Лабораторная работа №1 6 страница

though not of course in the occupied rooms, but only in those that happen to be empty, and that work must be done very qui­etly so that the gentlemen's work is not disturbed. But how is it possible to tidy up quietly if the gentlemen occupy the rooms for days at a time, and what's more if the domestics, that dirty riff­raff, also go about their business in there so that when the room finally is turned over to the chambermaids, it is in such a state that not even the Flood could make it clean. Truly, they are high-ranking gentlemen, but you have to struggle hard to overcome your revulsion in order to be able to tidy up after them. The chambermaids really don't have too much work, but it is strenu­ous. And never a kind word, nothing but constant reproaches, es­pecially this, the most tormenting and most frequent of them all: that in the course of the tidying-up files have been lost. In reality nothing is ever lost, every scrap of paper is handed to the land­lord, but files naturally do get lost, only not by the girls. And then commissions come and the girls have to leave their room while the commission is rummaging through their beds; of course the girls don't have any possessions, their few things fit in a ruck­sack, but the commission searches for hours all the same. Of course it doesn't find anything; how could files possibly end up there? What interest could girls have in files? Once again, though, the only results are the insults and threats conveyed by the disappointed commission through the landlord. And never any peace—not by day, not by night. Noise half night long and noise from earliest morning. If only one didn't have to live there, but one must, for in between mealtimes it's the chambermaids' job to go and get little things from the kitchen when given the or­der, especially at night. Always the sudden banging of a fist on the chambermaids' door, the dictating of the order, the rushing down to the kitchen, the shaking of the sleeping kitchen lads out of their sleep, the placing of the tray with the things that have been ordered outside the chambermaids' door, where the domes­tics pick it up—how sad all of this is. But that isn't the worst thing. The worst thing rather is when we get no orders; deep at night, sometimes at a time when everybody should be asleep and

most people are finally asleep, something or other starts creeping about outside the chambermaids' door. Then the girls climb out of their beds—the beds are arranged one above the other, there is really very little space, the entire maids' room is actually no more than a large cabinet with three compartments—listen at the door, kneel down, and embrace one another in fear. And all this time you can hear the prowler at the door. By now everyone would be glad if he would finally come in, but nothing happens, nobody comes in. And you have to remind yourself that there doesn't have to be any danger lurking there, maybe it's only someone walking to and fro outside the door, wondering whether or not to place an order and in the end unable to decide to do so. Maybe that's all it is, but maybe it's something quite different. Actually you don't even know the gentlemen, you have barely seen them. In any case, the girls inside are dying of fright and when it has fi­nally become quiet outside they lean against the wall and don't have the strength to climb back into their beds. That life again awaits Pepi, this very evening she's supposed to take up her old place in the chambermaids' room again. And why? Because of K. and Frieda. Back to the life she's barely fled, not only with the help of K. but also through great efforts of her own. For while serving there the girls neglect their appearance, even those who are most careful otherwise. Who should they pretty themselves for? Nobody sees them, at most the kitchen staff; anybody happy with that is perfectly free to pretty herself. For the rest, though, to have to be constantly in their small room, or in the gentlemen's rooms, which it's silly and a waste to enter even just with clean clothes on. And always in that artificial light and stuffy air—the stove is constantly lit—and certainly always tired. The best way to spend the one free afternoon in the week is to sleep through it in some pantry off the kitchen, calmly and fearlessly. So why pretty oneself? You barely even get dressed. And then all of a sudden Pepi was transferred to the taproom, where, if you wanted to establish yourself, precisely the opposite was needed, where you were constantly being observed by people, including some quite spoiled and attentive gentlemen, so you always had

