evening was covering the glass of the walls, the golden peak of the Accumulating Tower, the voices and smiles of the Numbers. Is it not strange: the passing rays of the evening sun fall to the earth at the same angle as the awakening rays of the morning, yet they make everything seem so different; the pink tinge is different. At sunset it is so quiet, somewhat melancholy; at sunrise it is resounding, boisterous.
In the hall downstairs when I entered, I saw U-, the controller. She took a letter from the heaps of envelopes covered with pink dust and handed it to me. I repeat: she is a very respectable woman and I am sure she has only the very best feelings towards me.... Yet, every time I see those cheeks hanging down, which look like the gills of a fish, I....
Holding out her dry hand with the letter, U- sighed. But that sigh only very slightly moved in me the curtains which separate me from the rest of the world. I was completely projected upon the envelope which trembled in my hand. I had no doubt but that it was a letter from I-330.
At that moment I heard another sigh, such a deliberate one, underscored with two lines, that I raised my eyes from the envelope and saw a tender, cloudy smile coming from between the gills, through the bashful jalousies of lowered eyes. And then:
“You poor, poor, dear!...” a sigh underscored with three lines, and a glance at the letter, an imperceptible glance. (What was in the letter she naturally knew, ex officio.)
“No, really?... Why?”
“No, no, dear, I know better than you. For a long time I have watched you and I see that you need some one with years of experience of life to accompany you.”
I felt all pasted around by her smile. It was like a plaster upon the wounds which were to be inflicted upon me by the letter I held in my hand. Finally, through the bashful jalousies of her eyes, she said in a very low voice: “I shall think about it, dear. I shall think it over. And be sure that if I feel myself strong enough ...”
“Great Well-Doer! Is it possible that my lot is?... Is it possible that she means to say, that she?...”
My eyes were dimmed and filled with thousands of sinusoids; the letter was trembling. I went near the light, to the wall. There the light of the sun was going out; from the sun was falling thicker and thicker the dark, sad, pink dust, covering the floor, my hands, the letter. I opened the envelope and found the signature as fast as I could,—the first wound! It was not I-330; it was O-90! And another wound: in the right-hand corner a slovenly splash,—a blot! I cannot bear blots. It matters little whether they are made by ink or by ... well, it matters not by what. Heretofore, such a blot would have had only a disagreeable effect, disagreeable to the eyes; but now—why did that small gray blot seem to be like a cloud and seem to spread about me a leaden, bluish darkness? Or was it again the “soul” at work? Here is a transcript of the letter:
“You know, or perhaps you don’t ... I cannot write well. Little it matters! Now you know that without you there is for me not a single day, a single morning, a single spring, for R- is only ... well, that is of no importance to you. At any rate, I am very grateful to him, for without him, alone all these days, I don’t know what would.... During these last few days and nights I have lived through ten years, or perhaps twenty years. My room seemed to me not square but round; I walk around without end, round after round, always the same thing, not a door to escape through. I cannot live without you because I love you; and I should not, I cannot be with you any more,—because I love you! Because I see and I understand that you need no one now, no one in the world save that other, and you must realize that it is precisely because I love you I must ...
“I need another two or three days in order to paste together the fragments of myself and thus restore at least something similar to the O-90 of old. Then I shall go myself, and myself I shall state that I take your name from my list, and this will be better for you; you must feel happy now. I shall never again....”
“Good-bye, O-.”
Never again. Yes, that is better. She is right. But, why then?... Why then?...
Record Ninteen
The Infinitesimal of the Third Order
From Under the Forehead
Over the Railing
There in the strange corridor lighted by the dotted line of dim little electric lamps ... or no, no, later, when we had already reached one of the nooks in the courtyard of the Ancient House, she said, “Day-after-tomorrow.” That “day-after-tomorrow” is today. And everything seems to have wings and to fly; the day flies; and our Integral too already has wings. We finished placing the motor and tried it out today, without switching it in. What magnificent, powerful salvos! Each of them sounded for me like a salute in honor of her, the only one,—in honor of today!
At the time of the first explosion about a dozen loafing Numbers from the docks stood near the main tube—and nothing was left of them save a few crumbs and a little soot. With pride I write down now that this occurrence did not disturb the rhythm of our work even for a second. Not a man shrank. We and our lathes continued our rectilinear or curved motions with the same sparkling and polished precision as before, as if nothing had happened. As a matter of fact, what did happen? A dozen Numbers represent hardly one hundred millionth part of the United State. For practical consideration, that is but an infinitesimal of the third order. That pity, a result of arithmetical ignorance, was known to the ancients; to us it seems absurd.
It seems droll to me also, that yesterday I was thinking, even relating in these pages about a gray blot! All that was only the “softening of the surface” which is normally as hard as diamond, like our walls. (There is an ancient saying: “Shooting beans at a stone wall—”)
Sixteen o’clock. I did not go for the supplementary walk; who knows, she might come now, when the sun is so noisily bright.
I am almost the only one in his room. Through the walls full of sunshine I see for a distance to the right and to the left and below strings of other rooms, repeating each other as if in a mirror, hanging in the air and empty. Only on the bluish stairway, striped by the golden ink of the sun, is seen rising a thin, gray shadow. Already I hear steps, and I see through the door and I feel a smile pasted to my face like a plaster. But it passed to another stairway and down. The click of the switchboard! I threw myself to that little white slit and ... an unfamiliar male Number! (A consonant means a male Number.)
The elevator groaned and stopped. A big, slovenly, slanting forehead stood before me, and the eyes ... They impressed me strangely; it seemed as if the man talked with his eyes which were deep under the forehead.
“Here is a letter from her, for you.” (From under the awning of that forehead.) “She asked that everything ... as requested in the letter ... without fail.” This too, from under the forehead, from under the awning, and he turned, looked about.
“No, there is nobody, nobody. Quickly! the letter!”
He put the letter in my hand and went out without a word.
A pink check fell out of the envelope. It was hers, her check! Her tender perfume! I felt like running to catch up with that wonderful under-the-forehead one. A tiny note followed the check from the envelope; three lines: “The check ... Lower the curtains without fail, as if I were actually with you. It is necessary that they should think that I ... I am very, very sorry.”
I tore the note into small bits. A glance at the mirror revealed my distorted, broken eyebrows. I took the check and was ready to
