Joyce's Ulysses Concordance

15. Circe

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[19846][ 15 ]

[19847]

[19848](The Mabbot street entrance of nighttown, before which stretches

[19849]an uncobbled tramsiding set with skeleton tracks, red and green

[19850]will-o’-the-wisps and danger signals. Rows of grimy houses with gaping

[19851]doors. Rare lamps with faint rainbow fans. Round Rabaiotti’s halted

[19852]ice gondola stunted men and women squabble. They grab wafers between

[19853]which are wedged lumps of coral and copper snow. Sucking, they scatter

[19854]slowly. Children. The swancomb of the gondola, highreared, forges on

[19855]through the murk, white and blue under a lighthouse. Whistles call and

[19856]answer.)

[19857]

[19858]THE CALLS: Wait, my love, and I’ll be with you.

[19859]

[19860]THE ANSWERS: Round behind the stable.

[19861]

[19862](A deafmute idiot with goggle eyes, his shapeless mouth dribbling, jerks

[19863]past, shaken in Saint Vitus’ dance. A chain of children ’s hands

[19864]imprisons him.)

[19865]

[19866]THE CHILDREN: Kithogue! Salute!

[19867]

[19868]THE IDIOT: (Lifts a palsied left arm and gurgles.) Grhahute!

[19869]

[19870]THE CHILDREN: Where’s the great light?

[19871]

[19872]THE IDIOT: (Gobbling.) Ghaghahest.

[19873]

[19874](They release him. He jerks on. A pigmy woman swings on a rope slung

[19875]between two railings, counting. A form sprawled against a dustbin and

[19876]muffled by its arm and hat snores, groans, grinding growling teeth, and

[19877]snores again. On a step a gnome totting among a rubbishtip crouches

[19878]to shoulder a sack of rags and bones. A crone standing by with a smoky

[19879]oillamp rams her last bottle in the maw of his sack. He heaves his

[19880]booty, tugs askew his peaked cap and hobbles off mutely. The crone

[19881]makes back for her lair, swaying her lamp. A bandy child, asquat on the

[19882]doorstep with a paper shuttlecock, crawls sidling after her in spurts,

[19883]clutches her skirt, scrambles up. A drunken navvy grips with both hands

[19884]the railings of an area, lurching heavily. At a corner two night watch

[19885]in shouldercapes, their hands upon their staffholsters, loom tall. A

[19886]plate crashes: a woman screams: a child wails. Oaths of a man roar,

[19887]mutter, cease. Figures wander, lurk, peer from warrens. In a room lit by

[19888]a candle stuck in a bottleneck a slut combs out the tatts from the

[19889]hair of a scrofulous child. Cissy Caffrey’s voice, still young, sings

[19890]shrill from a lane.)

[19891]

[19892]CISSY CAFFREY:

[19893]

[19894] I gave it to Molly

[19895] Because she was jolly,

[19896] The leg of the duck,

[19897] The leg of the duck.

[19898](Private Carr and Private Compton, swaggersticks tight in their oxters,

[19899]as they march unsteadily rightaboutface and burst together from their

[19900]mouths a volleyed fart. Laughter of men from the lane. A hoarse virago

[19901]retorts.)

[19902]

[19903]THE VIRAGO: Signs on you, hairy arse. More power the Cavan girl.

[19904]

[19905]CISSY CAFFREY: More luck to me. Cavan, Cootehill and Belturbet. (She

[19906]sings.)

[19907]

[19908] I gave it to Nelly

[19909] To stick in her belly,

[19910] The leg of the duck,

[19911] The leg of the duck.

[19912](Private Carr and Private Compton turn and counterretort, their tunics

[19913]bloodbright in a lampglow, black sockets of caps on their blond cropped

[19914]polls. Stephen Dedalus and Lynch pass through the crowd close to the

[19915]redcoats.)

[19916]

[19917]PRIVATE COMPTON: (Jerks his finger.) Way for the parson.

[19918]

[19919]PRIVATE CARR: (Turns and calls.) What ho, parson!

[19920]

[19921]CISSY CAFFREY: (Her voice soaring higher.)