to be as refined and pleasant-looking as possible. Well, that was quite a change. And Pepi may say of herself that she spared no ef­fort. What would happen later on was of no concern to Pepi. She knew that she had the qualities needed for this post, was quite certain of it, and still had that belief, which nobody can take from her, not even today on the day of her defeat. Only having to prove herself in the early days, that was difficult, because she was after all only a poor chambermaid without clothes or jewels, and because the gentlemen hadn't the patience to wait and see how you turn out but wanted a barmaid right away, without any gap, as is only appropriate, for they turn aside if that isn't the case. One might think their demands weren't all that great, for after all even Frieda could satisfy them. But that is not so. Pepi often thought about this, often got together with Frieda, and for a time even slept with her. It is not easy to figure out Frieda and anybody who doesn't pay close attention—well, do any of the gen­tlemen pay close attention?—is immediately misled by her. No­body realizes as keenly as Frieda herself how wretched she looks; the first time you see her letting down her hair, say, you clutch your hands with pity, and if everything were done by rights, a girl of that sort should not even be a chambermaid; she knows it too, and many nights she wept over it, pressed herself up against Pepi and wound Pepi's hair around her own head. But when she's on duty, all her doubts disappear, she thinks she's the most beautiful of all and knows how to convince everybody of that. She understands people, and that is her true skill. And is quick to lie and deceive so that people don't have time to take a closer look at her. Of course in the long run that isn't enough, people do have eyes, and in the end they would be proved right. But no sooner has she noticed this kind of danger than she comes up with some other measure, most recently, for instance, her re­lationship with Klamm. Her relationship with Klamm! If you don't believe that, you can always check, go to Klamm and ask him. How sly, oh how sly! And if, say, you don't dare go to Klamm with a question like that, and if you aren't admitted with some infinitely more important questions and Klamm shuts him-

self off completely from you—only from you and people of your sort, since Frieda, for instance, skips in to see him whenever she likes—if that is so, then you can still check the matter, all you need do is wait. Klamm won't be able to tolerate such a false ru­mor for long, he must after all be wildly eager to discover what is being said about him in the taproom and in the public rooms, all this is of the greatest importance to him, and if it's wrong, then he will correct it at once. But he hasn't corrected it, so it doesn't need to be corrected, it is the utter truth. All you actually see is Frieda taking beer into Klamm's room and then coming out with the payment, but Frieda describes what one cannot see, and one has to take her at her word. But she doesn't even describe it, she isn't about to blurt out secrets like that, no, all around her the se­crets blurt out on their own and once they're blurted out, she herself no longer hesitates to talk about them, modestly, without making claims, referring only to matters that are already common knowledge. But not to everything, not, for instance, to the fact that ever since she came to the taproom Klamm has been drinking less beer than he used to, not a great deal less, but clearly less all the same, she says nothing about this; well, there may be various reasons for that, beer has lost its appeal for Klamm just now or maybe he even forgot all about beer drinking over Frieda. So at any rate, however astonishing this may seem, Frieda is Klamm's mistress. How could anything that is good enough for Klamm fail to draw admiration from the others, and so, be­fore you know what is happening, Frieda has become a great beauty, a girl who is made to fit the needs of the taproom and is almost too beautiful, too powerful; but now the taproom is barely good enough for her. And people even find it odd that she's still in the taproom; to be a barmaid is no small thing; from that point of view her relationship with Klamm seems quite cred­ible; but once the barmaid has become Klamm's mistress, why does he leave her in the taproom, especially so long? Why doesn't he lead her higher? One can say to people a thousand times that there's no contradiction here, that Klamm has definite reasons for acting like this, or that Frieda will be raised all of a sudden,

