The Metamorphosis and Other Stories (18 page)

The traveler followed this activity closely from below; his neck grew stiff and his eyes ached from the blaze of sunlight glaring across the sky. The soldier and the condemned man were absorbed with each other. The condemned man's shirt and trousers, which had already been dumped in the pit, were fished out by the soldier with the point of his bayonet. The shirt was filthy beyond belief, and the condemned man washed it in the bucket of water. When the condemned man donned the shirt and trousers, neither of the men could help bursting out laughing because the garments had been slit up the back. Perhaps the condemned man felt obliged to amuse the soldier, he twirled around again and again in his slashed clothes while the soldier squatted on the ground, slapping his knees in merriment. They did, however, control themselves somewhat out of consideration for the gentlemen's presence.

When at long last the officer had finished his work up above, he surveyed each part of the entire machine with a smile and closed the cover of the designer, which had remained open until now. He climbed down, looked into the pit and then at the condemned man, noting with satisfaction that he had taken back his clothes, then went over to wash his hands in the water bucket, realizing only too late how revoltingly dirty it was, and disheartened that he could no longer wash his hands, he ultimately thrust them—this alternative did not please him, but he had to accept it—into the sand. He then rose and began to unbutton his tunic. As he did this, the two ladies' handkerchiefs that he had tucked behind his collar fell into his hands. "Here, take your handkerchiefs," he said, and tossed them over to the condemned man. And to the traveler he said by way of explanation: "Presents from the ladies."

Despite the obvious haste with which he removed the tunic and then the rest of his clothing, he handled each garment with the utmost care, even running his fingers over the tunic's silver braid and shaking a tassel into place. But all this care was in direct contrast with the fact that no sooner was he finished removing a garment than he hurled it unceremoniously into the pit with an indignant jerk. The last thing left to him was his short sword and its belt. He drew the sword out of the scabbard and broke it, then gathered it all up, the pieces of sword, the scabbard, the belt, and threw them into the pit so violently they clanked against each other.

Now he stood there naked. The traveler chewed his lip and said nothing. He knew without a doubt what was going to happen, but he had no right to prevent the officer from doing anything. If the judicial procedure that was so clear to the officer was truly near its end—possibly due to the traveler's intervention, to which he felt quite committed—then the officer's actions were proper; the traveler would have done the same in his place.

The soldier and the condemned man understood nothing at first, they weren't even watching. The condemned man was delighted to have his handkerchiefs returned, but he was not allowed to enjoy them for long, as the soldier snatched them with a sudden, unexpected motion. Now the condemned man tried in turn to grab at the handkerchiefs, which the soldier had tucked under his belt for safekeeping, but the soldier was on his guard. So they half jokingly wrestled with each other. Only when the officer was totally naked did they begin to pay attention. The notion that some drastic reversal was about to take place seemed to have struck the condemned man in particular. What had happened to him was now happening to the officer. Perhaps it would be seen through to the end. The foreign traveler had probably ordered it. This, then, was revenge. Without having suffered to the end himself, he would be avenged to the end. A broad, silent grin now appeared on his face and stayed there.

The officer, however, had turned to the machine. It had previously been clear enough that he understood the machine well, but now it was almost mind-boggling to see how he handled it and how it obeyed him. He had only to reach out a hand toward the harrow for it to raise and lower itself several times until it found the proper position to receive him; he merely nudged the edge of the bed and it started to vibrate; it was plain that he was rather reluctant, when the felt gag came to meet his mouth, to receive it, but his hesitation only lasted a moment; he promptly submitted and received it. Everything was ready; only the straps still hung down at the sides, but they were evidently superfluous; the officer did not need to be strapped in. But the condemned man noticed the loose straps, and in his opinion the execution was not complete unless the straps were fastened; he eagerly beckoned to the soldier and they both ran over to strap the officer down. The latter had already stretched out one foot to push the crank that would start the designer, then he saw the two men approaching; he withdrew his foot and allowed himself to be strapped in. But now he could no longer reach the crank; neither the soldier nor the condemned man would be able to find it, and the traveler was determined not to lift a finger. It wasn't necessary; hardly were the straps in place when the machine started to operate: The bed shook, the needles danced over the flesh, the harrow gently bobbed up and down. The traveler had already been staring at it for some time before remembering that a gear in the designer should be screeching, but everything was still, not even the slightest whirring could be heard.

Because the machine was working so silently, it became virtually unnoticeable. The traveler looked over at the soldier and the condemned man. The condemned was the livelier of the two, every facet of the machine interested him—one moment he was bending down, the next reaching up, his forefinger always extended to point something out to the soldier. This made the traveler extremely uncomfortable. He was determined to stay here till the end, but he couldn't bear the sight of those two for long. "Go on home," he said. The soldier might have been willing to do so, but the condemned man considered the order a punishment. With clasped hands he begged to be allowed to stay, and when the traveler, shaking his head, did not relent, he even went down on his knees. The traveler realized that giving orders was useless and was at the point of going over to chase the pair away. Just then he heard a noise in the designer above him. He looked up. Was it that troublesome gear after all? But it was something else. The cover of the designer rose slowly and then fell completely open. The teeth of a gear wheel emerged and rose higher, soon the whole wheel could be seen. It was as if some monumental force were compressing the designer so that there was no more room for this wheel—the wheel spun to the edge of the designer, fell, and rolled a little ways in the sand before it toppled onto its side. But a second wheel was already following it, with many others rolling after it—large ones, small ones, some so tiny they were hard to see; the same thing happened with all of them. One kept imagining that the designer was finally empty, but then a fresh, particularly numerous group would come into view, climb out, fall, spin in the sand, and lie still. In the thrall of this spectacle, the condemned man completely forgot the traveler's order. He was fascinated by the wheels and kept trying to catch one, urging the soldier at the same time to help him; but he always drew back his hand in alarm, for another wheel would immediately come speeding along and frighten him, at least when it started to roll.

