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1984 by George Orwell, Part two, Chapter 1 (1)

Part two, Chapter 1 (1)

It was the middle of the morning, and Winston had left the cubicle to go to the lavatory.

A solitary figure was coming towards him from the other end of the long, brightly-lit corridor. It was the girl with dark hair. Four days had gone past since the evening when he had run into her outside the junk-shop. As she came nearer he saw that her right arm was in a sling, not noticeable at a distance because it was of the same colour as her overalls. Probably she had crushed her hand while swinging round one of the big kaleidoscopes on which the plots of novels were ‘roughed in'. It was a common accident in the Fiction Department.

They were perhaps four metres apart when the girl stumbled and fell almost flat on her face. A sharp cry of pain was wrung out of her. She must have fallen right on the injured arm. Winston stopped short. The girl had risen to her knees. Her face had turned a milky yellow colour against which her mouth stood out redder than ever. Her eyes were fixed on his, with an appealing expression that looked more like fear than pain.

A curious emotion stirred in Winston's heart. In front of him was an enemy who was trying to kill him: in front of him, also, was a human creature, in pain and perhaps with a broken bone. Already he had instinctively started forward to help her. In the moment when he had seen her fall on the bandaged arm, it had been as though he felt the pain in his own body.

‘You're hurt?' he said.

‘It's nothing. My arm. It'll be all right in a second.'

She spoke as though her heart were fluttering. She had certainly turned very pale.

‘You haven't broken anything?'

‘No, I'm all right. It hurt for a moment, that's all.'

She held out her free hand to him, and he helped her up. She had regained some of her colour, and appeared very much better.

‘It's nothing,' she repeated shortly. ‘I only gave my wrist a bit of a bang. Thanks, comrade!'

And with that she walked on in the direction in which she had been going, as briskly as though it had really been nothing. The whole incident could not have taken as much as half a minute. Not to let one's feelings appear in one's face was a habit that had acquired the status of an instinct, and in any case they had been standing straight in front of a telescreen when the thing happened. Nevertheless it had been very difficult not to betray a momentary surprise, for in the two or three seconds while he was helping her up the girl had slipped something into his hand. There was no question that she had done it intentionally. It was something small and flat. As he passed through the lavatory door he transferred it to his pocket and felt it with the tips of his fingers. It was a scrap of paper folded into a square.

While he stood at the urinal he managed, with a little more fingering, to get it unfolded. Obviously there must be a message of some kind written on it. For a moment he was tempted to take it into one of the water-closets and read it at once. But that would be shocking folly, as he well knew. There was no place where you could be more certain that the telescreens were watched continuously.

He went back to his cubicle, sat down, threw the fragment of paper casually among the other papers on the desk, put on his spectacles and hitched the speakwrite towards him. ‘Five minutes,' he told himself, ‘five minutes at the very least!' His heart bumped in his breast with frightening loudness. Fortunately the piece of work he was engaged on was mere routine, the rectification of a long list of figures, not needing close attention.

Whatever was written on the paper, it must have some kind of political meaning. So far as he could see there were two possibilities. One, much the more likely, was that the girl was an agent of the Thought Police, just as he had feared. He did not know why the Thought Police should choose to deliver their messages in such a fashion, but perhaps they had their reasons. The thing that was written on the paper might be a threat, a summons, an order to commit suicide, a trap of some description. But there was another, wilder possibility that kept raising its head, though he tried vainly to suppress it. This was, that the message did not come from the Thought Police at all, but from some kind of underground organization. Perhaps the Brotherhood existed after all! Perhaps the girl was part of it! No doubt the idea was absurd, but it had sprung into his mind in the very instant of feeling the scrap of paper in his hand. It was not till a couple of minutes later that the other, more probable explanation had occurred to him. And even now, though his intellect told him that the message probably meant death — still, that was not what he believed, and the unreasonable hope persisted, and his heart banged, and it was with difficulty that he kept his voice from trembling as he murmured his figures into the speakwrite.

He rolled up the completed bundle of work and slid it into the pneumatic tube. Eight minutes had gone by. He re-adjusted his spectacles on his nose, sighed, and drew the next batch of work towards him, with the scrap of paper on top of it. He flattened it out. On it was written, in a large unformed handwriting:

I LOVE YOU.