perhaps even in the very near future, but this has barely any ef­fect, people have definite ideas and in the end they refuse to let sleight-of-hand of any kind distract them from them. Nobody even doubted anymore that Frieda is the mistress of Klamm, even those who obviously knew better had become too tired to doubt it, "In the name of the devil, be Klamm's mistress," they were thinking, "but if you are that already, we want to see signs of it in your rising up." But they saw no such signs and Frieda re­mained in the taproom and secretly she was even quite happy that everything remained as it was. But she lost prestige among the people; this couldn't of course have escaped her notice, she usually notices things even before they happen. A really charm­ing beautiful girl, once settled in the taproom, doesn't have to use tricks; so long as she is beautiful, barring some particularly un­fortunate coincidence, she will remain a barmaid. But a girl like Frieda has to worry constantly about her position, though of course she doesn't show it, understandably enough, instead she usually complains and curses the post. But in secret she is con­stantly observing the general mood. And so she saw that people were becoming indifferent, that they no longer thought it worth­while to lift up their eyes when Frieda came in, that even the domestics no longer bothered with her but rather clung for un­derstandable reasons to Olga and girls of that sort, and she also saw from the landlord's conduct that she was becoming less and less indispensable, one couldn't continue inventing new stories about Klamm, there's a limit to everything—and so dear Frieda decided to try something new. But who could possibly have seen through that right away! Pepi suspected it, but unfortunately she failed to see through it. Frieda decided to create a scandal; she, Klamm's mistress, would throw herself at the first comer, if pos­sible at the lowest of the low. This would cause a stir, they would talk about it a long time and finally, finally they will once again remember what it means to be Klamm's mistress and what it means to reject this honor in the intoxication of a new love. The only difficulty was how to find the appropriate man with whom this clever game could be played. It couldn't be an acquaintance

of Frieda's, not even one of the domestics, he would probably have stared wide-eyed at her and gone his way, above all else he wouldn't have maintained sufficient seriousness and it would have been impossible even with the greatest eloquence to spread the rumor that Frieda had been accosted by him, hadn't been able to ward him off, and had in a moment of oblivion succumbed to him. And even if it had to be the lowest of the low, it still had to be someone of whom one could credibly claim that de­spite his dull and unrefined manner he longed for nobody but Frieda and had no higher wish—good heavens!—than to marry Frieda. But even if it had to be a common man, perhaps lower even than a laborer, far lower than a laborer, then he would still have to be a man who wouldn't make you the laughingstock of every girl and might even seem attractive to some judicious girl. But where do you find a man like that? Another girl would prob­ably have spent her entire life vainly looking for him, but Frieda's good fortune guides the surveyor into the taproom, perhaps on the very evening that the plan first crosses her mind. The sur­veyor! So what is K. thinking of? What extraordinary ideas go through his head? Is there something special that he wants to achieve? A good appointment, a prize? Does he want something of that sort? Well then he should have gone about the whole thing very differently from the very start. He is nothing, though; it's painful even to think about his situation. He's a surveyor, per­haps that is something since he has learned a trade, but if you don't have any idea what to do with it, it's still nothing. And he still makes demands; without having the least bit of support he makes demands, not directly, but you can still see he's making certain demands, and naturally this is irritating enough. For did he not know that even a chambermaid demeans herself some­what if she talks to him at any length. And then with all these special demands of his, on that very first evening he goes and falls into the crudest trap with a thud. So is he not ashamed of himself? Well, what was it about Frieda that won him over? For he could own up to it now. Had she really succeeded in pleas­ing him, that thin yellowish creature? Oh no, he never even

looked at her, she simply told him that she was Klamm's mistress; that still struck him as a novelty at the time and so he was lost. But then she had to move out, there was naturally no room for her at the Gentlemen's Inn anymore. Pepi saw her again the morn­ing before the move, the staff had come running, everybody was eager to get a look. And she still had such power that people pitied her; everybody, even her enemies, pitied her; so at the very beginning her calculation proved correct; her having thrown her­self away on a man such as that seemed incomprehensible to everyone, a stroke of fate; the little kitchen maids, who of course admire every barmaid, were inconsolable. Even Pepi was affected by it, even she couldn't completely resist, though her attention was actually directed elsewhere. She noticed that Frieda wasn't all that sad. But basically it was a terrible misfortune that had be­fallen her, she herself acted as though she were very unhappy, but that wasn't good enough, Pepi wouldn't allow herself to be de­ceived by that game. What kept her going? Perhaps the happiness of her new love? Well, there could be no question of that. But what else could it be? Where did she get the strength to be as coolly amicable as ever, even with Pepi, who was regarded as her successor. Pepi hadn't the time to think about all this just then, she had too much to do with the preparations for the new post. She was probably supposed to start in a few hours and had no beautiful hairdo, no elegant dress, no fine underclothing, no ser­viceable shoes. All of that had to be put together in a few hours; if you could not fit yourself out properly, then it was better to re­linquish the post entirely, for you would certainly lose it other­wise before half an hour had gone by. Well, she almost managed. She has a special talent for hairdressing, the landlady once asked her for a hairdo, it's a special nimbleness with her hands that has been given to her, but then her thick hair is easy to manage. For the dress too there was help at hand. Her two colleagues remained loyal to her, they regard it as something of an honor when a girl from within their own group becomes a barmaid, and besides, later on, if Pepi had gained power, she could have pro­vided them with some advantages. One of the girls had left some

