We
poison themselves.... And degeneration,' ... etc.... This is true to
the point of indecency."
"Indecency?"
"Yes. To let out into the street such a group of bald-headed naked
little truths. Only imagine please. Imagine, say, that persistent
admirer of mine, S-, well, you know him. Then imagine: if he should
discard the deception of clothes and appear in public in his true
form ... oh!" She laughed. But I clearly saw her lower, sorrowful
triangle; two deep grooves from the nose to the mouth. And for
some reason these grooves made me think: that double-curved being,
half-hunched, with wing-like ears,--he embraced her? her, such ...
Oh!
Naturally, I try now merely to express my abnormal feelings of that
moment. Now, as I write, I understand perfectly that all this is as
it should be; that he, S-4711, like any other honest Number has a
perfect right to the joys of life and that it would be unjust....
But I think the point is quite clear.
I-330 laughed a long, strange laugh. Then she cast a look at me,
into me.
"The most curious thing is that I am not in the least afraid of you.
You are such a dear, I am sure of it! You would never think of going
to the Bureau and reporting that I drink liqueurs and smoke. You
will be sick or busy, or I don't know what.... Furthermore, I am
sure you will drink this charming poison with me."
What an impertinent, mocking tone! I felt definitely that in a
moment I should hate her. (Why in a moment? In fact I hated her all
the time.)
I-330 turned over the little glass of green poison straight into
her mouth. Then she stood up, and all rosy through the translucent
saffron-yellow tissue, she made a few steps and stopped behind my
chair.... Suddenly her arms were about my neck ... her lips grew
into mine, no, even somewhere much deeper, much more terribly.... I
swear all this was very unexpected for me. That is why perhaps ...
for I could not (at this moment I see clearly) I could not myself
have the desire to....
Unbearably sweet lips. (I suppose it was the taste of the liqueur.)
It was as though burning poison were being poured into me, and more
and more....
I tore away from the earth and began revolving as an independent
planet,--down--down--following an uncalculable curve....
What happened next I am able to describe only in an approximate way,
only by way of more or less corresponding analogies.
It never occurred to me before but it is true: we who live on the
earth, we are always walking over a seething red sea of fire which
is hidden in the womb of the earth. We never think of it. But
imagine the ground under our feet suddenly transformed into a thin
glass shell; suddenly we should behold...!
I became glass-like and saw within myself. There were two selves in
me. One, the former D-503, Number D-503; and the other.... Before,
that other used only to show his hairy paws from time to time, but
now the whole other self left his shell. That shell was breaking,
and in a moment....
Grasping with all my strength the last straw (the arms of the
chair), I asked loudly (so as to hear my first self), "Where, where
did you get this poison?"
"Oh, this? A physician, one of my...."
"'One of my! one of my' what?" And my other self jumped up suddenly
and yelled: "I won't allow it! I want no one but me.... I shall
kill any one who.... Because I.... You." ... I saw my other self
grasp her rudely with his hairy paws, tear the silk, and put his
teeth in her flesh!... I remember exactly, his teeth!...
I do not remember how, but I-330 slipped away and I saw her
straightened, her head raised high, her eyes overlain by that cursed
impenetrable curtain. She stood leaning with her back against the
closet door and listening to me.
I remember I was on the floor; I embraced her limbs, kissed her
knees and cried supplicatingly, "At once, right away, right away."
Sharp teeth.... The sharp mocking triangle of the brows.... She bent
over and in silence unbuttoned my badge.
"Yes, yes, dear--dear."
I began hastily to remove my unif. But I-330, silent as before,
lifted my badge to my eyes, showing me the clock upon it. It was
twenty-two-twenty-five.
I became cold. I knew what it meant to be out in the street after
twenty-two-thirty. My insanity disappeared at once. I was again
I. I saw clearly one thing: I hated her, hated her, hated-- ...
Without saying good-bye, without looking back, I ran out of the
room. Hurriedly trying to fasten the badge back in its place, I
ran down the stairs (I was afraid lest some one notice me in the
elevator), and jumped out into a deserted street.
Everything was in its place; life so simple, ordinary, orderly.
Glittering glass houses, pale glass sky, a greenish, motionless
night. But under that cool glass something wild, something red
and hairy, was silently seething. I was gasping for breath but I
continued to run, so as not to be late.
Suddenly I felt that my badge which I had hurriedly pinned on, was
detaching itself; it came off and fell to the sidewalk. I bent
over to pick it up and in the momentary silence I heard somebody's
steps. I turned. Someone small and hunched was disappearing around
the corner. At least so it seemed. I started to run as fast as I
could. The wind whistled in my ears. At the entrance of my house I
stopped and looked at the clock; one minute to twenty-two-thirty! I
listened; nobody behind. It was my foolish imagination, the effect
of the poison.
The night was full of torture. My bed seemed to lift itself under
me, then to fall again, then up again! I used autosuggestion: "At
night all the Numbers must sleep; sleeping at night is a duty just
like working during the day. To sleep at night is necessary for the
next day's work. Not to sleep at night is criminal." Yet I could
not sleep--I could not. I was perishing! I was unable to fulfill my
duties to the United State! I....
RECORD ELEVEN
No, I Can't; Let It Be without Headings!
