Page 111 - the-trial

and, of course, I came straight here. And for no other rea-
son, but it seems to me that this is reason enough. I can read
you out the part of the letter that concerns you.” He drew
the letter out from his wallet. “Here it is. She writes; ‘I have
not seen Josef for a long time, I was in the bank last week but
Josef was so busy that they would not let me through; I wait-
ed there for nearly an hour but then I had to go home as I
had my piano lesson. I would have liked to have spoken to
him, maybe there will be a chance another time. He sent me
a big box of chocolates for my name-day, that was very nice
and attentive of him. I forgot to tell you about it when I
wrote, and I only remember now that you ask me about it.
Chocolate, as I am sure you are aware, disappears straight
away in this lodging house, almost as soon as you know
somebody has given you chocolate it is gone. But there is
something else I wanted to tell you about Josef. Like I said,
they would not let me through to see him at the bank be-
cause he was negotiating with some gentleman just then.
After I had been waiting quietly for quite a long time I asked
one of the staff whether his meeting would last much longer.
He said it might well do, as it was probably about the legal
proceedings, he said, that were being conducted against
him. I asked what sort of legal proceedings it was that were
being conducted against the chief clerk, and whether he was
not making some mistake, but he said he was not making
any mistake, there were legal proceedings underway and
even that they were about something quite serious, but he
did not know any more about it. He would have liked to
have been of some help to the chief clerk himself, as the

110 The Trial