For several seconds he was too stunned even to throw the incriminating thing into the memory hole. When he did so, although he knew very well the danger of showing too much interest, he could not resist reading it once again, just to make sure that the words were really there.

For the rest of the morning it was very difficult to work. What was even worse than having to focus his mind on a series of niggling jobs was the need to conceal his agitation from the telescreen. He felt as though a fire were burning in his belly. Lunch in the hot, crowded, noise-filled canteen was torment. He had hoped to be alone for a little while during the lunch hour, but as bad luck would have it the imbecile Parsons flopped down beside him, the tang of his sweat almost defeating the tinny smell of stew, and kept up a stream of talk about the preparations for Hate Week. He was particularly enthusiastic about a papier-mache model of Big Brother's head, two metres wide, which was being made for the occasion by his daughter's troop of Spies. The irritating thing was that in the racket of voices Winston could hardly hear what Parsons was saying, and was constantly having to ask for some fatuous remark to be repeated. Just once he caught a glimpse of the girl, at a table with two other girls at the far end of the room. She appeared not to have seen him, and he did not look in that direction again.

The afternoon was more bearable. Immediately after lunch there arrived a delicate, difficult piece of work which would take several hours and necessitated putting everything else aside. It consisted in falsifying a series of production reports of two years ago, in such a way as to cast discredit on a prominent member of the Inner Party, who was now under a cloud. This was the kind of thing that Winston was good at, and for more than two hours he succeeded in shutting the girl out of his mind altogether. Then the memory of her face came back, and with it a raging, intolerable desire to be alone. Until he could be alone it was impossible to think this new development out. Tonight was one of his nights at the Community Centre. He wolfed another tasteless meal in the canteen, hurried off to the Centre, took part in the solemn foolery of a ‘discussion group', played two games of table tennis, swallowed several glasses of gin, and sat for half an hour through a lecture entitled ‘Ingsoc in relation to chess'. His soul writhed with boredom, but for once he had had no impulse to shirk his evening at the Centre. At the sight of the words I LOVE YOU the desire to stay alive had welled up in him, and the taking of minor risks suddenly seemed stupid. It was not till twenty-three hours, when he was home and in bed — in the darkness, where you were safe even from the telescreen so long as you kept silent — that he was able to think continuously.

It was a physical problem that had to be solved: how to get in touch with the girl and arrange a meeting. He did not consider any longer the possibility that she might be laying some kind of trap for him. He knew that it was not so, because of her unmistakable agitation when she handed him the note. Obviously she had been frightened out of her wits, as well she might be. Nor did the idea of refusing her advances even cross his mind. Only five nights ago he had contemplated smashing her skull in with a cobblestone, but that was of no importance. He thought of her naked, youthful body, as he had seen it in his dream. He had imagined her a fool like all the rest of them, her head stuffed with lies and hatred, her belly full of ice. A kind of fever seized him at the thought that he might lose her, the white youthful body might slip away from him! What he feared more than anything else was that she would simply change her mind if he did not get in touch with her quickly. But the physical difficulty of meeting was enormous. It was like trying to make a move at chess when you were already mated. Whichever way you turned, the telescreen faced you. Actually, all the possible ways of communicating with her had occurred to him within five minutes of reading the note; but now, with time to think, he went over them one by one, as though laying out a row of instruments on a table.

Obviously the kind of encounter that had happened this morning could not be repeated. If she had worked in the Records Department it might have been comparatively simple, but he had only a very dim idea whereabouts in the building the Fiction Department lay, and he had no pretext for going there. If he had known where she lived, and at what time she left work, he could have contrived to meet her somewhere on her way home; but to try to follow her home was not safe, because it would mean loitering about outside the Ministry, which was bound to be noticed. As for sending a letter through the mails, it was out of the question. By a routine that was not even secret, all letters were opened in transit. Actually, few people ever wrote letters. For the messages that it was occasionally necessary to send, there were printed postcards with long lists of phrases, and you struck out the ones that were inapplicable. In any case he did not know the girl's name, let alone her address. Finally he decided that the safest place was the canteen.

Part two, Chapter 1 (1) Deel twee, Hoofdstuk 1 (1)

It was the middle of the morning, and Winston had left the cubicle to go to the lavatory.

