III

Gregor's severe wound, which he suffered from for over a month—the apple remained, since no one dared remove it, sitting as a visible memento in his flesh—seemed even to have reminded the father that, despite his present sorrowful and repulsive form, Gregor was a family member who must not be treated like an enemy, but toward whom the duty of family obligation was to swallow down the aversion and to tolerate, nothing but tolerate.

And if now Gregor, through his wound, had probably lost forever his capacity for movement and for the time being needed long, long minutes to cross his room like an old invalid—crawling up high was out of the question—he received for this worsening of his condition a compensation, in his opinion fully sufficient, in that always toward evening the parlor door, which he was accustomed to observe sharply one or two hours beforehand, was opened, so that he, lying in the darkness of his room, invisible from the parlor, could see the whole family at the lit table and hear their speech, with general permission as it were, thus quite differently than before.

To be sure, these were no longer the lively conversations of earlier times, of which Gregor had always thought with some longing in the little hotel rooms when he had to throw himself wearily into the damp bedding. Now it usually went very quietly. The father soon fell asleep in his armchair after supper; the mother and sister admonished each other to silence; the mother sewed, bent far over the light, fine linen for a fashion shop; the sister, who had taken a position as a salesgirl, studied stenography and French in the evening in order perhaps later to attain a better post. Sometimes the father woke up, and as if he did not know at all that he had slept, said to the mother: "How long you have been sewing again today!" and immediately fell asleep again, while mother and sister smiled wearily at each other.

With a kind of stubbornness the father refused to take off his servant's uniform even at home; and while the dressing gown hung uselessly on the clothes hook, the father dozed fully clothed in his place, as if always ready for his service and here too awaiting the voice of his superior. Consequently the uniform, which from the start was not new, lost none of its cleanliness despite all the care of mother and sister, and Gregor often watched for whole evenings this garment, stained all over and yet gleaming with its ever-polished gold buttons, in which the old man slept most uncomfortably yet peacefully.

As soon as the clock struck ten, the mother tried through gentle words to wake the father and then persuade him to go to bed, for here it was no proper sleep, and this the father, who had to begin his service at six, urgently needed. But in the stubbornness that had seized him since becoming a servant, he always insisted on staying longer at the table, although he regularly fell asleep, and was then moreover only with the greatest difficulty to be moved to exchange the armchair for the bed. However much mother and sister pressed him with little admonitions, for a quarter of an hour he slowly shook his head, kept his eyes closed, and did not stand up. The mother tugged at his sleeve, spoke flattering words into his ear, the sister left her task to help the mother, but with the father this did not catch. He only sank deeper into his armchair. Only when the women took him under the armpits did he open his eyes, looked alternately at mother and sister, and was accustomed to say: "That is a life. That is the rest of my old days." And supported by the two women, he rose, cumbersomely, as if he were the greatest burden to himself, let himself be led by the women to the door, waved them off there, and then went on independently, while the mother threw down her sewing things and the sister her pen with the greatest haste, to run behind the father and help him further.

Who in this overworked and exhausted family had time to concern themselves with Gregor more than absolutely necessary? The household was increasingly restricted; the maid was now dismissed after all; a huge bony charwoman with white hair fluttering around her head came in the morning and evening to do the heaviest work; everything else the mother attended to beside her much sewing. It even happened that various pieces of family jewelry, which mother and sister had formerly worn with great delight at gatherings and celebrations, were sold, as Gregor learned in the evening from the general discussion of the prices obtained. But the greatest complaint was always that one could not leave this apartment, too large for present circumstances, since it was unthinkable how one might move Gregor. But Gregor well understood that it was not only consideration for him that prevented a move, for he could easily have been transported in a suitable box with a few air holes; what chiefly kept the family from changing quarters was rather the utter hopelessness and the thought that they were stricken with a misfortune such as no one else in their whole circle of relatives and acquaintances. What the world demands of poor people they fulfilled to the utmost; the father fetched breakfast for the little bank clerk, the mother sacrificed herself for the laundry of strangers, the sister ran back and forth behind the counter at the command of customers, but beyond that the family's strength did not reach. And the wound in his back began to pain Gregor as if anew when mother and sister, after having put the father to bed, now returned, left their work, moved close together, and sat already cheek to cheek; when now the mother, pointing to Gregor's room, said: "Shut the door there, Grete," and when Gregor was again in darkness while in the next room the women mingled their tears or stared tearlessly at the table.

