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Page 11
When explaining things, his father repeated himself several
times, partly because it was a long time since he had been
occupied with these matters himself and partly because
Gregor's mother did not understand everything first time.
From these repeated explanations Gregor learned, to his
pleasure, that despite all their misfortunes there was still
some money available from the old days. It was not a lot,
but it had not been touched in the meantime and some
interest had accumulated. Besides that, they had not been
using up all the money that Gregor had been bringing home
every month, keeping only a little for himself, so that
that, too, had been accumulating. Behind the door, Gregor
nodded with enthusiasm in his pleasure at this unexpected
thrift and caution. He could actually have used this
surplus money to reduce his father's debt to his boss, and
the day when he could have freed himself from that job would
have come much closer, but now it was certainly better the
way his father had done things.
This money, however, was certainly not enough to enable the
family to live off the interest; it was enough to maintain
them for, perhaps, one or two years, no more. That's to
say, it was money that should not really be touched but set
aside for emergencies; money to live on had to be earned.
His father was healthy but old, and lacking in self
confidence. During the five years that he had not been
working - the first holiday in a life that had been full of
strain and no success - he had put on a lot of weight and
become very slow and clumsy. Would Gregor's elderly mother
now have to go and earn money? She suffered from asthma and
it was a strain for her just to move about the home, every
other day would be spent struggling for breath on the sofa
by the open window. Would his sister have to go and earn
money? She was still a child of seventeen, her life up till
then had been very enviable, consisting of wearing nice
clothes, sleeping late, helping out in the business, joining
in with a few modest pleasures and most of all playing the
violin. Whenever they began to talk of the need to earn
money, Gregor would always first let go of the door and then
throw himself onto the cool, leather sofa next to it, as he
became quite hot with shame and regret. He would often lie
there the whole night through, not sleeping a wink but
scratching at the leather for hours on end. Or he might go
to all the effort of pushing a chair to the window, climbing
up onto the sill and, propped up in the chair, leaning on
the window to stare out of it. He had used to feel a great
sense of freedom from doing this, but doing it now was
obviously something more remembered than experienced, as
what he actually saw in this way was becoming less distinct
every day, even things that were quite near; he had used to
curse the ever-present view of the hospital across the
street, but now he could not see it at all, and if he had
not known that he lived in Charlottenstrasse, which was a
quiet street despite being in the middle of the city, he
could have thought that he was looking out the window at a
barren waste where the grey sky and the grey earth mingled
inseparably. His observant sister only needed to notice the
chair twice before she would always push it back to its
exact position by the window after she had tidied up the
room, and even left the inner pane of the window open from
then on.
If Gregor had only been able to speak to his sister and
thank her for all that she had to do for him it would have
been easier for him to bear it; but as it was it caused him
pain. His sister, naturally, tried as far as possible to
pretend there was nothing burdensome about it, and the
longer it went on, of course, the better she was able to do
so, but as time went by Gregor was also able to see through
it all so much better. It had even become very unpleasant
for him, now, whenever she entered the room. No sooner had
she come in than she would quickly close the door as a
precaution so that no-one would have to suffer the view into
Gregor's room, then she would go straight to the window and
pull it hurriedly open almost as if she were suffocating.
Even if it was cold, she would stay at the window breathing
deeply for a little while. She would alarm Gregor twice a
day with this running about and noise making; he would stay
under the couch shivering the whole while, knowing full well
that she would certainly have liked to spare him this
ordeal, but it was impossible for her to be in the same room
with him with the windows closed.
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