Part 7

But the man did not obey the command; instead he kept his hands quietly in his trouser pockets and laughed aloud. "You see," he said to the girl, "so I did hit upon the right thing after all. The gentleman is only uncomfortable here, not in general." The girl smiled too, but tapped the man lightly on the arm with her fingertips, as if he had permitted himself too strong a joke at K.'s expense. "But what do you think," said the man, still laughing, "I really do want to lead the gentleman out." "Then it's all right," said the girl, bowing her dainty head for a moment. "Don't attach too much meaning to the laughing," the girl said to K., who had again become sad and was staring gloomily ahead and seemed to need no explanation. "This gentleman—may I introduce him?" (the gentleman gave permission with a gesture of his hand)—"this gentleman, then, is the information clerk. He gives the waiting parties all the information they need, and since our system of justice is not very well known among the population, many inquiries are made. He has an answer to every question; you can test him on that, if you ever feel inclined. But that is not his only merit; his second merit is his elegant clothing. We, that is the officials, once thought that one must dress the information clerk, who is constantly, and indeed first of all, in negotiation with the parties, elegantly, for the sake of a worthy first impression. We others, as you can see at once from me, are unfortunately very poorly and old-fashionedly dressed; nor is there much sense in spending anything on clothing, since we are almost uninterruptedly in the offices, we even sleep here. But as I said, for the information clerk we once considered fine clothing necessary. Since, however, it could not be obtained from our administration, which is somewhat peculiar in this respect, we took up a collection—parties contributed too—and we bought him this fine garment and some others. Everything would now be prepared to make a good impression, but with his laughing he spoils it again and frightens the people." "So it is," said the gentleman mockingly, "but I do not understand, Miss, why you are telling the gentleman all our intimacies, or rather forcing them upon him, for he does not want to learn them at all. Just see how he sits there, evidently occupied with his own affairs." K. did not even have the inclination to contradict; the girl's intention might be a good one, perhaps aimed at diverting him or giving him the possibility to collect himself, but the means were misguided. "I had to explain your laughing to him," said the girl. "It was offensive." "I believe he would forgive even worse offenses, if I finally lead him out." K. said nothing, did not even look up; he tolerated that the two negotiated over him as over a thing, it was even most agreeable to him. But suddenly he felt the hand of the information clerk on one arm and the hand of the girl on the other. "Come now, you weak man," said the information clerk. "I thank you both very much," said K., pleasantly surprised, rose slowly and himself guided the strange hands to the places where he most needed support. "It looks as if," the girl whispered softly into K.'s ear, as they approached the corridor, "I were especially anxious to put the information clerk in a good light, but one may believe it, I do want to tell the truth. He has no hard heart. He is not obliged to lead sick parties out, and yet he does it, as you see. Perhaps no one of us is hard-hearted, we should all perhaps like to help, but as court officials we easily give the appearance of being hard-hearted and not wanting to help anyone. I suffer from that, quite literally."

"Won't you sit down here for a moment," asked the information clerk; they were already in the corridor and right in front of the defendant whom K. had addressed earlier. K. almost felt ashamed before him; earlier he had stood so upright before him, now two people had to support him, the information clerk was balancing his hat on spread fingers, his hairdo was destroyed, his hair hung into his sweat-covered forehead. But the defendant seemed to notice nothing of it; humbly he stood before the information clerk, who looked past him, and only sought to excuse his presence. "I know," he said, "that the settlement of my motions cannot be given today. But I have come anyway, I thought I could wait here, it is Sunday, I have time and I am not disturbing anyone here." "You need not apologize so much," said the information clerk, "your diligence is quite commendable; to be sure, you are taking up space here unnecessarily, but I, for my part, as long as it is not troublesome to me, will by no means prevent you from following the course of your affair exactly. When one has seen people who shamefully neglected their duty, one learns to have patience with people like you. Sit down."

