weary yet proud air. 'Couldn't I,' asked K., seeing that the
woman had now returned with the candle and was kneeling before the
chest 62
looking for the paper, 'couldn't I help your wife to look "for it?' The
Superintendent smilingly shook his head: 'As I said before, 1 don't want
to make any parade of official secrecy before you, but to let you look
through these papers yourself - no, I can't go so far as that.' Now stillness
fell in the room, only the rustling of the papers was to be heard; it looked,
indeed, for a few minutes, as if the Superintendent were dozing. A faint
rapping on the door made K. turn round. It was of course the assistants.
All the same they showed already some of the effects of their training,
they did not rush at once into the room, but whispered at first through the
door which was slightly ajar: 'It's cold out here.' 'Who's that?' asked the
Superintendent, starting up. 'It's only my assistants,' replied K. 'I don't
know where to ask them to wait for me, it's too cold outside and here they
would be in the way.' 'They won't disturb me,' said the Superintendent
indulgently. 'Ask them to come in. Besides I know them. Old
acquaintances.' 'But they're in my way,' K. replied bluntly, letting his gaze
wander from the assistants to the Superintendent and back again, and
finding on the faces of all three the same smile. 'But seeing you're here as
it is,' he went on experimentally, 'stay and help the Superintendent's lady
there to look for a document with the word Land Surveyor underlined in
blue pencil.' The Superintendent raised no objection. What had not been
permitted to K. was allowed to the assistants; they threw themselves at
once on the papers, but they did not so much seek for anything as
rummage about in the heap, and while one was spelling out a document
the other would immediately snatch it out of his hand. The woman
meanwhile knelt before the empty chest, she seemed to have completely
given up looking, in any case the candle was standing quite far away from
her. 'The assistants,' said the Superintendent with a self-complacent smile,
which seemed to indicate that he had the lead, though nobody was in a
position even to assume this, 'they're hi your way then? Yet they're your
own assistants.' 'No,' replied K. coolly, 'they only ran into me here.' 'Ran
into you,' said he; 'you mean, of course, were assigned to you.' 'All right
then, were assigned to me,' said K., 'but they might as well have fallen
from the sky, for all the thought that was spent in choos- 63
ing them.* 'Nothing here is done without taking thought,' said the
Superintendent, actually forgetting the pain in his foot and; sitting up.
'Nothing!' said K., 'and what about my being summoned here then?' 'Even
your being summoned was carefully considered,' said the Superintendent;
'it was only certain auxiliary circumstances that entered and confused the
matter,] I'll prove it to you from the official papers.' 'The papers will] not
be found,' said K. 'Not be found?' said the Superintendent.] 'Mizzi, please
hurry up a bitl Still I can tell you the story eveni without the papers. We
replied with thanks to the order that I'vel mentioned already, saying that
we didn't need a Land Surveyor.: But this reply doesn't appear to have
reached the original de-1 partment - I'll call it A - but by mistake went to
another de-l partment, B. So Department A remained without an answer,!
but unfortunately our full reply didn't reach B either; whether itj was that
the order itself was not enclosed by us, or whether itl got lost on the way -
it was certainly not lost in my department,! that I can vouch for - in any
case all that arrived at Department | B was the covering letter, in which
was merely noted that the] enclosed order, unfortunately an impracticable
one, was con-j cerned with the engagement of a Land Surveyor.
Meanwhile Department A was waiting for our answer, they had, of]
course, made a memorandum of the case, but as excusably] enough often
happens and is bound to happen even under the! most efficient handling,
our correspondent trusted to the fact] that we would answer him, after
which he would either sum-, mon the Land Surveyor, or else if need be
write us further about] the matter. As a result he never thought of
referring to hisf memorandum and the whole thing fell into oblivion. But
in] Department B the covering letter came into the'hands of a]
correspondent, famed for his conscientiousness, Sordini by] name, an
Italian; it is incomprehensible even to me, though ll am one of the
initiated, why a man of his capacities is left in an| almost subordinate
position. This Sordini naturally sent bad the unaccompanied covering
letter for completion. Now months,] if not years, had passed by this time
since that first communication from Department A, which is
understandable enough,] for when - which is the rule - a document goes
the proper rout 64
it reaches the department at the outside in a day and is settled that day, but
when it once in a while loses its way then in an organization so efficient
as ours its proper destination must be sought for literally with desperation,
otherwise it mightn't be found; and then, well then the search may last
really for a long time. Accordingly, when we got Sordini's note we had
only a vague memory of the affair, there were only two of us to do the
work at that time, Mizzi and myself, the teacher hadn't yet been assigned
to us, we only kept copies in the most important instances, so we could
only reply in the most vague terms that we knew nothing of this
engagement of a Land Surveyor and that as far as we knew there was no
need for one. 'But,' here the Superintendent interrupted himself as if,
carried on by his tale, he had gone too far, or as if at least it were possible
that he had gone too far, 'doesn't the story bore you?' 'No,' said K., 'it
amuses me.' Thereupon the Superintendent said: 'I'm not telling it to
amuse you.' 'It only amuses me,' said K., 'because it gives me an insight
into the ludicrous bungling which in certain circumstances may decide
the life of a human being.' 'You haven't been given any insight into that
yet,' replied the Superintendent gravely, 'and I can go on with my story.
