It had happened at last. The expected message had come. All his
life, it seemed to him, he had been waiting for this to happen.
He was walking down the long corridor at the Ministry and
he was almost at the spot where Julia had slipped the note into his
hand when he became aware that someone larger than himself was
walking just behind him. The person, whoever it was, gave a small
cough, evidently as a prelude to speaking. Winston stopped
abruptly and turned. It was O’Brien.
At last they were face to face, and it seemed that his only
impulse was to run away. His heart bounded violently. He would
have been incapable of speaking. O’Brien, however, had continued
forward in the same movement, laying a friendly hand for a
moment on Winston’s arm, so that the two of them were walking
side by side. He began speaking with the peculiar grave courtesy
that differentiated him from the majority of Inner Party members.
‘I had been hoping for an opportunity of talking to you,’ he
said. ‘I was reading one of your Newspeak articles in ‘The Times’
the other day. You take a scholarly interest in Newspeak, I believe?’
Winston had recovered part of his self-possession. ‘Hardly
scholarly,’ he said. ‘I’m only an amateur. It’s not my subject. I have
never had anything to do with the actual construction of the
language.’
‘But you write it very elegantly,’ said O’Brien. ‘That is not only
my own opinion. I was talking recently to a friend of yours who is
certainly an expert. His name has slipped my memory for the moment.’
Again Winston’s heart stirred painfully. It was inconceivable
that this was anything other than a reference to Syme. But Syme
was not only dead, he was abolished, an unperson. Any identifiable
reference to him would have been mortally dangerous. O’Brien’s
remark must obviously have been intended as a signal, a codeword.
By sharing a small act of thoughtcrime he had turned the two of
them into accomplices. They had continued to stroll slowly down
the corridor, but now O’Brien halted. With the curious, disarming
friendliness that he always managed to put in to the gesture he
resettled his spectacles on his nose. Then he went on:
‘What I had really intended to say was that in your article I
noticed you had used two words which have become obsolete. But
they have only become so very recently. Have you seen the tenth
edition of the Newspeak Dictionary?’
‘No,’ said Winston. ‘I didn’t think it had been issued yet. We
are still using the ninth in the Records Department.’
‘The tenth edition is not due to appear for some months, I
believe. But a few advance copies have been circulated. I have one
myself. It might interest you to look at it, perhaps?’
‘Very much so,’ said Winston, immediately seeing where this
tended.
‘Some of the new developments are most ingenious. The
reduction in the number of verbs — that is the point that will
appeal to you, I think. Let me see, shall I send a messenger to you
with the dictionary? But I am afraid I invariably forget anything of
that kind. Perhaps you could pick it up at my flat at some time that
suited you? Wait. Let me give you my address.’
They were standing in front of a telescreen. Somewhat absentmindedly O’Brien felt two of his pockets and then produced a small leather-covered notebook and a gold ink-pencil. Immediately
beneath the telescreen, in such a position that anyone who was
watching at the other end of the instrument could read what he
was writing, he scribbled an address, tore out the page and handed
it to Winston.
‘I am usually at home in the evenings,’ he said. ‘If not, my
servant will give you the dictionary.’
He was gone, leaving Winston holding the scrap of paper,
which this time there was no need to conceal. Nevertheless he
carefully memorized what was written on it, and some hours later
dropped it into the memory hole along with a mass of other papers.
They had been talking to one another for a couple of minutes
at the most. There was only one meaning that the episode could
possibly have. It had been contrived as a way of letting Winston
know O’Brien’s address. This was necessary, because except by
direct enquiry it was never possible to discover where anyone lived.
There were no directories of any kind. ‘If you ever want to see me,
this is where I can be found,’ was what O’Brien had been saying to
him. Perhaps there would even be a message concealed somewhere
in the dictionary. But at any rate, one thing was certain. The
conspiracy that he had dreamed of did exist, and he had reached
the outer edges of it.
He knew that sooner or later he would obey O’Brien’s
summons. Perhaps tomorrow, perhaps after a long delay — he was
not certain. What was happening was only the working-out of a
process that had started years ago. The first step had been a secret,
involuntary thought, the second had been the opening of the diary.
He had moved from thoughts to words, and now from words to
actions. The last step was something that would happen in the
Ministry of Love. He had accepted it. The end was contained in the beginning. But it was frightening: or, more exactly, it was like a
foretaste of death, like being a little less alive. Even while he was
speaking to O’Brien, when the meaning of the words had sunk in, a
chilly shuddering feeling had taken possession of his body. He had
the sensation of stepping into the dampness of a grave, and it was
not much better because he had always known that the grave was
there and waiting for him.