"How well he knows how to speak with the parties," whispered the girl. K. nodded, but started up at once when the information clerk asked him again: "Won't you sit down here?" "No," said K., "I do not want to rest." He had said that with as much determination as possible, but in reality it would have done him very well to sit down. He was like one seasick. He believed himself to be on a ship that was in heavy seas. It seemed to him as if the water were dashing against the wooden walls, as if from the depth of the corridor came a roaring like that of overturning water, as if the corridor were rocking crosswise and as if the waiting parties on both sides were being lowered and lifted. All the more incomprehensible was the calm of the girl and the man who were leading him. He was delivered up to them; if they let him go, he must fall like a board. From their small eyes went sharp glances back and forth; their even steps K. felt without taking part in them, for he was almost carried from step to step. Finally he noticed that they were speaking to him, but he did not understand them; he heard only the noise that filled everything and through which an unchanging high tone seemed to sound like that of a siren. "Louder," he whispered with lowered head and was ashamed, for he knew that they had spoken loudly enough, even if unintelligibly for him. Then finally, as if the wall before them had been torn open, a fresh draft of air came toward him and he heard someone beside him say: "First he wants to leave, then one can tell him a hundred times that here is the exit, and he doesn't move." K. noticed that he was standing before the exit door, which the girl had opened. It was to him as if all his strength had returned at once, to gain a foretaste of freedom; he at once stepped onto a stair and took his leave from there of his companions, who bent down to him. "Many thanks," he repeated, pressed both their hands repeatedly and only let go when he thought he saw that they, accustomed to the office air, poorly endured the relatively fresh air that came from the stairs. They could scarcely answer, and the girl would perhaps have fallen if K. had not extremely quickly closed the door. K. then stood still for a moment, arranged his hair with the help of a pocket mirror, picked up his hat, which lay on the next landing—the information clerk had probably thrown it there—and then ran down the stairs so fresh and in such long bounds that he almost became afraid at this reversal. Such surprises his otherwise quite settled state of health had never yet presented him with. Did his body perhaps want to revolt and prepare a new trial for him, since it bore the old one so effortlessly? He did not entirely reject the thought of going to a doctor at the next opportunity; but in any case he wanted—in this he could advise himself—to employ all future Sunday mornings better than this one.

FOURTH CHAPTER

THE GIRLFRIEND OF MISS BÜRSTNER

In the next period it was impossible for K. to speak even a few words with Miss Bürstner. He tried in the most various ways to get to her, but she always knew how to prevent it. He came home right after the office, stayed in his room without turning on the light, sat on the couch and occupied himself with nothing other than observing the anteroom. If the maid happened to pass by and close the door of the apparently empty room, he would stand up after a while and open it again. In the morning he got up an hour earlier than usual, to perhaps meet Miss Bürstner alone when she went to the office. But none of these attempts succeeded. Then he wrote her a letter both to the office and to the apartment, sought again in it to justify his behavior, offered himself for any satisfaction, promised never to overstep the bounds that she would set him, and begged only to be given the possibility of speaking with her once, especially since he could also arrange nothing with Mrs. Grubach as long as he had not first consulted with her; finally he informed her that he would wait the next Sunday during the whole day in his room for a sign from her that would promise him the fulfillment of his request or that would at least explain to him why she could not fulfill the request, even though he had promised to submit to her in everything. The letters did not come back, but there was also no answer. Instead, on Sunday there was a sign, whose clearness was sufficient. Early he noticed through the keyhole a particular movement in the anteroom, which soon explained itself. A teacher of French—she was by the way a German and was called Montag, a weak pale girl who limped a little and had hitherto occupied a room of her own—was moving into Miss Bürstner's room. For hours one saw her shuffle through the anteroom. Always another piece of laundry or a little cover or a book had been forgotten, that had especially to be fetched and carried over into the new dwelling.

When Mrs. Grubach brought K. the breakfast—since she had so enraged K., she left not the slightest service to the maid—K. could not restrain himself from addressing her for the first time. "Why is there such a noise in the anteroom today?" he asked, while he poured the coffee, "could that not be stopped? Must the cleaning be done just on Sunday?" Although K. did not look up at Mrs. Grubach, he nevertheless noticed that she breathed a sigh of relief. She took even these strict questions of K.'s as forgiveness or as the beginning of forgiveness. "There is no cleaning being done, Mr. K.," she said, "Miss Montag is only moving to Miss Bürstner and carrying her things over." She said nothing further, but waited how K. would take it and whether he would permit her to speak further. But K. put her to the test, stirred the coffee thoughtfully with the spoon and was silent. Then he looked up at her and said: "Have you already given up your former suspicion regarding Miss Bürstner." "Mr. K.," cried Mrs. Grubach, who had only waited for this question, and held her folded hands out to K., "you took a chance remark the other day so seriously. I did not in the remotest think of offending you or anyone. You have known me long enough, Mr. K., to be convinced of that. You do not know how I have suffered these last days! I should slander my tenants! And you, Mr. K., believed it! And said I should give you notice! Give you notice!" The last exclamation was already stifled amid tears; she lifted her apron to her face and sobbed loudly.

