by Franz Kafka
“Here, I think, you’re coming to the decisive point,” said K. “That’s it. After hearing all you’ve said, I think that now I can see clearly. Barnabas is too young for this task. Nothing that he says about what happens up there can be taken seriously. Since he’s always dying of fear up there, he cannot make observations, and if one makes him talk about it here, all one hears are confused fairy tales. It doesn’t surprise me. Respect for the authorities is innate here, and then it’s instilled in you throughout your lives in many different ways and from all sides, and you yourselves help this along as best you can. Still, on the whole, I’m not saying anything against that; if an authority is good, then why shouldn’t one respect it? But then one shouldn’t all of a sudden dispatch to the Castle an uninformed youth like Barnabas, who has never gone beyond the village surroundings, and then expect faithful reports from him and scrutinize his every word as though it were a word from Revelations and make one’s own happiness in life depend on the interpretation. Nothing can be more mistaken. True, I too, not unlike you, let him lead me astray, put my hopes in him and also suffered disappointments through him that were based on his words alone, and thus on next to nothing.” Olga remained silent. “It won’t be easy for me,” said K., “to shake your trust in your brother, for I can see now how much you love him and what you expect of him. But it has to happen and not least because of your love and your expectations. For look here, there’s always something preventing you—I don’t know what it is—from fully recognizing not so much what Barnabas has accomplished as what has been given to him. He is allowed into the offices or, if you prefer, into an anteroom, all right then it’s an anteroom, but there are doors there that lead farther, barriers one can cross if one has the skill to do so. In my case, for instance, that anteroom is, at least for now, completely inaccessible. Who Barnabas speaks to there I don’t know, perhaps that copyist is the lowest of the servants, but even if he is the lowest he can lead you to the next highest and if he cannot lead you to him, then he can at least name him, and if he cannot name him then he can after all point out someone who will be able to name him. That so-called Klamm may not have anything at all in common with the real one, the similarity may exist only in Barnabas’s eyes, which are blind from excitement, he may be the lowest of the officials, perhaps he is not even an official, but some task or other does keep him busy at his desk, he reads something in his large book, whispers something to the copyist, thinks of something when, after a long interval, his eye falls on Barnabas, and even if all of this isn’t true and his actions are quite insignificant, then at least somebody put him there and did so with some purpose in mind. By all this I simply want to say that something is there, that Barnabas is being offered something, and that it is only Barnabas’s fault if he can achieve nothing with that other than doubt, fear, and hopelessness. And as a starting point I always took the least favorable case, which is actually quite unlikely. For we do have the letters in hand, which I certainly don’t trust much, though far more so than the words of Barnabas. Even if they are old worthless letters pulled out indiscriminately from a pile of equally worthless letters, indiscriminately, and with no more sense than that employed by canaries at fairs who pick somebody’s fortune out of a pile, even if that is so, then at least these letters bear some relation to my work, are clearly intended for me, though perhaps not for my use, and, as the council chairman and his wife have testified, were personally signed by Klamm, and have, once again according to the council chairman, a significance that, while merely private and scarcely transparent, is nevertheless quite considerable.” “Did the council chairman say so?” Olga asked. “Yes, he said so,” K. answered. “I’ll tell Barnabas,” Olga said quickly, “that will greatly encourage him.” “But he needs no encouragement,” said K., “encouraging him now means telling him that he’s right, that he need only carry on in the same way as before, but that way he’ll never accomplish anything; no matter how much you keep encouraging someone who is blindfolded to stare through the cloth, he still won’t see a thing; it’s only when you take off the blindfold that he can see. It is help that Barnabas needs, not encouragement. But bear this in mind: up there are the authorities in their inextricable greatness—I thought I had an approximate conception of them before coming here, how childish all that was—up there, therefore, are the authorities, and Barnabas approaches them, nobody else, only he, pitiably alone, he would be too greatly honored if he doesn’t spend the rest of his life lost in a dark corner of the office.” “Don’t imagine, K.,” said Olga, “that we underestimate the difficulty of the task that Barnabas has taken on. And we do not lack respect for the authorities, you yourself said so.” “But it’s misguided respect,” said K., “it’s respect that is addressed to the wrong place, that kind of respect demeans its object. Can one still call it respect when Barnabas misuses the gift of entry to those rooms in order to while away his days idly there or when he comes down and discredits and belittles those whom he has just trembled before or when out of despair or weariness he fails to deliver the letters and messages that are entrusted to him? That is hardly respect. But the reproach goes even further, goes against you as well, Olga, I cannot spare you this, for though you think you respect the authorities, you sent Barnabas, young, weak, and isolated as he is, to the Castle, or at any rate never kept him from going.”