Naturally Sordini was not satisfied with our reply. I admire the man,
although he is a plague'to me. He literally distrusts everyone; even if, for
instance, he has come to know somebody, through countless
circumstances, as the most reliable man in the world, he distrusts him as
soon as fresh circumstances arise, as if he didn't want to know him, or
rather as if he wanted to know that he was a scoundrel. I consider that
right and proper, an official must behave like that; unfortunately with my
nature I can't follow out this principle; you see yourself how frank I am
with you, a stranger, about those things, I can't act in any other way. But
Sordini, on the contrary, was seized by suspicion when he read our reply.
Now a large correspondence began to grow. Sordini inquired how I had
suddenly recalled that a Land Surveyor shouldn't be summoned. I replied,
drawing on Mizzi's splendid memory, that the first suggestion had come
from the 65
chancellery itself (but that it had come from a different department we
had of course forgotten long before this). Sordini countered: "Why had I
only mentioned this official order now?" I replied: "Because I had just
remembered it." Sordini: "That was very extraordinary." Myself: "It was
not in the least extraordinary in such a long-drawn-out business." Sordini:
"Yes, it was extraordinary, for the order that I remembered didn't exist."
Myself: "Of course it didn't exist, for the whole document had gone
a-missing." Sordini: "But there must be a memorandum extant relating to
this first communication, and there wasn't one extant." That drew me up,
for that an error should happen in Sordini's department I neither dared to
maintain nor to believe. Perhaps, my dear Land Surveyor, you'll make the
reproach against Sordini in your mind, that in consideration of my
assertion he should have been moved at least to make inquiries in the
other departments about the affair. But that is just what would have been
wrong; I don't want any blame to attach to this man, no, not even in your
thoughts. It's a working principle of the Head Bureau that the very
possibility of error must be ruled out of account. This ground principle is
justified by the consummate organization of the whole authority, and it is
necessary if the maximum speed in transacting business is to be attained.
So it wasn't within Sordini's power to make inquiries in other departments,
besides they simply wouldn't have answered, because they would have
guessed at once that it was a case of hunting out a possible error.' 'Allow
me, Superintendent, to interrupt you with a question,' said K. 'Did you not
mention once before a Control Authority? From your description the
whole economy is one that would rouse one's apprehension if onecould
imagine the control failing.' 'You're very strict,' said the Superintendent,
'but multiply your strictness a thousand times and it would still be nothing
compared with the strictness which the Authority imposes on itself. Only
a total stranger could ask a question like yours. Is there a Control
Authority? There are only control authorities. Frankly it isn't their
function to hunt out errors in the vulgar sense, for errors don't happen,
and even when once in a while 66
ao error does happen, as in your case, who can say finally that it's an
error?' 'This is news indeed 1' cried K. 'It's very old news to me,' said the
Superintendent. 'Not unlike yourself I'm convinced that an error has
occurred, and as a result Sordini is quite ill with despair, and the first
Control Officials, whom we have to thank for discovering the source of
error, recognize that there is an error. But who can guarantee that the
second Control Officials will decide in the same way and the third lot and
all the others?' 'That may be,' said K. 'I would much rather not mix in
these speculations yet, besides this is the first mention I've heard of these
Control Officials and naturally I can't understand them yet. But I/fancy
that two things must be distinguished here: firstly, what is transacted in
the offices and can be construed again officially this way or that, and
secondly, my own actual person, me myself, situated outside of the
offices and threatened by their encroachments, which are so meaningless
that I can't even yet believe in the seriousness of the danger. The first
evidently is covered by what you, Superintendent, tell me in such
extraordinary and disconcerting detail; all the same I would like to hear a
word now about myself.' Tm coming to that too,' said the Superintendent,
'but you couldn't understand it without my giving a few more preliminary
details. My mentioning the Control Officials just now was premature. So
I must turn back to the discrepancies with Sordini. As I said, my defence
gradually weakened. But whenever Sordini has in his hands even the
slightest hold against anyone, he has as good as won, for then his
vigilance, energy, and alertness are actually increased and it's a terrible
moment for the victim, and a glorious one for the victim's enemies. It's
only because in other circumstances I have experienced this last feeling
that I'm able to speak of him as I do. All the same I have never managed
yet to come within sight of him. He can't get down here, he's so
overwhelmed with work; from the descriptions I've heard of his room
every wail is covered with columns of documents tied together, piled on
top of one another; those are only the documents that Sordini is working
on at the time, 67
and as bundles of papers are continually being taken away and brought in,
and all in great haste, those columns are always falling on the floor, and
it's just those perpetual crashes, following fast on one another, that have
come to distinguish Sordini's workroom. Yes, Sordini is a worker and he
gives the same scrupulous care to the smallest case as to the greatest.'
