Page:Evgenii Zamyatin - We (Zilboorg translation).pdf/87

O-90 was lying down. I kissed her gently. I kissed that childish, fluffy fold at her wrist. Her blue eyes were closed. The pink crescent of her lips was slowly blooming, more and more like a flower. I kissed her. . . .

Suddenly I clearly realized how empty I was, how I had given away . . . No, I could not—impossible! I knew I must . . . but no—impossible! I ought but no—impossible! My lips cooled at once. The rosy crescent trembled, darkened, drew together. O-90 covered herself with the bedspread, her face hidden in the pillow.

I was sitting near the bed, on the floor. What a desperately cold floor! I sat there in silence. The terrible cold from the floor rose higher and higher. There in the blue, silent space among the planets, there probably it is as cold.

“Please understand, dear; I did not mean . . .” I muttered, “With all my heart, I . . .”

It was the truth. I, my real self, did not mean. . . . Yet how could I express it in words? How could I explain to her that the piece of iron did not want to? . . . But that the law is precise, inevitable!

O-90 lifted her face from the pillow and without opening her eyes she said, “Go away.” But because she was crying she pronounced it “Oo aaa-ay.” For some reason this absurd detail will not leave my memory.

Penetrated by the cold, and torpid, I went out into the hall. I pressed my forehead against the cold glass. Outside a thin, almost imperceptible film of haze was spread. “Toward night,” I thought, “it will descend again and drown the world. How sad a night it will be!”

O-90 passed swiftly by, going toward the elevator. The door slammed.

“Wait a minute!” I screamed. I was frightened.

But the elevator was already groaning, going down, down, down. . . .

“She robbed me of R-, she robbed me of O-90, yet, yet . . . nevertheless . . .”