Gregor spent the nights and days almost entirely without sleep. Sometimes he thought of taking the family's affairs back in hand exactly as before at the next opening of the door; in his thoughts there appeared again after a long time the chief and the manager, the clerks and the apprentices, the so very obtuse porter, two or three friends from other businesses, a chambermaid from a provincial hotel, a dear fleeting memory, a cashier from a hat shop, for whom he had courted seriously but too slowly—they all appeared intermingled with strangers or already forgotten, but instead of helping him and his family, they were all inaccessible, and he was glad when they disappeared. Then again he was not at all in the mood to worry about his family; only anger at the poor care filled him, and although he could imagine nothing he might have had an appetite for, he nonetheless made plans how to get into the pantry to take there what, even if he had no hunger, was after all his due. No longer considering what might especially please Gregor, the sister hurriedly, before she ran to the shop in the morning and at noon, shoved some arbitrary food into Gregor's room with her foot, to sweep it out in the evening with a flourish of the broom, indifferent as to whether the food had perhaps only been tasted or—the most frequent case—left entirely untouched. The cleaning of the room, which she now always did in the evening, could not have been done more hastily. Dirt streaks ran along the walls, here and there lay clumps of dust and refuse. At first Gregor stationed himself on the sister's arrival in such particularly telling corners, to reproach her by this posture, as it were. But he might have stayed there for weeks without the sister improving; she saw the dirt exactly as he did, but had simply resolved to leave it. Besides, she watched with a sensitivity quite new in her, which had seized the whole family, that the cleaning of Gregor's room remained reserved for her. Once the mother subjected Gregor's room to a thorough cleaning, which succeeded her only after the use of several pails of water—the great dampness did indeed afflict Gregor too and he lay broad, embittered, and immobile on the couch—but the punishment for the mother did not fail to come. For hardly had the sister noticed the change in Gregor's room in the evening when she, deeply offended, ran into the parlor and, despite the mother's beseeching raised hands, broke into a fit of weeping, at which the parents—the father had of course been startled from his armchair—first looked on astonished and helpless; until they too began to stir; the father on the right reproached the mother for not leaving the cleaning of Gregor's room to the sister; on the left, however, shouted at the sister that she would never again be allowed to clean Gregor's room; while the mother tried to drag the father, who in his agitation no longer knew himself, into the bedroom; the sister, shaken by sobs, beat the table with her small fists; and Gregor hissed loudly in anger that no one thought to close the door and spare him this sight and noise.

But even if the sister, exhausted from her job, had become weary of caring for Gregor as before, the mother would by no means have had to take her place and Gregor would still not have needed to be neglected. For now the charwoman was there. This old widow, who in her long life might have survived the worst with the help of her strong bone structure, had no real disgust for Gregor. Without being at all curious, she had by chance once opened the door of Gregor's room and, at the sight of Gregor, who, completely surprised, although no one chased him, began to run back and forth, had stood still with hands folded in her lap, astonished. Since then she never failed to open the door a little briefly morning and evening and look in at Gregor. At first she also called him over to her, with words she probably considered friendly, like "Come over here, old dung beetle!" or "Look at the old dung beetle!" To such addresses Gregor answered with nothing, but remained motionless in his place, as if the door had not been opened. If only one had given this charwoman, instead of letting her uselessly disturb him at her pleasure, the order to clean his room daily! Once in the early morning—a heavy rain, perhaps already a sign of coming spring, beat against the panes—when the charwoman began again with her talk, Gregor was so enraged that he, as if to attack, though slowly and feebly, turned against her. The charwoman, instead of fearing, merely lifted a chair standing near the door high up, and as she stood with wide-open mouth, her intention was clear: to close her mouth only when the chair in her hand came down on Gregor's back. "So no further?" she asked, as Gregor turned around again, and quietly put the chair back in the corner.