'Superintendent,' said K., 'you always call my case one of the smallest,
and yet it has given hosts of officials a great deal of trouble, and if,
perhaps, it was unimportant at the start, yet through the diligence of
officials of Sordini's type it has grown into a great affair. Very much
against my will, unfortunately, for my ambition doesn't run to seeing
columns of documents, all about me, rising and crashing together, but to
working quietly at my drawing-board as a humble Land Surveyor.' 'No,'
said the Superintendent, 'it's not at all a great affair, in. that respect you've
no ground for complaint - it's one of the; least important among the least
important. The importance of a case is not determined by the amount of
work it involves, you're far from understanding the authorities if you
believe that. But even if it's a question of the amount of work, your case
would remain one of the slightest; ordinary cases, those without any
so-called errors I mean, provide far more work and far more profitable
work as well. Besides you know absolutely nothing yet of the actual work
which was caused by your case. I'll tell you about that now. Well,
presently Sordini left me out of count, but the clerks arrived, and every
day a formal inquiry involving the most prominent members of the
community was held in the Herrenhof. The majority stuck by me, only a
few held back - the question of a Land Surveyor appeals to peasants -
they scented secret plots and injustices and what not, found a leader, no
less, and Sordini was forced by their assertions to the conviction that if I
had brought the question forward in the Town Council, every voice
wouldn't have been against the summoning of a Land Surveyor. So a
commonplace - namely, tl a Land Surveyor wasn't needed - was turned
after all into doubtful matter at least. A man called Brunswick
distinguish* himself especially, you don't know him, of course; probably
he'* 68
ot a bad man, only stupid and fanciful, he's a son-in-law of Lasemann's.'
'Of the Master Tanner?' asked K., and he described the fullbearded man
whom he had seen at Lasemann's. 'Yes, that's the man,' said the
Superintendent. CI know his wife, too,' said K. a little at random. 'That's
possible,' replied the Superintendent briefly. 'She's beautiful,' said K., 'but
rather pale and sickly. She comes, of course, from the Castle?' It was half
a question. The Superintendent looked at the clock, poured some
medicine into a spoon, and gulped at it hastily. 'You only know the
official side of the Castle?' asked K. bluntly. 'That's so,' replied the
Superintendent, with an ironical and yet grateful smile, 'and it's the most
important. And as for Brunswick; if we could exclude him from the
Council we would almost all be glad, and Lasemann not least. But at that
time Brunswick gained some influence, he's not an orator of course, but a
shouter; but even that can do a lot. And so it came about that I was forced
to lay the matter before the Town Council; however, it was Brunswick's
only immediate triumph, for of course the Town Council refused by a
large majority to hear anything about a Land Surveyor. That, too, was a
long time ago, but the whole time since the matter has never been allowed
to rest, partly owing to Sordini's conscientiousness, who by the most
painful sifting of data sought to fathom the motives of the majority no
less than the opposition, partly owing to Brunswick's stupidity and
ambition, who had several personal acquaintances among the authorities
whom he set working with fresh inventions of his fancy. Sordini, at any
rate, didn't let himself be deceived by Brunswick - how could Brunswick
deceive Sordini? -but simply to prevent himself from being deceived a
new sifting of data was necessary, and long before it was ended
Brunswick had already thought out something new; he's very, very
versatile, no doubt of it, that goes with his stupidity. And now I come to a
peculiar characteristic of our administrative apparatus. Along with its
precision it's extremely sensitive as well. When an affair has been
weighed for a very long time, it 69
may happen, even before the matter has been fully considered, that
suddenly in a flash the decision comes in some unforeseen place, that,
moreover, can't be found any longer later on, a decision that settles the
matter, if in most cases justly, yet all the same arbitrarily. It's as if the
administrative apparatus were unable any longer to bear the
tension,theyear-longirritation caused by the same affair - probably trivial
in itself-and had hit upon the decision by itself, without the assistance of
the officials. Of course a miracle didn't happen and certainly it was some
clerk who hit upon the solution or the unwritten decision, but in any case
it couldn't be discovered by us, at least by us here, or even by the Head
Bureau, which clerk had decided in this case and on what grounds. The
Control Officials only discovered that much later, but we will never learn
it; besides by this time it would scarcely interest anybody. Now, as I said,
it's just these decisions that are generally excellent. The only annoying
thing about them - it's usually the case with such things - is that one
learns too late about them and so in the meantime keeps on still
passionately canvassing things that were decided long ago. I don't know
whether in your case a decision of this kind happened-some people say
yes, others no-but if it had happened then the summons would have been
sent to you and you would have made the long journey to this place,
much time would have passed, and in the meanwhile Sordini would have
been working away here all the time on the same case until he was
exhausted. Brunswick would have been intriguing, and I would have been
plagued by both of them. I only indicate this possibility, but I know the
following for a fact: a Control Official discovered meanwhile that a query
had gone out from the Department A to the Town Council many years
