began to wash himself at the tap. Only then, with his back to the teacher, did he ask him the reason for his visit. “I have come at the instance of the Parish Superintendent,” he said. K. made ready to listen. But as the noise of the water made it difficult to catch what K. said, the teacher had to come nearer and lean against the wall beside him. K. excused his washing and his hurry by the urgency of his coming appointment. The teacher swept aside his excuses, and said: “You were discourteous to the Parish Superintendent, an old and experienced man who should be treated with respect.” “Whether I was discourteous or not I can’t say,” said K. while he dried himself, “but that I had other things to think of than polite behaviour is true enough, for my existence is at stake, which is threatened by a scandalous official bureaucracy whose particular failings I needn’t mention to you, seeing that you’re an acting member of it yourself. Has the Parish Superintendent complained about me?” “Where’s the man that he would need to complain of?” asked the teacher. “And even if there was anyone, do you think he would ever do it? I’ve only made out at his dictation a short protocol on your interview, and that has shown me clearly enough how kind the Superintendent was and what your answers were like.”
While K. was looking for his comb, which Frieda must have cleared away somewhere, he said: “What? A protocol? Drawn up afterwards in my absence by someone who wasn’t at the interview at all? That’s not bad. And why on earth a protocol? Was it an official interview, then?” “No,” replied the teacher, “a semiofficial one, the protocol too was only semiofficial. It was merely drawn up because with us everything must be done in strict order. In any case it’s finished now, and it doesn’t better your credit.” K. , who had at last found the comb, which had been tucked into the bed, said more calmly: “Well then, it’s finished. Have you come to tell me that?” “No,” said the teacher, “but I’m not a machine and I had to give you my opinion. My instructions are only another proof of the Superintendent’s kindness; I want to emphasise that his kindness in this instance is incomprehensible to me, and that I only carry