Gregor now ate almost nothing more. Only when he by chance passed by the prepared food did he take a bite into his mouth for play, held it there for hours, and then mostly spat it out again. At first he thought it was the sorrow over the state of his room that kept him from eating, but he soon reconciled himself with the changes of the room. They had grown accustomed to putting things that could not be placed elsewhere into this room, and there were many such things, since one room of the apartment had been rented to three lodgers. These serious gentlemen—all three had full beards, as Gregor once established through a door crack—were punctilious about order, not only in their room, but, having rented here, in the whole household, thus especially in the kitchen. Useless or even dirty stuff they could not bear. Moreover they had brought most of their own furnishings. For this reason many things had become superfluous, which were not saleable but which one also did not want to throw away. All these wandered into Gregor's room. Likewise the ash bin and the waste bin from the kitchen. Whatever was momentarily unusable, the charwoman, who was always in great haste, simply flung into Gregor's room; Gregor fortunately mostly saw only the respective object and the hand holding it. The charwoman perhaps intended, given time and occasion, to fetch the things again or throw them all out at once, but in fact they remained lying where they had come by the first throw, unless Gregor crawled through the clutter and set it in motion, at first forced, because no other space was free for crawling, later with growing pleasure, although after such wanderings, tired and sad unto death, he again did not stir for hours.

Since the lodgers sometimes took their supper at home in the common parlor, the parlor door remained closed on some evenings; but Gregor quite easily renounced the opening of the door, for he had already not used many evenings when it was open, but had lain, without the family noticing, in the darkest corner of his room. Once, however, the charwoman had left the door to the parlor slightly open, and it stayed so open, even when the lodgers entered in the evening and lit the light. They sat down at the top of the table, where in earlier times the father, mother, and Gregor had sat, unfolded their napkins and took knives and forks in hand. Immediately the mother appeared in the door with a dish of meat and close behind her the sister with a dish of piled-up potatoes. The food steamed with strong smoke. The lodgers bent over the dishes set before them, as if they wanted to examine them before eating, and indeed the one sitting in the middle, who seemed to count as authority for the other two, cut a piece of meat still on the dish, evidently to determine whether it was tender enough and whether it should perhaps be sent back to the kitchen. He was satisfied, and mother and sister, who had watched tensely, began to smile with relief.

The family itself ate in the kitchen. Nevertheless the father came in here before going to the kitchen, and with a single bow, cap in hand, made a round of the table. The lodgers all rose and murmured something into their beards. When they were alone, they ate almost in complete silence. It seemed strange to Gregor that from all the manifold noises of eating one always heard again their chewing teeth, as if it were meant to show Gregor that one needs teeth to eat, and that even with the finest toothless jaws one can accomplish nothing. "I do have appetite," Gregor told himself anxiously, "but not for these things. How these lodgers nourish themselves, and I perish!"

Precisely this evening—Gregor did not remember having heard the violin during the whole time—it sounded from the kitchen. The lodgers had already finished their supper, the middle one had pulled out a newspaper, given each of the other two a sheet, and now they read leaning back and smoking. When the violin began to play, they became attentive, rose and went on tiptoe to the door of the front room, where they remained crowded together. One must have heard them from the kitchen, for the father called: "Is the playing perhaps unpleasant to the gentlemen? It can be stopped at once." "On the contrary," said the middle gentleman, "would not the young lady come in to us and play here in the room, where it is after all much more comfortable and cozy?" "Oh please," cried the father, as if he were the violinist. The gentlemen stepped back into the room and waited. Soon the father came with the music stand, the mother with the music, and the sister with the violin. The sister calmly prepared everything for playing; the parents, who had never before rented rooms and therefore exaggerated politeness toward the lodgers, did not even dare sit on their own chairs; the father leaned against the door, the right hand stuck between two buttons of the closed livery coat; the mother, however, was offered a chair by a gentleman and sat, since she left the chair where the gentleman had by chance placed it, apart in a corner.