“The reproach you’re making,” said Olga, “is one I have always leveled against myself. In any case what I should be reproached for is not that I sent Barnabas to the Castle, I didn’t send him, he went on his own, but rather that I should have kept him from going by every means, through persuasion, through cunning, and through force. I ought to have kept him from going, but if this were that day again, that day of decision, and I felt the plight of Barnabas, the plight of our family, as I did then and do now, and if Barnabas himself, fully conscious of all the responsibility and danger, were to free himself from me consciously, with a smile, gently, in order to leave, even today I wouldn’t keep him from going, despite all my experiences in the meantime, and I believe that in my place you couldn’t help but do likewise. You don’t know our plight, so you treat all of us, but Barnabas in particular, unjustly. We had more hope then than we do today, but at the time our hope was not great either, what was great was our plight, and that is still so. Hasn’t Frieda told you anything about us?” “Only a few hints,” said K., “nothing definite, but the mere mention of your name irritates her.” “And the landlady didn’t tell you anything either?” “No, nothing.” “And nobody else either?” “Nobody.” “Of course how could anybody tell you anything! Everybody knows something about us, either the truth, insofar as people have access to it, or at least a rumor, picked up somewhere or mostly fabricated outright, and everybody thinks about us more than they ought, but nobody will go so far as to tell you, because they’re afraid to let such things cross their lips. And they’re right about that. It’s difficult to bring this up even with you, K., for isn’t it possible that after you’ve heard it you’ll go away and will want to have nothing more to do with us, little enough though this seems to affect you. Then we will have lost you, a person who, I must confess, almost means more to me than does the entire previous Castle service of Barnabas. And yet—this contradiction has been tormenting me all evening—this is something that you must hear, for otherwise you won’t get an overall picture of our situation, and would continue—this would be especially hurtful to me—being unjust toward Barnabas, for the complete agreement that is necessary would be missing, and you couldn’t help us or accept our help, our unofficial help. But there is one other question still: Do you even want to know?” “Why do you ask that?” said K., “if it is necessary, I want to know, but why do you ask like that?” “Out of superstition,” said Olga, “You will be drawn into our affairs, innocently, not much guiltier than Barnabas.” “Tell me quickly,” said K., “I’m not afraid. Besides, you’re making things worse with your woman’s fears.”
XVII.
AMALIA
’S SECRET
“Judge for yourself,” said Olga, “in any case it sounds quite simple, one doesn’t immediately understand how it can be so important. There’s an official at the Castle called Sortini.” “I’ve heard of him,” said K., “he was involved in summoning me.” “I don’t think so,” said Olga, “Sortini hardly ever appears in public. Aren’t you mistaking him for Sordini, written with a ‘d’?” “You’re right,” said K., “it was Sordini.” “Yes,” said Olga, “Sordini is quite well known, one of the most industrious officials, he’s often mentioned, Sortini by contrast is very retiring and little known. Three years ago I saw him for the first and last time. It was on the third of July at a festival of the Firemen’s Association, the Castle had participated by donating a new fire engine. Sortini, who is said to deal partly with fire department matters but may only have been present as a substitute—usually the officials fill in for one another and so it’s difficult to determine the responsibility of this or that official—Sortini took part in the handing over of the engine, others too had of course come from the Castle, officials and servants, and Sortini, as befits his character, remained in the background. He’s a small, frail, pensive gentleman, what struck everyone who even noticed him was the way he wrinkled his forehead, all his wrinkles—and there were a lot, though he could hardly be over forty—spread out in fanlike fashion straight across his forehead and down to the bridge of his nose, I have never seen anything like it. And so this was the festival. We, Amalia and I, had been looking forward to it for weeks, our Sunday clothes had been made to seem almost like new again, Amalia’s dress was very beautiful, her white blouse was billowing at the top with row upon row of lace, Mother had lent her all her lace, I was jealous then, and before the festival I wept half the night. It was only when the landlady from the Bridge Inn came to inspect us in the morning—” “The landlady from the Bridge Inn?” asked K. “Yes,” said Olga, “she was a good friend of ours, she came and had to admit that Amalia had an advantage over me, and then, to calm me down, she lent me her own necklace of Bohemian garnets. But just when we