IV

IV

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 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 forever 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 Fräulein Frieda by herself.” And when he 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 faces. 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 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 honour,” said the landlady, who also had tears in her eyes. She looked a little worn and breathed with difficulty, but she found strength enough to say: “There’s only the question now of what guarantees you are to give Frieda, for great as is my respect for you, you’re a stranger here; there’s nobody here who can speak to you, your family circumstances aren’t known here, so some guarantee is necessary. You must see that, my dear sir, and indeed you touched on it yourself when you mentioned how much Frieda must lose through her association with you.” “Of 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!” “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!” “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!” “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 my 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 absentminded 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 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 either. 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’s possible, but she’ll never again be admitted to his presence, a girl who has thrown herself away upon you. And there’s just 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 lay 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 title⁠—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 incomprehendingly, and turned to Frieda. “Do you hear that, Frieda, it’s about you that he, he, wants to speak to Klamm, to Klamm!”

“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 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 faraway 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 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 in 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!” 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 emphasise 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! 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, she seized one of them by the hand, “do you hear where the man goes hobnobbing, with the family of Barnabas? Oh, certainly he’d get a bed there; I only wish 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 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 so. 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 committed,” 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 landlady 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 enlightened 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 you own ignorance constantly in 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 realised 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 unshakable 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 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.