[19922]

[19923] She has it, she got it,

[19924] Wherever she put it,

[19925] The leg of the duck.

[19926](Stephen, flourishing the ashplant in his left hand, chants with joy the

[19927]introit for paschal time. Lynch, his jockeycap low on his brow, attends

[19928]him, a sneer of discontent wrinkling his face.)

[19929]

[19930]STEPHEN: Vidi aquam egredientem de templo a latere dextro. Alleluia.

[19931]

[19932](The famished snaggletusks of an elderly bawd protrude from a doorway.)

[19933]

[19934]THE BAWD: (Her voice whispering huskily.) Sst! Come here till I tell

[19935]you. Maidenhead inside. Sst!

[19936]

[19937]STEPHEN: (Altius aliquantulum.) Et omnes ad quos pervenit aqua ista.

[19938]

[19939]THE BAWD: (Spits in their trail her jet of venom.) Trinity medicals.

[19940]Fallopian tube. All prick and no pence.

[19941]

[19942](Edy Boardman, sniffling, crouched with Bertha Supple, draws her shawl

[19943]across her nostrils.)

[19944]

[19945]EDY BOARDMAN: (Bickering.) And says the one: I seen you up Faithful

[19946]place with your squarepusher, the greaser off the railway, in his

[19947]cometobed hat. Did you, says I. That’s not for you to say, says I.

[19948]You never seen me in the mantrap with a married highlander, says I. The

[19949]likes of her! Stag that one is! Stubborn as a mule! And her walking with

[19950]two fellows the one time, Kilbride, the enginedriver, and lancecorporal

[19951]Oliphant.

[19952]

[19953]STEPHEN: (Triumphaliter.) Salvi facti sunt.

[19954]

[19955](He flourishes his ashplant, shivering the lamp image, shattering light

[19956]over the world. A liver and white spaniel on the prowl slinks after him,

[19957]growling. Lynch scares it with a kick.)

[19958]

[19959]LYNCH: So that?

[19960]

[19961]STEPHEN: (Looks behind.) So that gesture, not music not odour, would be

[19962]a universal language, the gift of tongues rendering visible not the lay

[19963]sense but the first entelechy, the structural rhythm.

[19964]

[19965]LYNCH: Pornosophical philotheology. Metaphysics in Mecklenburgh street!

[19966]

[19967]STEPHEN: We have shrewridden Shakespeare and henpecked Socrates. Even

[19968]the allwisest Stagyrite was bitted, bridled and mounted by a light of

[19969]love.

[19970]

[19971]LYNCH: Ba!

[19972]

[19973]STEPHEN: Anyway, who wants two gestures to illustrate a loaf and a jug?

[19974]This movement illustrates the loaf and jug of bread or wine in Omar.

[19975]Hold my stick.

[19976]

[19977]LYNCH: Damn your yellow stick. Where are we going?

[19978]

[19979]STEPHEN: Lecherous lynx, to la belle dame sans merci, Georgina Johnson,

[19980]ad deam qui laetificat iuventutem meam.

[19981]

[19982](Stephen thrusts the ashplant on him and slowly holds out his hands, his

[19983]head going back till both hands are a span from his breast, down turned,

[19984]in planes intersecting, the fingers about to part, the left being

[19985]higher.)

[19986]

[19987]LYNCH: Which is the jug of bread? It skills not. That or the

[19988]customhouse. Illustrate thou. Here take your crutch and walk.

[19989]

[19990](They pass. Tommy Caffrey scrambles to a gaslamp and, clasping, climbs

[19991]in spasms. From the top spur he slides down. Jacky Caffrey clasps to

[19992]climb. The navvy lurches against the lamp. The twins scuttle off in the

[19993]dark. The navvy, swaying, presses a forefinger against a wing of his

[19994]nose and ejects from the farther nostril a long liquid jet of snot.

[19995]Shouldering the lamp he staggers away through the crowd with his flaring

[19996]cresset.

