Page 50 - the-metamorphosis

with a dull voice; evidently she was pressing her face into
her father’s chest: ‘Mother fainted, but she’s getting better
now. Gregor has broken loose.’ ‘Yes, I have expected that,’
said his father, ‘I always told you that, but you women don’t
want to listen.’
It was clear to Gregor that his father had badly mis-
understood Grete’s short message and was assuming that
Gregor had committed some violent crime or other. Thus,
Gregor now had to find his father to calm him down, for he
had neither the time nor the opportunity to clarify things
for him. And so he rushed away to the door of his room and
pushed himself against it, so that his father could see right
away as he entered from the hall that Gregor fully intended
to return at once to his room, that it was not necessary to
drive him back, but that one only needed to open the door
and he would disappear immediately.
But his father was not in the mood to observe such nice-
ties. ‘Ah,’ he yelled as soon as he entered, with a tone as if he
were all at once angry and pleased. Gregor pulled his head
back from the door and raised it in the direction of his fa-
ther. He had not really pictured his father as he now stood
there. Of course, what with his new style of creeping all
around, he had in the past while neglected to pay attention
to what was going on in the rest of the apartment, as he had
done before, and really should have grasped the fact that
he would encounter different conditions. Nevertheless, nev-
ertheless, was that still his father? Was that the same man
who had lain exhausted and buried in bed in earlier days
when Gregor was setting out on a business trip, who had re-