Page:Evgenii Zamyatin - We (Zilboorg translation).pdf/175

then nothing! Period. In the whole world, evenly, everywhere, there is distributed . . .”

‘Ah, evenly’! ‘Everywhere!’ That is the point, entropy! Psychological entropy. Don’t you as a mathematician know that only differences—only differences—in temperature, only thermic contrasts make for life? And if all over the world there are evenly warm or evenly cold bodies, they must be pushed off! . . . in order to get flame, explosions! And we shall push! . . .”

“But I-330, please realize that our ancestors during the Two Hundred Years’ War did exactly that!”

“Oh, they were right! A thousand times right! But they did one thing wrong: later they began to believe that they were the last number, a number that does not exist in nature. Their mistake was the mistake of Galileo; he was right in that the earth revolves around the sun, but he did not know that our whole solar system revolves around some other center, he did not know that the real, not relative, orbit of the earth is not a naive circle.”

“And you, the Mephi?”

“We? For the time being we know that there is no last number. We may forget that, someday. Of course, we shall certainly forget it when we grow old, as everything inevitably grows old. Then we shall inevitably fall like autumn leaves from the trees, like you the day after tomorrow. . . . No, no, dear, not you personally. You are with us, aren’t you? You are with us?”

Flaming, stormy, sparkling! I never before had seen her in such a state. She embraced me with her whole self, and my self disappeared.

Her last word, looking steadily, deeply into my eyes:

“Then, do not forget: at twelve o’clock sharp.”

And I answered:

“Yes, I remember.”

She left. I was alone amidst a rebellious, multivoiced commotion of blue, red, green, saffron-yellow, and orange. . . .