[19997]

[19998]Snakes of river fog creep slowly. From drains, clefts, cesspools,

[19999]middens arise on all sides stagnant fumes. A glow leaps in the south

[20000]beyond the seaward reaches of the river. The navvy, staggering forward,

[20001]cleaves the crowd and lurches towards the tramsiding. On the farther

[20002]side under the railway bridge Bloom appears, flushed, panting, cramming

[20003]bread and chocolate into a sidepocket. From Gillen’s hairdresser’s

[20004]window a composite portrait shows him gallant Nelson’s image. A

[20005]concave mirror at the side presents to him lovelorn longlost lugubru

[20006]Booloohoom. Grave Gladstone sees him level, Bloom for Bloom. He passes,

[20007]struck by the stare of truculent Wellington, but in the convex mirror

[20008]grin unstruck the bonham eyes and fatchuck cheekchops of Jollypoldy the

[20009]rixdix doldy.

[20010]

[20011]At Antonio Rabaiotti’s door Bloom halts, sweated under the bright

[20012]arclamp. He disappears. In a moment he reappears and hurries on.)

[20013]

[20014]BLOOM: Fish and taters. N. g. Ah!

[20015]

[20016](He disappears into Olhausen’s, the porkbutcher’s, under the

[20017]downcoming rollshutter. A few moments later he emerges from under

[20018]the shutter, puffing Poldy, blowing Bloohoom. In each hand he holds

[20019]a parcel, one containing a lukewarm pig’s crubeen, the other a cold

[20020]sheep’s trotter, sprinkled with wholepepper. He gasps, standing

[20021]upright. Then bending to one side he presses a parcel against his ribs

[20022]and groans.)

[20023]

[20024]BLOOM: Stitch in my side. Why did I run?

[20025]

[20026](He takes breath with care and goes forward slowly towards the lampset

[20027]siding. The glow leaps again.)

[20028]

[20029]BLOOM: What is that? A flasher? Searchlight.

[20030]

[20031](He stands at Cormack’s corner, watching.)

[20032]

[20033]BLOOM: Aurora borealis or a steel foundry? Ah, the brigade, of course.

[20034]South side anyhow. Big blaze. Might be his house. Beggar’s bush.

[20035]We’re safe. (He hums cheerfully.) London’s burning, London’s

[20036]burning! On fire, on fire! (He catches sight of the navvy lurching

[20037]through the crowd at the farther side of Talbot street.) I’ll miss

[20038]him. Run. Quick. Better cross here.

[20039]

[20040](He darts to cross the road. Urchins shout.)

[20041]

[20042]THE URCHINS: Mind out, mister!

[20043]

[20044](Two cyclists, with lighted paper lanterns aswing, swim by him, grazing

[20045]him, their bells rattling.)

[20046]

[20047]THE BELLS: Haltyaltyaltyall.

[20048]

[20049]BLOOM: (Halts erect, stung by a spasm.) Ow!

[20050]

[20051](He looks round, darts forward suddenly. Through rising fog a dragon

[20052]sandstrewer, travelling at caution, slews heavily down upon him,

[20053]its huge red headlight winking, its trolley hissing on the wire. The

[20054]motorman bangs his footgong.)

[20055]

[20056]THE GONG: Bang Bang Bla Bak Blud Bugg Bloo.

[20057]

[20058](The brake cracks violently. Bloom, raising a policeman’s whitegloved

[20059]hand, blunders stifflegged out of the track. The motorman, thrown

[20060]forward, pugnosed, on the guidewheel, yells as he slides past over

[20061]chains and keys.)

[20062]

[20063]THE MOTORMAN: Hey, shitbreeches, are you doing the hat trick?

[20064]

[20065](Bloom trickleaps to the curbstone and halts again. He brushes a

[20066]mudflake from his cheek with a parcelled hand.)

[20067]

[20068]BLOOM: No thoroughfare. Close shave that but cured the stitch. Must take

[20069]up Sandow’s exercises again. On the hands down. Insure against street

[20070]accident too. The Providential. (He feels his trouser pocket.) Poor

[20071]mamma’s panacea. Heel easily catch in track or bootlace in a cog. Day

[20072]the wheel of the black Maria peeled off my shoe at Leonard’s corner.