precious material, her treasure, lying around for a long time, she had often let the others admire it and probably dreamed of putting it to splendid use at some point, but then—and that was nicely done on her part—since Pepi needed it, she gave it up. And both of them helped her very eagerly with the sewing; had they been sewing for themselves, they couldn't have shown greater zeal. It was even cheerful and gratifying work. They sat there, each on her own bed, one above the other, sewing and singing, passing the finished pieces and accessories up and down. When Pepi thinks about it, her heart grows even heavier at the thought that everything was in vain and that she is going back empty-handed to her friends. What a misfortune and how frivolously it had been brought about, especially by K. How pleased everyone had been about the dress. It seemed a guarantee of success, and after it was finished and they found room for one more small rib­bon, the last doubts vanished. And isn't the dress really beauti­ful? It's already crushed and a little stained, Pepi didn't even have a second dress, she had to wear this one day and night, but you can still see how beautiful it is, it's something not even that ac­cursed Barnabas woman could have come up with. And then the way you can draw it tight and loosen it again as you wish, at the top and the bottom, and the way, although it's only a dress, it can be so easily changed, was a particular advantage and was actu­ally something she had invented. Of course she isn't difficult to sew for, Pepi wasn't boasting about this, anything will look good on healthy young girls. It was far more difficult to get hold of un­derclothing and boots and this actually is where the misfortune commences. Here, too, her girlfriends helped out as best they could, but they weren't able to do much. For it was only coarse underclothing that she gathered and sewed, and instead of boots with high heels she had to make do with slippers, which you feel better hiding than showing. They consoled Pepi: after all, Frieda didn't dress very prettily either and traipsed about so sloppily at times that the guests would rather be served by the cellar boys than by her. That was true, but this was something Frieda could permit herself, for she had already won favor and prestige; if at

some point a lady shows up dirty and carelessly dressed, that only makes her all the more enticing, but what about a novice like Pepi? And in any case Frieda was completely incapable of dressing well; she's utterly lacking in taste; if a person happens to have yellowish skin, then she is of course stuck with it; she needn't, like Frieda, deck herself out in a cream blouse with a low neckline, and almost blind you with the sight of all that yellow. And even if that hadn't been so, she was really too stingy to dress well; everything she earned she held on to, nobody knew what for. On duty she didn't need money, she made do with lies and dodges, Pepi could not and would not follow this example; she was therefore justified in prettying herself in this way so as to show herself to her best advantage, especially at the start. Had she had great resources to draw on, she would, in spite of Frieda's slyness, in spite of K.'s foolishness, have emerged the vic­tor. Things certainly got off to a good start. She had already ac­quainted herself with the few little skills and bits of knowledge that were necessary. No sooner was she in the taproom than she had settled in. At work nobody missed Frieda. It wasn't until the second day that a number of guests asked where Frieda was. There hadn't been any mistakes, the landlord was satisfied; on the first day in his anxiety he was always in the taproom, later on he came only now and then, and finally, since the cashbook tallied—the receipts were even a little higher on average than in Frieda's day—he handed everything over to Pepi. She came up with a few innovations. Frieda had, not out of diligence but rather out of stinginess, imperiousness, and fear of giving up her rights to others, supervised the domestics, to some extent any­how, particularly when there was somebody looking; by con­trast, Pepi assigned that entire task to the cellar boys, who are more adept at it. That way she could spend more time on the gen­tlemen's rooms; the guests were quickly served, but she could still say a few words to each one, unlike Frieda, who claimed that she was reserving herself for Klamm alone and took every word, every approach from other men to be an insult to Klamm. But of course that was clever of her, for if she ever let anyone approach