before regarding a Land Surveyor, without having received a reply up till
then. A new inquiry was sent to me, and now the whole business was
really cleared up. Department A was satisfied with my answer that a|
Land Surveyor was not needed, and Sordini was forced to* recognize that
he had not been equal to this case and, innocently it is true, had got
through so much nerve-racking work for nothing. If new work hadn't
come rushing in as ever from every side, and if your case hadn't been a
very unimportant case-one
juight almost say the least important among the unimportant vie mignt all
of us have breathed freely again, I fancy even Sordini himself; Brunswick
was the only one that grumbled, but that was only ridiculous. And now
imagine to yourself, Land Surveyor, my dismay when after the fortunate
end of the whole business - and since then, too, a great deal of time had
passed by _ suddenly you appear and it begins to look as if the whole
thing must begin all over again. You'll understand of course that I'm
firmly resolved, so far as I'm concerned, not to let that happen in any
case?' 'Certainly,' said K., 'but I understand better still that a terrible abuse
of my case, and probably of the law, is being carried on. As for me, I shall
know how to protect myself against it.' 'How will you do it?' asked the
Superintendent. 'I'm not at liberty to reveal that,' said K. 'I don't want to
press myself upon you,' said the Superintendent, 'only I would like you to
reflect that in me you have-I won't say a friend, for we're complete
strangers of course - but to some extent a business friend. The only thing
I will not agree to is that you should be taken on as Land Surveyor, but in
other matters you can draw on me with confidence, frankly to the extent
of my power, which isn't great.' 'You always talk of the one thing,' said K.,
'that I shan't be taken on as Land Surveyor, but I'm Land Surveyor already,
here is Klamm's letter.' 'Klamm's letter,' said the Superintendent. 'That's
valuable and worthy of respect on account of Klamm's signature which
seems to be genuine, but all the same - yet I won't dare to advance it on
my own unsupported word. Mizzi,' he called, and then: 'But what are you
doing?' Mizzi and the assistants, left so long unnoticed, had clearly not
found the paper they were looking for, and had then tried to shut
everything up again in the cabinet, but on account of the confusion and
superabundance of papers had not succeeded. Then the assistants had hit
upon the idea which they were carrying out now. They had laid the
cabinet on its back on the floor, crammed all the documents in, then along
with Mizzi had knelt 7*
on the cabinet door and were trying now in this way to get it shut 'So the
paper hasn't been found,' said the Superintendent. 'A pity, but you know
the story already; really we don't need the paper now, besides it will
certainly be found sometime yet; probably it's at the teacher's place,
there's a great pile of papers there too. But come over here now with the
candle, Mizzi, and read this letter for me.' Mizzi went over and now
looked still more grey and insignificant as she sat on the edge of the bed
and leaned against the strong, vigorous man, who put his arm round her.
In the candlelight only her pinched face was cast into relief, its simple
and austere lines softened by nothing but age. Hardly had shcj glanced at
the letter when she clasped her hands lightly anc said: 'From Klamm.'
Then they read the letter together,^ whispered for a moment, and at last,
just as the assistants gave] a 'Hurrahl' for they had finally got the cabinet
door shut-j which earned them a look of silent gratitude from Mizzi - the|
Superintendent said: 'Mizzi is quite of my opinion and now I am at liberty
to cx.-\ press it. This letter is in no sense an official letter, but only a
private letter. That can be clearly seen in the very mode of address: "My
dear Sir." Moreover, there isn't a single word in it showing that you've
been taken on as Land Surveyor; on the contrary it's all about state
service in general, and even that is not absolutely guaranteed, as you
know, that is, the task of proving that you are taken on is laid on you.
Finally, you are officially and expressly referred to me, the
Superintendent, as your immediate superior, for more detailed
information, which, indeed, has in great part been given already. To
anyone who knows how to read official communications, and
consequently knows still better how to read unofficial letters, all this is
only ] too clear. That you, a stranger, don't know it doesn't surprise! me.
In general the letter means nothing more than that Klamm I intends to
take a personal interest in you if you should be taken l into the state
service.' 'Superintendent,' said K., 'you interpret the letter so well! that
nothing remains of it but a signature on a blank sheet of
paper. Don't you see that in doing this you depreciate Klamm's name,
which you pretend to respect?' 'You misunderstand me,' said the
Superintendent, 'I don't niisconstrue the meaning of the letter, my reading
of it doesn't disparage it, on the contrary. A private letter from Klamm has
naturally far more significance than an official letter, but it hasn't
precisely the kind of significance that you attach to it.' 'Do you know
Schwarzer?' asked K. 'No,' replied the Superintendent. 'Perhaps you know
him, Mizzi? You don't know him either? No, we don't know him.' 'That's
strange,' said K., 'he's a son of one of the undercastellans.' 'My dear Land
Surveyor,' replied the Superintendent, 'how on earth should I know all the
sons of all the under-castellans?' 'Right,' said K., 'then you'll just have to
take my word that he is one. I had a sharp encounter with this Schwarzer
on the very day of my arrival. Afterwards he made a telephone inquiry of
an under-castellan called Fritz and received the information that I was
engaged as Land Surveyor. How do you explain that, Superintendent?'
