The ArrestLeeftijdsaangepaste versie

Someone must have been telling lies about Josef K., for one morning – the very morning he turned thirty – he was arrested without having done anything he could understand was wrong. Every morning the cook came to Frau Grubach's boarding house with breakfast at eight o'clock. But this morning she did not come. K. waited, grew hungry, and rang the bell.

A strange man in a tight black suit walked right in, as if he belonged there. When K. asked who he was, he didn't answer. Instead, he opened the door to the sitting room and called in: "He wants Anna to bring his breakfast." Someone laughed in the room behind. "That's not possible," the man said.

K. jumped out of bed and pulled on his trousers. "I want to see who's there and why Frau Grubach allows this," he said. "You'd better stay where you are," the man replied. K. demanded at least a proper introduction. The man opened the door. In the sitting room sat another man by the window, reading. When K. tried to go into the hallway, the second man stood up and said calmly: "You can't go anywhere when you're under arrest."

"Arrested? What for?" asked K. The man answered: "We can't tell you that. The proceedings have begun.

You'll find out everything in due time." He added that if K. was lucky with the people who arrested him, things could go well. K. looked around.

There was only one chair, the one by the window; the rest were taken up by the two of them. They called each other Franz and Willem.

They fussed about his nightshirt being too fine and said he should get a poorer one. They wanted to keep his underwear in the meantime, "because in the storeroom things often disappear," they said, "or they get sold for a pittance after many years." K. barely listened properly. He wanted to understand what was happening, but couldn't think with them there.

He thought: This must be a bad joke from the colleagues at the bank. Or something because it was his birthday. But from the moment he first saw Franz, he had decided: He would not lose any advantage by pretending he didn't take it seriously. Even if it was a joke, he would treat it seriously, so people could say he didn't understand a joke if they wanted to.

He ran into his room to get his papers. He grew clumsy with agitation, finding first his bicycle license, then his birth certificate. Just then Frau Grubach opened the door carefully. She blushed, apologized, and closed it quickly. K. stood there with the papers in his hand, waiting. The large constable was eating breakfast at the table and asked why the landlady didn't come in.

"She's not allowed to," he said, shrugging. "You're under arrest, after all." K. demanded to see the arrest warrant and identification. "We're just small people," said Willem. "We don't know the ins and outs of such cards. And our law doesn't look for guilt; guilt draws the law forth. That's how the law works."

"That law I don't know," said K. "So much the worse for you," smiled Willem. K. realized that their "law" probably only existed in their heads. "He admits he doesn't know the law, but says he's innocent," Franz interjected, almost pleased. K. saw that talking to these lowly functionaries was a waste of time. "Your superior," he said, "I want to speak with him." "Not until he wants to see you," replied Willem. "Go to your room and wait quietly. Don't waste your strength on speculation. If you want breakfast from the café, just say so."

K. didn't answer. He considered tearing open the door and simply leaving. But he imagined them throwing him to the floor, and how that would put him at a disadvantage. He chose the safer path: he went back without a word, lay down on his bed, picked up the apple he had saved for breakfast.

It tasted better than anything from that dirty café. He felt calm returning. The bank could manage without him for one morning; his position was high.

He could explain everything later, with Frau Grubach and the old couple across the street as witnesses. That they had left him alone in a room where he could kill himself in at least ten different ways puzzled him. But suicide was so meaningless to him that he couldn't even bring himself to want it. He took out a bottle of good schnapps from the cupboard, drank a glass instead of breakfast, then another for courage and to be safe.

Suddenly a shout came from the sitting room. K. bit into the glass in fright. "The Supervisor wants to see you!" The shout was short and hard, more like a sergeant's than a man in a parlor.

"Finally!" cried K., locked the cupboard, and hurried out. But the constables drove him back. "Do you think you're going to meet the Supervisor in just your shirt?"

K. protested that he couldn't be expected to appear in coat and tails when they had dragged him out of bed, but they insisted: black jacket. He put on his best black suit, clean shirt, tied his tie carefully. He thanked himself that they hadn't forced him into the bathtub too. Willem sent Franz to report that K. was ready.

Well-dressed, K. went through the sitting room and into Fräulein Bürstner's room – her room had been rearranged and used as an office. The night table had been pulled to the center and used as a desk. On it sat a gentleman with crossed legs and his arm over the back of the chair. In the corner stood three young people looking at photographs pinned to the wall. In the window a white blouse hung over the handle. Across the street stood the old couple staring in, now joined by a tall man with an open shirt and reddish beard.

"Josef K.?" said the Supervisor. K. nodded. "You were quite surprised."

"I am surprised, but not so that I'm very surprised," replied K., relieved to be speaking with someone who seemed reasonable. "Not very surprised?" said the Supervisor, adjusting the light a little. K. asked if he could sit down.

"That's not usually done," said the man, but K. insisted. He explained that after thirty years in the world, one is no longer easily shocked.

"And especially not today," he added. "Why not today?"

"This could be a joke, but it's too much trouble. Everyone in the house has been dragged in. At the same time, it can't be so important, since I can't think of any crime. The main question is: Who is bringing this case against me? What office? You don't even wear uniforms. Give me clear answers, and we can part as friends."

The Supervisor struck the matchbox hard on the table. "Great mistake. We have nothing to do with your affairs. Whether you're charged or not, I don't know. You're simply under arrest. My advice: Think less about us and more about yourself. And talk less – what you've said hasn't been in your favor."

K. stood staring. He felt spoken to like a schoolmaster. He began to pace back and forth. No one stopped him.

"This makes no sense," he said aloud, turning toward the three men. They turned and looked at him seriously. He went to the table and said: "Prosecutor Hasterer is a good friend of mine. Can I call him?" "Of course," said the Supervisor, "but what good will it do?"

"What good will it do?" cried K., more confused than angry. "You demand a 'point' while carrying on with something completely pointless. It's enough to make you cry!" He threw out his hand, but didn't call. He went to the window and shouted at the three nosy people across the street: "Go away!" They retreated a few steps but didn't disappear. "Pushy, thoughtless people!" muttered K.

Finally, he reached out his hand across the table. "Let's end this peacefully with a handshake." The Supervisor looked at the hand, bit his lip, stood up, took a round, hard hat from the bed, and put it on carefully with both hands. "Everything seems so simple to you, doesn't it?" he said. "No, no, it's not that simple. But take it easy: I don't want you to think it's hopeless. You're just arrested, nothing more. That was all I had to say, and I've seen how you took it. That's enough for today. You want to go to the bank now?"