The traveler on the other hand was deeply troubled—the machine was obviously falling apart—its silent operation was an illusion. He had the feeling that it was now his duty to take care of the officer, since he was no longer capable of looking after himself. However, while the chaos of the gear wheels claimed all his attention, he had failed to keep an eye on the rest of the machine; now that the last wheel had left the designer, he went over to the harrow and had a new and even less welcome surprise. The harrow wasn't writing at all but just stabbing, and the bed wasn't rolling the body over but thrusting it up, quivering, into the needles. The traveler wanted to do something, bring the whole machine to a stop if possible, because this was not the exquisite torture the officer had wished for; this was out-and-out murder. He reached out, but at that moment the harrow rose with the body already spitted upon it and swung to the side as it usually only did at the twelfth hour. Blood flowed in a hundred streams—not mixed with water, the water jets had also failed to function this time—and the last function failed to complete itself, the body did not drop from the long needles: It hung over the pit, streaming with blood, without falling. The harrow tried to return to its original position, but as if it also noticed that it had not unloaded its burden, it stayed where it was, suspended over the pit. "Come and help!" the traveler shouted to the soldier and the condemned man, and grabbed the officer by the feet. He wanted to push against the feet from this side while the other two took hold of the head from the other side so the officer could gently be removed from the needles. But the others couldn't make up their minds to come right away; the condemned man had even turned away. The traveler was compelled to go over to them and force them to get in position by the officer's head. And from this vantage point he had to look, almost against his will, at the face of the corpse. It was as it had been in life (no sign of the promised deliverance could be detected). What all the others had found in the machine, the officer had not; his lips were clamped together, the eyes were open and bore the same expression as in life, a quiet, convinced look; and through the forehead was the point of the great iron spike.

As the traveler, with the soldier and the condemned man following, reached the first houses in the colony, the soldier pointed to one of them and said: "That's the teahouse."

On the ground floor of this house was a deep, low, cavernous room whose walls and ceiling were blackened with smoke. It was open to the street along the whole of its width. Although the teahouse differed very little from the other houses in the colony, which, except for the palatial buildings of the commandant's headquarters, were all very dilapitated, it gave the traveler the impression of being a historic landmark, and he felt the power of earlier times. Followed by his companions, he went closer, passed between the empty tables that stood on the street in front of the teahouse, and breathed in the damp, cool air that came from the interior. "The old man is buried here," said the soldier. "The priest wouldn't allow him in the cemetery. For a while no one knew where to bury him, they ended up burying him here. The officer didn't tell you about it because, naturally, it's what he's most ashamed of. A few times he even tried to dig the old man up at night, but he was always chased away." "Where's the grave?" asked the traveler, finding it impossible to believe the soldier. Both the soldier and the condemned man immediately ran in front of him, pointing with outstretched hands to where the grave was. They led the traveler to the far wall, where several customers were sitting at tables. They were apparently dock workers, strong men with black, glistening, full beards. They were all in their shirtsleeves and their shirts were raggedy: These were poor, humble people. As the traveler approached, some of them rose and edged back against the wall, staring at him. "He's a foreigner," was whispered around him, "he wants to see the grave." They pushed one of the tables aside, and under it there actually was a gravestone. It was a simple stone, low enough to be hidden beneath a table. It bore an inscription in very small lettering; the traveler had to kneel down in order to read it. It read: "Here lies the old commandant. His followers, who must now remain nameless, have dug this grave and set this stone. It has been prophesied that after a certain number of years he will rise again and lead his followers out of this house to reclaim the colony. Have faith and wait!" When the traveler read this, he rose to his feet. He saw the men surrounding him smile, as if they had read the inscription with him, found it absurd, and were inviting him to agree with them. The traveler pretended not to notice, distributed a few coins among them, and waiting until the table was pushed back over the grave, left the teahouse and made for the harbor.

The soldier and the condemned man were detained in the teahouse by some acquaintances. But they must have broken away from them relatively quickly because the traveler had only descended half the long flight of stairs that led to the boats when they came running after him. They probably wanted to force the traveler to take them with him at the last minute. While he was down below negotiating with a ferryman to take him to the steamer, the two men charged down the steps in silence, as they did not dare shout. But by the time they arrived at the foot of the steps, the traveler was already in the boat and the ferryman was casting off. They could still have jumped aboard, but the traveler hoisted a heavy, knotted rope from the floor of the boat and threatened them with it, thereby preventing them from attempting the leap.

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A Hunger Artist

IN RECENT DECADES THERE HAS been a marked define in the public's interest in professional fasting. It was formerly very profitable to mount large, privately managed productions of this kind, while today this is entirely impossible. Those were different times. There was a time when the whole town was entranced by the hunger artist; during his fast, enthusiasm grew from day to day, everyone wanted to see the hunger artist at least once a day; during the latter stages people would reserve special seats in front of the small barred cage all day long, there were even night exhibitions by torchlight for a more extreme effect; on fine days the cage was carried out into the open and then it was a particular treat for children to see the hunger artist, while for the elders he was often mostly a joke in which they participated because it was fashionable; the children stood around in open-mouthed wonder, holding each other's hands for security, and watching as he sat on the spread-out straw, spurning even a chair, a pale figure in black tricot, his ribs protruding hideously; sometimes he nodded politely, answering questions with a forced smile, occasionally proffering an arm through the bars for them to feel how skinny it was but then sinking down and retreating completely into himself, paying attention to nothing and no one, not even the all-important striking of the clock, which was the only piece of furniture in the cage, but staring straight ahead through narrowed eyes and taking an occasional sip from a glass of water to moisten his lips.