A solitary figure was coming towards him from the other end of the long, brightly-lit corridor. Una figura solitaria venía hacia él desde el otro extremo del pasillo largo y brillantemente iluminado. It was the girl with dark hair. Four days had gone past since the evening when he had run into her outside the junk-shop. As she came nearer he saw that her right arm was in a sling, not noticeable at a distance because it was of the same colour as her overalls. Cuando ella se acercó, vio que su brazo derecho estaba en cabestrillo, no se notaba a la distancia porque era del mismo color que su overol. Коли вона підійшла ближче, він побачив, що її права рука була в слінгу, непомітна на відстані, оскільки була такого ж кольору, як і її комбінезон. Probably she had crushed her hand while swinging round one of the big kaleidoscopes on which the plots of novels were ‘roughed in'. Wahrscheinlich hatte sie sich die Hand gequetscht, als sie um eines der großen Kaleidoskope schwenkte, auf denen die Romanhandlungen „aufgeraut“ waren. Probablemente se había aplastado la mano mientras giraba en torno a uno de los grandes caleidoscopios en los que se «machacaban» las tramas de las novelas. Ймовірно, вона розтрощила руку, коли розгойдувалась навколо одного з великих калейдоскопів, на яких «зачіплялися» сюжети романів. It was a common accident in the Fiction Department.

They were perhaps four metres apart when the girl stumbled and fell almost flat on her face. Estaban quizás a cuatro metros de distancia cuando la niña tropezó y cayó de bruces. Між ними було приблизно чотири метри одна від одної, коли дівчина спіткнулася і впала майже на обличчя. A sharp cry of pain was wrung out of her. Un agudo grito de dolor salió de ella. She must have fallen right on the injured arm. Debe haber caído directamente sobre el brazo lesionado. Winston stopped short. Winston se detuvo en seco. The girl had risen to her knees. La niña se había puesto de rodillas. Her face had turned a milky yellow colour against which her mouth stood out redder than ever. Her eyes were fixed on his, with an appealing expression that looked more like fear than pain. Sus ojos estaban fijos en los de él, con una expresión atractiva que parecía más miedo que dolor.

A curious emotion stirred in Winston's heart. In front of him was an enemy who was trying to kill him: in front of him, also, was a human creature, in pain and perhaps with a broken bone. Already he had instinctively started forward to help her. Instintivamente ya se había adelantado para ayudarla. In the moment when he had seen her fall on the bandaged arm, it had been as though he felt the pain in his own body. En el momento en que la había visto caer sobre el brazo vendado, había sido como si sintiera el dolor en su propio cuerpo.

‘You're hurt?' he said.

‘It's nothing. My arm. It'll be all right in a second.'

She spoke as though her heart were fluttering. Sie sprach, als ob ihr Herz flatterte. Hablaba como si su corazón estuviera latiendo. Вона говорила так, ніби її серце тріпотіло. She had certainly turned very pale. Sie war sicherlich sehr blass geworden. Ciertamente se había puesto muy pálida. Вона, звичайно, дуже зблідла.

‘You haven't broken anything?'

‘No, I'm all right. It hurt for a moment, that's all.' Es tat einen Moment lang weh, das ist alles.'

She held out her free hand to him, and he helped her up. Ella le tendió la mano libre y él la ayudó a levantarse. She had regained some of her colour, and appeared very much better.

‘It's nothing,' she repeated shortly. ‘I only gave my wrist a bit of a bang. 'Solo le di a mi muñeca un poco de golpe. Thanks, comrade!'

And with that she walked on in the direction in which she had been going, as briskly as though it had really been nothing. Y con eso siguió caminando en la dirección en la que había ido, tan rápidamente como si realmente no hubiera sido nada. І з цими словами вона пішла в тому напрямку, куди йшла, так жваво, ніби це й було нічого. The whole incident could not have taken as much as half a minute. Todo el incidente no pudo haber durado ni medio minuto. Not to let one's feelings appear in one's face was a habit that had acquired the status of an instinct, and in any case they had been standing straight in front of a telescreen when the thing happened. No dejar que los sentimientos aparecieran en la cara era un hábito que había adquirido la categoría de instinto y, en cualquier caso, estaban parados frente a una telepantalla cuando sucedió. Не допускати своїх почуттів на обличчі було звичкою, яка набула статусу інстинкту, і в усякому разі вони стояли прямо перед телеекраном, коли це сталося. Nevertheless it had been very difficult not to betray a momentary surprise, for in the two or three seconds while he was helping her up the girl had slipped something into his hand. Sin embargo, había sido muy difícil no traicionar una sorpresa momentánea, porque en los dos o tres segundos que estuvo ayudándola a levantarse, la chica le había deslizado algo en la mano. Та все ж було дуже важко не викрити миттєвого здивування, бо за дві-три секунди, поки він допомагав їй піднятися, дівчина щось просунула йому в руку. There was no question that she had done it intentionally. It was something small and flat. As he passed through the lavatory door he transferred it to his pocket and felt it with the tips of his fingers. It was a scrap of paper folded into a square.

