1984. Книга для чтения на английском языке

D’you know what that little girl of mine did last Saturday, when her troop was on a hike out Berkhamsted way? She got two other girls to go with her, slipped off from the hike, and spent the whole afternoon following a strange man. They kept on his tail for two hours, right through the woods, and then, when they got into Amersham, handed him over to the patrols.”

“What did they do that for?” said Winston, somewhat taken aback[44 - somewhat taken aback – (разг.) слегка ошарашенно].

Parsons went on triumphantly:

“My kid made sure he was some kind of enemy agent – might have been dropped by parachute, for instance. But here’s the point, old boy. What do you think put her on to him in the first place? She spotted he was wearing a funny kind of shoes – said she’d never seen anyone wearing shoes like that before. So the chances were he was a foreigner. Pretty smart for a nipper of seven, eh?”

“What happened to the man?” said Winston.

“Ah, that I couldn’t say, of course.

But I wouldn’t be altogether surprised if —” Parsons made the motion of aiming a rifle, and clicked his tongue for the explosion.

“Good,” said Syme abstractedly, without looking up from his strip of paper.

“Of course we can’t afford to take chances[45 - we can’t afford to take chances – (разг.) мы не можем позволить себе рисковать],” agreed Winston dutifully.

“What I mean to say, there is a war on,” said Parsons.

As though in confirmation of this, a trumpet call floated from the telescreen just above their heads. However, it was not the proclamation of a military victory this time, but merely an announcement from the Ministry of Plenty.

“Comrades!” cried an eager youthful voice. “Attention, comrades! We have glorious news for you. We have won the battle for production! Returns now completed of the output of all classes of consumption goods show that the standard of living has risen by no less than 20 per cent over the past year.

All over Oceania this morning there were irrepressible spontaneous demonstrations when workers marched out of factories and offices and paraded through the streets with banners voicing their gratitude to Big Brother for the new, happy life which his wise leadership has bestowed upon us. Here are some of the completed figures. Foodstuffs —”

The phrase “our new, happy life” recurred several times.