K. is questioned by Momus and refuses to answer

After his failed attempt to intercept Klamm by waiting in the yard and entering the official's sleigh, K. returns to the bar of the Castle Inn, where he finds the landlady of the Bridge Inn, Pepi, and a young gentleman who introduces himself as Momus, Klamm's village secretary. Momus is seated at a small table with papers spread before him, comparing documents and writing, while the landlady stands over him, her lips pursed as if at rest, having apparently already said all she needed to say. Pepi, proud with her head thrown back and her braid shaking, hurries back and forth bringing beer and then pen and ink. K. orders a cognac, but finds it undrinkable; Pepi tells him that all the gentlemen drink it, and when he suggests they must have better cognac, she replies, "Maybe, but I don't." The landlady suddenly pricks up her ears, stares into space with great concentration, then strides on tiptoe to the door leading into the yard, looks through the keyhole, and beckons the others over with a crooked finger. They all take turns looking through the keyhole, but the landlady keeps the lion's share, bending low, practically kneeling, as if adjuring the keyhole to let her through. When she finally straightens up, passes her hands over her face, tidies her hair, and takes a deep breath, K. asks, "Has Klamm left, then?" The landlady walks past him in silence, but Momus answers from his table: "Yes, to be sure. Once you had left the place where you were standing guard, Klamm was able to go out." Momus adds that Klamm looked around nervously, but the landlady, while siding with the gentleman, suggests that Klamm's sensitivity may be exaggerated by those who try to protect him. K. suggests that Klamm might have been looking for him, but everyone laughs, Pepi loudest of all, though she understands hardly any of what is going on.

Momus's Identity and the Offer of Questioning

Momus, now that the room has turned serious at the mention of his name and office, buries himself in his files and begins writing, as if he had said too much even for himself to take in. The landlady explains that Momus is a secretary to Klamm like any of Klamm's other secretaries, but his office—and she corrects herself when Momus shakes his head vigorously—is restricted to the village. He deals with all Klamm's written work that may be necessary in the village and is the first to receive all petitions to Klamm coming from the village. Momus adds that he works for two masters, Klamm and Vallabene, making him village secretary twice over. K. nods as if to a child, but his disdain goes unnoticed or seems requisite. He is not impressed by the proximity to Klamm that Momus enjoys; for K., the point is not to linger with Klamm but to get past him and go on into the castle. Momus, in Klamm's name, commands K. to answer his questions, but K. moves toward the door, saying he must go home to his duties as school janitor. Momus slams a file down on the table and stands up, repeating the command. The landlady joins in, telling K. that the only way leading to Klamm will be through Momus's records, though she admits the path may not reach Klamm at all. K. retorts that it is not the only way to Klamm, nor is it worth more than any other.

The Landlady's Contradictory Advice

The landlady, who had earlier tried so hard to keep K. away from Klamm, now seems to take his request seriously and considers him lost if his plans fail. K. points out this contradiction: how can she honestly advise him not to try seeing Klamm and now urge him forward on the path to Klamm? The landlady denies urging him forward, saying she only confesses that she may have overestimated him at first, alarmed by his swift conquest of Frieda. Now she has learned to think more calmly; he may do as he wishes, but his actions will leave only deep footprints in the snow. K. asks Momus directly whether the records could result in an interview with Klamm, and Momus replies flatly that there is no such connection; his business is only to get a precise account of the afternoon's events down on paper for Klamm's village registry. The landlady insists that the records are the only real official connection K. can have with Klamm, and that the hope lies in the fact that through them he may have a kind of connection with Klamm, even if nothing more precise can be said. K. asks whether Klamm will read the records, and Momus says no, Klamm never reads any of them, often saying, "Oh, don't come pestering me with your records!" The landlady, exhausted by K.'s questions, argues that the records go into Klamm's village registry and that Momus, acting with Klamm's approval, is a tool in Klamm's hand.

K.'s Refusal and Departure

K. is not afraid of the landlady's threats and is tired of the hopes in which she tries to entangle him. He thinks of Klamm's remote distance, his impregnable residence, his silence, his piercing glance from on high—Klamm and the eagle have all this in common. Meanwhile, Momus is crumbling a salted pretzel over the papers, scattering salt and crumbs. K. says, "Well, good night. I have a rooted dislike of any kind of questioning," and heads for the door. Momus asks the landlady, almost anxiously, "Is he going, then?" She replies, "He'll never dare." But K. is already out in the entrance hall, where the landlord, who seems to have been keeping watch through a peephole, comes through a doorway, clutching his coat-tails against the wind. The landlord asks if K. has been questioned, and K. says no, he wasn't letting anyone question him. The landlord, agreeing only out of civility, says he thought the hearing was important, but K. dismisses it as a joke or an official whim. The landlord adds, "Well, well, that doesn't mean we'll necessarily see fire and brimstone raining down from the sky," and they part, laughing.