Evening. It is somewhat foggy. The sky is covered with a
milky-golden tissue, and one cannot see what is there, beyond,
on the heights. The ancients "knew" that the greatest, bored
skeptic--their God, lived there. We know that crystalline, blue,
naked, indecent Nothing is there. _I_ do not know any more what
_is_ there. I have learned too many things of late. Knowledge,
self-confident knowledge which is sure that it is faultless, is
faith. I had firm faith in myself; I believed that I knew all about
myself. But then.... I look in the mirror. And for the first time
in my life, yes, _for the first time in my life_, I see clearly,
precisely, consciously and with surprise, I see myself as some
"him!" I am "he." Frowning, black, straight brows; between them
like a scar, there is a vertical wrinkle. (Was there that wrinkle
before?) Steel gray eyes encircled by the shadow of a sleepless
night. And behind that steel ... I understand; I never before knew
what there was behind that steel. From there (this "there" is at
once so near and so infinitely distant!) I look at myself--at "him."
And I know surely that "he" with his straight brows is a stranger,
that I meet him here for the first time in my life. The real I is
_not_ he.
No. Period. All this is nonsense. And all these foolish emotions are
only delirium, the result of last night's poisoning.... Poisoning
with what? With a sip of that green poison or with her? It matters
little. I write all this merely in order to demonstrate how
strangely the precise and sharp human reason may become confused.
This reason, strong enough to make infinity which the ancients
feared so much, understandable by means of.... The switch buzzes,
"Number R-13." Well, I am even glad; alone I should....
_Twenty minutes later_:
On the plane of this paper, in a world of two dimensions, these
lines follow each other, but in another world they.... I am losing
the sense for figures.... Twenty minutes! Perhaps two hundred or two
hundred thousand!...
It seems so strange, quietly, deliberately, measuring every word,
to write down my adventure with R-. Imagine yourself sitting down
at your own bed, crossing your legs, watching curiously how you
yourself shrivel in the very same bed. My mental state is similar to
that.
When R-13 came in I was perfectly quiet and normal. I began with
sincere admiration to tell him how wonderfully he succeeded in
versifying the death sentence of that insane man, and that his
poem more than anything else had smothered and annihilated the
transgressor of the law.
"More than that," I said, "if I were ordered to prepare a
mathematical draught of the Machine of the Well-Doer, I should
undoubtedly,--undoubtedly, put on that draught some of your
verses!"--Suddenly I saw R-'s eyes becoming more and more opaque,
his lips acquiring a gray tint.
"What is the matter?"
"What?--Well.... Merely that I am dead sick of it; everybody keeps
on: 'the death-sentence, the death-sentence!' I want to hear no more
of it! You understand? I do not want...." He became serious, rubbing
his neck--that little valise filled with luggage which I cannot
understand. A silence. There! He found something in that little
valise of his, removed it, unwrapped it, spread it out; his eyes
became covered with the varnish of laughter. He began:
"I am writing something for your _Integral_. Yes.... I am!" He was
himself again; bubbling, sprinkling lips; words splashing like a
fountain.
"You see, it is the ancient legend of paradise." ("p" like a
fountain.) "That legend referred to us of today, did it not? Yes.
Only think of it, think of it a moment! There were two in paradise
and the choice was offered to them: happiness without freedom, or
freedom without happiness. No other choice. _Tertium non datur_.
They, fools that they were, chose freedom. Naturally, they longed
for centuries afterwards for fetters, for the fetters of yore.
This was the meaning of their world-weariness, _Weltschmerz_. For
centuries! And only we found a way to regain happiness.... No,
listen, follow me! The ancient god and we, side by side at the
same table! Yes, we helped god definitely and finally to defeat
the devil. It was he, the devil, who lead people to transgression,
to taste pernicious freedom, he the cunning serpent? And we came
along, planted a boot on his head and ... squash! Done with him!
Paradise again! We returned to the simple-mindedness and innocence
of Adam and Eve. No more meddling with good and evil and all
that; everything is simple again, heavenly, childishly simple!
The Well-Doer, The Machine, The Cube, the giant Gas Bell, The
Guardians,--all these are good. All this is magnificent, beautiful,
noble, lofty, crystalline, pure. For all this preserves our
non-freedom, that is, our happiness. In our place those ancients
would indulge in discussions, deliberations, etc. They would break
their heads trying to make out what was moral or unmoral. But we....
Well, in short, these are the highlights of my little paradise
poem. What do you think of it? And above all the style is most
solemn, pious. Understand me? Nice little idea, is it not? Do you
understand?"
Of course I understood. I remember my thoughts at that moment: "his
appearance is nonsensical and lacking in symmetry, yet what an
orderly-working mind he has!" This made him dear to me, that is to
the real _me_. (I still insist that _I_ of before is the real one;
my I of late is, certainly, only an illness.)
Apparently R- read my thought in my face; he put his hand on my
shoulders and laughed: "Oh you!... Adam! By the way, about Eve...."
He searched for something in his pockets, took out a little book,
turned over a few leaves and said, "For the day-after-tomorrow,--oh,
no, two days from now,--O-90 has a pink check on you. How about
it?... As before?... You want her to?"