Page:Evgenii Zamyatin - We (Zilboorg translation).pdf/194

Rh RECORD THIRTY-FOUR

The Forgiven OnesA Sunny NightA Radio-Valkyrie

Oh, if only I had actually broken myself to pieces! If only I had actually found myself with her in some place beyond the Wall, among beasts showing their yellow tusks. If only I had never actually returned here! It would be a thousand, a million times easier! But now—what? Now to go and choke that—! But would it help? No, no, no! Take yourself in hand, D-503! Set into yourself the firm hub of logic; at least for a short while weigh heavily with all your might on the lever and, like the ancient slave, turn the millstones of syllogisms until you have written down and understood everything that happened

When I boarded the Integral, everyone was already there and in his place; all the cells of the gigantic hive were filled. Through the decks of glass—tiny, antlike people below, at the telegraph, dynamo, transformers, altimeters, ventilators, indicators, motor, pumps, tubes In the saloon people were sitting over tables and instruments, probably those commissioned by the Scientific Bureau; near them the Second Builder and his two aides. All three had their heads down between their shoulders like turtles, their faces gray, autumnal, rayless.

“Well?” I asked.