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" I spoke with your wife a short while ago. She’s not here anymore. The student carried her off to the examining magistrate.” “You see,” said the court usher, “they’re always taking her away from me. Today is Sunday, and I have no official duties, but just to get me out of the way, they send me off with a message that’s meaningless anyway. And in fact I’m not sent far, so that the hope remains that if I really hurry, I might get back in time. I run as fast as I can to the office they’ve sent me to, shout my message so breathlessly through the half-open door that they probably don’t understand it, and race back again, but the student has moved even faster than I have, and of course he doesn’t have as far to go, he has only to run down the attic stairs. If I weren’t so dependent on them, I would have long since crushed the student against this wall. Right here next to the sign. I keep dreaming about it. He’s squashed flat a little above floor level here, his arms stretched out, his fingers spread, his crooked legs curved in a circle with blood spattered all about. But it’s just been a dream up to now. "
― Franz Kafka , The Trial