±äÐμǣ¨Ó¢Îİ桪¡ªThe Metamorphosis£©

  III 

The serious injury done to Gregor, which disabled him for more than a month¡ªthe apple remained stuck in his body as a visible reminder, since no one dared to remove it¡ªseemed to have made even his father recollect that Gregor was a member of the family, despite his present unfortunate and repulsive shape, and ought not to be treated as an enemy, that, on the contrary family duty required them to swallow their disgust and to practice patience, nothing but patience.
 

And although his injury had impaired, probably forever, his powers of movement, and for the time being it took him long, long minutes to creep across his room like an old invalid¡ªthere was no question now of crawling up the wall¡ªyet in his own opinion he was sufficiently compensated for this worsening of his condition by the fact that toward evening the living room door, which he used to watch intently for an hour or two beforehand, was now always opened, so that lying in the darkness of his room, invisible to the family, he was permitted to see them all at the lamp-lit table and listen to their talk by general consent, as it were, very different from his earlier eavesdropping.
 

True, their conversation lacked the lively character of former times, which he had always called to mind with a certain wistfulness in the small hotel bedrooms where he so often used to throw himself down, tired out, on the damp bedding. They were now mostly very silent. Soon after supper his father would fall asleep in his armchair; his mother and sister would admonish each other to be silent; his mother, bending low under the lamp, would sew delicate undergarments for a fashionable shop; his sister, who had taken a job as a salesgirl, was learning shorthand and French in the evenings in the hopes of getting a better position some day. Sometimes his father woke up, and as if quite unaware that he had been sleeping said to his mother: "What a lot of sewing you're doing today!" and at once fell asleep again, while the two women exchanged a tired smile.
 

With a kind of mulishness his father persisted in keeping his uniform on even in the house; his robe hung uselessly on its peg and he slept fully dressed where he sat, as if he were ready for service at any moment and even here only awaiting the call of his superior. As a result, his uniform, which was not brand-new to start with, began to look dirty, despite all the loving care of the mother and sister to keep it clean, and Gregor often spent whole evenings gazing at the many greasy spots on the garment, gleaming with gold buttons always in a high state of polish, in which the old man sat sleeping in extreme discomfort and yet quite peacefully.
 

As soon as the clock struck ten his mother tried to rouse his father with gentle words and to persuade him after that to get into bed, for sitting there he could not have a proper sleep and that was what he needed most, since he had to go on duty at six. But with the mulishness he displayed since becoming a bank attendant he always insisted on staying longer at the table, although he regularly fell asleep again and finally only with the greatest trouble could be persuaded to relinquish his armchair and go to bed. However insistently Gregor's mother and sister kept urging him with gentle reminders, he would go on slowly shaking his head for a quarter of an hour, keeping his eyes shut, and refuse to get to his feet. The mother plucked at his sleeve, whispering endearments in his ear, the sister left her lessons to come to her mother's help, but it all made little impression on Gregor's father. He would only sink down deeper in his chair. Not until the two women hoisted him up by the armpits did he open his eyes and look at them both, one after the other, usually with the remark, "What a life. So this is the peace and quiet of my old age." And leaning on the two of them he would heave himself up, with difficulty, as if he were his own greatest burden, permit them to lead him as far as the door, and then wave them away and go on alone, while the mother threw down her needlework and the sister her pen in order to run after him and be of further assistance.
 

Who could find time in this overworked and tired-out family to bother about Gregor more than was absolutely necessary? The household was reduced more and more; the maid was now let go; a gigantic bony cleaning woman with white hair flying around her head came in mornings and evenings to do the rough work; Gregor's mother did all the rest, as well as all her sewing. Even various pieces of family jewelry, which his mother and sister had loved to wear at parties and celebrations, had to be sold, as Gregor discovered one evening from hearing them discuss the prices obtained. But what they lamented most was the fact that they could not leave the apartment, which was much too big for their present circumstances, because they could not think of any way to transfer Gregor. Yet Gregor saw well enough that consideration for him was not the main difficulty preventing the move, for they could easily have carried him in some suitable box with a few air holes in it; what really kept them from moving into another apartment was rather their own complete hopelessness and the belief that they had been singled out for a misfortune such as had never happened to any of their relations or acquaintances. They fulfilled to the utmost all that the world demands of poor people: the father fetched breakfast for the minor clerks in the bank, the mother devoted her energy to making underwear for strangers, the sister trotted back and forth behind the counter at the demand of her customers, but more than this they had not the strength to do. And the wound in Gregor's back began to hurt him afresh when his mother and sister, after getting his father into bed, came back again, left their work lying, drew close to each other, and sat cheek by cheek¡ªwhen his mother, pointing toward his room, said, "Shut that door now, Grete," and he was left again in darkness, while next door the women mingled their tears or perhaps sat dry-eyed, staring at the table.
 

Gregor hardly slept at all now, night or day. He was often haunted by the idea that the next time the door opened he would take the family's affairs in hand again just as he used to do; once again after this long interval, there appeared in his thoughts the figures of the boss and the chief clerk, the salesmen and the apprentices, the messenger boy who was so dull-witted, two or three friends in other firms, a chambermaid in one of the rural hotels, a sweet and fleeting memory, a cashier in a milliner's shop, whom he had courted earnestly but too slowly¡ªthey all appeared, together with strangers or people he had quite forgotten, but instead of helping him and his family they were all inaccessible and he was glad w