The sister began to play; father and mother followed, each from their side, attentively the movements of her hands. Gregor, drawn by the playing, had ventured a little farther forward and already had his head in the parlor. He scarcely wondered that lately he had shown so little consideration for the others; formerly this consideration had been his pride. And yet he would just now have had more reason to hide, for owing to the dust that lay everywhere in his room and flew about at the slightest movement, he too was entirely covered with dust; threads, hairs, food remnants he dragged about on his back and sides; his indifference to everything was too great for him to have lain on his back and rubbed against the carpet, as he had several times during the day before. And despite this state he had no shyness about advancing a piece onto the immaculate floor of the parlor.

To be sure, no one paid attention to him either. The family was wholly occupied with the violin playing; the lodgers, however, who had at first, hands in trouser pockets, placed themselves too close behind the sister's music stand, so that they could all have looked into the music, which surely must disturb the sister, soon withdrew with subdued talk and lowered heads to the window, where they remained, watched anxiously by the father. It really had the all too clear appearance as if they were disappointed in their assumption of hearing beautiful or entertaining violin playing, had had enough of the whole performance, and only out of politeness let themselves be disturbed in their rest. Especially the way they all blew the smoke of their cigars upward from nose and mouth suggested great nervousness. And yet the sister played so beautifully. Her face was inclined to the side, her gaze followed the lines of music probing and sad. Gregor crawled a little farther forward and held his head close to the ground, in order possibly to meet her gaze. Was he an animal, since music so moved him? It seemed to him as if the way to the longed-for unknown nourishment were revealed. He was resolved to press forward to the sister, pluck at her skirt and thereby indicate to her that she should come with her violin into his room, for no one here rewarded the playing as he wanted to reward it. He did not want to let her out of his room again, at least not as long as he lived; his frightful shape should be useful to him for the first time; at all doors of his room he wanted to be simultaneously and snarl at attackers; but the sister should stay with him not forced but voluntarily; she should sit beside him on the couch, bend her ear down to him, and he wanted then to confide to her that he had had the firm intention to send her to the conservatory, and that he would have said this, had not misfortune intervened, last Christmas—Christmas was surely already past?—to everyone, without caring for any contradiction. After this explanation the sister would burst into tears of emotion, and Gregor would raise himself to her armpit and kiss her neck, which, since she went to work, she wore free without band or collar.

"Mr. Samsa!" cried the middle gentleman to the father and pointed, without losing another word, with his index finger at Gregor, who was slowly moving forward. The violin fell silent, the middle lodger first smiled shaking his head at his friends and then looked again at Gregor. The father seemed to consider it more necessary, instead of driving Gregor away, first to calm the lodgers, although these were not at all excited and Gregor seemed to entertain them more than the violin playing. He hurried to them and sought to press them with outstretched arms into their room and at the same time with his body block their view of Gregor. They now indeed became a little angry, one did not know whether at the father's behavior or at the realization now dawning on them, without knowing it, to have possessed such a room neighbor as Gregor. They demanded explanations from the father, raised their arms in turn, plucked uneasily at their beards and retreated only slowly toward their room. Meanwhile the sister had overcome the bewilderment into which she had fallen after the abruptly broken-off playing; after she had for a while held violin and bow in her laxly hanging hands and looked further into the music as if still playing, she suddenly pulled herself together, laid the instrument on the mother's lap, who still sat in her chair with breathing trouble and violently working lungs, and ran into the next room, which the lodgers under the father's pushing were already approaching faster. One saw how under the practiced hands of the sister the covers and pillows in the beds flew up and arranged themselves. Before the gentlemen reached the room she was finished making the beds and slipped out. The father seemed again so seized by his stubbornness that he forgot all respect which he after all owed his tenants. He only pushed and pushed, until already in the door of the room the middle gentleman stamped thunderously with his foot and thereby brought the father to a halt. "I hereby declare," he said, raised his hand and sought with his glances also the mother and sister, "that with regard to the loathsome conditions prevailing in this apartment and family"—here he spat decisively on the floor—"I cancel my room immediately. I shall of course pay nothing whatsoever for the days I have lived here, on the contrary I shall consider whether I shall not proceed against you with certain—believe me—very easily justified claims." He fell silent and looked straight ahead, as if expecting something. In fact his two friends immediately joined in with the words: "We also cancel immediately." Thereupon he grasped the door handle and closed the door with a crash.

