Page 30 - the-metamorphosis

by the living room door, determined to bring in the hesitant
visitor somehow or other or at least to find out who it might
be. But now the door was not opened any more, and Gregor
waited in vain. Earlier, when the door had been barred, they
had all wanted to come in to him; now, when he had opened
one door and when the others had obviously been opened
during the day, no one came any more, and the keys were
stuck in the locks on the outside.
The light in the living room was turned off only late at
night, and now it was easy to establish that his parents and
his sister had stayed awake all this time, for one could hear
clearly as all three moved away on tiptoe. Now it was cer-
tain that no one would come into Gregor any more until
the morning. Thus, he had a long time to think undisturbed
about how he should reorganize his life from scratch. But
the high, open room, in which he was compelled to lie flat
on the floor, made him anxious, without his being able to
figure out the reason, for he had lived in the room for five
years. With a half unconscious turn and not without a slight
shame he scurried under the couch, where, in spite of the
fact that his back was a little cramped and he could no lon-
ger lift up his head, he felt very comfortable and was sorry
only that his body was too wide to fit completely under it.
There he remained the entire night, which he spent partly
in a state of semi-sleep, out of which his hunger constantly
woke him with a start, but partly in a state of worry and
murky hopes, which all led to the conclusion that for the
time being he would have to keep calm and with patience
and the greatest consideration for his family tolerate the