Page 52 - the-metamorphosis

father remained standing, and scampered forward again
when his father merely stirred. In this way they made their
way around the room repeatedly, without anything decisive
taking place; indeed because of the slow pace it didn’t look
like a chase. Gregor remained on the floor for the time be-
ing, especially as he was afraid that his father could take a
flight up onto the wall or the ceiling as an act of real mal-
ice. At any event Gregor had to tell himself that he couldn’t
keep up this running around for a long time, because when-
ever his father took a single step, he had to go through an
enormous number of movements. Already he was starting
to suffer from a shortage of breath, just as in his earlier days
his lungs had been quite unreliable. As he now staggered
around in this way in order to gather all his energies for
running, hardly keeping his eyes open, in his listlessness he
had no notion at all of any escape other than by running and
had almost already forgotten that the walls were available
to him, although they were obstructed by carefully carved
furniture full of sharp points and spikes—at that moment
something or other thrown casually flew down close by and
rolled in front of him. It was an apple; immediately a second
one flew after it. Gregor stood still in fright. Further flight
was useless, for his father had decided to bombard him.
From the fruit bowl on the sideboard his father had filled
his pockets, and now, without for the moment taking ac-
curate aim, was throwing apple after apple. These small
red apples rolled as if electrified around on the floor and
collided with each other. A weakly thrown apple grazed
Gregor’s back but skidded off harmlessly. However anoth-

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