While he stood at the urinal he managed, with a little more fingering, to get it unfolded. Mientras estaba de pie junto al urinario consiguió, con un poco más de dedos, desdoblarlo. Поки він стояв біля пісуара, йому вдалося, трохи більше перебираючи пальцями, розгорнути його. Obviously there must be a message of some kind written on it. For a moment he was tempted to take it into one of the water-closets and read it at once. Por un momento estuvo tentado de llevarlo a uno de los retretes y leerlo de inmediato. But that would be shocking folly, as he well knew. Pero eso sería una locura espantosa, como bien sabía. There was no place where you could be more certain that the telescreens were watched continuously.

He went back to his cubicle, sat down, threw the fragment of paper casually among the other papers on the desk, put on his spectacles and hitched the speakwrite towards him. Regresó a su cubículo, se sentó, arrojó casualmente el fragmento de papel sobre el escritorio entre los demás papeles, se puso las gafas y se acercó el talkwrite. ‘Five minutes,' he told himself, ‘five minutes at the very least!' "Cinco minutos", se dijo a sí mismo, "¡cinco minutos como mínimo!" «П’ять хвилин, — сказав він собі, — щонайменше п’ять хвилин!» His heart bumped in his breast with frightening loudness. El corazón le latía en el pecho con un volumen aterrador. Fortunately the piece of work he was engaged on was mere routine, the rectification of a long list of figures, not needing close attention. Afortunadamente, el trabajo en el que estaba comprometido era mera rutina, la rectificación de una larga lista de cifras, que no necesitaba mucha atención.

Whatever was written on the paper, it must have some kind of political meaning. Lo que sea que esté escrito en el papel, debe tener algún tipo de significado político. So far as he could see there were two possibilities. One, much the more likely, was that the girl was an agent of the Thought Police, just as he had feared. Una, mucho más probable, era que la niña fuera un agente de la Policía del Pensamiento, tal como había temido. He did not know why the Thought Police should choose to deliver their messages in such a fashion, but perhaps they had their reasons. The thing that was written on the paper might be a threat, a summons, an order to commit suicide, a trap of some description. Lo que estaba escrito en el papel podría ser una amenaza, una citación, una orden de suicidio, una trampa de alguna descripción. But there was another, wilder possibility that kept raising its head, though he tried vainly to suppress it. Pero había otra posibilidad más salvaje que seguía levantando la cabeza, aunque intentó en vano reprimirla. This was, that the message did not come from the Thought Police at all, but from some kind of underground organization. Perhaps the Brotherhood existed after all! Perhaps the girl was part of it! No doubt the idea was absurd, but it had sprung into his mind in the very instant of feeling the scrap of paper in his hand. Sin duda la idea era absurda, pero se le había ocurrido en el mismo instante en que sintió el trozo de papel en la mano. It was not till a couple of minutes later that the other, more probable explanation had occurred to him. No fue hasta un par de minutos después que se le ocurrió la otra explicación más probable. Лише через кілька хвилин йому спало на думку інше, більш вірогідне пояснення. And even now, though his intellect told him that the message probably meant death — still, that was not what he believed, and the unreasonable hope persisted, and his heart banged, and it was with difficulty that he kept his voice from trembling as he murmured his figures into the speakwrite. E incluso ahora, aunque su intelecto le decía que el mensaje probablemente significaba la muerte, aún así, eso no era lo que él creía, y la esperanza irracional persistía, y su corazón latía con fuerza, y le costaba trabajo evitar que le temblara la voz mientras lo hacía. murmuró sus figuras en el talkwrite. І навіть зараз, хоч його інтелект підказував йому, що повідомлення, ймовірно, означало смерть, — все ж він вірив не в це, і безпідставна надія зберігалася, і його серце калатало, і він насилу стримував голос, щоб не тремтів, коли він пробурмотів свої цифри в диктофон.

