It could
not have been ten seconds, and yet it seemed a long time that their hands were
clasped together. He had time to learn every detail of her hand. He explored
the long fingers, the shapely nails, the work-hardened palm with its row of
callouses, the smooth flesh under the wrist. Merely from feeling it he would
have known it by sight. In the same instant it occurred to him that he did not
know what colour the girl’s eyes were. They were probably brown, but people
with dark hair sometimes had blue eyes. To turn his head and look at her would
have been inconceivable folly. With hands locked together, invisible among the
press of bodies, they stared steadily in front of them, and instead of the eyes
of the girl, the eyes of the aged prisoner gazed mournfully at Winston out of
nests of hair.
No podrían haber pasado diez segundos y,
sin embargo, parecía que sus manos habían estado entrelazadas mucho tiempo. No
tenía tiempo para aprender cada detalle de su mano. Exploró los dedos largos,
las uñas bien formadas, la palma endurecida por el trabajo con su hilera de
callos, la carne suave debajo de la muñeca. Simplemente por haberlas sentido
las habría reconocido al verlas. En el mismo instante pensó que no sabía de qué
color eran los ojos de la chica. Probablemente eran marrones, pero la gente con
cabello oscuro a veces tenía ojos azules. Volver la cabeza y mirarla hubiera
sido una torpeza inconcebible. Con las manos acerrojadas, invisibles entre la
presión de los cuerpos, miraban fijamente hacia adelante, y en vez de los ojos
de la chica, los ojos del prisionero envejecido miraban tristemente a Winston
desde entre nidos de pelo.
George
Orwell
Nineteen
Eighty-four
Penguin,
GB, 1954
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