Metamorphosis | Page 9

him and
seemed, at first, quite engrossed in herself, but then she suddenly
jumped up with her arms outstretched and her fingers spread shouting:
"Help, for pity's sake, Help!" The way she held her head suggested she
wanted to see Gregor better, but the unthinking way she was hurrying
backwards showed that she did not; she had forgotten that the table was
behind her with all the breakfast things on it; when she reached the
table she sat quickly down on it without knowing what she was doing;
without even seeming to notice that the coffee pot had been knocked
over and a gush of coffee was pouring down onto the carpet.
"Mother, mother", said Gregor gently, looking up at her. He had
completely forgotten the chief clerk for the moment, but could not help
himself snapping in the air with his jaws at the sight of the flow of
coffee. That set his mother screaming anew, she fled from the table and
into the arms of his father as he rushed towards her. Gregor, though,
had no time to spare for his parents now; the chief clerk had already
reached the stairs; with his chin on the banister, he looked back for the
last time. Gregor made a run for him; he wanted to be sure of reaching
him; the chief clerk must have expected something, as he leapt down
several steps at once and disappeared; his shouts resounding all around
the staircase. The flight of the chief clerk seemed, unfortunately, to put

Gregor's father into a panic as well. Until then he had been relatively
self controlled, but now, instead of running after the chief clerk himself,
or at least not impeding Gregor as he ran after him, Gregor's father
seized the chief clerk's stick in his right hand (the chief clerk had left it
behind on a chair, along with his hat and overcoat), picked up a large
newspaper from the table with his left, and used them to drive Gregor
back into his room, stamping his foot at him as he went. Gregor's
appeals to his father were of no help, his appeals were simply not
understood, however much he humbly turned his head his father merely
stamped his foot all the harder.
Across the room, despite the chilly weather, Gregor's mother had pulled
open a window, leant far out of it and pressed her hands to her face. A
strong draught of air flew in from the street towards the stairway, the
curtains flew up, the newspapers on the table fluttered and some of
them were blown onto the floor. Nothing would stop Gregor's father as
he drove him back, making hissing noises at him like a wild man.
Gregor had never had any practice in moving backwards and was only
able to go very slowly. If Gregor had only been allowed to turn round
he would have been back in his room straight away, but he was afraid
that if he took the time to do that his father would become impatient,
and there was the threat of a lethal blow to his back or head from the
stick in his father's hand any moment. Eventually, though, Gregor
realised that he had no choice as he saw, to his disgust, that he was
quite incapable of going backwards in a straight line; so he began, as
quickly as possible and with frequent anxious glances at his father, to
turn himself round. It went very slowly, but perhaps his father was able
to see his good intentions as he did nothing to hinder him, in fact now
and then he used the tip of his stick to give directions from a distance
as to which way to turn.
If only his father would stop that unbearable hissing! It was making
Gregor quite confused. When he had nearly finished turning round, still
listening to that hissing, he made a mistake and turned himself back a
little the way he had just come. He was pleased when he finally had his
head in front of the doorway, but then saw that it was too narrow, and
his body was too broad to get through it without further difficulty. In

his present mood, it obviously did not occur to his father to open the
other of the double doors so that Gregor would have enough space to
get through. He was merely fixed on the idea that Gregor should be got
back into his room as quickly as possible. Nor would he ever have
allowed Gregor the time to get himself upright as preparation for
getting through the doorway. What he did, making more noise than
ever, was to drive Gregor forwards all the harder as if there had been
nothing in the way; it sounded to Gregor as if