Page 48 - the-metamorphosis

and which made his hot abdomen feel good. At least this
picture, which Gregor at the moment completely concealed,
surely no one would now take away. He twisted his head to-
wards the door of the living room to observe the women as
they came back in.
They had not allowed themselves very much rest and
were coming back right away. Grete had placed her arm
around her mother and held her tightly. ‘So what shall we
take now?’ said Grete and looked around her. Then her
glance crossed with Gregor’s from the wall. She kept her
composure only because her mother was there. She bent her
face towards her mother in order to prevent her from look-
ing around, and said, although in a trembling voice and too
quickly, ‘Come, wouldn’t it be better to go back to the living
room for just another moment?’ Grete’s purpose was clear
to Gregor: she wanted to bring his mother to a safe place
and then chase him down from the wall. Well, let her just
attempt that! He squatted on his picture and did not hand it
over. He would sooner spring into Grete’s face.
But Grete’s words had immediately made the moth-
er very uneasy. She walked to the side, caught sight of the
enormous brown splotch on the flowered wallpaper, and,
before she became truly aware that what she was looking
at was Gregor, screamed out in a high pitched raw voice
‘Oh God, oh God’ and fell with outstretched arms, as if she
was surrendering everything, down onto the couch and lay
there motionless. ‘Gregor, you …,’ cried out his sister with
a raised fist and an urgent glare. Since his transformation
those were the first words which she had directed right at