her, it was an enormous favor. But Pepi hates tricks like that, and in any case they're not useful when you're just starting there. Pepi was friendly to each of the customers and each one repaid her with his friendliness. All of them were clearly pleased with the change; when the exhausted gentlemen finally manage to sit down over beer for a moment, you can literally transform them with a glance or a shrug of the shoulders. So eagerly did all of them run their hands through Pepi's curls that she probably had to redo her hair ten times a day; nobody can resist the lure of these curls and bows, not even K., who is so absentminded otherwise. And that's the way those exciting, strenuous, but successful days flew by. If only they hadn't flown by so quickly, if only there had been a few more of them! Four days are too few, even when you're exerting yourself to the point of exhaustion, perhaps a fifth day would have been enough, but four days were too few. True, in those four days Pepi had found some patrons and friends; if she could have trusted all of the looks she was given every time she came in with mugs of beer, she would be awash in a sea of friendship; a clerk called Bratmeier is crazy about her, he bestowed on her this small chain and a pendant, which he had put his portrait into, that certainly was cheeky of him—that and a few other things had happened, but still it had only been four days; but if Pepi put her mind to it, in four days Frieda could al­most be forgotten, though not completely, but she would have been forgotten all the same, perhaps even earlier, if she hadn't taken the precaution of putting her name on people's lips with her big scandal; in this way she had become a novelty to people, simply out of curiosity they would have liked to see her again; the very thing they had grown sick and tired of now held some at­traction for them again, thanks to K., whom they regarded with utter indifference otherwise, though they wouldn't have given up Pepi in exchange, so long as she was there making her presence felt in the taproom, but they are mostly older gentlemen, cum­bersome in their habits, it does take a few days for them to get used to a new barmaid, no matter how advantageous the change may be; quite against the wishes of the gentlemen themselves it

does take a few days, maybe only five, but four aren't enough, for despite everything they regarded Pepi merely as a temporary. And then possibly the greatest misfortune, that in those four days, Klamm, even though he had been in the village those first two days, didn't come down to the public room. Had he come, that would have been the decisive test for Pepi, a test, inciden­tally, that she was least afraid of and even looked forward to. She wouldn't—but of course it's best not to go near matters like that with words—wouldn't have become Klamm's mistress and wouldn't have lied her way up to a position like that, but she could have put the beer glass down on the table at least as nicely as Frieda had done, could have welcomed the guests in a pleasant manner and taken leave of them just as pleasantly, without any of Frieda's pushiness, and if Klamm ever looks for anything in a girl's eyes, then Pepi's eyes would have completely satisfied him. But why did he not come? By chance? Pepi had even believed that at the time. During those two days she expected him any mo­ment, and even during the night she waited for him. "No, Klamm will come," she thought constantly, running back and forth sim­ply out of restless expectation and the wish to be the first to see him the moment he came. This constant disappointment made her tired, perhaps that's why she did not accomplish as much as she might have accomplished. When she had the time, she sneaked up to the corridor, which the staff is strictly forbidden to enter, squeezed into an alcove, and waited. "If Klamm would only come," she thought, "if only I could take the gentleman out of his room and carry him in my arms down to the public room. I wouldn't collapse under the burden, no matter how big it was." But he did not come. In those corridors upstairs it's so silent, one cannot imagine it if one hasn't been there. It's so silent that one cannot stand it there for long, the silence drives one away. Again and again, ten times, Pepi was driven away, but ten times she went back up. That was quite pointless. If Klamm wanted to come, then he would come, but if he did not want to come, Pepi would not entice him out, even though with her pounding heart she was almost suffocating in the alcove. It was pointless, but if