were ready to leave, Amalia was standing in front of me, we were all admiring her, and Father was saying: “Today, mark my words, Amalia will find a fiancé,” just then, I don’t know why, I took off the necklace, my pride, and, no longer jealous, put it around Amalia’s neck. I simply bowed down before her victory and thought that everyone else would also have to bow down before her; perhaps we were surprised that she looked different than usual, for she certainly wasn’t beautiful, but her bleak gaze, which has been the same ever since, went high up over our heads, so that we, quite involuntarily and almost literally, bowed down before her. Everybody noticed it, even Lasemann and his wife, who came to fetch us.” “Lasemann?” asked K. “Yes, Lasemann,” said Olga, “we were held in great esteem and the festival, for instance, couldn’t really have started without us, since Father was third drillmaster in the fire company.” “So your father was still that robust?” asked K. “Father?” asked Olga, as though she didn’t quite understand, “three years ago he was still more or less a young man and, during a fire at the Gentlemen’s Inn, for instance, he sprinted out with an official, the heavyset Galater, on his back. I was there myself, there was certainly no danger of fire, only some dry wood by a stove had started smoldering, but Galater became frightened, he called out the window for help, the firemen came and my father had to carry him out, though the fire had already been put out. Well, Galater finds it difficult to move and has to be cautious in situations like that. I’m only telling you this because of Father, that’s little more than three years ago and now look at how he is sitting there.” Only now did K. notice that Amalia was back in the room, but she was far off at her parents’ table, feeding her mother, who couldn’t move her rheumatic arms, and encouraging her father to be a little more patient about his meal, saying she’d be over soon to feed him. But her rebuke had little effect, since her father, ravenous for his soup, overcame his physical weakness, attempted to slurp the soup out of the spoon and then to drink it straight from the soup plate, muttering angrily each time over his lack of success; the spoon, empty long before it reached his mouth, which he was trying to dip into the soup, got only as far as his drooping mustache, which was dripping and splashing soup everywhere except into his mouth. “That’s what those three years have done to him?” K. asked, but he still had no pity for these old people, he had nothing but distaste for that entire corner with the family table. “Those three years,” said Olga slowly, “or to be precise, a couple of hours at a festival. The festival was held on a meadow outside the village at the brook, it was already packed when we arrived, many people had come from the neighboring villages as well, the din left us quite confused. First Father led us to the fire engine, he laughed with joy when he saw it, a new engine made him happy, he began to touch it and to explain it to us, he would tolerate no argument or contradiction from the others; if something had to be inspected under the engine, all of us had to bend down and virtually crawl under the engine, Barnabas, who put up some resistance, got blows. Only Amalia ignored the engine, she was standing upright in her beautiful dress, nobody dared say a word to her, I occasionally ran over to her and took her by the arm, but she remained silent. Even today I cannot explain to myself how we could have kept standing there in front of that engine for so long, and only when Father freed himself from it did we notice Sortini, who evidently had been behind the fire engine the whole time, leaning against one of its levers. True, there was a dreadful din at the time, and not just the usual sort of thing at festivals; the Castle had also donated a few trumpets to the fire company, special instruments on which a person, even a child, could without the slightest effort produce the wildest sounds; on hearing them, one would think the Turks were coming, and one could never get used to it, at each blast one jumped. And since they were new trumpets, everyone wanted to try them out, and since it was after all a public festival, permission was given. Standing around us, perhaps they had been attracted by Amalia, were a few such trumpeters, it was difficult to keep our wits about us, and then when in addition on Father’s orders we were obliged to watch the engine, we were absolutely stretched to the limit, which is why Sortini, whom we had never seen before, escaped our attention so long. There’s Sortini,’ Lasemann finally said—I was standing next to him—in a whisper to Father. Father bowed low and, very excitedly, motioned for us to bow too. Although Father had never before met Sortini, he had always had great respect for his expertise in fire company matters and had often spoken of him at home, and so it was extremely surprising and significant to see Sortini in person. But Sortini paid no attention to us, that