He rolled up the completed bundle of work and slid it into the pneumatic tube. Eight minutes had gone by. Habían pasado ocho minutos. He re-adjusted his spectacles on his nose, sighed, and drew the next batch of work towards him, with the scrap of paper on top of it. Se reajustó las gafas en la nariz, suspiró y se acercó el siguiente lote de trabajo, con el trozo de papel encima. He flattened it out. Lo aplastó. Він його розплющив. On it was written, in a large unformed handwriting: En él estaba escrito, con letra grande y sin formato: На ньому великим неформованим почерком було написано:

I LOVE YOU.

For several seconds he was too stunned even to throw the incriminating thing into the memory hole. Durante varios segundos estuvo demasiado aturdido incluso para arrojar la cosa incriminatoria al agujero de la memoria. When he did so, although he knew very well the danger of showing too much interest, he could not resist reading it once again, just to make sure that the words were really there. Cuando lo hizo, aunque conocía muy bien el peligro de mostrar demasiado interés, no pudo resistirse a leerlo una vez más, solo para asegurarse de que las palabras estaban realmente ahí. Коли він це зробив, хоч він дуже добре розумів небезпеку виявлення занадто великого інтересу, він не міг утриматися від того, щоб прочитати це ще раз, просто щоб переконатися, що слова справді там.

For the rest of the morning it was very difficult to work. What was even worse than having to focus his mind on a series of niggling jobs was the need to conceal his agitation from the telescreen. He felt as though a fire were burning in his belly. Lunch in the hot, crowded, noise-filled canteen was torment. El almuerzo en la cantina caliente, abarrotada y ruidosa fue un tormento. Обід у гарячій, людній, наповненій шумом їдальні був мукою. He had hoped to be alone for a little while during the lunch hour, but as bad luck would have it the imbecile Parsons flopped down beside him, the tang of his sweat almost defeating the tinny smell of stew, and kept up a stream of talk about the preparations for Hate Week. Tenía la esperanza de estar solo un rato durante la hora del almuerzo, pero por mala suerte, el imbécil de Parsons se dejó caer a su lado, el olor fuerte de su sudor casi derrotaba el olor metálico del estofado, y siguió hablando. sobre los preparativos para la Semana del Odio. He was particularly enthusiastic about a papier-mache model of Big Brother's head, two metres wide, which was being made for the occasion by his daughter's troop of Spies. Estaba particularmente entusiasmado con un modelo en papel maché de la cabeza del Gran Hermano, de dos metros de ancho, que estaba haciendo para la ocasión la tropa de espías de su hija. The irritating thing was that in the racket of voices Winston could hardly hear what Parsons was saying, and was constantly having to ask for some fatuous remark to be repeated. Lo irritante era que, en medio del estrépito de las voces, Winston apenas podía oír lo que decía Parsons y tenía que pedir constantemente que le repitieran algún comentario fatuo. Just once he caught a glimpse of the girl, at a table with two other girls at the far end of the room. She appeared not to have seen him, and he did not look in that direction again.