'Very simply,' replied the Superintendent. 'You haven't once up till now
come into real contact with our authorities. All those contacts of yours
have been illusory, but owing to your ignorance of the circumstances you
take them to be real. And as for the telephone. As you see, in my place,
though I've certainly enough to do with the authorities, there's no
telephone. In inns and suchlike places it may be of real use, as much use
say as a pennyin-the-slot musical instrument, but it's nothing more than
that. Have you ever telephoned here? Yes? Well, then perhaps you'll
understand what I say. In the Castle the telephone works beautifully of
course, I've been told it's going there all the time, that naturally speeds up
the work a great deal. We can hear this continual telephoning in our
telephones down here as a humming and singing, you must have heard it
too. Now this humming and singing transmitted by our telephones is the
only real and reliable thing you'll hear, everything else is deceptive.
There's no fixed connexion with the Castle, no central exchange transmits
our calls further. When anybody calls up the 73
Castle from here the instruments in all the subordinate departments ring,
or rather they would all ring if practically all the departments -1 know it
for a certainty - didn't leave their receivers off. Now and then, however, a
fatigued official may feel the need of a little distraction, especially in the
evenings and at night and may hang the receiver on. Then we get an
answer, but an answer of course that's merely a practical joke. And that's
very understandable too. For who would take the responsibility of
interrupting, in the middle of the night, the extremely important work up
there that goes on furiously the whole time, with a message about his own
little private troubles? I can't comprehend how even a stranger can
imagine that when he calls up Sordini, for example, it's really Sordini that
answers. Far more probably it's a little copying clerk from an entirely
different department. On the other hand, it may certainly happen once in a
blue moon that when one calls up the little copying clerk Sordini will
answer himself. Then finally the best thing is to fly from the telephone
before the first sound comes through.' 'I didn't know it was like that,
certainly,' said K. 'I couldn't know of all these peculiarities, but I didn't
put much confideno in those telephone conversations and I was always
aware that tfo only things of real importance were those that happened in
th< Castle itself.' 'No,' said the Superintendent, holding firmly on to the
word,s 'these telephone replies certainly have a meaning, why shouldn't
they? How could a message given by an official from the Castld be
unimportant? As I remarked before apropos Klamm's letter. All these
utterances have no official significance; when you! attach official
significance to them you go astray. On the other hand, their private
significance in a friendly or hostile sense is very great, generally greater
than an official communication! could ever be.' 'Good.' said K. 'Granted
that all this is so, I should have lots of good friends in the Castle: looked
at rightly the sudden inspiration of that department all these years ago -
saying that aj Land Surveyor should be asked to come-was an act of
friendship towards myself; but then in the sequel one act was followed 74
hv another, until at last, on an evil day, I was enticed here and then
threatened with being thrown out again.' There's a certain amount of truth
in your view of the case,' said the Superintendent; 'you're right in thinking
that the pronouncements of the Castle are not to be taken literally. But
caution is always necessary, not only here, and always the more necessary
the more important the pronouncement in question happens to be. But
when you went on to talk about being enticed, I ceased to fathom you. If
you had followed my explanation more carefully, then you must have
seen that the question of your being summoned here is far too difficult to
be settled here and now in the course of a short conversation.' 'So the only
remaining conclusion,' said K., 'is that everything is very uncertain and
insoluble, including my being thrown out.' 'Who would take the risk of
throwing you out, Land Surveyor?' asked the Superintendent. 'The very
uncertainty about your summons guarantees you the most courteous
treatment, only you're too sensitive by all appearances. Nobody keeps
you here, but that surely doesn't amount to throwing you out.' 'Oh,
Superintendent,' said K., 'now again you're taking far too simple a view of
the case. I'll enumerate for your benefit a few of the things that keep me
here: the sacrifice I made in leaving my home, the long and difficult
journey, the wellgrounded hopes I built on my engagement here, my
complete lack of means, the impossibility after this of finding some other
suitable job at home, and last but not least my fiancee, who lives here.'
'Oh, Frieda!' said the Superintendent without showing any surprise. 'I
know. But Frieda would follow you anywhere. As for the rest of what
you've said, some consideration will be necessary and I'll communicate
with the Castle about it. If a decision should be come to, or if it should be
necessary first to interrogate you again, I'll send for you. Is that agreeable
to you?' 'No, absolutely,' said K., 'I don't want any act of favour from the
Castle, but my rights.' 'Mizzi,' the Superintendent said to his wife, who
still sat pressed against him, and lost in a day-dream was playing with
Klamm's letter, which she had folded into the shape of a 75
little boat-K. snatched it from her in alarm. 'Mizzi, my foot is beginning
to throb again, we must renew the compress.' K. got up. 'Then I'll take my
leave,' he said. 'Hm,' said Mizzi, who was already preparing a poultice,
'the last one was drawing too strongly.' K. turned away. At his last words
the assistants with their usual misplaced zeal to be useful had thrown
open both wings of the door. To protect the sickroom from the strong
draught of cold air which was rushing in, K. had to be content with
making the Superintendent a hasty bow. Then, pushing the assistants in
front of him, he rushed out of the room and quickly closed the door.