"Don't cry, Mrs. Grubach," said K. and looked out the window; he thought only of Miss Bürstner and that she had taken a strange girl into her room. "Don't cry," he said again, when he turned back into the room and Mrs. Grubach still wept. "It wasn't meant so badly by me then either. We simply misunderstood each other. That can happen even to old friends." Mrs. Grubach shifted the apron under her eyes, to see whether K. were really reconciled. "Well yes, so it is," said K. and now dared, since according to Mrs. Grubach's behavior the captain had betrayed nothing, to add: "Do you really believe that I could fall out with you on account of a strange girl." "That is just it, Mr. K.," said Mrs. Grubach; it was her misfortune that, as soon as she felt in any way freer, she immediately said something awkward. "I asked myself continually: Why does Mr. K. take Miss Bürstner's part so much? Why does he quarrel with me on her account, even though he knows that every harsh word from him takes my sleep away? I have said nothing else about the young lady than what I have seen with my own eyes." K. said nothing to that; he would have had to drive her out of the room with the first word, and that he did not want. He contented himself with drinking the coffee and letting Mrs. Grubach feel her superfluousness. Outside one again heard the dragging step of Miss Montag, who crossed the whole anteroom. "Do you hear it?" asked K. and pointed with his hand toward the door. "Yes," said Mrs. Grubach and sighed, "I wanted to help her and also let the maid help, but she is stubborn, she wants to move everything herself. I wonder at Miss Bürstner. It is often troublesome to me that I have Miss Montag as a tenant, but Miss Bürstner even takes her into her room." "That need not concern you at all," said K. and crushed the remaining sugar in the cup. "Do you have any damage from it?" "No," said Mrs. Grubach, "in and of itself it is quite welcome to me, I thereby get a room free and can put my nephew, the captain, there. I had long feared that he might have disturbed you in the last days, during which I had to let him live next door in the parlor. He takes little consideration." "What ideas!" said K. and stood up; "there is no question of that. You seem to take me for oversensitive, because I cannot bear this wandering of Miss Montag—now she is going back again." Mrs. Grubach felt quite powerless. "Shall I, Mr. K., say that she should postpone the rest of the moving? If you wish, I will do it at once." "But she is supposed to move to Miss Bürstner!" said K. "Yes," said Mrs. Grubach, who did not quite understand what K. meant. "Well then," said K., "then she must carry her things over." Mrs. Grubach only nodded. This silent helplessness, which outwardly looked like defiance, irritated K. all the more. He began to walk up and down the room from the window to the door, and thereby took from Mrs. Grubach the possibility of leaving, which she would otherwise probably have done.

Just as K. had again come to the door, there was a knock. It was the maid, who announced that Miss Montag would like to speak a few words with Mr. K. and that she therefore asked him to come into the dining room, where she awaited him. K. listened to the maid thoughtfully, then turned with an almost scornful look toward the frightened Mrs. Grubach. This look seemed to say that K. had long foreseen this invitation of Miss Montag and that it also fitted very well with the torment that he had to experience this Sunday morning from Mrs. Grubach's tenants. He sent the maid back with the answer that he would come at once, then went to the wardrobe to change his coat and had as answer for Mrs. Grubach, who softly lamented the troublesome person, only the request that she might carry away the breakfast dishes. "You have hardly touched anything," said Mrs. Grubach. "Oh, just take it away," cried K.; it was to him as if somehow everything were mixed with Miss Montag and made it repulsive.

As he walked through the anteroom, he looked at the closed door of Miss Bürstner's room. But he was not invited there, but into the dining room, whose door he flung open without knocking.

It was a very long but narrow single-windowed room. There was only so much space there that one had been able to place two cabinets crookedly in the corners on the door side, while the remaining space was completely taken up by the long dining table, which began near the door and reached almost up to the large window, which had thereby become almost inaccessible. The table was already laid, and indeed for many persons, since on Sunday almost all tenants ate here at noon.

As K. entered, Miss Montag came from the window along one side of the table to meet K. They greeted each other silently. Then said Miss Montag, as always with her head unusually raised: "I do not know whether you know me." K. looked at her with narrowed eyes. "Certainly," he said, "you have been living with Mrs. Grubach for some time." "But you do not concern yourself much with the boarding house, I believe," said Miss Montag. "No," said K. "Won't you sit down," said Miss Montag. They both silently drew two armchairs out at the farthest end of the table and sat opposite each other. But Miss Montag stood up at once again, for she had left her handbag on the windowsill and went to fetch it; she dragged through the whole room. When she came back, lightly swinging the handbag, she said: "I should only like to speak a few words with you on behalf of my friend. She wanted to come herself, but she feels a little unwell today. You should excuse her and hear me instead of her. She could not have said anything else to you than I will say to you. On the contrary, I believe I can even tell you more, since I am comparatively uninvolved. Do you not think so too?"

