“It wasn’t imprudent, as was proved later,” said the landlady. “I threw myself into the work, I was strong, I was the blacksmith’s daughter, I didn’t need maid or servant. I was everywhere, in the taproom, in the kitchen, in the stables, in the yard. I cooked so well that I even enticed some of the Herrenhof’s customers away. You’ve never been in the inn yet at lunchtime, you don’t know our day customers; at that time there were more of them, many of them have stopped coming since. And the consequence was that we were able not merely to pay the rent regularly, but that after a few years we bought the whole place and today it’s practically free of debt. The further consequence, I admit, was that I ruined my health, got heart’s disease, and am now an old woman. Probably you think that I’m much older than Hans, but the fact is that he’s only two or three years younger than me and will never grow any older either, for at his work—smoking his pipe, listening to the customers, knocking out his pipe again and fetching an occasional pot of beer—at that sort of work one doesn’t grow old.”
“What you’ve done has been splendid,” said K. “I don’t doubt that for a moment, but we were speaking of the time before your marriage, and it must have been an extraordinary thing at that stage for Hans’ family to press on the marriage—at a money sacrifice, or at least at such a great risk as the handing over of the inn must have been—and without trusting in anything but your powers of work, which besides nobody knew of then, and Hans’ powers of work, which everybody must have known beforehand were nil.”
“Oh, well,” said the landlady wearily, “I know what you’re getting at and how wide you are of the mark. Klamm had absolutely nothing to do with the matter. Why should he have concerned himself about me, or better, how could he in any case have concerned himself about me? He knew nothing about me by that time. The fact that he had ceased to summon me was a sign that he had forgotten me. When he stops summoning people, he forgets them completely. I didn’t want to talk of this before Frieda. And it’s not mere forgetting, it’s something more than that. For anybody one has forgotten can come back to one’s memory again, of course. With Klamm that’s impossible. Anybody that he stops summoning he has forgotten completely, not only as far as the past is concerned, but literally for the future as well. If I try very hard I can of course think myself into your ideas, valid, perhaps, in the very different land you come from. But it’s next thing to madness to imagine that Klamm could have given me Hans as a husband simply that I might have no great difficulty in going to him if he should summon me sometime again. Where is the man who could hinder me from running to Klamm if Klamm lifted his little finger? Madness, absolute madness, one begins to feel confused oneself when one plays with such mad ideas.”
“No,” said K., “I’ve no intention of getting confused; my thoughts hadn’t gone so far as you imagined, though, to tell the truth, they were on that road. For the moment the only thing that surprises me is that Hans’ relations expected so much from his marriage and that these expectations were actually fulfilled, at the sacrifice of your sound heart and your health, it is true. The idea that these facts were connected with Klamm occurred to me I admit, but not with the bluntness, or not till now with the bluntness that you give it—apparently with no object but to have a dig at me, because that gives you pleasure. Well, make the most of your pleasure! My idea, however, was this: first of all Klamm was obviously the occasion of your marriage. If it hadn’t been for Klamm you wouldn’t have been unhappy and wouldn’t have been sitting doing nothing in the garden, if it hadn’t been for Klamm Hans wouldn’t have seen you sitting there, if it hadn’t been that you were unhappy a shy man like Hans would never have ventured to speak, if it hadn’t been for Klamm Hans would never have found you in tears, if it hadn’t been for Klamm the good old uncle would never have seen you sitting there together peacefully, if it hadn’t been for Klamm you wouldn’t have been indifferent to what life still offered you, and therefore would never have married Hans. Now in all this there’s enough of Klamm already, it seems to me. But that’s not all. If you hadn’t been trying to forget, you certainly wouldn’t have overtaxed your strength so much and done so splendidly with the inn. So Klamm was there too. But apart from that Klamm is also the root cause of your illness, for before your marriage your heart was already worn out with your hopeless passion for him. The only question that remains now is, what made Hans’ relatives so eager for the marriage? You yourself said just now that to be Klamm’s mistress is a distinction that can’t be lost, so it may have been that that attracted them. But besides that, I imagine, they had the hope that the lucky star that led you to Klamm—assuming that it was a lucky star, but you maintain that it was—was your star and so would remain constant to you and not leave you quite so quickly and suddenly as Klamm did.”
“Do you mean all this in earnest?” asked the landlady.
“Yes, in earnest,” replied K. immediately, “only I consider Hans’ relations were neither
