Amerika

by Franz Kafka

  The comeuppance for the speech was that they now needed to run to the station. That wasn’t very difficult, though, for – Karl only noticed it now – no one had any luggage – really the only luggage was the pram, which, pushed along by the father at the head of the column, bounced wildly up and down. Suspicious, unpropertied people had assembled here, and had been so well received and looked after! And the head of transport in particular was so involved. At one moment he was helping to push the pram with one hand, while raising the other to exhort the recruits, at the next he was behind the last of the stragglers, driving them on, the next he was running down the flanks, fixing some of the slower ones in the middle with his eye, and by waving his arm, demonstrating to them how they should be running.

  When they reached the station, the train was already standing there. The people in the station pointed to the group, called out such things as: ‘They all belong to the Theatre of Oklahoma,’ the theatre seemed to be far better known than Karl had supposed, although of course he’d never been at all interested in theatrical matters previously. A whole carriage had been reserved for the group, the head of transport was more assiduous than the conductor in urging them in. First he looked into each compartment, arranging a thing or two here and there, and only then did he climb in himself. Karl had managed to get a window seat, and pulled Giacomo in next to him. So they sat pressed together, and both were really looking forward to the trip, they had yet to travel in such a carefree manner in America. When the train began to move, they put their hands out of the window to wave, at which the youths opposite dug each other in the ribs and found it stupid.

  They rode for two days and two nights. Only now did Karl begin to grasp the size of America. He looked out of the window tirelessly, and Giacomo craned towards it with him, until the youths opposite, more interested in playing cards, had had enough, and gave him the window seat opposite. Karl thanked them – Giacomo’s English wasn’t comprehensible to everyone – and as time passed, as happens with people sharing a compartment, they became much friendlier, though their friendliness often took trying forms, for instance each time they dropped a card and looked for it on the floor, they pinched Karl or Giacomo in the leg as hard as they could. Giacomo would cry out, and pull his legs up, Karl sometimes tried to reply with a kick, but otherwise bore it in silence. Everything that happened in the little smoke-filled compartment – even though the windows were open – paled into insignificance compared to what was outside.

  On the first day they travelled over a high mountain range. Blue-black formations of rock approached the train in sharp wedges, they leaned out of the window and tried in vain to see their peaks, narrow dark cloven valleys opened, with a finger they traced the direction in which they disappeared, broad mountain streams came rushing like great waves on their hilly courses, and, pushing thousands of little foaming wavelets ahead of them, they plunged under the bridges over which the train passed, so close that the chill breath of them made their faces shudder.