"To the bank?" K. straightened his back. "I thought I was under arrest." "You've misunderstood," said the Supervisor, already on his way out. "It's true that you're arrested, but—" He didn't finish the sentence. Later K. learned that "arrest" here meant he should not leave the city, but otherwise live as before. His work should not be disturbed.

Three bank colleagues – Rabensteiner, Kullich, and Kaminer – were to accompany him to the bank. K. was struck that he hadn't even recognized them in that room. They fetched his hat, and the whole procession went out. On the staircase, Frau Grubach was calm and generous as always. "My best lodger," she said. K. said nothing more.

Later that same evening, he went straight to her. He felt that the whole apartment had been turned upside down by the morning, and that he had to put everything in order, erase all traces. Frau Grubach sat mending stockings. K. thanked her for clearing away the breakfast things, and wondered if the men had given her extra work. "Hardly at all," she said, and then admitted she had listened a little at the door. "It seemed to be about your luck," she told him softly. "This isn't like when they arrest a thief. It's something much more complicated."

"It's just nonsense and noise," said K. "I was caught off guard. If I had gotten up like a normal person, nothing would have happened." Yet he asked her for a handshake, as if to seal that everything was fine between them. She became embarrassed and said: "Don't take it so hard, Herr K."

He grew irritated – those very words made her sympathy worthless to him. As he was leaving, he asked if Fräulein Bürstner was home.

No, she was at the theater. "I want to apologize for them using her room," said K. "That's all right," said Frau Grubach, but then began to complain about Fräulein's habits, that she came home late and had been seen with two different gentlemen this month. K. grew angry. "You're wrong," he said firmly. "And don't say this to her." He slammed the door, while Frau Grubach called after him that she only wanted to keep the house respectable.

K. couldn't bear to go to bed. He decided to wait for Fräulein Bürstner. He smoked in the dark, walked out into the hallway, listened. Not until a little after half past eleven did she come, thin-shouldered and light, with a shawl pulled tightly around her.

"Fräulein Bürstner," K. whispered in the crack of the door. She started, but smiled when she saw it was him. "I've been waiting since nine," he said. She was tired, but let him come in for a short talk.

She sat on the ottoman, still wearing her little hat pin. K. apologized for the mess they had made of her room. She noticed that someone had moved her photographs. "That was one of my subordinates," said K.

"I'll dismiss him." He told her that a committee had been there because of him. She laughed: "Then you're not such a great criminal if you're allowed to go free." "Perhaps they'll soon see that I'm innocent," said K. "I like the law.

I'm starting at a law office soon," she replied.

"Then I might need your advice," he smiled. "But what have you actually done?" "I don't know," he said. She grew irritated, thinking he was laughing at her.

"No," he said seriously, "listen. Do you want to see how they did it? I can show you." Reluctantly, she agreed to move the night table back to the center, like a desk. K. positioned himself by the door, called out her name loudly: "Josef K.!" The sound echoed against the walls.

Then someone knocked violently on the wall from the next room. Fräulein Bürstner went pale and put her hand to her heart. K. took her hand. "It's Frau Grubach's nephew," she whispered.

"A captain. He came yesterday and sleeps in there. You frightened him." She was agitated. K. kissed her gently on the forehead. She asked him to leave. He refused until she calmed down, and led her to a corner where they wouldn't be heard. "It's not dangerous," he said calmly. "Frau Grubach values me.

She decides here." Then, at the door to the hallway, he hesitated. Fräulein Bürstner pointed at the light seeping under the captain's door. "He's laughing at us," she said.

K. took a step, grabbed her, and kissed her on the mouth – and all over her face like a very thirsty person who had finally found water. He kissed her neck and stood with his lips there for a long time. He only let go when a sound came from the captain's room. "I'm leaving now," he said. She nodded wearily and gave him her hand. She didn't really know what she was doing. That's how that night ended – and in bed afterward, K. was surprised that he didn't feel more pleased with himself, and worried about what the captain might do to her.

On Sunday came a telephone message: First hearing. Sundays were chosen so as not to disturb him at the bank. He was given a number in a gray suburb. He decided to attend, and just as he stood by the telephone, the Vice-Director came to make a call. "Would you like to come sailing on Sunday?" he asked kindly, as if to make peace between them.

K. declined. He had "an appointment" after all. "Too bad," said the Vice-Director, and K. realized a little too late that he had been standing stupidly in the way. He found a weak excuse: "I think I have to call back and check the time again." The Vice-Director said he should go ahead. K. left, but all his thoughts were on Sunday.

Sunday's weather was gloomy and gray. K. had been out late drinking, nearly overslept. He set off without breakfast, refused to take the tram so as not to seem weak. This was his case.

The long Juliusstrasse was full of poor people; windows with men in shirtsleeves, women with babies, drying lines, noise. Some people laughed at K. when they saw him running. He walked slowly, as if he had plenty of time, but it was past nine.

The house had a carriage gate.

A man sat reading barefoot, two children played in a handcart, a girl in a morning jacket pumped water. Three stairways. He chose one at random and went up. The policeman had said something about the court being attracted to the guilty. Perhaps he should just go where it wanted him to go.

He didn't ask for a court – that seemed foolish. He invented a carpenter named Lanz (the captain's surname) and went from door to door asking: "Does carpenter Lanz live here?" It smelled of cabbage in the hallways, doors stood open, in small rooms women cooked with babies on their arms, young people ran about. No Lanz. Everyone pointed him further, upward.

On the fifth floor he wanted to give up. He was furious at all the time he had wasted. But he knocked on the first door anyway.

A young woman with black, shiny eyes stood washing children's clothes in a tub. She pointed into the next room.

K. went in – and thought he had stepped into a strange assembly. A medium-sized room was full of people, and up near the ceiling ran a sort of gallery with even more people bent over. The air was thick and warm, K. had to pull back, but the woman pushed him gently inside and closed the door behind him.

A small, reddish-blond boy took him by the hand and led him through a narrow passage between people's backs. At the front stood a small table on a low platform. Behind it sat a small, fat man who wheezed when he breathed: the Examining Magistrate. The boy tried to whisper something to him on tiptoe, but someone on the platform nodded only when the Magistrate took out his pocket watch.

