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