[20073]Third time is the charm. Shoe trick. Insolent driver. I ought to report

[20074]him. Tension makes them nervous. Might be the fellow balked me this

[20075]morning with that horsey woman. Same style of beauty. Quick of him all

[20076]the same. The stiff walk. True word spoken in jest. That awful cramp in

[20077]Lad lane. Something poisonous I ate. Emblem of luck. Why? Probably lost

[20078]cattle. Mark of the beast. (He closes his eyes an instant.) Bit light

[20079]in the head. Monthly or effect of the other. Brainfogfag. That tired

[20080]feeling. Too much for me now. Ow!

[20081]

[20082](A sinister figure leans on plaited legs against O’Beirne’s wall,

[20083]a visage unknown, injected with dark mercury. From under a wideleaved

[20084]sombrero the figure regards him with evil eye.)

[20085]

[20086]BLOOM: Buenas noches, señorita Blanca, que calle es esta?

[20087]

[20088]THE FIGURE: (Impassive, raises a signal arm.) Password. Sraid Mabbot.

[20089]

[20090]BLOOM: Haha. Merci. Esperanto. Slan leath. (He mutters.) Gaelic league

[20091]spy, sent by that fireeater.

[20092]

[20093](He steps forward. A sackshouldered ragman bars his path. He steps left,

[20094]ragsackman left.)

[20095]

[20096]BLOOM: I beg.

[20097]

[20098](He leaps right, sackragman right.)

[20099]

[20100]BLOOM: I beg.

[20101]

[20102](He swerves, sidles, stepaside, slips past and on.)

[20103]

[20104]BLOOM: Keep to the right, right, right. If there is a signpost planted

[20105]by the Touring Club at Stepaside who procured that public boon? I who

[20106]lost my way and contributed to the columns of the Irish Cyclist the

[20107]letter headed In darkest Stepaside. Keep, keep, keep to the right. Rags

[20108]and bones at midnight. A fence more likely. First place murderer makes

[20109]for. Wash off his sins of the world.

[20110]

[20111](Jacky Caffrey, hunted by Tommy Caffrey, runs full tilt against Bloom.)

[20112]

[20113]BLOOM: O.

[20114]

[20115](Shocked, on weak hams, he halts. Tommy and Jacky vanish there, there.

[20116]Bloom pats with parcelled hands watch, fobpocket, bookpocket, pursepoke,

[20117]sweets of sin, potato soap.)

[20118]

[20119]BLOOM: Beware of pickpockets. Old thieves’ dodge. Collide. Then snatch

[20120]your purse.

[20121]

[20122](The retriever approaches sniffing, nose to the ground. A sprawled form

[20123]sneezes. A stooped bearded figure appears garbed in the long caftan

[20124]of an elder in Zion and a smokingcap with magenta tassels. Horned

[20125]spectacles hang down at the wings of the nose. Yellow poison streaks are

[20126]on the drawn face.)

[20127]

[20128]RUDOLPH: Second halfcrown waste money today. I told you not go with

[20129]drunken goy ever. So you catch no money.

[20130]

[20131]BLOOM: (Hides the crubeen and trotter behind his back and, crestfallen,

[20132]feels warm and cold feetmeat.) Ja, ich weiss, papachi.

[20133]

[20134]RUDOLPH: What you making down this place? Have you no soul? (With feeble

[20135]vulture talons he feels the silent face of Bloom.) Are you not my son

[20136]Leopold, the grandson of Leopold? Are you not my dear son Leopold who

[20137]left the house of his father and left the god of his fathers Abraham and

[20138]Jacob?

[20139]

[20140]BLOOM: (With precaution.) I suppose so, father. Mosenthal. All that’s

[20141]left of him.

[20142]

[20143]RUDOLPH: (Severely.) One night they bring you home drunk as dog after

[20144]spend your good money. What you call them running chaps?

[20145]

[20146]BLOOM: (In youth’s smart blue Oxford suit with white vestslips,

[20147]narrowshouldered, in brown Alpine hat, wearing gent’s sterling silver

[20148]waterbury keyless watch and double curb Albert with seal attached, one

[20149]side of him coated with stiffening mud.) Harriers, father. Only that

[20150]once.

[20151]

[20152]RUDOLPH: Once! Mud head to foot. Cut your hand open. Lockjaw. They make

[20153]you kaputt, Leopoldleben. You watch them chaps.