"You should have been here one hour and five minutes ago," he said. There was murmuring from the right side of the hall. K. decided to assess the playing field and said calmly: "Perhaps. But now I'm here." Then the right side burst into applause, as if it were a theater. The left side was silent.

The Magistrate said he wasn't obliged to hear him further, but would make an exception. "Step forward." Some people jumped down from the platform so K. could get space. He leaned against the table; it was so crowded behind him that he had to stand steady not to knock it over. The Magistrate flipped through a small, moldy notebook, completely skewed from heavy use. "Are you a painter?" he asked. "No," said K. "I'm a chief clerk at a large bank." The right side burst into laughter. K. laughed too. The Magistrate turned red but couldn't get the audience to quiet down. The left side stood with hands at their sides, attentive and still.

K. began to speak, and the words came. "Your question, Herr Magistrate – actually you didn't ask, you imposed it on me – whether I am a painter, shows everything that is wrong. You might say that there is no case against me. You're right: There is first a case only when I acknowledge it.

I do so now, but only out of pity for yourselves. I'm not saying you're negligent, but I'm making it clear that I am the one giving you a case."

He carefully took the Magistrate's book with two fingers and let the pages fall over his hand. "These are the official records? I'm not afraid of anything written here." The Magistrate grabbed the book back and smoothed it out. The old men in the front row – many with white beards – raised their faces, stiff as if carved in wood.

K. continued: "What has happened to me is not isolated. I stand here for many, not just for myself. Ten days ago I was arrested in bed. Two of them came, a couple of ruffians, took my breakfast, tried to swindle money out of me. I had to go into a room I respect – a lady's room – and they messed everything up. The Supervisor could confirm all this if he were here."

He had nearly won the hall. He struck the table with his fist: "None of you have anything to do with me, so I can speak calmly. The hearing should be useful to you, if this court means anything at all. But I have no time to waste; I'm leaving immediately."

Right then a piercing sound came from the back of the hall. K. shielded his eyes from the smoky, yellow light. It was the washerwoman from the hallway; she was being dragged into a corner by a young man, who pressed himself against her and screamed with his mouth wide open toward the ceiling. A lustful, noisy game or a choked protest – K. couldn't tell. He wanted to storm over, but the front row raised their arms and held him back. A hand grabbed his collar. He jumped down from the platform and came face to face with the hall.

Then he saw something: on the collars of many of the coats gleamed small badges, pins in various colors and shapes.

As far as he could see, everyone had such badges. They were all part of the same thing, even though they had pretended the hall was divided into two opinions. When he turned, he saw the badge also on the Magistrate's collar. The Magistrate sat calmly with his hands in his lap, looking down at K.

"So," cried K., throwing out his arms, "you're all in on this. You're exactly the swindlers and spies I was talking about. You came here to listen and snoop, you pretended to be divided, and you applauded and booed to test me – to see how best you could trap an innocent man. Enjoy yourselves! Either you've amused yourselves at the expense of someone who asked you to defend him, or you've learned something useful to continue your dirty business." He took his hat and forced his way to the door. The hall fell completely still in surprise.

The Magistrate was already standing in the doorway. "One moment," he said kindly, almost caringly. K. stopped, his hand on the door handle. "Just so you know: Today you have deprived yourself of the advantage that such a hearing usually gives an accused person." K. laughed toward the door. "You can keep all your hearings as a gift," he said, and ran down the stairs. Behind him, the murmuring rose again, as if they were writing a report of what had happened.

The following week K. waited for a new summons, but nothing came. Saturday evening he convinced himself that he had to appear at the same time and place on Sunday without a summons. On Sunday he went there. The washerwoman from before opened the door.

"There's no session today," she said. The room was empty, more dismal than before. On the platform lay some books. K. asked to see them.

"They belong to the Examining Magistrate," said the woman. K. said that the court tried innocent people without informing them of anything.

"My husband is the court usher," said the woman cautiously. K. saw that the room was furnished as a dwelling for them. "We get to live here as long as we clean up when there's a session," she said. K. was shocked – she was married, yet he remembered her from last time: that student who had dragged her into the corner. "He pursues me constantly," she said. "My husband has to put up with it, otherwise we'll lose our jobs." It all fit, K. thought – everything was like this here.

The woman wondered if K. wanted to do something better. She had heard part of his speech and liked it. "Better?" said K.

"It's not my job to improve you. I act because I'm under arrest." But if she could show him the books, he'd like to see them. She pulled him up onto the platform, excited as a girl. The books were old and dirty.

K. leafed through the first and saw a crude, ugly picture of a naked couple on a sofa. The next was a novel: What Grete Suffered at the Hands of Her Husband Hans.

"These are your law books?" asked K.

"People like this are supposed to judge me?" She blushed and defended herself, but didn't put the books away. She offered to help him. She praised his eyes, said she noticed them when he first came. K. understood that she was offering herself as much as help. "You only know the small people here," he said. "Only the high-ups really help." "The Examining Magistrate isn't so small," she replied quickly, and told a long story about how he had sat here the whole Sunday after the last session writing reports, how she had lit a little lamp for him, how late at night he stood by her bed with the lamp shaded, and whispered that he would never forget how she looked when she slept.

She pulled up her skirt a little to show the silk stockings she had received as a gift – "for the cleaning," but that was a poor excuse, because it was really her husband's work. "They're too fine for me," she said, almost happy and sad at the same time.

Then her gaze froze. "We must be quiet. Berthold is watching us," she whispered. In the doorway stood a short student with crooked legs and a thin, red strip of beard. He kept touching his beard with a finger, as if it made him wiser. He ignored K. and beckoned her to him. She whispered in K.'s ear: "Don't get angry.

I have to go to him. He's terrible. But I'll come back soon. If you want, I'll go with you wherever you want. You can do whatever you want with me, just so I can get away a little, preferably forever." She stroked her hand over his, then ran to the window before K. could grab her.

K. felt how strongly he was drawn to her right then. He thought quickly: Perhaps she was a lure. But he dismissed the thought. He was still free, free enough to crush the whole court if he wanted, at least in what concerned him.

Taking this woman from the Examining Magistrate would be sweet revenge. He imagined the Examining Magistrate writing dishonest reports about him until night, and when he finally came to her bed, he found it empty – because she was with K. and belonged to him now.