he didn't come, then almost everything else was pointless, too. And he did not come. Pepi now knows why Klamm didn't come. Frieda would have been wonderfully amused had she been able to see Pepi in the alcove in the corridor, with both hands on her heart. Klamm didn't come down because Frieda wouldn't let him. It wasn't through her pleas that she had accomplished this, her pleas don't reach Klamm. But she, the spider, has connections nobody knows anything about. When Pepi says something to a guest, she says it openly, the next table can hear it; Frieda has nothing to say to them, she puts the beer on the table and leaves; all one can hear is the rustling of her silk petticoat, the only thing she spends money on. But when she does say something, she does not do so openly, she whispers it to the guest, bending down so that the people at the next table prick up their ears. The things she says are probably quite trivial, but not always, she does have connections, uses some to support others, and if most of them lead nowhere—who would want to have to bother about Frieda all the time?—one or the other of those connections does work. And she now began to exploit these connections, K. gave her the opportunity to do so; instead of sitting with her and keeping watch over her, he hardly ever stays at home, wanders about, has discussions here and there, is attentive to everything, only not to Frieda, and in order to give her even more freedom moves from the Bridge Inn into the empty schoolhouse. What a wonderful way to begin a honeymoon. Well, Pepi is certainly the last one who will reproach K. for not being able to stand being with Frieda; one simply cannot stand being with her. But then why hasn't he left her altogether, why has he gone back to her again and again, why has he created the impression through his wan­derings that he is fighting for her. It even looked as if it was only through his contact with Frieda that he had discovered his actual paltriness and in an effort to make himself worthy of Frieda and somehow claw his way to the top had abandoned their life to­gether temporarily, but only in order to be able to make up later on for the privations without being disturbed. Meanwhile Frieda loses no time, she sits in the schoolhouse, to which she probably

steered K., and observes the Gentlemen's Inn and observes K. She has excellent messengers at hand, namely, K.'s assistants, whom K.—this is incomprehensible, even if you know K. it's incompre­hensible—leaves entirely to her. She sends them to her old friends, reawakens their memories of her, complains of being held cap­tive by a man such as K., agitates against Pepi, announces she'll soon be back, asks for help, begs them not to reveal anything to Klamm, acts as though Klamm has to be protected and can therefore on no account be allowed down to the taproom. What to some she makes out to be consideration for Klamm, she uses with the landlord as an example of her success, pointing out that Klamm doesn't come down anymore; how could he come if the person serving in the taproom is only a Pepi; true, it isn't the landlord's fault, for this Pepi was the best replacement he was able to find, only she won't do, not even for a few days. K. knows nothing about all these activities of Frieda's; when he's not wan­dering about, he lies at her feet unawares while she counts the hours that keep her from the taproom. But the assistants do more than carry messages, they also serve to make K. jealous and to keep his blood warm. Frieda has known the assistants since childhood, they certainly don't have secrets to keep from one an­other anymore, but in K.'s honor they begin to long for each other, and the danger arising for K. is that this will turn into a great love. And K. does everything Frieda wants, even the most contradictory things, allows himself to become jealous because of the assistants, but permits the three of them to stay together while he wanders off on his own. It's almost as if he were Frieda's third assistant. Finally Frieda decides, on the strength of her ob­servations, to strike a great blow, she decides to return. And it actually is high time for that, it's admirable how this sly Frieda senses it and takes advantage of it, Frieda's inimitable skill lies in her powers of observation and resolve; if Pepi had that, how different her life would be! Had Frieda only stayed in the schoolhouse another day or two, Pepi cannot be driven out, is a barmaid for good, loved and kept by all, has earned enough money to add some splendid things to her meager wardrobe, and