BEFORE the inn the landlord was waiting for him. Without being
questioned he would not have ventured to address him, accordingly K.
asked what he wanted. 'Have you found new lodgings yet?' asked the
landlord, looking at the ground. 'You were told to ask by your wife?'
replied K., 'you're very much under her influence?' 'No,' said the landlord,
'I didn't ask because of my wife. But she's very bothered and unhappy on
your account, can't work, lies in bed and sighs and cornplains all the
time.' 'Shall I go and see her?' asked K. 'I wish you would,' said the
landlord. 'I've been to the Superintendent's already to fetch you. I listened
at the door but you were talking. I didn't want to disturb you, besides I
was anxious about my wife and ran back again; but she wouldn't see me,
so there was nothing for it but to wait for you.' 'Then let's go at once,' said
K., Til soon reassure her.' 'If you could only manage it,' said the landlord.
They went through the bright kitchen where three or four maids, engaged
all in different corners at the work they were happening to be doing,
visibly stiffened on seeing K. From the; kitchen the sighing of the
landlady could already be heard. She* lay in a windowless annex
separated from the kitchen by thin lath boarding. There was room in it
only for a huge family becll and a chest. The bed was so placed that from
it one could over-' 76
k the whole kitchen and superintend the work. From the i/tchen, on the
other hand, hardly anything could be seen in he annex. There it was quite
dark: only the faint gleam of the urplc bed-coverlet could be
distinguished. Not until one entered nd one's evcs b^31116 uscd to the
darkness did one detach particular objects. 'You've come at last,' said the
landlady feebly. She was lying stretched out on her back, she breathed
with visible difficulty, she had thrown back the feather quilt. In bed she
looked much younger than in her clothes, but a nightcap of delicate
lacework which she wore, although it was too small and nodded on her
head, made her sunk face look pitiable. 'Why should I have come?'
asked K. mildly. 'You didn't send for me.' 'You shouldn't have kept
me waiting so long,' said the landlady with the capriciousness of an
invalid. 'Sit down,' she went on, pointing to the bed, 'and you others go
away.' Meantime the maids as well as the assistants had crowded in. 'I'll
go too, Gardana,' said the landlord. This was the first time that K. had
heard her name. 'Of course,' she replied slowly, and as if she were
occupied with other thoughts she added absently: 'Why should you
remain any more than the others?' But when they had all retreated to the
kitchen-even the assistants this time went at once, besides, a maid was
behind them-Gardana was alert enough to grasp that everything she said
could be heard in there, for the annex lacked a door, and so she
commanded everyone to leave the kitchen as well. It was immediately
done. 'Land Surveyor,' said Gardana, 'there's a wrap hanging over there
beside the chest, will you please reach me it? I'll lay it over me. I can't
bear the feather quilt, my breathing is so bad.' And as K. handed her the
wrap, she went on: 'Look, this is a beautiful wrap, isn't it?' To K. it
seemed to be an ordinary woollen wrap; he felt it with his fingers again
merely out of politeness, but did not reply. 'Yes, it's a beautiful wrap,' said
Gardana covering herself up. Now she lay back comfortably, all her pain
seemed to have gone, she actually had enough strength to think of the
state of her hair which had been disordered by her lying position; she
raised herself up for a moment and 77
I rearranged her coiffure a little round the nightcap. Her hair was
abundant. K. became impatient, and began: "You asked me, madam,
whether I had found other lodgings yet.' 'I asked you?' said the landlady,
'no, you're mistaken.' 'Your husband asked me a few minutes ago.' 'That
may well be,' said the landlady; 'I'm at variance with him. When I didn't
want you here, he kept you here, now that I'm glad to have you here, he
wants to drive you away. He's always like that.' 'Have you changed your
opinion of me so greatly, then?' asked K. 'In a couple of hours?' 'I haven't
| changed my opinion,' said the landlady more freely again; 'give t me
your hand. There, and now promise to be quite frank with5 me and I'll be
the same with you.' 'Right,' said K., 'but who's to begin first?' 'I shall,' said
the landlady. She did not give so much the impression of one who wanted
to meet K. half-way, as of one who was eager to have the first word. She
drew a photograph from under the pillow and held it out to K. 'Look at
that portrait,' she said eagerly. To see it better K. stepped into the kitchen,
but even there it was not easy to distinguish anything on the photograph,
for it was faded with age, cracked in several places, crumpled, and dirty.