K. drummed on the platform with his knuckles, then with his fist.

The student pressed himself tighter against the woman and kissed her on the neck. "You should have been kept in your room between hearings," said the student over his shoulder. "You go," K. suggested. "If you came to study, you can have the room.

I'm going with her. And believe me, you have much more to learn before you become a judge." The student snapped at his hand with his teeth. Then he picked up the woman in his arms with surprising strength and carried her out.

K. followed slowly, like someone who had just suffered his first loss. Where were they going? Not out into the street. Opposite was a narrow wooden staircase that curved up toward the attic. The student panted and went slower; the woman waved down to K. and shrugged: She was innocent, she seemed to say. But she didn't seem to regret much. K. stood and watched without expression, like a stranger.

That was when K. saw the sign on the wall: "Entrance to the Court Offices." Up here? In the attic of a poorhouse? It was almost comical. Either the court was poor, or they spent everything on themselves. Both humiliated the accused – and yet gave them a kind of hope. K. compared: At the bank he had a large office, an anteroom, a window overlooking the square. He took no bribes and didn't have women carried in for him. And that was good.

A man came up the stairs. K. recognized him from the previous Sunday – the court usher. "The student has taken my wife," he complained. "He always takes her.

I dream of smashing him flat against the wall. Blood everywhere. But it's only a dream. I'm not allowed." K. asked if his wife bore some of the blame. "Yes, sure," he sighed. "She clings to him. He throws himself at all women. Five apartments in this building have thrown him out.

And I can't defend myself." K. said: "Nothing to be done." "You, who stand before the court, can do anything – you risk less than others," said the usher suddenly. K. was surprised by the strange advice, but weakly promised that if the opportunity arose, he would take care of the student. "Thank you, Herr K.," said the usher seriously, and showed him the attic offices.

Just inside the threshold, K. nearly tripped over a hidden step. "Not very visitor-friendly," he said. The usher nodded and pointed: the waiting room, a long corridor with rough doors leading to tiny offices. The walls were flimsy, the light came only through narrow slits of wood.

Through them K. could see clerks bent over papers. It was Sunday, yet a dozen accused people were present, sitting humbly on long benches. No hooks for coats, hats under the benches. When they saw K. and the usher, they jumped up and bowed, like beggars. "You're completely crushed," said K. The usher nodded: "Everyone here is accused." "Really? Then they're my colleagues," said K. ironically, and turned to a tall, thin man with gray hair. "What are you waiting for?" asked K. politely. The man stiffened, slightly terrified, looking around as if for rescue.

The usher took over in a calm voice, and after some stammering, the man managed to say that he had submitted a petition to present witnesses a month ago, and was now waiting for an answer.

"I myself am accused, but I haven't submitted any evidence yet," said K. The man became more confused, as if he thought K. was mocking him. K. grew impatient, took the man's arm gently – the man screamed as if burned. K. pushed him back onto the bench abruptly. "The accused here are so oversensitive," said the usher, just as a guard with a saber arrived. The usher waved him calmly away.

It got worse. The hot air under the ceiling struck K. in the head. A young maid opened a small hatch high up to let air in – soot rained down on K.'s hands. She wiped him carefully with a handkerchief.

"You're a bit dizzy, aren't you?" she said softly. "It's the heat from the roof, and all the laundry hanging to dry. Everyone gets dizzy the first time. It passes."

She introduced the man next to her, a thin gentleman in a gray vest, "the Information Officer," who was supposed to help the waiting with answers.

He laughed constantly, without being mean, she assured – perhaps because they had used money collected from the accused to dress him nicely, and now he wanted to live up to his role. K. said little. He let himself be led out, a hand under each arm. He thought: It's best to get out of here, otherwise I'll go deeper and deeper, room after room, and never find my way back.

Outside in the cool air, his strength suddenly returned. K. thanked them, banged the door, and felt as if the wind in there, full of heavy work and sweat and washing, was chasing after him to pull him back in. He ran down the stairs in long leaps and decided that from now on he would spend his Sundays better.

So began the week when he again tried to meet Fräulein Bürstner: waiting in the dark in her room, getting up early to meet her in the hallway, writing letters with apologies and promises to respect all her boundaries.

Nothing worked. Then came Sunday with its "clear sign": Miss Montag, a pale, limping French teacher, began moving her things into Fräulein Bürstner's room. Shoving back and forth in the hallway for hours.

Frau Grubach, who now decided to serve breakfast herself after their quarrel, seemed almost relieved when K. was stern with her about the noise. She said Miss Montag was "just" moving in. "So Fräulein Bürstner has taken her in?" said K. coldly. He stirred his coffee without drinking, crushed a sugar cube, fell silent. Frau Grubach folded her hands and lamented: she hadn't meant to offend Fräulein, only said a coincidence, and now K. thought she was lying. She cried into her apron.

K. finally said he didn't want to quarrel with her over a girl – one they barely knew. She immediately became freer and said something foolish about wondering why K. cared so much about Fräulein Bürstner. K. said nothing. He should have asked her to leave, but he sat drinking his coffee and let her feel unwelcome.

In the hallway, Miss Montag's footsteps kept scraping past. K. pointed at the door. Frau Grubach sighed and explained that Miss Montag wanted to do everything herself, and that she didn't understand why Fräulein Bürstner had taken her in. "There's nothing to worry about," said K., standing up. "You think I'm oversensitive because I can't stand her pacing back and forth?" Frau Grubach offered to ask Miss Montag to take a break. "No," said K. sharply, "she must move in." Frau Grubach just nodded. She seemed helpless, and it irritated him. He began to pace back and forth in the room, between window and door, so she couldn't get past.

Someone knocked. The maid announced that Miss Montag wished to speak with him in the dining room. K. breathed heavily, looked at Frau Grubach with a glance that said he had been expecting just this – and that it proved how much trouble these lodgers had given him this Sunday. He put on another jacket and ordered Frau Grubach to clear away, "even though you've hardly touched anything," she said cautiously.

The dining room was long and narrow, with a long table set for Sunday dinner. Two large cupboards stood at an angle by the door. The window was almost unreachable behind the table. Miss Montag came toward him from the window. They greeted stiffly.

