that of O'Brien. Just as he had done a few days earlier, he slid
a coin out of his pocket and looked at it. The face gazed up at him, heavy,
calm, protecting: but what kind of smile was hidden beneath the dark
moustache? Like a leaden knell the words came back at him:

WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH

* * *



PART II

I

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 s