'It isn't in very good condition,' said K. 'Unluckily no,' said the landlady,
'when one carries a thing about with one for years it's bound to be the
case. But if you look at it carefully, you'll be able to make everything out,
you'll see. But I can help you; tell me what you see, I like to hear anyone
talk about the portrait. Well, then?' 'A young man,' said K. 'Right,' said the
landlady, 'and what's he doing?' 'It seems to me he's lying on a board
stretching himself and yawning.' The landlady laughed. 'Quite wrong,' she
said. 'But here's the board and here he is lying on it,' persisted K. on his
side. 'But look more carefully,' said the landlady in annoyance, 'is he
really lying down?' 'No,' said K. now, 'he's floating, and now I can see it,
it's not a board at all, but probably a rope, and the young man is taking a
high leap.' 'You seef replied the landlady triumphantly, 'he's leaping, that's
how the I official messengers practise. I knew quite well that you wouUl
make it out. Can you make out his face, too?' 'I can only mal f out his face
very dimly,' said K., 'he's obviously making a gre | 78
mouth is open, his eyes tightly shut and his hair flutter. 'Well done,' said
the landlady appreciatively, 'nobody who ever saw him could have made
out more than that But he was a beautiful young man. I only saw him
once for a second and I'll never forget him.' 'Who was he then?' asked K.
'He was the messenger that Klamm sent to call me to him the first rime.'
JC. could not hear properly, his attention was distracted by the rattling of
glass. He immediately discovered the cause of the disturbance. The
assistants were standing outside in the yard hopping from one foot to the
other in the snow, behaving as if they were glad to see him again; in their
joy they pointed each other out to him and kept tapping all the time on the
kitchen window. At a threatening gesture from K. they stopped at once,
tried to pull one another away, but the one would slip immediately from
the grasp of the other and soon they were both back at the window again.
K. hurried into the annex where the assistants could not see him from
outside and he would not have to see them. But the soft and as it were
beseeching tapping on the window-pane followed him there too for a long
time. 'The assistants again,' he said apologetically to the landlady and
pointed outside. But she paid no attention to him; she had taken the
portrait from him, looked at it, smoothed it out, and pushed it again under
her pillow. Her movements had become slower, but not with weariness,
but with the burden of memory. She had wanted to tell K. the story of her
life and had forgotten about him in thinking of the story itself. She was
playing with the fringe of her wrap. A little time went by before she
looked up, passed her hand over her eyes, and said: 'This wrap was given
me by Klamm. And the nightcap, too. The portrait, the wrap, and the
nightcap, these are the only three things of his I have as keepsakes. I'm
not young like Frieda, I'm not so ambitious as she is, nor so sensitive
either, she's very sensitive to put it bluntly, I know how to accommodate
myself to life, but one Aing I must admit, I couldn't have held out so long
here without these three keepsakes. Perhaps these three things seem very
trifling to you, but let me tell you, Frieda, who has had relations with
Klamm for a long time, doesn't possess a single keepsake 79
from him. I have asked her, she's too fanciful, and too difficult to please
besides; 1, on the other hand, though I was only three times with Klamm-
after that he never asked me to come again, I don't know why-I managed
to bring three presents back with me all the same, having a premonition
that my time would be short. Of course one must make a point of it.
Klamm gives nothing of himself, but if one sees something one likes
lying about there, one can get it out of him.' K. felt uncomfortable
listening to these tales, much as they interested him. 'How long ago was
all that, then?' he asked with a sigh. 'Over twenty years ago,' replied the
landlady, 'considerably over twenty years.' 'So one remains faithful to
Klamm as long as that,' said K. 'But are you aware, madam, that these
stories give me grave alarm when I think of my future married life?' The
landlady seemed to consider this intrusion of his own affairs
unseasonable and gave him an angry sidelook. 'Don't be angry, madam,'
said K. Tve nothing at all to say against Klamm. All the same, by force of
circumstances I have come in a sense in contact with Klamm; that can't
be gainsaid even by his greatest admirer. Well, then. As a result of that I
am forced whenever Klamm is mentioned to think of myself as well, that
can't be altered. Besides, madam,' here K. took hold of her reluctant hand,
'reflect how badly our last talk turned out and that this time we want to
part in peace.' 'You're right,' said the landlady, bowing her head, 'but
sparc| me. I'm not more touchy than other people; on the contrary,
everyone has his sensitive spots, and I -only have this one.' 'Unfortunately
it happens to be mine too,' said K., 'but promise to control myself. Now
tell me, madam, how I am put up with my married life in face of this
terrible fideli granted that Frieda, too, resembles you in that?' 'Terrible
fidelity 1' repeated the landlady with a growl. 'Is it * question of fidelity?
I'm faithful to my husband-but Klammfl Klamm once chose me as his
mistress, can I ever lose thij honour? And you ask how you are to put up
with Frieda? 80
, n(j Surveyor, who are you after all that you dare ask such things?'