She said calmly that she was speaking on behalf of her friend, Fräulein Bürstner, who felt unwell and therefore could not meet him. "We don't think it's necessary either," she said, with an authoritative tone, "rather useless. It's best to give a clear message instead of leaving you in uncertainty." "Thank you," said K. dryly.

He took a step toward the door. Then the captain – Frau Grubach's nephew – came in.

Large, brown in the face, he filled the room. He bowed deeply to Miss Montag and kissed her hand. At that moment K. understood: these two – with nods, handshakes, and kisses – were the small fellowship that would, unnoticed, ensure that he and Fräulein Bürstner never spoke again. He almost felt relieved. He left, stopped outside Fräulein's door, knocked softly, then harder, then opened very carefully. The room was almost unrecognizable: two beds, one behind the other, piles of clothes, the cupboard door ajar. Then he heard them behind him – Miss Montag and the captain – in the dining room, with looks that cut through him. He hurried into his own room.

Several days later, just before closing time at the bank, K. walked through an empty corridor and heard sighs behind a door he thought led to a junk room. He wrenched it open. Inside stood two men in their underwear – Franz and Willem – and a third man dressed in dark leather, with a stiff cane. "He's going to whip us," Franz managed to say, "because you complained about us!"

"I didn't complain," protested K. "I only told the truth about what you did." Willem explained that they were poorly paid and had families. That they had taken his clothes as an old custom. "We hoped to become whippers ourselves one day," he said with odd pride.

K. asked the whipper to stop. "I can pay you," he said quietly. "My job is to whip people," replied the whipper, laughing without warmth. "I do my job."

K. suddenly grew furious at "the high-ups" in this strange court machine: "Those who really decide should be whipped," he said.

"I'd pay to see that." The whipper shrugged. "That's not how it works here."

He pointed with his cane. Franz begged K. urgently: "At least save me!" He mentioned his fiancée waiting for him outside. K. didn't want to witness the cane falling. But it fell – and Franz screamed a sound K. had never heard before. A long, howling scream that filled the corridor. K. pushed him down to muffle the sound – it was terrible. People in the bank could hear. He slammed the door shut and opened a window to the courtyard.

The whole evening he stood in doubt about whether he should go back and do something, but he did nothing more than listen at the door. The next day, halfway through a routine, he opened the same door again – and everything was there as before: lamp, table, inkwell, whipper, trembling constables. He slammed the door with his fist and shouted at the servants: "Clean out this junk room tomorrow!" Then he went home, blind with exhaustion.

The next afternoon, Uncle Karl stormed into his office. The countryman, his former guardian, always in a hurry. "Josef!" he cried. "What is this I hear?"

He waved a letter from K.'s cousin Erna: She had been to the bank and heard whispering about a case against K. His uncle was upset. K. looked out the window, at the narrow pocket of wall on the other side. "You just stare!" his uncle scolded, pulling him out. Outside, his voice softened, but the words were still hard: "Is it true?

A criminal case?" "It's true," said K. "And you sit calmly?"

"The calmer, the better," said K. His uncle stared. "You're coming to the country with me, right now! You've lost weight. We'll strengthen you and get you away from these offices." "You can't forbid me to stay," said K., half joking. His uncle wouldn't let him go: "We have no time to lose. We're going to Lawyer Huld. We went to school together. He's known for defending the poor well."

They went. Huld was sick, it was whispered from a dark hallway. A girl in a white apron with large, dark eyes finally opened. His uncle spoke harshly to her, without politeness. Inside a dark room, two black eyes shone from a bed: the lawyer. "Albert?" he said in a weak voice. That softened his uncle. But he still wanted the nurse, Leni, out. Huld said she could stay – "nothing is secret from her." His uncle put on a show but let it go. Leni finally left with a look at K. as if she was noting him.

The lawyer breathed poorly, but when his uncle presented K. as his nephew, he perked up a little. He spoke about K.'s case as if he knew everything. K. was struck by it.

How? "I move in court circles," said Huld. "Such cases come to my ear. Especially when they concern a friend's nephew." K. bit his tongue instead of saying: You're a lawyer in a higher court, what do you know about the attic court? He didn't get the chance. From a dark corner an older man rose – "the Chief Clerk," said Huld, an important man who had sat unseen while they spoke.

Everything was set for an important meeting that his uncle had arranged. But K.'s gaze slid toward the door when he heard a plate break out there.

"I'll go see," he said. No one stopped him. In the half-darkness of the lawyer's office, Leni stood alone. "I let you out," she whispered. "I want to talk to you."

He almost sank down onto a dark chest. On the wall hung an enormous painting of a judge, larger than life, with his hand clutching the armrest as if to spring up and judge anyone on the spot. "He's just a small man in reality," said Leni, laughing a little.

"He had himself painted like that out of vanity. He sits on kitchen chairs and rugs otherwise."

She got him to kneel beside her, showed him the little web of skin between her ring and middle finger – like a small swimming membrane. "See? A defect." "Beautiful claw," said K., fascinated out of everything. Then she leaned over him with a scent of spice and kissed him. "Now you're mine," she whispered. She gave him a key. "Come whenever you want."

Outside in the rain, his uncle stood by a black carriage. He grabbed K. by the arms. "You ruined everything!" he cried. He had held his breath; they had waited perhaps for hours. The Chief Clerk had left. Huld was even sicker. K. stood there soaked through in rain and shame. His uncle looked like an old bird that had strayed from its nest. K. didn't recognize himself and only said: "Forgive me."

Later – one morning at the office, heavy snow and thick air – K. thought that he had to write his own defense. The lawyer just said things like "first documents are often not read" and "the defense doesn't have access to the case files." He also said that the defense wasn't really legal, just tolerated. And the lawyer never had concrete steps to show – there was always a small "advantage" in that everything went slowly.

"I won't pay a penny," thought K. But as soon as he sat down to draft, the Vice-Director stood there with a joke, took his pencil, and drew on the pad – right where K. wanted to write about his life and his choices. Then a manufacturer came for a visit with papers and figures. K. couldn't follow. The manufacturer saw it but thundered on undeterred, until the Vice-Director appeared in the doorway and took over with smiles and glances, as if he always got the credit for everything. K. stared down at the man's skull and thought that everything was slipping from his hands.

