K. pulled the girl aside
and told her straight out that he was on his way to the Castle to speak with Klamm,
but that he had gotten tired and was therefore looking for a bed.
Abruptly Frieda burst out laughing.
It was absolutely impossible for him to speak to Klamm at the Castle.
All the more because tonight Klamm was here, at the manorial inn.
She of all must know, after all she was Klamm's mistress.
When K. wanted to investigate, she went on quickly.
One who had goals would always meet resistance
After all it was not a crime to be in favor with an important man.
And Klamm was good and generous,
Otherwise, how would she have gotten from stable- to bar-maid?
And she pulled K. to a door and pointed in the neighbouring room;
By the wall on the tops of some casks sat men,
but they were more neatly and uniformly dressed than the peasants in the village.
They were smallish men with flat bony faces, but rounded cheeks.
Frieda vagely pointed in the room and told him, there was his Klamm.
His appearance was known in the village: some had seen him,
everyone had heard of him, and finally an overall picture of Klamm had emerged,
that seemed correct in its essentials.
But furthermore this picture was variable,
for when arriving he looked different from when he left, drank or slept.
After a moment of hesitation K. asked once again if he could spend the night at the inn.
Frieda affirmed without hesitation.
But first she had to clear out the guests.
Meanwhile he should hide behind the bar counter.
K. dodged in a corner, while the landlady turned out the light and shut the door.
A moment later Frieda lay down next to him;
„My darling! My darling!“ she whispered,
as if swooning with love, but she did not touch him.
Then again they embraced each other, and rolled around on the floor in a state of unconsciousness.
There, hours went past, hours in which they breathed as one, in which their hearts beat as one,
hours in which K. was haunted by the feeling of losing himself
or wandering far into strange country, where one might die of strangeness,
and yet whose enchantment was such that one could only go on and lose oneself further.
And now that Klamm would never call for Frieda again, both of them were irrecoverably lost;
even though they had won each other.
K. awoke with a start, turned, and noticed his assistants in the corner
jeering and eying them quietly, but in a sense scornful.
K. cried as if they were to blame for everything
He drove them out and followed Frieda up to her room,
were he lay down on her bed, while she went back to work.
He slept, but did not know how long.
When he got up at last he was much refreshed, and it was the fourth day since his arrival in the village.