The father staggered with groping hands to his armchair and let himself fall into it; it looked as if he were stretching out for his usual evening nap, but the strong nodding of his seemingly helpless head showed that he was not sleeping at all. Gregor had lain still the whole time in the place where the lodgers had caught him. The disappointment at the failure of his plan, but perhaps also the weakness caused by much hunger, made it impossible for him to move. With a certain certainty he already feared for the next moment a general collapse discharging upon him, and waited. Not even the violin startled him, which, slipping from the mother's trembling fingers, fell from her lap and gave off a resounding tone.

"Dear parents," said the sister and, by way of introduction, struck her hand on the table, "this cannot go on. If you perhaps do not see this, I see it. I do not want to speak the name of my brother before this creature and therefore say only: we must try to get rid of it. We have tried the humanly possible to care for it and tolerate it, I believe no one can make us the slightest reproach."

"She is a thousand times right," said the father to himself. The mother, who still could not find enough breath, began with an expression of madness in her eyes to cough dully into her held-up hand.

The sister hurried to the mother and held her forehead. The father seemed brought to more definite thoughts by the sister's words, had sat up straight, played with his servant's cap among the plates that still stood on the table from the lodgers' supper, and now and then looked at the silent Gregor.

"We must try to get rid of it," said the sister now exclusively to the father, for the mother heard nothing in her coughing, "it will kill you both yet, I see it coming. When one already must work so hard, as we all do, one cannot also endure this eternal torment at home. I cannot either." And she broke into such violent weeping that her tears flowed down onto the mother's face, from which she wiped them with mechanical hand movements.

"Child," said the father pityingly and with striking understanding, "but what shall we do?"

The sister only shrugged her shoulders as a sign of the helplessness that had now, during her weeping, seized her in contrast to her former certainty.

"If he understood us," said the father half questioning; the sister shook her hand out of her weeping violently as a sign that this was not to be thought of.

"If he understood us," repeated the father and by closing his eyes took into himself the sister's conviction of the impossibility of that, "then perhaps an understanding with him were possible. But so—"

"Away it must," cried the sister, "that is the only means, father. You must only try to lose the thought that it is Gregor. That we have believed so for so long, that is our actual misfortune. But how can it be Gregor? If it were Gregor, he would have long realized that a coexistence of humans with such an animal is impossible, and would have gone away voluntarily. We would then have no brother, but could continue to live and honor his memory. But so this animal persecutes us, drives away the lodgers, evidently wants to occupy the whole apartment and let us spend the night on the street. Look, father," she suddenly cried out, "it starts again!" And in a fright entirely incomprehensible to Gregor the sister even left the mother, pushed herself off her chair as if she would rather sacrifice the mother than remain near Gregor, and hurried behind the father, who, excited merely by her behavior, also stood up and held his arms half raised as if to protect the sister before her.

But Gregor had not the least intention of frightening anyone, least of all his sister. He had only begun to turn around in order to crawl back into his room, and that did indeed look striking, for owing to his afflicted condition he had to help himself with his head during the difficult turns, which he here lifted many times and knocked against the floor. He paused and looked around. His good intention seemed to have been recognized; it had been only a momentary fright. Now they all looked at him silently and sadly. The mother lay, legs stretched out and pressed together, in her chair, her eyes almost closing from exhaustion; the father and sister sat side by side, the sister had laid her hand around the father's neck.

"Now I may perhaps turn around," thought Gregor and began his work again. He could not suppress the panting of exertion and now and then had to rest. Otherwise no one urged him, everything was left to himself. When he had completed the turn, he immediately began to crawl straight back. He marveled at the great distance separating him from his room, and did not at all understand how, in his weakness shortly before, he had covered the same way almost without noticing. Ever only intent on rapid crawling, he scarcely noticed that no word, no exclamation of his family disturbed him. Only when he was already in the door did he turn his head, not completely, for he felt his neck stiffening, yet he still saw that behind him nothing had changed, only the sister had stood up. His last glance brushed the mother, who was now completely asleep.

