Level 7

Then I asked her if she was kept busy. She said no, for there were very few accidents down here, and hardly any sickness so far. I suggested that this might make her life boring. She replied that she spent a lot of time listening to music—to the light tape, not the classical.

Wouldn’t marriage be an additional distraction? I suggested. She answered that she did not feel a need for any additional distraction. “Still, I may marry,” she said. “E-647 proposed to me yesterday, and I promised to give him an answer today, but he hasn’t come.” She looked around the room with a slight air of disappointment.

I did not ask her what her answer would be, but changed the subject. Though I liked her calm, hardly sensitive nature, I did not feel too cut up about the prospect of her marrying E-647. Apparently he cared for her more than I did.

Perhaps E-647 is less unsociable than I.

APRIL 22

P-867 reappeared in the lounge today. She was in even better spirits than usual, and came straight up to me. “What do you think about the marriages?” she said. “Aren’t they wonderful?”

I made some cynical remark to the effect that marriage was an affliction as old as humanity itself. She laughed it off and said: “Oh, I know you don’t mean that! You’re only talking like that in an attempt to hide your real feelings.” At this she giggled in her typical way.

I did not argue the point, but asked her where she had been the last few days.

“You missed me, didn’t you?” she said with satisfaction. “Well,” she went on more briskly, “I’ve been busy with your colleague X-117. It’s a difficult case. Marriage might help him, though, and I’m sorry the facilities weren’t announced earlier. You know, he’s too sociable for Level 7, but if he’d been able to marry before the hysterical symptoms appeared, it might have provided a harmless outlet for his sociable impulses. It’s not so easy now.” Then she glanced up at me and gave what I took to be a winning smile. “Still, don’t let’s waste our half hour talking about X-117. I’ve had enough of him recently.”

I wanted to hear more about my fellow-officer, but I did not ask her to go on. She had a right to rest, after all. I remained silent, not knowing quite what to say. P-867, however, needs very little co-operation in conversation. She eagerly went on talking.

“You know,” she said, “I’ve had two proposals of marriage through the mediation service. Two shy officers,” she giggled, “want to marry me!”

I congratulated her on her success, but this did not seem to satisfy her. “Aren’t you jealous?” she asked, “Or are you so sure of your charms that you know I shall refuse my two shy officers? Oh, you naughty X-127!” She gave me an arch look, fluttering her eye-lashes in a coquettish manner.

I failed to see why I was naughty, I was not in the least jealous, and I did not care a damn whom she married, or whether she married at all. But I made some silly remark about how sure I was she would refuse her shy suitors, whoever they were. This seemed to confirm my naughtiness, in her eyes; which meant my interest in her.

Our half hour in the lounge was up at this point, and on parting from P-867 I felt some relief.

APRIL 24

I am playing cat and mouse with P-867. She, of course, is the cat.

She wants to marry me. I do not want to marry at all, and if I had felt like marrying at any time I would have chosen N-527. But I have missed my chance there, I admit. Her marriage to E-647 was announced yesterday.

I am trying to escape from P-867 by talking to other people when I visit the lounge—the only alternative is to give up going there, which would be a pity. Yesterday I discovered a quiet girl there, R-747. Eventually, when some children have been born and grown past the kindergarten stage, she will become a teacher—T-747. (The reason TN-237m has already had her title changed is that her job is likely to start in less than a year.) R-747 will instruct children from the age of six or seven onwards. In the meantime, she is preparing instructional material and developing methods of education for use on Level 7. Occasionally, as a reserve officer, she is given odd duties which do not require special training, but she says that the task of preparing for the education of the coming generation is enough by itself to keep her pretty busy.

I said I did not see how this could occupy all her working life for the next six or seven years, so she explained some of the problems to me. “Look,” she said, “when you were six years old I expect your grandmother sat you on her knee and told you stories about a good Lord in heaven who rewarded good children, about angels who watched over you when you were asleep, and so on. If you were a naughty boy, then you may have been frightened of going to hell, which was supposed to be a place deep, deep down inside the earth. Now, stories like these—”