wasn’t an idiosyncrasy of Sortini’s, in public most officials seem indifferent, besides he was tired, only his official duties kept him down here, those officials who find these representational duties particularly oppressive aren’t the worst sort, the other officials and servants mingled with the ordinary people now that they had actually come, but he remained beside the engine, anybody who attempted to approach him with requests or flattery he drove away with his silence. And this explains why he noticed us even later than we noticed him. Only when we bowed respectfully and Father attempted to apologize for us did he glance over at us, glancing wearily from one to the other, as if sighing over the fact that behind each person there was always another, until he fixed on Amalia, whom he had to look up at since she was much taller than he. He gave a start, then jumped over the shaft in order to be close to Amalia, we misunderstood this at first and all of us tried to approach him with Father in the lead, but he kept us away by raising his hand and then motioned for us to leave. That’s all that happened. We teased Amalia a great deal about having actually found a fiancé and in our foolishness were quite cheerful all afternoon, but Amalia was more silent than ever, ‘She’s utterly, madly in love with Sortini,’ said Brunswick, who’s always quite coarse and cannot understand people with natures such as Amalia’s, but this time his comment seemed to us almost justified, that day we
were quite silly and all of us, except for Amalia, seemed in a daze from the sweet Castle wine when we arrived home after midnight.” “And Sortini?” asked K. “Oh, Sortini,” said Olga, “I saw Sortini several times during the festival, he was sitting on the shaft with his arms crossed over his chest and stayed like that until the carriage from the Castle came to pick him up. He didn’t even go to the fire drills, in the course of which Father, precisely in hopes of being seen by Sortini, stood out from the other men his age.” “And did you never hear from him again?” asked K. “You seem to have great admiration for Sortini.” “Yes, admiration,” said Olga, “and yes, we did hear from him again. Next morning we were awakened from our wine-induced sleep by Amalia’s screams, the others immediately sank back on their beds, but I was fully awake and ran to Amalia, she stood by the window holding a letter which had just been handed in the window by a man who was still waiting for an answer. Amalia had already read the letter—it was brief—and she held it in her hand, which hung limply by her side; how I always loved her when she was tired. I knelt down beside her and read the letter. I had barely finished when Amalia, after a quick glance at me, picked it up and, unable to force herself to read it again, tore it up, threw the scraps in the face of the man outside, and shut the window. And so that was the decisive morning. I call it decisive, but every moment of the previous afternoon was just as decisive.” “And what was in the letter?” asked K. “Oh yes, I haven’t told you yet,” said Olga, “the letter came from Sortini and was addressed to the girl with the garnet necklace. I cannot repeat the whole thing. It was a demand that Amalia should come to him at the Gentlemen’s Inn and, to be precise, that she should come at once since Sortini had to leave in half an hour. The letter made use of the most vulgar expressions, I had never heard the likes of them before and from the context could only half-guess their meaning. Anybody who did not know Amalia and who had read only this letter would have to think that a girl to whom someone had dared to address such a letter was dishonored, even if she had not been touched. And it wasn’t a love letter, it contained no flattery; on the contrary, Sortini was obviously annoyed that the sight of Amalia had moved him and kept him from his work. The way we explained it later to ourselves was that Sortini had probably wanted to go to the Castle that evening, had stayed behind only because of Amalia, and then, furious next morning at not having succeeded in forgetting Amalia at night, had written the letter. Even the most cold-blooded person couldn’t help being outraged by the letter, but then in anyone other than Amalia fear of the malicious, threatening tone would have gained the upper hand; in Amalia’s case, it went further than outrage, she simply knows no fear, neither for herself nor for others. And then as I crawled back to bed, repeating the fragmentary final sentence: ‘So come at once, or else—!’ Amalia stayed on the window sill, gazing out as if she were waiting for further messengers and were determined to treat each one just like the first.” “Those then are the officials,” K. said hesitantly, “there are even types like that among them. And what did your father do? I hope he lodged a forceful complaint about Sortini with the proper office, unless he chose to take the shorter, more certain path to the Gentlemen’s Inn. What’s most dreadful about the story is of course not the insult to Amalia, that could have been easily remedied, I cannot understand why you insist on attaching such disproportionate importance to that; why should Sortini have permanently disgraced Amalia with such a letter, that is the conclusion which could be drawn from your story, but that’s actually quite impossible, Amalia would have been easily satisfied and in a few days the incident would have been forgotten, Sortini did not show Amalia up but rather himself. I recoil from Sortini and the possibility of such abuse of power. The approach that failed in this case because it was stated clearly and bluntly and encountered in Amalia a superior opponent can succeed completely in thousands of other cases in circumstances that are only slightly more unfavorable and cannot be seen by anybody, even by the mistreated person.” “Hush,” said Olga, “Amalia is looking over.” Amalia had finished feeding her parents and was about to undress her mother, she had just untied her skirt, put her mother’s arms around her neck, raised her slightly, took off her skirt, and laid her down gently. The father, constantly impatient that the mother was being taken care of first, though this obviously had happened only because the mother was even more helpless than he, attempted, perhaps in order to punish his daughter for her supposed slowness, to undress himself, but even though he had begun with the least necessary and easiest part, the enormous slippers in which his feet were flopping about, he had absolutely no success in slipping them off; breathing hoarsely, he soon had to give up and to lean back stiffly on his chair. “You missed the decisive point,” said Olga, “everything you say may be true, but the decisive point was that Amalia wouldn’t go to the Gentlemen’s Inn; her treatment of the messenger could have been let slip, could have been hushed up; but because of her refusal to go, the curse was placed on our family and then the treatment of the messenger came to be seen as unpardonable, and was even thrust to the forefront of public attention.” “What!” cried K., and instantly lowered his voice since Olga was raising her hands pleadingly, “You, Amalia’s sister, surely don’t mean she should have obeyed Sortini and rushed to the Gentlemen’s Inn?” “No,” said Olga, “spare me your suspicions, how can you believe such a thing? I don’t know anybody who’s so firmly in the right in all she does as Amalia. Had she gone to the Gentlemen’s Inn, I would of course have thought she was right, but her not going was heroic. As for me, I will openly admit to you that if I had received a letter like that I would have gone. I couldn’t have endured the anxiety about what might happen, only Amalia could have done so. Well, there were several ways around this, another woman might for instance have dressed very beautifully, which would have taken time, and then gone to the Gentlemen’s Inn and found out that Sortini had already left, perhaps that he had left immediately after sending the messenger, something that is indeed quite likely since the gentlemen’s whims are short-lived. But Amalia didn’t do that or anything of the sort, she was too deeply insulted and could not restrain herself. If only she had somehow made a show of obeying, simply stepped over the threshold of the Gentlemen’s Inn, then the disaster could have been averted, we have very clever lawyers here who know how to transform a mere trifle into anything one cares for it to be, but in this case there wasn’t even a favorable trifle; on the contrary, there was only the degradation of Sortini’s letter and the insult to the messenger.” “But what kind of disaster is this,” said K., “what kind of lawyers are they? They couldn’t accuse, let alone punish Amalia because of Sortini’s criminal behavior?” “Oh yes they could,” said Olga, “though not after a regular trial, and they didn’t punish her directly either, but they certainly punished her in another way, her and our entire family, and surely you’re beginning to understand the severity of this punishment. To you, it seems unjust and monstrous, but in the village that is an extremely rare opinion, it’s very favorable to us and should console us, as indeed it would if it weren’t clearly attributable to certain mistakes. I can easily prove this to you, pardon me if I mention Frieda here, but what happened between Frieda and Klamm is actually, except for the form it ultimately took, extremely similar to what happened between Amalia and Sortini, and yet, however shocked you may initially have been, you now think it’s a good thing. And that isn’t simply habit, habit doesn’t dull one’s perceptions in that manner if one simply has to arrive at some judgment; it’s just a casting off of error.” “No, Olga,” said K., “I don’t know why you’re bringing Frieda into this, her case was entirely different, don’t get such completely different things mixed up, go on.” “Please,” said Olga, “don’t take it amiss if I insist on comparing them, you’re still mistaken concerning Frieda if you think you have to defend her against such a comparison. She doesn’t need to be defended, simply praised. In comparing the two cases I don’t mean to say that they’re identical, they are to each each o