Scarcely was he within his room when the door was pressed shut hastily, bolted and locked. At the sudden noise behind him Gregor was so startled that his little legs buckled. It was the sister, who had hurried so. She had already stood upright and waited, then sprung forward lightly, Gregor had not heard her come, and a "At last!" she called to the parents while she turned the key in the lock.

"And now?" asked Gregor and looked around in the darkness. He soon made the discovery that he could now not move at all. He was not surprised at this, rather it seemed unnatural to him that he had actually been able to move about until now with these thin little legs. Besides he felt comparatively comfortable. He did have pains in his whole body, but it seemed to him as if they were gradually growing weaker and weaker and would finally vanish entirely. The rotten apple in his back and the inflamed surrounding area, entirely covered with soft dust, he scarcely felt anymore. He thought back on his family with emotion and love. His opinion that he must disappear was, if possible, even more decided than that of his sister. In this state of empty and peaceful reflection he remained until the tower clock struck the third morning hour. He still experienced the beginning of the general brightening outside before the window. Then his head sank completely down without his will, and from his nostrils his last breath streamed forth weakly.

When the charwoman came early in the morning—out of sheer strength and haste she slammed, as often as one had already begged her to avoid it, all doors so that in the whole apartment from her arrival no quiet sleep was possible anymore—she found at her usual brief visit to Gregor first nothing special. She thought he lay intentionally so immobile and played the offended; she attributed all possible understanding to him. Because she by chance held the long broom in her hand, she tried to tickle Gregor from the door with it. When no success showed even then, she grew angry and poked a little into Gregor, and only when she had shoved him from his place without any resistance did she become attentive. When she soon recognized the true state of affairs, she made big eyes, whistled to herself, but did not linger, rather tore open the door of the bedroom and called with loud voice into the darkness: "Just look, it's croaked; there it lies, quite and entirely croaked!"

Mr. and Mrs. Samsa sat upright in the conjugal bed and had to overcome the fright at the charwoman before they could take in her message. Then, however, Mr. and Mrs. Samsa climbed hastily out of bed, each on his side, Mr. Samsa threw the blanket over his shoulders, Mrs. Samsa came out only in her nightgown; thus they entered Gregor's room. Meanwhile the door of the parlor had also opened, in which Grete had slept since the lodgers moved in; she was fully dressed, as if she had not slept at all, and her pale face seemed to prove it. "Dead?" said Mrs. Samsa and looked questioning up at the charwoman, although she could after all examine everything herself and even without examination recognize it. "I should say so," said the charwoman and, as proof, pushed Gregor's corpse with the broom a good piece sideways. Mrs. Samsa made a movement as if to hold back the broom, but did not do it. "Well," said Mr. Samsa, "now we can thank God." He crossed himself, and the three women followed his example. Grete, who did not turn her eyes from the corpse, said: "Look how thin he was. He hadn't eaten anything for so long either. Just as the food went in, it came out again." In fact Gregor's body was completely flat and dry, one recognized that really only now, since he was no longer lifted by the little legs and nothing else diverted the view.

"Come, Grete, in to us for a little while," said Mrs. Samsa with a melancholy smile, and Grete went, not without looking back at the corpse, behind the parents into the bedroom. The charwoman closed the door and opened the window fully. Despite the early morning, the fresh air already had some mildness mixed in. It was already the end of March.

From their room stepped the three lodgers and looked around astonished for their breakfast; one had forgotten them. "Where is the breakfast?" asked the middle gentleman sullenly of the charwoman. She, however, put her finger to her mouth and then beckoned hastily and silently for the gentlemen to come into Gregor's room. They came too and stood then, hands in the pockets of their somewhat worn jackets, in the now quite bright room around Gregor's corpse.

Then the door of the bedroom opened, and Mr. Samsa appeared in his livery, on one arm his wife, on the other his daughter. All were a little tearful; Grete now and then pressed her face to the father's arm.

