October 11. The impressions became seven.
At ten past nine I read the notice.
The annual stocktaking. There was one last October too.
It says to enter the number of articles kept and the number of stamped impressions.
An instruction to count impressions has entered the form for the first time.
At twenty to ten I opened the box.
I always open it at five; today I opened it in the morning.
I took out the notebook. My predecessor's notebook.
There are impressions on the back cover.
I counted them.
Seven.
At ten I turned back through the log.
Yesterday evening I entered six.
For eight months I have entered six. There is not one page with another figure.
At twenty past ten I looked at the seventh.
It is below the sixth.
No ink. No character formed. Only an outline.
The six before it are the same. All six are outline only.
That is why I have never known what was stamped.
At twenty to eleven I looked at where they overlap.
The seventh half overlaps the sixth.
Where they overlap the pressing lies in two layers. The one on top is the newer.
The one on top is the seventh.
At eleven I counted the days.
The articles became seven on the twenty-fourth of February.
To today is two hundred and thirty days.
Last July's case was a hundred and seven. It is more than twice that.
At twenty to twelve I wrote out the order.
In July's case the impression came first. The article came a hundred and seven days later.
I entered then that the impression runs ahead.
This time the article came first. The impression came two hundred and thirty days later.
The order is reversed.
There is no box for entering a reversal.
At twenty past twelve I filled in the stocktaking form.
Articles kept, seven.
Stamped impressions, seven.
Last year's stocktaking I entered six articles. There was no impression box then.
At ten to one I wrote out the seven articles one by one.
The librarian's catalogue, the surveyor's field book, the lighthouse keeper's tide table, the telegraph operator's register of messages. Four.
Kim Dogyeong's bundle of paper is the fifth.
My predecessor's notebook is the sixth.
My computer room log is the seventh.
Up to the sixth they were things that were in this room. The seventh is a thing that came to be in this room.
At ten past one I counted the impressions with a phrase.
Four. The ten characters are stamped on the last page of the four bundles.
For two months I have entered four.
Today it is four.
At twenty past one I counted the impressions without a phrase.
One on the last page of the fifth bundle.
One on the last page of the transcript received in September.
Seven on the back cover of the notebook.
Nine.
Two months ago it was seven.
At twenty to two I held the seventh up to the window.
Inside the outline there is something very shallow.
A few things like strokes.
I counted them. It does not settle at eight or nine.
Change the angle and the number changes.
There is nothing to count with to tell whether they are characters.
At ten past two I set the outlines against each other.
I laid the stamp of the four bundles against each of the seven on the back cover in turn.
All seven have the same outline. The same across and the same down.
It is the same stamp. It was pressed seven times.
Whoever pressed it lifted the same thing seven times.
At twenty past two I opened the notebook.
One blank page remains.
Last December one of the two was filled.
The remaining one is as it was.
At three I looked at the remarks box of the stocktaking form.
Three lines.
I entered that the number of articles and the number of impressions becoming equal is the first such case since I took the post.
Two lines are left.
At twenty to four I looked at what to put in the remaining two lines.
Until now the impressions were fewer than the articles.
Fewer I read as meaning there is a place left. As meaning there is one more thing to be put in.
Equal means there is no place left.
The box for that is not remarks. Remarks is a box for facts.
What I read is not a fact.
I left the two lines blank and wrote it in the margin.
At half past four I opened the right-hand material.
Five hundred and two pages. The date on the page gained is the ninth of November of ninety-eight.
My log is also on its five hundred and second page today.
At ten to five I closed the box.
Seven articles. Seven impressions. The two hundred and thirtieth day.
At five I looked at the sixth box.
Three thousand one hundred and forty-eight.
At ten past five I ran off the query record. The set's row was opened twenty-eight times yesterday. Fourteen by the imprint route.
At half past five I sealed the stocktaking form.
Having sealed it I looked at the notebook's back cover again.
Seven impressions. Seven articles.
Of the seven articles six were written by others. The seventh was written by me.
At twenty to six I counted the impressions again.
Of the seven, six were there before I came.
The seventh is there today.
What the impressions count is not in the procedure.
What is not in the procedure in this room I have always settled myself.
Today I did not settle it.
It was seven before I settled anything.