ther as white is to black, and Frieda is white. If worst comes to worst, one can always laugh at Frieda, as I so rudely did in the taproom—I very much regretted it later—but even then the person who laughs is merely malicious or envious; still, one can laugh, whereas for Amalia all one can have, if one is not a blood relative of hers, is contempt. So they certainly are, as you say, entirely different cases, but they’re similar too.” “They are not similar either,” said K., shaking his head in anger, “leave Frieda out of this. Frieda didn’t get a nice fine letter like Amalia’s from Sortini, and Frieda truly loved Klamm, anyone who doubts this can ask her, she still loves him.” “But are those such big differences?” asked Olga. “Do you think Klamm couldn’t have written to Frieda in the same manner? That’s how the gentlemen are when they stand up from their desks; they cannot get their bearings in the world; in their absentmindedness they say the coarsest things, not everyone does, but many do. The letter to Amalia may well have been dashed off while deep in thought, without any regard whatsoever for what was actually being written. What do we know about the gentlemen’s thoughts! Have you not heard anything yourself, or found out through anybody else, about the tone in which Klamm consorted with Frieda? Klamm is known to be very vulgar, supposedly he doesn’t say a word for hours and then suddenly he says something so vulgar that one can only shudder. Sortini isn’t particularly known for that, indeed he is entirely unknown. Actually, all that’s known about him is that his name is similar to Sordini’s, and if it weren’t for the similarity of their names, people would probably not even know him. Even as an expert in fire company matters he is probably confused with Sordini, the real expert, who uses the similarity of the two names to shift his representational duties onto Sortini so that he isn’t interrupted at work. When a man so unfamiliar with the ways of the world as Sortini is overcome by love for a village girl, this naturally takes on a very different shape from the love affair of the cabinetmaker’s apprentice next door. Nor should one forget the great distance between an official and a shoemaker’s daughter, which must somehow be bridged, this is how Sortini went about it, another person might do so differently. True, they say that all of us belong to the Castle and that there’s no distance between them and us, and that there’s nothing to bridge, and in general this may indeed be so, but unfortunately we had a chance to see that when everything is at stake it isn’t that way at all. Anyhow, after all this, Sortini’s behavior will at least seem more understandable and slightly less outrageous to you, and indeed, compared with Klamm’s behavior, it’s far more understandable and, even if one happens to be directly involved, far more tolerable. A tender letter from Klamm is more painfully embarrassing than the most vulgar letter from Sortini. Don’t misunderstand me, I wouldn’t dare to pronounce judgment on Klamm, I’m comparing them only because you resist the comparison. But Klamm is like a commandant over women, he commands this one here and that one there to come to him, but doesn’t tolerate any one of them for long, and just as he commands them to come, so too does he command them to go. Oh! Klamm wouldn’t even go to the trouble of writing a letter first. And by contrast does it still seem so outrageous that Sortini, who leads a completely retiring existence and whose relationships with women are at the very least unknown, should one day sit down and in his beautiful official’s script write a truly repulsive letter. And if this doesn’t yield a difference that is favorable to Klamm but rather the opposite, could Frieda’s love possibly do so? Believe me, the relationship between women and officials is very difficult, or rather always very easy, to determine. Love is never lacking here. In the case of the officials there is no unhappy love. So in this regard it is not praise when one says of a girl—and I’m certainly not talking about Frieda alone—that it was only out of love that she gave herself to the official. She loved him and gave herself to him, that’s how it was, but there’s nothing praiseworthy about that. Yet Amalia didn’t love Sortini, you want to object. All right, so she didn’t love him, but then again perhaps she did love him, who can tell? Not even she is capable of that. How can she think she loved him when she rejected him more forcefully than any official was probably ever rejected. Barnabas says that even now she sometimes still trembles from the emotion with which she slammed that window three years ago. That is indeed true, so one cannot ask her about it; she’s finished with Sortini and that’s all she knows; she does not know whether she loves him. But we know that women cannot help loving officials when the