The afternoon was more bearable. Immediately after lunch there arrived a delicate, difficult piece of work which would take several hours and necessitated putting everything else aside. Inmediatamente después del almuerzo llegó un trabajo delicado y difícil que tomaría varias horas y requería dejar todo lo demás a un lado. It consisted in falsifying a series of production reports of two years ago, in such a way as to cast discredit on a prominent member of the Inner Party, who was now under a cloud. Es bestand darin, eine Reihe von Produktionsberichten von vor zwei Jahren zu fälschen, um ein prominentes Mitglied der Inneren Partei, das jetzt unter einer Wolke stand, in Verruf zu bringen. Consistió en falsificar una serie de reportajes de producción de hace dos años, de tal manera que se desacreditara a un destacado miembro del Partido Interior, que ahora se encontraba bajo una nube. This was the kind of thing that Winston was good at, and for more than two hours he succeeded in shutting the girl out of his mind altogether. Este era el tipo de cosas en las que Winston era bueno, y durante más de dos horas logró apartar a la chica de su mente por completo. Це те, що Вінстон добре вмів, і більше ніж на дві години йому вдавалося викинути дівчину з голови. Then the memory of her face came back, and with it a raging, intolerable desire to be alone. Entonces volvió el recuerdo de su rostro y, con él, un deseo rabioso e intolerable de estar sola. Тоді пам’ять про її обличчя повернулася, а з ним — шалене, нестерпне бажання побути на самоті. Until he could be alone it was impossible to think this new development out. Hasta que pudiera estar solo, era imposible pensar en este nuevo desarrollo. Tonight was one of his nights at the Community Centre. He wolfed another tasteless meal in the canteen, hurried off to the Centre, took part in the solemn foolery of a ‘discussion group', played two games of table tennis, swallowed several glasses of gin, and sat for half an hour through a lecture entitled ‘Ingsoc in relation to chess'. Devoró otra comida insípida en la cantina, se apresuró al centro, participó en la solemne tontería de un 'grupo de discusión', jugó dos partidos de tenis de mesa, se tragó varios vasos de ginebra y se sentó durante media hora a dar una conferencia. titulado "Ingsoc en relación con el ajedrez". His soul writhed with boredom, but for once he had had no impulse to shirk his evening at the Centre. Seine Seele wand sich vor Langeweile, aber ausnahmsweise hatte er keinen Impuls gehabt, sich vor seinem Abend im Zentrum zu drücken. Su alma se retorcía de aburrimiento, pero por una vez no había tenido el impulso de eludir su velada en el Centro. Його душа корчилася від нудьги, але на цей раз у нього не було бажання ухилитися від вечора в Центрі. At the sight of the words I LOVE YOU the desire to stay alive had welled up in him, and the taking of minor risks suddenly seemed stupid. При вигляді слів I LOVE YOU в ньому зародилося бажання залишитися в живих, і йти на незначний ризик раптом здалося дурним. It was not till twenty-three hours, when he was home and in bed — in the darkness, where you were safe even from the telescreen so long as you kept silent — that he was able to think continuously. Лише через двадцять три години, коли він був удома й у ліжку — у темряві, де ти був у безпеці навіть від телеекрану, поки ти мовчав — він міг безперервно думати.

It was a physical problem that had to be solved: how to get in touch with the girl and arrange a meeting. Era un problema físico que había que solucionar: cómo ponerme en contacto con la chica y concertar una cita. Це була фізична проблема, яку потрібно було вирішити: як зв’язатися з дівчиною і домовитися про зустріч. He did not consider any longer the possibility that she might be laying some kind of trap for him. Ya no consideró la posibilidad de que ella pudiera estar tendiéndole algún tipo de trampa. Він більше не думав про можливість того, що вона може влаштувати йому якусь пастку. He knew that it was not so, because of her unmistakable agitation when she handed him the note. Він знав, що це не так, через її безпомилкове хвилювання, коли вона подала йому записку. Obviously she had been frightened out of her wits, as well she might be. Offensichtlich war sie zu Tode erschrocken, so gut sie es auch sein könnte. Era obvio que había estado muerta de miedo, y bien podría estarlo. Nor did the idea of refusing her advances even cross his mind. Er kam auch nicht auf die Idee, ihre Annäherungsversuche abzulehnen. Ni siquiera cruzó por su mente la idea de rechazar sus avances. Ідея відмовитися від її залицянь навіть не спала йому на думку. Only five nights ago he had contemplated smashing her skull in with a cobblestone, but that was of no importance. Noch vor fünf Nächten hatte er darüber nachgedacht, ihr den Schädel mit einem Kopfsteinpflaster einzuschlagen, aber das war ohne Bedeutung. Solo cinco noches antes había contemplado aplastarle el cráneo con un adoquín, pero eso no tenía importancia. He thought of her naked, youthful body, as he had seen it in his dream. Pensó en su cuerpo joven y desnudo, tal como lo había visto en su sueño. He had imagined her a fool like all the rest of them, her head stuffed with lies and hatred, her belly full of ice. Er hatte sie sich wie alle anderen für eine Närrin vorgestellt, ihren Kopf voller Lügen und Hass, ihren Bauch voller Eis. A kind of fever seized him at the thought that he might lose her, the white youthful body might slip away from him! Eine Art Fieber ergriff ihn bei dem Gedanken, er könnte sie verlieren, der weiße jugendliche Körper könnte ihm entgleiten! Una especie de fiebre se apoderó de él al pensar que podría perderla, ¡el cuerpo blanco y juvenil podría escaparse de él! What he feared more than anything else was that she would simply change her mind if he did not get in touch with her quickly. Was er mehr als alles andere fürchtete, war, dass sie ihre Meinung einfach ändern würde, wenn er sich nicht schnell bei ihr meldete. Lo que más temía era que ella simplemente cambiara de opinión si él no se comunicaba con ella rápidamente. Більше всього він боявся, що вона просто передумає, якщо він швидко з нею не зв’яжеться. But the physical difficulty of meeting was enormous. It was like trying to make a move at chess when you were already mated. Era como intentar hacer un movimiento de ajedrez cuando ya estabas emparejado. Whichever way you turned, the telescreen faced you. Wohin Sie sich auch wandten, der Televisor stand Ihnen gegenüber. En cualquier dirección que girara, la telepantalla estaba frente a usted. Niezależnie od tego, w którą stronę się obróciłeś, teleekran był skierowany w twoją stronę. Actually, all the possible ways of communicating with her had occurred to him within five minutes of reading the note; but now, with time to think, he went over them one by one, as though laying out a row of instruments on a table. Tatsächlich waren ihm innerhalb von fünf Minuten, nachdem er die Notiz gelesen hatte, alle Möglichkeiten eingefallen, mit ihr zu kommunizieren; aber jetzt, mit Zeit zum Nachdenken, ging er sie einzeln durch, als lege er eine Reihe von Instrumenten auf einen Tisch. Власне, усі можливі способи спілкування з нею прийшли йому в голову протягом п’яти хвилин після прочитання записки; але тепер, маючи час на роздуми, він перебирав їх один за одним, ніби розкладаючи на столі ряд інструментів.

