The Trial by Franz Kafka (best chinese ebook reader TXT) đ
- Author: Franz Kafka
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Against the wall there were now two beds behind one another, there were clothes piled up on three chairs near the door, a wardrobe stood open.
Miss BĂŒrstner must have gone out while Miss Montag was speaking to him in the dining room. K. was not greatly bothered by this, he had hardly expected to be able to find Miss BĂŒrstner so easily and had made this attempt for little more reason than to spite Miss Montag. But that made it all the more embarrassing for him when, as he was closing the door again, he saw Miss Montag and the captain talking in the open doorway of the dining room. They had probably been standing there ever since K.
had opened the door, they avoided seeming to observe K. but chatted lightly and followed his movements with glances, the absent minded glances to the side such as you make during a conversation. But these glances were heavy for K., and he rushed alongside the wall back into his own room.
One evening, a few days later, K. was walking along one of the corridors that separated his office from the main stairway - he was nearly the last one to leave for home that evening, there remained only a couple of workers in the light of a single bulb in the dispatch department - when he heard a sigh from behind a door which he had himself never opened but which he had always thought just led into a junk room. He stood in amazement and listened again to establish whether he might not be mistaken. For a while there was silence, but then came some more sighs. His first thought was to fetch one of the servitors, it might well have been worth having a witness present, but then he was taken by an uncontrollable curiosity that make him simply yank the door open. It was, as he had thought, a junk room. Old, unusable forms, empty stone ink-bottles lay scattered behind the entrance. But in the cupboard-like room itself stood three men, crouching under the low ceiling. A candle fixed on a shelf gave them light. âWhat are you doing here?â asked K. quietly, but crossly and without thinking. One of the men was clearly in charge, and attracted attention by being dressed in a kind of dark leather costume which left his neck and chest and his arms exposed. He did not answer. But the other two called out, âMr. K.! Weâre to be beaten because you made a complaint about us to the examining judge.â And now, K. finally realised that it was actually the two policemen, Franz and Willem, and that the third man held a cane in his hand with which to beat them.
âWell,â said K., staring at them, âI didnât make any complaint, I only said what took place in my home. And your behaviour was not entirely unobjectionable, after all.â âMr. K.,â said Willem, while Franz clearly tried to shelter behind him as protection from the third man, âif you knew how badly we get paid you wouldnât think so badly of us. Iâve got a family to feed, and Franz here wanted to get married, you just have to get more money where you can, you canât do it just by working hard, not however hard you try. I was sorely tempted by your fine clothes, policemen arenât allowed to do that sort of thing, course they arenât, and it wasnât right of us, but itâs tradition that the clothes go to the officers, thatâs how itâs always been, believe me; and itâs understandable too, isnât it, what can things like that mean for anyone unlucky enough to be arrested? But if he starts talking about it openly then the punishment has to follow.â âI didnât know about any of this that youâve been telling me, and I made no sort of request that you be punished, I was simply acting on principle.â âFranz,â said Willem, turning to the other policeman, âdidnât I tell you that the gentleman didnât say he wanted us to be punished? Now you can hear for yourself, he didnât even know weâd have to be punished.â âDonât you let them persuade you, talking like that,â said the third man to K., âthis punishment is both just and unavoidable.â âDonât listen to him,â said Willem, interrupting himself only to quickly bring his hand to his mouth when it had received a stroke of the cane, âweâre only being punished because you made a complaint against us. Nothing would have happened to us otherwise, not even if theyâd found out what weâd done. Can you call that justice? Both of us, me especially, weâd proved our worth as good police officers over a long period - youâve got to admit yourself that as far as official work was concerned we did the job well - things looked good for us, we had prospects, itâs quite certain that we wouldâve been made whip-men too, like this one, only he had the luck not to have anyone make a complaint about him, as you really donât get many complaints like that. Only thatâs all finished now, Mr. K., our careers are at an end, weâre going to have to do work now thatâs far inferior to police work and besides all this weâre going to get this terrible, painful beating.â âCan the cane really cause so much pain, then?â asked K., testing the cane that the whip-man swang in front of him. âWeâre going to have to strip off totally naked,â said Willem. âOh, I see,â
said K., looking straight at the whip-man, his skin was burned brown like a sailorâs, and his face showed health and vigorous. âIs there then no possibility of sparing these two their beating?â he asked him.
âNo,â said the whip-man, shaking his head with a laugh. âGet undressed!â he ordered the policemen. And to K. he said, âYou shouldnât believe everything they tell you, itâs the fear of being beaten, itâs already made them a bit weak in the head. This one here, for instance,â
he pointed at Willem, âall that he told you about his career prospects, itâs just ridiculous. Look at him, look how fat he is - the first strokes of the cane will just get lost in all that fat. Do you know what it is thatâs made him so fat? Heâs in the habit of, everyone that gets arrested by him, he eats their breakfast. Didnât he eat up your breakfast? Yeah, I thought as much. But a man with a belly like that canât be made into a whip-man and never will be, that is quite out of the question.â âThere are whip-men like that,â Willem insisted, who had just released the belt of this trousers. âNo,â said the whip-man, striking him such a blow with the cane on his neck that it made him wince, âyou shouldnât be listening to this, just get undressed.â âI would make it well worth your while if you would let them go,â said K., and without looking at the whip-man again - as such matters are best carried on with both pairs of eyes turned down - he pulled out his wallet. âAnd then youâd try and put in a complaint against me, too,â
said the whip-man, âand get me flogged. No, no!â âNow, do be reasonable,â said K., âif I had wanted to get these two punished I would not now be trying to buy their freedom, would I. I could simply close the door here behind me, go home and see or hear nothing more of it.
But thatâs not what Iâm doing, it really is of much more importance to me to let them go free; if I had realised they would be punished, or even that they might be punished, I would never have named them in the first place as they are not the ones I hold responsible. Itâs the organisation thatâs to blame, the high officials are the ones to blame.â
âThatâs how it is!â shouted the policemen, who then immediately received another blow on their backs, which were by now exposed. âIf you had a senior judge here beneath your stick,â said K., pressing down the cane as he spoke to stop it being raised once more, âI really would do nothing to stop you, on the contrary, I would even pay you money to give you all the more strength.â âYeah, thatâs all very plausible, what youâre saying there,â said the whip-man , âonly Iâm not the sort of person you can bribe. Itâs my job to flog people, so I flog them.â
Franz, the policeman, had been fairly quiet so far, probably in expectation of a good result from K.âs intervention, but now he stepped forward to the door wearing just his trousers, kneeled down hanging on to K.âs arm and whispered, âEven if you canât get mercy shown for both of us, at least try and get me set free. Willem is older than me, heâs less sensitive than me in every way, he even got a light beating a couple of years ago, but my recordâs still clean, I only did things the way I did because Willem led me on to it, heâs been my teacher both for good and bad. Down in front of the bank my poor bride is waiting for me at the entrance, Iâm so ashamed of myself, itâs pitiful.â His face was flowing over with tears, and he wiped it dry on K.âs coat. âIâm not going to wait any longer,â said the whip-man, taking hold of the cane in both hands and laying in to Franz while Willem cowered back in a corner and looked on secretly, not even daring to turn
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