"What would there be to say?" answered K., who was tired of constantly seeing Miss Montag's eyes directed at his lip. She thereby already assumed a mastery over what he wanted to say first. "Miss Bürstner evidently does not grant me the personal conversation I asked of her." "That is it," said Miss Montag, "or rather, it is not at all so, you express it strangely sharply. In general conversations are neither granted nor the opposite happens. But it can happen that one considers conversations unnecessary and so it is here. Now, after your remark, I can speak openly. You have asked my friend in writing or orally for an interview. Now my friend knows—so I must at least assume—what this interview concerns, and is for reasons I do not know convinced that it would bring no one benefit if the interview actually took place. Besides, she only told me about it yesterday and quite fleetingly; she said herewith that you certainly could not care much about the interview either, for you had only come upon such a thought by chance and would yourself, even without special explanation, if not now then very soon, recognize the senselessness of the whole. I answered thereupon that that may be correct, that I, however, for the sake of complete clarification still consider it advantageous to let you have an explicit answer. I offered to take on this task; after some hesitation my friend gave in to me. I now hope also to have acted in your sense, for even the smallest uncertainty in the most trivial matter is always tormenting, and if one can easily remove it, as in this case, it should rather happen at once." "I thank you," said K. at once, stood up slowly, looked at Miss Montag, then across the table, then out the window—the opposite house stood in the sun—and went to the door. Miss Montag followed him a few steps, as if she did not quite trust him. But before the door both had to step back, for it opened and Captain Lanz entered. K. saw him for the first time close up. He was a large man of about forty with a sun-tanned fleshy face. He made a slight bow, which was also directed at K., then went to Miss Montag and kissed her hand respectfully. He was very dexterous in his movements. His courtesy toward Miss Montag strikingly contrasted with the treatment she had received from K. Nevertheless Miss Montag did not seem angry at K., for she even wanted to introduce him, as K. believed to notice, to the captain. But K. did not want to be introduced; he would not have been able to be in any way friendly toward either the captain or Miss Montag; the hand-kiss had bound them for him into a group that, under the appearance of utmost harmlessness and disinterestedness, wanted to keep him from Miss Bürstner. K., however, believed not only to recognize that; he also recognized that Miss Montag had chosen a good, though double-edged, means. She exaggerated the significance of the relation between Miss Bürstner and K.; she exaggerated above all the significance of the requested conversation and at the same time tried to turn it as if it were K. who exaggerated everything. She should deceive herself; K. wanted to exaggerate nothing; he knew that Miss Bürstner was a little typewriting girl who should not long resist him. In doing so he deliberately did not take into account at all what he had learned from Mrs. Grubach about Miss Bürstner. All this he considered while he left the room with a barely greeting gesture. He wanted to go straight to his room, but a little laugh of Miss Montag, which he heard behind him from the dining room, gave him the thought that he might perhaps give both, the captain and Miss Montag, a surprise. He looked around and listened whether from any of the surrounding rooms a disturbance was to be expected; everywhere it was quiet, only the conversation from the dining room was audible and from the corridor leading to the kitchen the voice of Mrs. Grubach. The opportunity seemed favorable; K. went to the door of Miss Bürstner's room and knocked softly. Since nothing stirred, he knocked again, but still no answer came. Was she sleeping? Or was she really unwell? Or did she only deny herself because she suspected that it could only be K. who knocked so softly? K. assumed that she was denying herself and knocked harder; finally, since the knocking had no success, he carefully opened the door, not without the feeling of doing something wrong and moreover useless. In the room was no one. It by the way hardly reminded more of the room as K. had known it. Along the wall two beds had now been placed one behind the other, three armchairs near the door were heaped with clothes and linen, a cabinet stood open. Miss Bürstner had probably gone away, while Miss Montag had been talking at K. in the dining room. K. was not very dismayed by this; he had scarcely expected to meet Miss Bürstner so easily; he had made this attempt almost only out of defiance against Miss Montag. But all the more embarrassing it was for him when, while he was closing the door again, he saw in the open door of the dining room Miss Montag and the captain conversing. They had perhaps been standing there since K. had opened the door; they avoided any appearance of observing K.; they conversed softly and followed K.'s movements with their eyes only as one looks around distractedly during a conversation. But these glances lay heavily on K.; he hurried along the wall to his room.

FIFTH CHAPTER

THE WHIPPER

“Stories of the world, in your language.”