III

still to come than of conquests past. But the opposition one meets in the world is great, and becomes greater the higher one aims, and it’s no disgrace to accept the help of a man who’s fighting his way up too, even though he’s a small and uninfluential man. Perhaps we could have a quiet talk together sometime, without so many onlookers?” “I don’t know what you’re after,” she said, and in her tone this time there seemed to be, against her will, an echo rather of countless disappointments than of past triumphs. “Do you want to take me away from Klamm, perhaps? O heavens!” and she clapped her hands. “You’ve seen through me,” said K. , as if wearied by so much mistrust, “that’s exactly my real secret intention. You ought to leave Klamm and become my sweetheart. And now I can go. Olga!” he cried, “we’re going home.” Obediently Olga slid down from her cask, but did not succeed immediately in breaking through her ring of friends. Then Frieda said in a low voice, with a hectoring look at K. : “When can I talk to you?” “Can I spend the night here?” asked K. “Yes,” said Frieda. “Can I stay now?” “Go out first with Olga, so that I can clear out all the others. Then you can come back in a little.” “Right,” said K. , and he waited impatiently for Olga. But the peasants would not let her go; they had made up a dance in which she was the central figure, they circled round her yelling all together and every now and then one of them left the ring, seized Olga firmly round the waist and whirled her round and round; the pace grew faster and faster, the yells more hungry, more raucous, until they were insensibly blended into one continuous howl. Olga, who had begun laughingly by trying to break out of the ring, was now merely reeling with flying hair from one man to the other. “That’s the kind of people I’m saddled with,” said Frieda, biting her thin lips in scorn. “Who are they?” asked K. “Klamm’s servants,” said Frieda, “he keeps on bringing those people with him, and they upset me. I can hardly tell what I’ve been saying to you, but please forgive me if I’ve offended you, it’s these people who are to blame, they’re the most contemptible and objectionable creatures I know, and I have to fill their glasses up with beer for them. How often