The manufacturer came back alone and said, almost with pity in his voice: "Everyone has their cross. You have a case going on." K. flinched. How did he know? "Not from the bank. A painter, Titorelli, told me. He paints portraits of judges. Maybe he can give you advice." He gave K. a letter. K. felt panic strike him: He had almost brought a shady acquaintance into the bank. He got rid of three waiting customers and left – almost happy to be able to do something for his own case one afternoon, even if it was unwise.

Titorelli's district was poor and gray. The stairs were so steep that K. was out of breath before he reached the top. A flock of girls – laughter, kicks, skirts barely above their knees – ran up ahead of him and pointed the way. The hunchbacked one, maybe thirteen, grinned and asked why he wanted to see Titorelli.

"To have my portrait painted," said K., and got another smirk. At the top was a door with "Titorelli" painted in red brush. When K. raised his hand, the door sprang open a crack; a man in a nightshirt hissed and disappeared.

The girls pushed K. forward; the painter pulled him in quickly and held the girls out. He grabbed the little hunchback by the skirt, spun her around, and set her neatly on the doorstep. Then he closed the door and bowed: "Forgive me. They bother me. I got a key to them by accident." He was barefoot in worn, yellow linen trousers, with a belt hanging loosely. On the easel stood a picture covered by a shirt.

K. gave him the letter. Titorelli looked at it, threw it on the bed as if he barely remembered the sender. "Do you want to buy a drawing or be painted?" he asked.

K. flinched – the letter hadn't mentioned the case. "What do you paint?" asked K., pointing at the shirt. Titorelli pulled it off.

A judge on a throne seemed to rise in fury. On the back of the throne was painted a large figure. "Justice," said the painter, "combined with the Goddess of Victory." K. said quietly: "She must stand still, otherwise the judgment won't be fair."

"They ask me to paint them as they want it," replied the painter with a small smile.

K. asked the judge's name. "I don't say." "You're one of their people," said K.

The painter put down his chalk. "Not officially," he said. "But they know me." K. sat on the bed as he was asked.

The room was suffocatingly hot; the window was fixed and couldn't be opened. Either K. had to stay – or leave quickly, before he got sick again. "Are you innocent?" asked the painter suddenly. K. felt a strange joy in answering truthfully: "Yes. Completely." "Then everything is simple," said the painter. "That's the stupidest thing I've heard today," replied K., with a dry smile. "They told me that in court too."

The painter cleared his throat. "It's impossible to get the court to change its mind once it has accused you. You could argue about my paintings for a whole night and have a better chance with them than with evidence and witnesses before the real court." "But you just said that if I'm innocent, everything is simple?" said K.

"The law says so," replied the painter. "Experience says something else.

I've never seen a complete acquittal. People talk about old times when it happened, but no one can prove it. I've painted pictures of such moments.

They're beautiful. But they don't help anyone today." A straw came in through a crack under the door. K. saw it move up and down and heard children's whispering outside. "They belong to the court too," said the painter, shrugging. "Everything does."

"What can you do for me then?" asked K. The painter leaned forward. "There are two possibilities. Three, if you count something that no longer exists. First: apparent acquittal. Many judges sign that you're innocent and send the papers on. The case is closed. But it's not gone – it just lies dormant. It can be awakened at any time, by a judge who loves to revive old files.

Then everything begins again." "And the second?" "Postponed judgment. The case is kept at its beginning all the time. It requires less effort at the moment, but more over time. Constant contact. Small errands. Showing up. Fetching and delivering. Being there. It's uncomfortable, but often the best many achieve."

"What about the third?" "Absolute acquittal," said the painter quietly. "The best. But only for the completely innocent. And I've never seen it."

"You said I was innocent," said K. "I thought you were. You said so yourself. But then you might not need help." It was like a riddle.

K. stood up, dizzy from the heat. "The window," he asked. "It can't be opened," said the painter. "I can open the door.

Or the other one." "The other one?" "Behind the bed. The judge I'm painting always comes that way."

The girls outside, the heat that sat in the walls, everything made K. tired and inclined to say yes to anything that looked like a way out. He bought three small landscape paintings of the bog from the painter, all exactly the same, just to end the visit. As he left, he thought gloomily that he had to laugh at himself: Court offices in every attic. Signs that no one saw. And he who had thought the court was a specific place.

Later that same evening, he went to dismiss Lawyer Huld. Leni didn't open. A small, stooped man with a full beard let him in – without a coat. "Do you work here?" asked K.

"No, I'm a client. My name is Block." "Real name?" "Of course." K. decided to make use of him. In the kitchen, Leni stood in an apron stirring soup. "Who is he?" asked K., with his mouth near her ear. "A poor soul.

A merchant. He's been a client for five years," she said.

"He even sleeps here sometimes so he can be at the lawyer's service at night." K. looked into a tiny room without a window, with a narrow bed, a lamp, and some papers. "It has its advantages," squeaked Block, as if it were an honor. K. couldn't stand the sight. He sent Leni in to Huld with the soup. "I have important things to say," said K., loud enough for Block to hear.

Block sat down and whispered. He had been impatient and secretly hired five small lawyers in addition. He now lived only for his case. His business was almost empty. He had even learned stupid signs from other accused people – that you could tell from people's lips how their case would end. Many had pointed secretly at K.'s lips and said "he'll soon be condemned," Block reported. K. took out a pocket mirror and saw nothing in his face except himself. He didn't mention it. He had no time to laugh at the unreasonableness. He had to go in and dismiss Huld.

In bed, the old man lay pale and soaked with sleep. "You're too impatient," he said even before K. could speak. "It always happens that clients get this haste in their minds. But things take the time they take.

This isn't public law. The defense isn't recognized, just tolerated. Documents are often not read. We have to talk to people instead. I'm sick, but my connections are alive."

"I'm dismissing you with immediate effect," said K. Huld tried to hold him with kind words and "we," as if they were still a team.

As a last attempt, he called for Block. Leni came too. Block came in on tiptoe and bowed deeply.

"Who is my lawyer?" asked Huld softly. "Only you," replied Block. "Let there be no other." Block sent a furious look at K., as if he were a rival.

K. said quietly that he didn't want to disturb this submission further. "You can crawl or kneel as you like," he added to Block, "it won't change my decision." Shortly after, Huld admitted that a judge had said a terrible sentence about Block: that his case might not even have begun, that some thought such cases only "started" when something deep in the machine was set in motion.