officials approach them, and indeed even beforehand they’re in love with the officials, no matter how strongly they attempt to deny it, and Sortini not only approached Amalia, on seeing Amalia he even jumped over the shaft, with legs stiff from desk work he jumped over the shaft. But, you will say, Amalia is an exception. Yes, she is, she proved that when she refused to go to Sortini, and that’s already enough of an exception; but as for her not having loved Sortini, that would be almost too much of an exception, it would be utterly incomprehensible. That afternoon certainly we were blinded, but our very belief that we could see through all that fog some sign of Amalia’s being in love surely shows some awareness. But if one pieces all this together, what difference does that leave between Frieda and Amalia? The only difference is that Frieda did what Amalia refused to do.” “Maybe so,” said K., “but to me the main difference is that Frieda is my fiancée whereas Amalia fundamentally concerns me only inasmuch as she is the sister of Barnabas the Castle messenger, and her fate is perhaps bound up with Barnabas’s service. Had an official done her such a crying injustice as I initially thought after hearing your story, then I would have worried about it a great deal, but more as a matter of public concern than as Amalia’s private sorrow. Now after your story the picture changes in a way that I find less than comprehensible, but since you are the one telling it, it’s credible enough, and so I shall be quite happy to disregard the matter entirely, I am not a fireman, why should I care about Sortini? But I do care about Frieda and therefore find it strange that you, whom I trusted completely and shall always be willing to trust, are constantly attempting through the roundabout means of Amalia to attack Frieda and to make me suspicious of her. I’m not assuming you do so intentionally, let alone with bad intentions, for if that were so I would long since have been obliged to leave, you’re not doing so intentionally, the circumstances lead you to do so, out of love for Amalia you want to set her above all other women and, since you cannot find enough to praise in Amalia even for that purpose, you help yourself out by belittling other women. Amalia’s deed is odd, but the more you speak of the deed, the harder it is to decide whether it was great or small, clever or foolish, heroic or cowardly, Amalia keeps her motives sealed within her breast, nobody can drag them from her. Frieda, on the other hand, hasn’t acted strangely but simply followed her heart, as is clear to anyone willing to occupy himself with this, anyone can check for himself, there is no cause for gossip. And I have no desire to belittle Amalia nor to defend Frieda, I simply want to explain how I stand with regard to Frieda and to show that all attacks against Frieda are at the same time attacks against my existence. I came here voluntarily and have tied myself down here voluntarily, but everything that happened in between, and especially my future prospects—bleak though they are, they do exist—I owe to Frieda, that simply cannot be denied. I was indeed taken on here as a surveyor, but only in appearance, they played games with me, drove me out of every house, and even today they’re still playing games with me, but now it’s all much more complicated, I have in a sense increased in girth and that already says something; trivial though all this is, I do after all have a home, a position, and real work, I have a fiancée who takes over my professional work whenever I have other business to attend to, I shall marry her and join the community; I also have, besides an official connection to Klamm, a personal one, which I have admittedly not yet been able to take advantage of. Now surely this is more than a little? And when I come to you, whom do you greet? In whom do you confide your family’s story? From whom do you expect a chance, be
it even the tiniest most improbable chance, of some help? Surely it’s not from me, the surveyor, who for instance only a week ago was forcibly ejected by Lasemann and Brunswick from their house, that you expect this but rather from the man who already has some means of power, yet it is precisely to Frieda that I owe these means of power, to Frieda, who is so modest that were you to ask her anything of that nature she would certainly say she didn’t know the slightest thing about it. And nonetheless after all this it seems as if Frieda in her innocence has done more than Amalia in all her arrogance, for look, I have the impression that you’re seeking help for Amalia. And from whom? Well, in reality from none other than Frieda.” “Did I really say such nasty things about Frieda?” said Olga, “I certainly had no intention of doing so and do not believe I did, but that’s possible, the situation is such that we have fallen out with absolutely everyone and once we start complaining we get carried away and don’t know where we will end up. You’re right again, there is a big difference now between Frieda