'j^fadam,' said K. warningly. j know,' said the landlady, controlling herself,
'but my husband never put such questions. I don't know which to call the
unhappier* myself then or Frieda now. Frieda who saucily left Klamm, or
myself whom he stopped asking to come. Yet it is probably Frieda,
though she hasn't even yet guessed the full extent of her unhappiness, it
seems. Still, my thoughts were more exclusively occupied by my
unhappiness then, all the same, for I had always to be asking myself one
question, and in reality haven't ceased to ask it to this day: Why did this
happen? Three times Klamm sent for me, but he never sent a fourth time,
no, never a fourth time 1 What else could I have thought of during those
days? What else could I have talked about with my husband, whom I
married shortly afterwards? During the day we had no time-we had taken
over this inn in a wretched condition and had to struggle to make it
respectable-but at night 1 For years all our nightly talks turned on Klamm
and the reason for his changing his mind. And if my husband fell asleep
during those talks I woke him and we went on again.' 'Now,' said K., 'if
you'll permit me, I'm going to ask a very rude question.' The landlady
remained silent. 'Then I mustn't ask it,' said K. 'Well, that serves my
purpose as well.' 'Yes,' replied the landlady, 'that serves your purpose as
well, and just that serves it best. You misconstrue everything, even a
person's silence. You can't do anything else. I allow you to ask your
question.' 'If I misconstrue everything, perhaps I misconstrue my question
as well, perhaps it's not so rude after all. I only want to know how you
came to meet your husband and how this inn came into your hands.' The
landlady wrinkled her forehead, but said indifferently: 'That's a very
simple story. My father was the blacksmith, and Hans, my husband, who
was a groom at a big farmer's place, came often to see him. That was just
after my last meeting with 8z
Klamm. I was very unhappy and really had no right to be so, for
everything had gone as it should, and that I wasn't allowed any longer to
see Klamm was Klamm's own decision. It was as it should be then, only
the grounds for it were obscure. I was entitled to inquire into them, but I
had no right to be unhappy; still I was, all the same, couldn't work, and
sat in our front garden all day. There Hans saw me, often sat down beside
me. I didn't complain to him, but he knew how things were, and as he was
a good young man, he wept with me. The wife of the landlord at that time
had died and he had consequently to give up business-besides he was
already an old man. Well once as he passed our garden and saw us sitting
there, he stopped, and without more ado offered us the inn to rent, didn't
ask for any money in advance, for he trusted us, and set the rent at a very
low figure. I didn't want to be a burden on my father, nothing else
mattered to me, and so thinking of the inn and of my new work that might
perhaps help me to forget a little, I gave Hans my hand. That's the whole
story.' There was silence for a little, then K. said: 'The behaviour of the
landlord was generous, but rash, or had he particular grounds for trusting
you both?' 'He knew Hans well,' said the landlady: 'he was Hans's uncle.'
'Well then,' said K., 'Hans's family must have been very anxious to be
connected with you?' 'It may be so,' said the landlady, 'I don't know. I've
never bothered about it.' 'But it must have been so all the same,' said K.,
'seeing that the family was ready to make such a sacrifice and to give the
inn into your hands absolutely without security.' 'It wasn't imprudent, as
was proved later,' said the landlady. 'I threw myself into the work, I was
strong, I was the black- j smith's daughter, I didn't need maid or servant. I
was everywhere, in the taproom, in the kitchen, in the stables, in the
yard. , I cooked so well that I even enticed some of the Herrenhof's
customers away. You've never been in the inn yet at lunchtime, you don't
know our day customers; at that time there were more of them, many of
them have stopped coming since. And 82
he consequence was that we were able not merely to pay the t regularly,
but after a few years we bought the whole place j to-day it's practically
free of debt. The further consequence, T admit, was that I ruined my
health, got heart disease, and am now an old woman. Probably you think
that I'm much older than Hans, but the fact is that he's only two or three
years younger than me and will never grow any older either, for at Kjs
work - smoking his pipe, listening to the customers, knocking out his pipe
again, and fetching an occasional pot of beer _. at that sort of work one
doesn't grow old.' 'What you've done has been splendid,' said K. 'I don't
doubt that for a moment, but we were speaking of the time before your
marriage, and it must have been an extraordinary thing at that stage for
Hans's family to press on the marriage - at a money sacrifice, or at least at
such a great risk as the handing over of the inn must have been - and
without trusting in anything but your powers of work, which besides
nobody knew of then, and Hans's powers of work, which everybody must
have known beforehand were nil.' 'Oh, well,' said the landlady wearily. 'I
know what you're getting at and how wide you are of the mark. Klamm
had absolutely nothing to do with the matter. Why should he have
concerned himself about me, or better, how could he in any case have
concerned himself about me? He knew nothing about me by that time.
The fact that he had ceased to summon me was a sign that he had
forgotten me. When he stops summoning people, he forgets them
completely. I didn't want to talk of this before Frieda. And it's not mere
forgetting, it's something more than that. For anybody one has forgotten
can come back to one's memory again, of course. With Klamm that's
impossible. Anybody that he stops summoning he has forgotten
completely, not only as far as the past is concerned, but literally for the
future as well. If I try very hard I can of course think myself into your
ideas, valid, perhaps, in the very different land you come from. But it's
next thing to madness to imagine that Klamm could have given me Hans
as a husband simply that I might have no great difficulty in going to him
if he should summon me sometime again. Where is the man who could 83
hinder me from running to Klamm if Klamm lifted his little finger?