Block raised his hands to his hair as if he would tear it out. Leni made him kiss the lawyer's hand. K. left. He had seen enough: This was not the way he would go under.

Winter grew wetter and colder. An Italian business contact came to visit the bank. K. was to be the host, show him the city. Usually an honor.

Now it was more work, more loss of footing. He practiced phrases to explain the cathedral. "They're bothering you," said Leni dryly on the phone when he told her where he was going. "Yes," said K. bluntly and hung up.

He went to the cathedral in the rain. It was dark and large, almost empty. The clock struck ten. No Italian.

He walked around, shone his pocket flashlight at a painting: a knight who stood motionless with his hand on his sword.

He felt something in that face – a restlessness without movement. A limping church sexton pointed somewhere. K. followed him a little, but pulled back. He decided to leave.

Then he heard his name from a small pulpit near the choir: "Josef K.!" The voice was strong, trained, like a bell ringer striking straight at your heart. A priest stood in the narrow pulpit with a small lamp above him.

K. stood still, free to pretend he hadn't heard.

But he turned. The priest nodded him closer. "You are Josef K.," he said. "Yes," replied K. "You are accused," said the priest quietly.

"Yes." "I have called you here. I am the prison chaplain." "I didn't know that," said K. "I was supposed to show the cathedral to an Italian." "That's irrelevant. What are you holding in your hand?" "A guidebook." "Put it down." K. threw it away. The pages scattered across the stone.

"Do you know that your case is going badly?" "That's my impression too," replied K., honest for once. "I have exerted myself a lot, and nothing has happened. But I still have documents I can submit." "How do you imagine it will end?" "Earlier I thought it would go well. Now I doubt it. Do you know?" "I don't know," said the priest. "But I fear it will end badly. You are considered guilty. For now, your guilt is deemed proven." "But I'm not guilty!" cried K. "It's a mistake! How can anyone be guilty? We're human beings!" "That's true," replied the priest. "But that's how guilty people talk."

"Do you also think I'm guilty?" "I pass no judgment." "Others do. Those who are involved influence those who aren't. My position keeps getting worse." "You don't understand the facts," said the priest. "The judgment doesn't come suddenly. The process continues; it deepens. One reaches a judgment gradually." "I need help," said K. "There are people I could ask—" "You seek too much help from people you don't know," the priest interrupted him, "especially women." "Perhaps," said K. "But they have power. Show the Examining Magistrate a woman from a distance, and he'll run across his desk." The priest bowed his head toward the railing. Outside it was already like night.

"Come down," asked K. "Now I can come down," said the priest. "Before I had to speak from above. Otherwise I become too easily influenced and forget my duty." He gave K. his hand and handed him the lamp. They walked together through the side aisle, in the darkness between the pillars. "I can speak openly with you," said K. "In a way, you're the first person who actually helps me." "Don't deceive yourself," said the priest. "How do I deceive myself?" "You are deceived in the court. The law begins with a story about just this. It's about a man from the country who wants to get into the law."

And then he told it. "The man from the country comes to the law. A gatekeeper says he cannot let him in now, perhaps later. The gate is open; the gatekeeper stands to the side. The man bends down to look in and asks why he can't enter.

'I am mighty,' says the gatekeeper, 'and I am the lowest. Further inside there are gatekeepers who are mightier in every hall.' The man sits down to wait. He gets a stool. Years pass.

He tries bribes; the gatekeeper accepts them and says he does so only so the man doesn't feel he has neglected anything. The man studies everything, even the fleas in the fur of the gatekeeper's collar. When he is near the end, he asks the gatekeeper: 'Everyone seeks the law. How can it be that no one else has come asking to be let in?' The gatekeeper shouts in his ear: 'This entrance was only for you. Now I'm going and closing it.'"

K. stood still with the lamp in his hand and felt chills along his spine. "He was deceived," he said. "The gatekeeper said 'not now,' but didn't say 'never.' And at the end he says the door was always only for him.

He kept him away from what was his own." "Beware of opinions," replied the priest. "Many interpret. The text doesn't change." He tilted his head and began to mention interpretations: that the gatekeeper was faithful and precise, but simple; that he had a crooked nose and a narrow black beard; that he gave a stool, took gifts so the man wouldn't see himself as a failure; that he bent kindly when he had to shout in his ear at the end.

"Some say the gatekeeper himself was deceived. He thought he stood there to guard the law, but really he stood there for this one man – more prisoner than guard. He couldn't even close the door, even though he said so. For in the story it says the door is always open."

"But if he was so simple and arrogant," said K., "he should be dismissed. For the man was destroyed. He died without having entered anywhere that was his." "Again – opinions," said the priest. "The gatekeeper is in the service of the law. To judge him is to judge the law." "Depressing," said K. "The lie made into the rule of the world."

The priest raised the lamp and let the light fall on K.'s face. "The court wants nothing from you," he said without warmth. "It receives you when you come and lets you go when you go." Then the lamp went out. "Where is the exit?" asked K. "There," said the priest, and disappeared between the pillars.

K. went out into the city, heavier and gentler at the same time. But he didn't have to wait long to find out what was coming. On the evening before his thirty-first birthday, a little after nine, two men in frock coats and top hats knocked at his door. K. stood dressed in black, with new gloves, as if he had been expecting someone. "Have you come for me?" he asked politely. They nodded. He looked out the window – in the attic across the street sat two small children in a playpen. They reached their arms out toward each other but couldn't get closer. "They've sent old, insignificant actors for me," thought K. "What theater do you play at?" The men only answered with an empty look, like a chorus that hadn't rehearsed.

On the stairs they tried to take him under the arm, but K. said: "Wait until we're outside." In the street they locked themselves in with him, one on each side, a grip just firm enough to be safe. They walked. Under the streetlights K. saw their faces, double chins and smooth skin, everything proper, everything empty. He stopped at a small square and held them back. "Why did they send you?" he cried.

No answer.

He thought of flies that pull away from their own legs on flypaper. Then, as if suddenly, Fräulein Bürstner appeared at the end of the street, or someone who looked so much like her it hurt. He felt from that sight that it was useless to resist. He began to walk again. The men smiled contentedly, and their smile was almost contagious, as if he and they had agreed on something.

They walked faster now, took side streets, ran in a stretch when a police constable turned to look at them. K. chose the direction, like a guide, and they followed. Then there were no more streets – only a stone quarry at the edge of the city. The moon lay still like an eye.

