arms bare. He made no answer. But the other two cried: “Sir! We’re to be flogged because
you complained about us to the Examining Magistrate.” And only then did K. realize that it
was actually the warders Franz and Willem, and that the third man was holding a rod in his
hand with which to beat them. “Why,” said K., staring at them in astonishment, “I never
complained, I only said what happened in my rooms. And, after all, your behavior there
was not exactly blameless.” “Sir,” said Willem, while Franz openly tried to take cover
behind him from the third man, “if you only knew how badly we are paid, you wouldn’t be
so hard on us. I have a family to feed and Franz here wants to get married, a man tries to
make whatever he can, and you don’t get rich on hard work, not even if you work day and
night. Your fine shirts were a temptation, of course that kind of thing is forbidden to
warders, it was wrong, but it’s a tradition that body-linen is the warders’ perquisite, it has
always been the case, believe me; and it’s understandable too, for what importance can
such things have for a man who is unlucky enough to be arrested? But if he ventilates it
openly, punishment is bound to follow.” “I had no idea of all this, nor did I ever demand
that you should be punished, I was only defending a principle.” “Franz,” Willem turned to
the other warder, “didn’t I tell you that the gentleman never asked us to be punished? Now
you see that lie didn’t even know we should be punished.” “Don’t be taken in by what they
say,” remarked the third man to K., “the punishment is as Just as it is inevitable.” “Don’t
listen to him,” said Willem, interrupting himself to clap his hand, over which he had got a
stinging blow with the rod, to his mouth. “We are only being punished because you
accused us; if you hadn’t, nothing would have happened, not even if they had discovered
what we did. Do you call that justice? Both of us, and especially myself, have a long
record of trustworthy service as warders — you must yourself admit that, officially speaking, we guarded you quite well — we had every prospect of advancement and would
certainly have been promoted to be Whippers pretty soon, like this man here, who simply
had the luck never to be complained of, for a complaint of that kind really happens very
seldom indeed. And all is lost now, sir, our careers are done for, we’ll be set to do much
more menial work than a warder’s, and, besides that, we’re in for a whipping, and that’s
horribly painful.” “Can that birch-rod cause such terrible pain ?” asked K., examining the
switch, which the man waved to and fro in front of him. “We’ll have to take off all our
clothes first,” said Willem. “Ah, I see,” said K., and he looked more attentively at the
Whipper, who was tanned like a sailor and had a brutal, healthy face. “Is there no way of
getting these two off their whipping?” K. asked him. “No,” said the man, smilingly shaking
his head. “Strip,” he ordered the warders. And he said to K.: “You mustn’t believe all they
say, they’re so terrified of the whipping that they’ve already lost what wits they had. For
instance, all that this one here” — he pointed to Willem — “says about his possible career is
simply absurd. See how fat he is — the first cuts of the birch will be quite lost in fat. Do
you know what made him so fat? He stuffs himself with the breakfasts of all the people he
arrests. Didn’t he eat up your breakfast too? There, you see, I told you so. But a man with a
belly like that couldn’t ever become a Whipper, it’s quite out of the question.” “There are
Whippers just like me,” maintained Willem, loosening his trouser belt. “No,” said the
Whipper, drawing the switch across his neck so that he winced, “you aren’t supposed to be
listening, you’re to take off your clothes.” “I’ll reward you well if you’ll let them go,” said