Reg
December 25th 07, 08:54 PM
interest in him. She did not speak. She
walked obliquely away across the grass as though trying to get rid of him,
then seemed to resign herself to having him at her side. Presently they
were in among a clump of ragged leafless shrubs, useless either for
concealment or as protection from the wind. They halted. It was vilely
cold. The wind whistled through the twigs and fretted the occasional,
dirty-looking crocuses. He put his arm round her waist.
There was no telescreen, but there must be hidden microphones:
besides, they could be seen. It did not matter, nothing mattered. They
could have lain down on the ground and done that if they had wanted to. His
flesh froze with horror at the thought of it. She made no response whatever
to the clasp of his arm; she did not even try to disengage herself. He knew
now what had changed in her. Her face was sallower, and there was a long
scar, partly hidden by the hair, across her forehead and temple; but that
was not the change. It was that her waist had grown thicker, and, in a
surprising way, had stiffened. He remembered how once, after the explosion
of a rocket bomb, he had helped to drag a corpse out of some ruins, and had
been astonished not only by the incredible weight of the thing, but by its
rigidity and awkwardness to handle, which made it seem more like stone than
flesh. Her body felt like that. It occurred to him that the texture of her
skin would be quite different from what it had once been.
walked obliquely away across the grass as though trying to get rid of him,
then seemed to resign herself to having him at her side. Presently they
were in among a clump of ragged leafless shrubs, useless either for
concealment or as protection from the wind. They halted. It was vilely
cold. The wind whistled through the twigs and fretted the occasional,
dirty-looking crocuses. He put his arm round her waist.
There was no telescreen, but there must be hidden microphones:
besides, they could be seen. It did not matter, nothing mattered. They
could have lain down on the ground and done that if they had wanted to. His
flesh froze with horror at the thought of it. She made no response whatever
to the clasp of his arm; she did not even try to disengage herself. He knew
now what had changed in her. Her face was sallower, and there was a long
scar, partly hidden by the hair, across her forehead and temple; but that
was not the change. It was that her waist had grown thicker, and, in a
surprising way, had stiffened. He remembered how once, after the explosion
of a rocket bomb, he had helped to drag a corpse out of some ruins, and had
been astonished not only by the incredible weight of the thing, but by its
rigidity and awkwardness to handle, which made it seem more like stone than
flesh. Her body felt like that. It occurred to him that the texture of her
skin would be quite different from what it had once been.