and went to fetch it, but his hands trembled so much that he couldn’t get it off the hook. I climbed on a chair and helped him. From that moment he was done for, he didn’t even take the diploma out of its frame, but handed the whole thing over to Seemann. Then he sat down in a corner and neither moved nor spoke to anybody, and we had to attend to the last people there by ourselves as well as we could.” “And where do you see in all this the influence of the Castle?” asked K. “So far it doesn’t seem to have come in. What you’ve told me about is simply the ordinary senseless fear of the people, malicious pleasure in hurting a neighbour, specious friendship, things that can be found anywhere, and, I must say, on the part of your father—at least, so it seems to me—a certain pettiness, for what was the diploma? Merely a testimonial to his abilities, these themselves weren’t taken from him, if they made him indispensable so much the better, and the one way he could have made things difficult for the Captain would have been by flinging the diploma at his feet before he had said two words. But the significant thing to me is that you haven’t mentioned Amalia at all; Amalia, who was to blame for everything, apparently stood quietly in the background and watched the whole house collapse.” “No,” said Olga, “nobody ought to be blamed, nobody could have done anything else, all that was already due to the influence of the Castle.” “Influence of the Castle,” repeated Amalia, who had slipped in unnoticed from the courtyard; the old people had been long in bed. “Is it Castle gossip you’re at? Still sitting with your heads together? And yet you wanted to go away immediately you came, K., and it’s nearly ten now. Are you really interested in that kind of gossip? There are people in the village who live on it, they stick their heads together just like you two and entertain each other by the hour. But I didn’t think you were one of them.” “On the contrary,” said K., “that’s exactly what I am, and moreover people who don’t care for such gossip and leave it all to others don’t interest me particularly.” “Indeed,” said Amalia, “well, there are many different kinds of interest, you know; I heard once of a young man who thought of nothing but the Castle day and night, he neglected everything else and people feared for his reason, his mind was so wholly absorbed by the Castle. It turned out at length, however, that it wasn’t really the Castle he was thinking of, but the daughter of a charwoman in the offices up there, so he got the girl and was all right again.” “I think I would like that man,” said K. “As for your liking the man, I doubt it,” said Amalia, “it’s probably his wife you would like. Well, don’t let me disturb you, I’ve got to go to bed, and I must put out the light for the old folks’ sake. They’re sound asleep now, but they don’t really sleep for more than an hour, and after that the smallest glimmer disturbs them. Good night.” And actually the light went out at once, and Amalia bedded herself somewhere on the floor near her parents. “Who’s the young man she mentioned?” asked K., “I don’t know,” said Olga, “perhaps Brunswick, although it doesn’t fit him exactly, but it might have been somebody else. It’s not easy to follow her, for often one can’t tell whether she’s speaking ironically or in earnest. Mostly she’s in earnest but sounds ironical.” “Never mind explaining,” said K. “How have you come to be so dependent on her? Were things like that before the catastrophe? Or did it happen later? And do you never feel that you want to be independent of her? And is there any sense in your dependence? She’s the youngest, and should give way to you. Innocently or not, she was the person who brought ruin on the family. And instead of begging your pardon for it anew every day she carries her head higher than anybody else, bothers herself about nothing except what she chooses to do for her parents, nothing would induce her to become acquainted with your affairs, to use her own expression, and then if she does speak to you at all she’s mostly in earnest, but sounds ironical. Does she queen it over you on account of her beauty, which you’ve mentioned more than once? Well, you’re all three very like each other, but Amalia’s distinguishing mark is hardly a recommendation, and repelled me the first time I saw it, I mean her cold hard eye. And although she’s the youngest she doesn’t look it, she has the ageless look of women who seem not to grow any older, but seem never to have been young either. You see her every day, you don’t notice the hardness of her face. That’s why, on reflection, I can’t take Sortini’s passion for her very seriously, perhaps he sent the letter simply to punish her, but not to summon her.” “I won’t argue about Sortini,” said Olga, “for the Castle gentlemen everything is possible, let a girl be as pretty or as ugly as you like. But in all the rest you’re utterly mistaken so far as Amalia is concerned. I have no particular motive for winning you over to Amalia’s side, and if I try to do it it’s only for your own sake. Amalia in some way or other was the cause of our misfortunes, that’s true, but not even my father, who was the hardest hit, and who was never very sparing of his tongue, particularly at home, not even my father has ever said a word of reproach to Amalia even in
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