and support that, being a man, he could surely give me. Without me he could hardly have got into the Castle, but since he is there, he’s independent of me. I’m his only intimate friend, but I’m certain that he only tells me a small part of what he has on his mind. He tells me a great many things about the Castle, but from his stories, from the trifling details that he gives, one can’t understand in the least how those things could have changed him so much. In particular I can’t understand how the daring he had as a boy—it actually caused us anxiety—how he can have lost it so completely up there now that he’s a man. Of course all that useless standing about and waiting all day, and day after day, and going on and on without any prospect of a change, must break a man down and make him unsure of himself and in the end actually incapable of anything else but this hopeless standing about. But why didn’t he put up a fight even at the beginning? Especially seeing that he soon recognised that I had been right and that there was no opportunity there for his ambition, though there might be some hope perhaps for the betterment of our family’s condition. For up there, in spite of the servants’ whims, everything goes on very soberly, ambition seeks it sole satisfaction in work, and as in this way the work itself gains the ascendancy, ambition ceases to have any place at all, for childish desires there’s no room up there. Nevertheless Barnabas fancied, so he has told me, that he could clearly see how great the power and knowledge even of those very questionable officials was into whose bureau he is allowed. How fast they dictated, with half-shut eyes and brief gestures, merely by raising a finger quelling the surly servants, and making them smile with happiness even when they were checked; or perhaps finding an important passage in one of the books and becoming quite absorbed in it, while the others would crowd round as near as the cramped space would allow them, and crane their necks to see it. These things and other things of the same kind gave Barnabas a great idea of those men, and he had the feeling that if he could get the length of being noticed by them and could venture to address a few words to them, not as a stranger, but as a colleague—true a very subordinate colleague—in the bureau, incalculable things might be achieved for our family. But things have never got that length yet, and Barnabas can’t venture to do anything that might help towards it, although he’s well aware that, young as he is, he’s been raised to the difficult and responsible position of chief breadwinner in our family on account of this whole unfortunate affair. And now for the final confession: it was a week after your arrival. I heard somebody mentioning it in the Herrenhof, but didn’t pay much attention; a Land Surveyor had come and I didn’t even know what a Land Surveyor was. But next evening Barnabas—at an agreed hour I usually set out to go a part of the way to meet him—came home earlier than usual, saw Amalia in the sitting-room, drew me out into the street, laid his head on my shoulder, and cried for several minutes. He was the little boy he had used to be again. Something had happened to him that he hadn’t been prepared for. It was as if a whole new world had suddenly opened to him, and he could not bear the joy and the anxieties of all this newness. And yet the only thing that had happened was that he had been given a letter for delivery to you. But it was actually the first letter, the first commission, that he had ever been given.”
Olga stopped. Everything was still except for the heavy, occasionally disturbed breathing of the old people. K. merely said casually, as if to round off Olga’s story: “You’ve all been playing with me. Barnabas brought me the letter with the air of an old and much occupied messenger, and you as well as Amalia—who for that time must have been in with you—behaved as if carrying messages and the letter itself were matters of indifference.” “You must distinguish between us,” said Olga. “Barnabas had been made a happy boy again by the letter, in spite of all the doubts that he had about his capability. He confined those doubts to himself and me, but he felt it a point of honour to look like a real messenger, as according to his ideas real messengers looked. So although his hopes were now rising to an official uniform I had to alter his trousers, and in two hours, so that they would have some resemblance at least to the close-fitting trews of the official uniform, and he might appear in them before you, knowing, of course, that on this point you could be easily taken in. So much for Barnabas. But Amalia really despises his work as a messenger, and now that he seemed to have had a little success—as she could easily guess from Barnabas and myself and our talking and whispering together—she despised it more than ever. So she was speaking the truth, don’t deceive yourself about that. But if I, K., have seemed to slight Barnabas’s work, it hasn’t been with any intention to deceive you, but from anxiety. These two letters that have gone through Barnabas’s hands are the first signs of grace, questionable as they are, that our family has received for three years. This change, if it is a change and not a deception—deceptions are more frequent than changes—is connected with your arrival here, our fate has become in a certain sense dependent on you, perhaps these two letters are only a beginning, and Barnabas’s abilities will be