"Leave my apartment immediately!" said Mr. Samsa and pointed to the door without releasing the women from him. "What do you mean?" said the middle gentleman somewhat startled and smiled sweetly. The two others held their hands behind their backs and rubbed them continuously, as in joyful expectation of a great quarrel, which however must turn out favorably for them. "I mean it exactly as I say it," answered Mr. Samsa and went in a line with his two companions toward the lodger. The latter first stood still and looked at the floor, as if the things in his head were arranging themselves into a new order. "Then we go," he said then and looked up at Mr. Samsa, as if in a suddenly come-over humility he even demanded for this decision a new permission. Mr. Samsa only nodded to him several times shortly with big eyes. Thereupon the gentleman actually went at once with long strides into the front room; his two friends had already for a while listened with quite calm hands and now fairly hopped after him, as in fear Mr. Samsa might enter the front room before them and disturb the connection with their leader. In the front room all three took their hats from the coat rack, pulled their canes from the cane holder, bowed silently and left the apartment. In a, as it turned out, wholly unfounded mistrust Mr. Samsa stepped with the two women onto the landing; leaning on the railing, they watched how the three gentlemen, though slowly, yet steadily descended the long stairs, in each story disappeared in a certain bend of the stairwell and after a few moments reappeared; the lower they got, the more the Samsa family's interest in them faded, and when against them and then high above them a butcher's lad with the carrying pole on his head ascended in proud posture, soon Mr. Samsa with the women left the railing, and all returned, as if relieved, into their apartment.

They resolved to use today for resting and walking; they had not only earned this interruption of work, they absolutely needed it. And so they sat down at the table and wrote three letters of excuse, Mr. Samsa to his director, Mrs. Samsa to her client, and Grete to her principal. While writing, the charwoman came in to say that she was leaving, for her morning work was done. The three writing ones first only nodded without looking up, only when the charwoman still would not leave did they look up angrily. "Well?" asked Mr. Samsa. The charwoman stood smiling in the door, as if she had great good fortune to report to the family, but would only do so if thoroughly questioned. The almost upright little ostrich feather on her hat, at which Mr. Samsa had been annoyed during her whole time of service, wavered slightly in all directions. "So what do you want?" asked Mrs. Samsa, before whom the charwoman had the most respect. "Well," answered the charwoman and could not immediately continue for friendly laughter, "well, about how the stuff from next door is to be removed, you need not worry. It's already taken care of." Mrs. Samsa and Grete bent down to their letters, as if they wanted to write on; Mr. Samsa, who noticed that the charwoman now wanted to describe everything in detail, warded this off decisively with outstretched hand. Since she was not allowed to tell, she remembered the great haste she was in, cried apparently offended: "Goodbye all," turned wildly around and left the apartment with terrible door slamming.

"She'll be dismissed this evening," said Mr. Samsa, but got neither from his wife nor from his daughter an answer, for the charwoman seemed to have disturbed their hardly won calm again. They rose, went to the window and remained there, holding each other. Mr. Samsa turned in his chair toward them and observed them silently for a while. Then he called: "Come on over here then. Leave the old things finally. And take a little consideration for me too." The women immediately followed him, hurried to him, caressed him and quickly finished their letters.

Then all three left the apartment together, which they had not done for months, and rode with the electric tram into the open country before the city. The car, in which they sat alone, was entirely suffused with warm sunshine. They discussed, comfortably leaning back on their seats, the prospects for the future, and it was found that these upon closer view were by no means bad, for all three employments were, about which they had actually not yet questioned each other, most favorable and especially promising for later. The greatest immediate improvement of the situation must of course easily result from a change of apartment; they wanted now to take a smaller and cheaper, but better located and altogether more practical apartment than the present one, which had still been selected by Gregor. While they thus conversed, it occurred almost simultaneously to Mr. and Mrs. Samsa at the sight of their ever more lively daughter that, despite all the care that had made her cheeks pale, she had blossomed into a beautiful and voluptuous girl. Growing quieter and almost unconsciously communicating through glances, they thought that it would now be time to seek also a decent man for her. And it was like a confirmation of their new dreams and good intentions when at the end of their ride the daughter as the first stood up and stretched her young body.

“Stories of the world, in your language.”