and us, and it’s good to emphasize that for a change. Three years ago we were middle-class girls and Frieda, the orphan, was a maid in the Bridge Inn, we went past her without even glancing at her, we were probably too arrogant, but that is how we were brought up. Yet that evening at the Gentlemen’s Inn, you may have noticed the present situation: Frieda, whip in hand, and me among the bunch of servants. But of course it is even worse. Frieda may despise us, that is in her position only fitting, the existing circumstances dictate it. But who does not despise us! Anybody who decides to despise us immediately joins the biggest circle of all. You know Frieda’s successor? Pepi is her name. I met her only two evenings ago, she used to be a chambermaid. Her contempt for me surpasses even Frieda’s. On catching sight of me through the window when I came for beer, she ran to the door and locked it, I had to plead for a long time and it wasn’t until I promised her the ribbon I wore in my hair that she finally opened up for me. But when I handed it to her, she simply threw it in a corner. Well, she’s entitled to despise me, I’m partly dependent on her goodwill and she is after all a barmaid at the Gentlemen’s Inn, but she is only temporary and certainly doesn’t have the qualities that are needed to obtain a permanent position there. One need only listen to how the landlord speaks to Pepi and compare it with how he spoke to Frieda. But that doesn’t stop Pepi from despising Amalia, Amalia, whose very expression would be enough to whisk tiny little Pepi with all her braids and bows from the room at a speed that, if she had been exclusively dependent on her own fat little legs, she could never have managed. What outrageous chatter about Amalia I had to put up with again yesterday until the guests finally took my side, but only in the way you yourself once saw.” “How frightened you are,” said K., “all I did was give Frieda her rightful place, I didn’t want to disparage you, as you now make out. Besides, your family means something to me, I never concealed that; how this specialness could be a reason for contempt I cannot understand.” “Oh, K.,” said Olga, “even you will eventually understand it, I fear; that Amalia’s conduct toward Sortini was the original reason for the contempt, is there no way you can understand that?” “But that would be too odd,” said K., “one could either admire or condemn Amalia for that reason, but despise her? And if on the strength of a feeling that I find quite incomprehensible they actually despise Amalia, why do they extend that contempt to you, the innocent family? It’s a little much that Pepi, say, despises you, and next time I go by the Gentlemen’s Inn I intend to make her pay for it.” “K.,” said Olga, “if you wanted to win over everyone who despises us it would be hard work since all of this comes from the Castle. I still have a distinct recollection of the next morning. Brunswick, our assistant at the time, had arrived as he did each day, Father had given him some work and sent him home, then we sat down to breakfast, everyone except Amalia and myself was quite lively, Father kept talking about the festival, he had various plans concerning the fire company; the Castle, you see, has its own fire company, which had also sent a delegation to the festival, with whom there had been several discussions, the gentlemen from the Castle who were present had seen the performance of our fire company, had spoken quite favorably of them, and had compared them with the performance of the Castle fire company, the outcome was in our favor, they spoke of the need to reorganize the Castle fire company, instructors from the village were needed for that, there were several possible contenders, but Father hoped that the choice would fall on him. He now spoke about this, and being in the rather endearing habit of spreading himself out rather wide at table, he sat there, clasping half the table with his arms and looking out the open window toward the sky, his face so young and so joyously hopeful, I would never again see him like that. Then Amalia said, with a sovereignty we had never noticed in her before, that one shouldn’t put one’s trust in speeches like that from the gentlemen, for on such occasions the gentlemen liked to say agreeable things, but they had little or no significance and, once uttered, they were forgotten for all time, but, admittedly, on the very next occasion one got caught again in their trap. Mother forbade her to speak like that, Father simply laughed at her precociousness and experienced airs, but then gave a start, seemed to look about for something he had just noticed was missing, but nothing was missing, and said that Brunswick had told a story about a messenger and a torn-up letter, he asked whether we knew anything about it, whom it concerned, and what the situation was in that regard. We remained silent; Barnabas, still young as a little lamb, said something particularly stupid or cheeky, we spoke about something else and the affair was forgotten.”