Obviously the kind of encounter that had happened this morning could not be repeated. Offensichtlich konnte die Art von Begegnung, die sich heute Morgen ereignet hatte, nicht wiederholt werden. If she had worked in the Records Department it might have been comparatively simple, but he had only a very dim idea whereabouts in the building the Fiction Department lay, and he had no pretext for going there. Wenn sie in der Archivabteilung gearbeitet hätte, wäre es vielleicht vergleichsweise einfach gewesen, aber er hatte nur eine sehr vage Ahnung, wo sich in dem Gebäude, in dem die Belletristikabteilung lag, befand, und er hatte keinen Vorwand, dorthin zu gehen. Якби вона працювала у відділі документації, це було б порівняно просто, але він мав лише дуже туманне уявлення про те, де в будівлі знаходиться відділ художньої літератури, і він не мав приводу туди піти. If he had known where she lived, and at what time she left work, he could have contrived to meet her somewhere on her way home; but to try to follow her home was not safe, because it would mean loitering about outside the Ministry, which was bound to be noticed. Wenn er gewusst hätte, wo sie wohnte und wann sie von der Arbeit kam, hätte er sie irgendwo auf dem Heimweg treffen können; aber zu versuchen, ihr nach Hause zu folgen, war nicht sicher, weil es bedeuten würde, außerhalb des Ministeriums herumzulungern, was zwangsläufig bemerkt werden würde. As for sending a letter through the mails, it was out of the question. En cuanto a enviar una carta por correo, estaba fuera de discusión. By a routine that was not even secret, all letters were opened in transit. Durch eine nicht einmal geheime Routine wurden alle Briefe unterwegs geöffnet. Actually, few people ever wrote letters. For the messages that it was occasionally necessary to send, there were printed postcards with long lists of phrases, and you struck out the ones that were inapplicable. Für die Mitteilungen, die gelegentlich verschickt werden mussten, gab es gedruckte Postkarten mit langen Phrasenlisten, und Sie haben die unzutreffenden gestrichen. Para los mensajes que ocasionalmente era necesario enviar, había postales impresas con largas listas de frases, y tachabas las que eran inaplicables. In any case he did not know the girl's name, let alone her address. Jedenfalls kannte er den Namen des Mädchens nicht, geschweige denn ihre Adresse. En cualquier caso, no sabía el nombre de la chica, y mucho menos su dirección. Finally he decided that the safest place was the canteen.