The men let go of him and took off their hats. One laid his hand kindly on K.'s back, patted him once, as if to say: "That's it." They took off his jacket, vest, shirt. He shivered. They tried to get him to sit against a stone, lay his head on a loose rock, but no matter how they lifted and pushed, it was awkward.

One opened his coat, pulled out a long, gleaming knife that a butcher would have loved. They passed it between them in the air, like an ugly game of politeness. K. knew he should take the knife and do it himself. Take himself away from them, from their last little hint of duty.

But he couldn't. He turned his neck and looked around. In a high window along the edge of the quarry, a light flickered. A face – thin, the distance made it smaller – leaned out and stretched its arms farther, as if to call out without sound.

"Who is that?" thought K. "A friend? A good person? Someone who wants to help? Is he alone?

Are they many?" There are surely objections we forgot. Logic cannot be contradicted, but whoever wants to live, lets himself not resist? Where was the judge he never saw? Where was the high court he never reached? He raised both hands and spread his fingers.

One man laid his hands around K.'s neck, carefully, almost lovingly. The other pressed the knife deep into his heart and twisted it twice. As the sight grew dark, K. saw the two men cheek to cheek, like two looking into a hole. "Like a dog!" he said, as if the shame should be what survives him.

It was over. But it wasn't emptiness. In the memories after him there still existed the small pictures that made everything alive: the breakfast tray that didn't come; the white blouse on the window handle in Fräulein's room; a flash of light in a small law book with stains; the washerwoman's look toward the door; the badge on the judge's collar; a straw reaching under a door; the wind of laundry drying dark in the attic; a silk stocking that was "too fine for me"; the small bog paintings in the painter's room, all the same, bought as a joke or an amulet; an old uncle trembling in the rain; a knight in a dark painting who stood completely still; a child in a playpen; a window that opened too late.

And inside all this walked a man saying: "I am innocent," because he couldn't see anywhere guilt could have attached itself – and because no one would show him where they had fastened it onto him.

Yet his story was more than just a fall. It was also a winding path through rooms full of people – some wanted to help him, some saw him as a case on a list, some laughed too often, some danced through rules, some traded him for a silk stocking.

It was a series of choices: to put on a black jacket with the staring eyes of two constables on him, to pretend not to be surprised and yet be surprised, to stand up and speak and believe his words carried in a hall that was less a hall than a rehearsal, to reach out his hand for a peace no one wanted, to knock on a door he had no right to open and yet open it, to go three flights too far up a staircase that had no railing, to point at another and say "there is guilt," to say "I can pay," to say "I dismiss you," to say "you deceive yourself."

And at the very end: to feel that he should take the knife himself to own his last action – and let it slip from his hands.

For who had the guilt? The gatekeeper of the law who said "not now" and "only for you"? The judge's badges? The student with crooked legs who carried a woman who said she wanted to be free, but let herself be carried? The woman who asked to be saved, but smiled at the one who carried her?

The painter who opened the other door "behind the bed"? The lawyer who kept his client locked in a small room without a window and let him kiss his hand?

The manufacturer who talked about price lists with the same tone one talks about fate? The uncle who held his breath too long in the rain? The priest who said the court's text doesn't change by what people think? Or K. himself, who poured his strength into the wrong cracks and waited for someone to say "now"?

Children of twelve who read this might say: "But why didn't he just run?" That's a good question. Sometimes a room is full of doors that aren't locked. But the keys hang so high up, and you have just stood before a man who said "not now," and you have sat down on a stool and waited a little, just a little, and then you have already used an entire afternoon waiting, and then you use a night, and a week, and a spring.

In the meantime, others have changed places with you. They now stand at your window, and you stand where they were, in the heat with the smell of drying laundry. And in that heat it's hard to breathe. So one does the simplest thing: One no longer breathes properly. One becomes still. And a still man is easy to lead, polite and calm, through three streets and out of the city.

Yet there is still something worth seeing, even in all this heat and cold: Truth is not always the same as "necessary," said the priest. The court's men believe in the necessary. K. believed in something else, only without having a name for it. He believed that he could carry a glass and let it clink against his teeth without dropping it, that he could do right by washing his hands, writing an address, arriving on time.

One day that wasn't enough. But while he did all this, he managed to show us one thing: that the law – even when it is invisible and seems incomprehensible – lives in small movements and small rooms. That sometimes a handshake that isn't accepted is greater than a verdict. That a silk stocking can tell more about an office than a thousand words.

And therefore we can, after his last sentence, after "like a dog!", remember something more than just shame. We can remember that in many moments he was brave. He spoke when everyone expected him to be silent. He laughed when they called him a painter. He saw the badge on a judge's collar. He said no to yet another kind voice that would make him passive. He gave his uncle answers, even when they were unpopular. He walked with the two men without begging them for mercy, and held his hands open until the last second, like someone who wants to receive something, if nothing else then the last light.

Thus the case ended in a stone quarry outside the city, and yet it continues – in us who saw him go. For we can come to the door of the law and see that it stands open. We can be tempted to bend down and wait. We can sit on the stool and count fleas in the fur of a fur collar and give away everything we have for the privilege of giving it away.

Or we can stand up after a short while, say politely "thank you for letting me ask my question," take two steps forward, and try a "now." And if a gatekeeper says "not now," we can still ask once more, with the only thing we have that he doesn't: our own time. For perhaps that was what K. ran out of. Not courage, not words. Just time.

That morning when it all began, when breakfast didn't come, when the nightshirt was called "too fine," and they asked him to put on black, one small thing could have been different. Perhaps. He could have asked himself – what can I give myself now? Not the court, not the bank, not women stirring soups, not men waving hats. Just one small thing: a name for why he felt what he felt.

That way we who read can be kinder to him. We can give the name we see: fear that makes people the smallest possible version of themselves. A small, very human fear. It lives here. And when we give it a name, we see it a little better next time someone says "not now."

There, in the room where a white blouse hung over a window handle in the morning light, it began. There it also ended, in a way, when he pointed up toward a window and wondered if someone was there. Perhaps it was the same person who once hung the blouse. Perhaps it was no one. But the question – "is someone there?" – was K.'s very last act. We let it remain. An ending belongs. And yet – we carry the question further inside us.