Her course had many twists and windings; such was the law of her being.
And whosoever could not follow her crooked course was washed on to the bank, for such was her law.
The motives of the individual did not matter to her.
His conscience did not matter to her, neither did she care what went on in his head and his heart.
The Party knew only one crime: to swerve from the course laid out; and only one punishment: death.
Death was no mystery in the movement; there was nothing exalted about it: it was the logical solution to political divergences. Not before the early hours of the morning did Rubashov, exhausted, fall asleep on his bunk.
He was woken again by the bugle blast which heralded a new day; shortly afterwards he was fetched by the old warder and two officials in uniform, to be conducted to the doctor.
Rubashov had hoped to be able to read the name. cards on the cell-doors of Hare-lip and of No. 402, but he was taken in the opposite direction.
The cell to his right was empty. It was one of the last cells of that end of the corridor; the wing of isolation cells was shut off by a heavy concrete door, which the old man opened with much fumbling.
They now passed through a long gallery, Rubashov, with the old warder in front, the two men in uniform behind.
Here all the cards on the cell-doors bore several names; they heard talking, laughter and even singing coming from the cells; Rubashov knew at once that they were in the section for petty criminals.
They passed the barber’s shop, of which the door stood open; a prisoner with the sharp bird’s face of the old convict was just being shaved; two peasants were having their heads shorn: all three turned their heads curiously as Rubashov and his escort marched past.
They came to a door with a red cross painted on it.
The warder knocked respectfully, and he and Rubashov went in; the two uniformed men waited outside.
The infirmary was small and the air stuffy; it smelled of carbolic and tobacco.
A bucket and two pans were filled to the brim with cotton-wool swabs and dirty bandages.
The doctor sat at a table with his back to them, reading the newspaper and chewing bread and dripping.
The newspaper lay on a heap of instruments, pincers and syringes.
When the warder had shut the door, the doctor turned slowly round.
He was bald and had an unusually small skull, covered with white fluff, which reminded Rubashov of an ostrich.
“He says he’s got toothache,” said the old man.
“Toothache?” said the doctor, looking past Rubashov.
“Open your mouth, and be quick about it.”
Rubashov looked at him through his glasses.
“I beg to point out,” he said quietly, “that I am a political prisoner and entitled to correct treatment.”
The doctor turned his head to the warder:
“Who is this bird?”
The warder gave Rubashov’s name.
For a second Rubashov felt the round ostrich eyes rest on him.
Then the doctor said: “Your cheek is swollen.
Open your mouth.”
Rubashov’s tooth was not aching at the moment.
He opened his mouth.
“You have no teeth left at all in the left side of your upper jaw,” said the doctor, probing with his finger in Rubashov’s mouth.
Suddenly Rubashov became pale and had to lean against the wall.
“There it is!” said the doctor.
“The root of the right eye-tooth is broken off and has remained in the jaw.”
Rubashov breathed deeply several times.
The pain was throbbing from his jaw to his eye and right to the back of his head.
He felt each pulsation of the blood singly, at regular intervals.
The doctor had sat down again and spread out his newspaper.
“If you like I can extract the root for you,” he said and took a mouthful of bread and dripping.
“We have, of course, no anaesthetics here.
The operation takes anything from half an hour to an hour.”
Rubashov heard the doctor’s voice through a mist. He leant against the wall and breathed deeply.
“Thank you,” he said. “Not now.”
He thought of Hare-lip and the “steambath” and of the ridiculous gesture yesterday, when he had stubbed out the cigarette on the back of his hand.
Things will go badly, he thought.
When he was back in his cell, he let himself drop on the bunk and fell asleep at once.
At noon, when the soup came, he was no longer omitted; from then on he received his rations regularly.