[20154]

[20155]BLOOM: (Weakly.) They challenged me to a sprint. It was muddy. I

[20156]slipped.

[20157]

[20158]RUDOLPH: (With contempt.) Goim nachez! Nice spectacles for your poor

[20159]mother!

[20160]

[20161]BLOOM: Mamma!

[20162]

[20163]ELLEN BLOOM: (In pantomime dame’s stringed mobcap, widow Twankey’s

[20164]crinoline and bustle, blouse with muttonleg sleeves buttoned behind,

[20165]grey mittens and cameo brooch, her plaited hair in a crispine net,

[20166]appears over the staircase banisters, a slanted candlestick in her hand,

[20167]and cries out in shrill alarm.) O blessed Redeemer, what have they done

[20168]to him! My smelling salts! (She hauls up a reef of skirt and ransacks

[20169]the pouch of her striped blay petticoat. A phial, an Agnus Dei, a

[20170]shrivelled potato and a celluloid doll fall out.) Sacred Heart of Mary,

[20171]where were you at all at all?

[20172]

[20173](Bloom, mumbling, his eyes downcast, begins to bestow his parcels in his

[20174]filled pockets but desists, muttering.)

[20175]

[20176]A VOICE: (Sharply.) Poldy!

[20177]

[20178]BLOOM: Who? (He ducks and wards off a blow clumsily.) At your service.

[20179]

[20180](He looks up. Beside her mirage of datepalms a handsome woman in Turkish

[20181]costume stands before him. Opulent curves fill out her scarlet trousers

[20182]and jacket, slashed with gold. A wide yellow cummerbund girdles her. A

[20183]white yashmak, violet in the night, covers her face, leaving free only

[20184]her large dark eyes and raven hair.)

[20185]

[20186]BLOOM: Molly!

[20187]

[20188]MARION: Welly? Mrs Marion from this out, my dear man, when you speak to

[20189]me. (Satirically.) Has poor little hubby cold feet waiting so long?

[20190]

[20191]BLOOM: (Shifts from foot to foot.) No, no. Not the least little bit.

[20192]

[20193](He breathes in deep agitation, swallowing gulps of air, questions,

[20194]hopes, crubeens for her supper, things to tell her, excuse, desire,

[20195]spellbound. A coin gleams on her forehead. On her feet are jewelled

[20196]toerings. Her ankles are linked by a slender fetterchain. Beside her

[20197]a camel, hooded with a turreting turban, waits. A silk ladder of

[20198]innumerable rungs climbs to his bobbing howdah. He ambles near with

[20199]disgruntled hindquarters. Fiercely she slaps his haunch, her goldcurb

[20200]wristbangles angriling, scolding him in Moorish.)

[20201]

[20202]MARION: Nebrakada! Femininum!

[20203]

[20204](The camel, lifting a foreleg, plucks from a tree a large mango fruit,

[20205]offers it to his mistress, blinking, in his cloven hoof, then droops his

[20206]head and, grunting, with uplifted neck, fumbles to kneel. Bloom stoops

[20207]his back for leapfrog.)

[20208]

[20209]BLOOM: I can give you... I mean as your business menagerer... Mrs

[20210]Marion... if you...

[20211]

[20212]MARION: So you notice some change? (Her hands passing slowly over her

[20213]trinketed stomacher, a slow friendly mockery in her eyes.) O Poldy,

[20214]Poldy, you are a poor old stick in the mud! Go and see life. See the

[20215]wide world.

[20216]

[20217]BLOOM: I was just going back for that lotion whitewax, orangeflower

[20218]water. Shop closes early on Thursday. But the first thing in the

[20219]morning. (He pats divers pockets.) This moving kidney. Ah!

[20220]

[20221](He points to the south, then to the east. A cake of new clean lemon

[20222]soap arises, diffusing light and perfume.)

[20223]

[20224]THE SOAP:

[20225]

[20226] We’re a capital couple are Bloom and I.

[20227] He brightens the earth. I polish the sky.

[20228](The freckled face of Sweny, the druggist, appears in the disc of the

[20229]soapsun.)

