Pathetic

five and four. The pain died down again. When he opened
his eyes it was to find that he was still seeing the same thing.
Innumerable fingers, like moving trees, were still streaming past in either
direction, crossing and recrossing. He shut his eyes again.
'How many fingers am I holding up, Winston?'
'I don't know. I don't know. You will kill me if you do that again.
Four, five, six -- in all honesty I don't know.'
'Better,' said O'Brien.
A needle slid into Winston's arm. Almost in the same instant a
blissful, healing warmth spread all through his body. The pain was already
half-forgotten. He opened his eyes and looked up gratefully at O'Brien. At
sight of the heavy, lined face, so ugly and so intelligent, his heart
seemed to turn over. If he could have moved he would have stretched out a
hand and laid it on O'Brien arm. He had never loved him so deeply as at
this moment, and not merely because he had stopped the pain. The old
feeling, that at bottom it did not matter whether O'Brien was a friend or
an enemy, had come back. O'Brien was a person who could be talked to.
Perhaps one did not want to be loved so much as to be understood. O'Brien
had tortured him to the edge of lunacy, and in a little while, it was
certain, he would send him to his death. It made no difference. In some
sense that