Kafka Page #2

BURGEL:

(flushed)

When I deliver a message the very

act of delivering it, you might say,

gives it an official stamp, and only

in this way are both the sender and

the receiver satisfied that it was

delivered at all.

KAFKA:

I'll commit that to memory.

They stare at each other with mutual antagonism.

BURGEL:

Your position in this firm is not

unassailable.

He waddles away.

KAFKA:

Has one more look over at the empty desk before returning to

his work.

THE OFFICE:

The desks make a checkerboard pattern of the huge floor as

Burgel calculates his path among them.

CUT:

LODGING HOUSE - MIDDAY

Kafka comes up the stairs to the top landing. He knocks on a

door. Waits. Knocks again. Leans a little closer to listen

for a moment, then goes away back down the stairs.

GROUND FLOOR:

Kafka comes through the door that divides the stairs from the

hall, goes to knock on the door of the first apartment down

here.

BIZARRE VOICE:

Yes?

KAFKA:

I'm sorry to disturb you -- I

wonder if you know where my

friend Eduard is?

BIZARRE VOICE:

I can't hear you! -- You'd better

come in.

APARTMENT:

Kafka comes in tentatively, seeing the CONCIERGE in a far

corner of the cluttered room, in bed, covers tucked right up

to her chin.

KAFKA:

-- I didn't want to bother you.

CONCIERGE:

Well, you have. What do you

want?

KAFKA:

(pointing upstairs)

My friend Eduard, I wonder if you've

seen him? He hasn't been in to

work, I thought he might be ill.

CUT:

STAIRS:

The Concierge trudges up to the top floor, Kafka following

guiltily.

KAFKA:

You didn't have to get out of

bed -- I could have taken the key.

CONCIERGE:

Yes, I'm sure you could.

She treats him like dirt.

EDUARD'S ROOM

The door unlocks and the two of them come in. Kafka goes to

open the window curtain. He turns around to see the

Concierge already poking about in drawers.

He ignores her and looks around the room on his own. Eduard

isn't here. Nothing else seems out of place. He wonders

instead how he can dissuade the Concierge from her

unbelievable snooping.

KAFKA:

Well, he's not here.

The Concierge takes a tie from one of the drawers and models

it over her own ample chest.

KAFKA:

Do you think you ought to do

that?

She looks at him indignantly.

CONCIERGE:

The manners of a tramp! It's my

house, isn't it?

CUT:

OFFICES - AFTERNOON

Kafka is in another section of the building, finding his way

through a department he's vaguely unfamiliar with. He

searches out a particular person -- a strikingly beautiful

woman with flaming hair and wild eyes.

KAFKA:

Miss Rossmann?

GABRIELA looks around from a file cabinet.

KAFKA:

I'm Kafka -- I work upstairs in

Accident --

GABRIELA:

I know.

KAFKA:

You're a friend of Eduard Raban's.

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