[20230]

[20231]SWENY: Three and a penny, please.

[20232]

[20233]BLOOM: Yes. For my wife. Mrs Marion. Special recipe.

[20234]

[20235]MARION: (Softly.) Poldy!

[20236]

[20237]BLOOM: Yes, ma’am?

[20238]

[20239]MARION: Ti trema un poco il cuore?

[20240]

[20241](In disdain she saunters away, plump as a pampered pouter pigeon,

[20242]humming the duet from Don Giovanni.)

[20243]

[20244]BLOOM: Are you sure about that Voglio? I mean the pronunciati...

[20245]

[20246](He follows, followed by the sniffing terrier. The elderly bawd seizes

[20247]his sleeve, the bristles of her chinmole glittering.)

[20248]

[20249]THE BAWD: Ten shillings a maidenhead. Fresh thing was never touched.

[20250]Fifteen. There’s no-one in it only her old father that’s dead drunk.

[20251]

[20252](She points. In the gap of her dark den furtive, rainbedraggled, Bridie

[20253]Kelly stands.)

[20254]

[20255]BRIDIE: Hatch street. Any good in your mind?

[20256]

[20257](With a squeak she flaps her bat shawl and runs. A burly rough pursues

[20258]with booted strides. He stumbles on the steps, recovers, plunges into

[20259]gloom. Weak squeaks of laughter are heard, weaker.)

[20260]

[20261]THE BAWD: (Her wolfeyes shining.) He’s getting his pleasure. You

[20262]won’t get a virgin in the flash houses. Ten shillings. Don’t be all

[20263]night before the polis in plain clothes sees us. Sixtyseven is a bitch.

[20264]

[20265](Leering, Gerty Macdowell limps forward. She draws from behind, ogling,

[20266]and shows coyly her bloodied clout.)

[20267]

[20268]GERTY: With all my worldly goods I thee and thou. (She murmurs.) You did

[20269]that. I hate you.

[20270]

[20271]BLOOM: I? When? You’re dreaming. I never saw you.

[20272]

[20273]THE BAWD: Leave the gentleman alone, you cheat. Writing the gentleman

[20274]false letters. Streetwalking and soliciting. Better for your mother take

[20275]the strap to you at the bedpost, hussy like you.

[20276]

[20277]GERTY: (To Bloom.) When you saw all the secrets of my bottom drawer.

[20278](She paws his sleeve, slobbering.) Dirty married man! I love you for

[20279]doing that to me.

[20280]

[20281](She glides away crookedly. Mrs Breen in man’s frieze overcoat

[20282]with loose bellows pockets, stands in the causeway, her roguish eyes

[20283]wideopen, smiling in all her herbivorous buckteeth.)

[20284]

[20285]MRS BREEN: Mr...

[20286]

[20287]BLOOM: (Coughs gravely.) Madam, when we last had this pleasure by letter

[20288]dated the sixteenth instant...

[20289]

[20290]MRS BREEN: Mr Bloom! You down here in the haunts of sin! I caught you

[20291]nicely! Scamp!

[20292]

[20293]BLOOM: (Hurriedly.) Not so loud my name. Whatever do you think of me?

[20294]Don’t give me away. Walls have ears. How do you do? It’s ages since

[20295]I. You’re looking splendid. Absolutely it. Seasonable weather we are

[20296]having this time of year. Black refracts heat. Short cut home here.

[20297]Interesting quarter. Rescue of fallen women. Magdalen asylum. I am the

[20298]secretary...

[20299]

[20300]MRS BREEN: (Holds up a finger.) Now, don’t tell a big fib! I know

[20301]somebody won’t like that. O just wait till I see Molly! (Slily.)

[20302]Account for yourself this very sminute or woe betide you!

[20303]

[20304]BLOOM: (Looks behind.) She often said she’d like to visit. Slumming.

[20305]The exotic, you see. Negro servants in livery too if she had money.

[20306]Othello black brute. Eugene Stratton. Even the bones and cornerman at

[20307]the Livermore christies. Bohee brothers. Sweep for that matter.

