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money that caused the difficulty, of course, it was much
more to do with me not working at the business as much as
I used to. If you want to do something about your trial you
don’t have much time for anything else.” “So you’re also
working at the court yourself?” asked K. “That’s just what I
want to learn more about.” “I can’t tell you very much about
that,” said the businessman, “at first I tried to do that too
but I soon had to give it up again. It wears you out too much,
and it’s really not much use. And it turned out to be quite
impossible to work there yourself and to negotiate, at least
for me it was. It’s a heavy strain there just sitting and wait-
ing. You know yourself what the air is like in those offices.”
“How do you know I’ve been there, then?” asked K. “I was in
the waiting room myself when you went through.” “What a
coincidence that is!” exclaimed K., totally engrossed and
forgetting how ridiculous the businessman had seemed to
him earlier. “So you saw me! You were in the waiting room
when I went through. Yes, I did go through it one time.” “It
isn’t such a big coincidence,” said the businessman, “I’m
there nearly every day.” “I expect I’ll have to go there quite
often myself now,” said K., “although I can hardly expect to
be shown the same respect as I was then. They all stood up
for me. They must have thought I was a judge.” “No,” said
the businessman, “we were greeting the servant of the court.
We knew you were a defendant. That sort of news spreads
very quickly.” “So you already knew about that,” said K.,
“the way I behaved must have seemed very arrogant to you.
Did you criticise me for it afterwards?” “No,” said the busi-
nessman, “quite the opposite. That was just stupidity.”

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