[20308]

[20309](Tom and Sam Bohee, coloured coons in white duck suits, scarlet socks,

[20310]upstarched Sambo chokers and large scarlet asters in their buttonholes,

[20311]leap out. Each has his banjo slung. Their paler smaller negroid hands

[20312]jingle the twingtwang wires. Flashing white Kaffir eyes and tusks they

[20313]rattle through a breakdown in clumsy clogs, twinging, singing, back to

[20314]back, toe heel, heel toe, with smackfatclacking nigger lips.)

[20315]

[20316]TOM AND SAM:

[20317]

[20318] There’s someone in the house with Dina

[20319] There’s someone in the house, I know,

[20320] There’s someone in the house with Dina

[20321] Playing on the old banjo.

[20322](They whisk black masks from raw babby faces: then, chuckling,

[20323]chortling, trumming, twanging, they diddle diddle cakewalk dance away.)

[20324]

[20325]BLOOM: (With a sour tenderish smile.) A little frivol, shall we, if you

[20326]are so inclined? Would you like me perhaps to embrace you just for a

[20327]fraction of a second?

[20328]

[20329]MRS BREEN: (Screams gaily.) O, you ruck! You ought to see yourself!

[20330]

[20331]BLOOM: For old sake’ sake. I only meant a square party, a mixed

[20332]marriage mingling of our different little conjugials. You know I had a

[20333]soft corner for you. (Gloomily.) ’Twas I sent you that valentine of

[20334]the dear gazelle.

[20335]

[20336]MRS BREEN: Glory Alice, you do look a holy show! Killing simply. (She

[20337]puts out her hand inquisitively.) What are you hiding behind your back?

[20338]Tell us, there’s a dear.

[20339]

[20340]BLOOM: (Seizes her wrist with his free hand.) Josie Powell that was,

[20341]prettiest deb in Dublin. How time flies by! Do you remember, harking

[20342]back in a retrospective arrangement, Old Christmas night, Georgina

[20343]Simpson’s housewarming while they were playing the Irving Bishop game,

[20344]finding the pin blindfold and thoughtreading? Subject, what is in this

[20345]snuffbox?

[20346]

[20347]MRS BREEN: You were the lion of the night with your seriocomic

[20348]recitation and you looked the part. You were always a favourite with the

[20349]ladies.

[20350]

[20351]BLOOM: (Squire of dames, in dinner jacket with wateredsilk facings, blue

[20352]masonic badge in his buttonhole, black bow and mother-of-pearl studs, a

[20353]prismatic champagne glass tilted in his hand.) Ladies and gentlemen, I

[20354]give you Ireland, home and beauty.

[20355]

[20356]MRS BREEN: The dear dead days beyond recall. Love’s old sweet song.

[20357]

[20358]BLOOM: (Meaningfully dropping his voice.) I confess I’m teapot with

[20359]curiosity to find out whether some person’s something is a little

[20360]teapot at present.

[20361]

[20362]MRS BREEN: (Gushingly.) Tremendously teapot! London’s teapot and I’m

[20363]simply teapot all over me! (She rubs sides with him.) After the parlour

[20364]mystery games and the crackers from the tree we sat on the staircase

[20365]ottoman. Under the mistletoe. Two is company.

[20366]

[20367]BLOOM: (Wearing a purple Napoleon hat with an amber halfmoon, his

[20368]fingers and thumb passing slowly down to her soft moist meaty palm which

[20369]she surrenders gently.) The witching hour of night. I took the splinter

[20370]out of this hand, carefully, slowly. (Tenderly, as he slips on her

[20371]finger a ruby ring.) Là ci darem la mano.

[20372]

[20373]MRS BREEN: (In a onepiece evening frock executed in moonlight blue, a

[20374]tinsel sylph’s diadem on her brow with her dancecard fallen beside

[20375]her moonblue satin slipper, curves her palm softly, breathing quickly.)

[20376]Voglio e non. You’re hot! You’re scalding! The left hand nearest the

[20377]heart.

[20378]

[20379]BLOOM: When you made your present choice they said it was beauty and

[20380]the beast. I can never forgive you for that. (His clenched fist at his

[20381]brow.) Think what it means. All you meant to me then. (Hoarsely.) Woman,

[20382]it’s breaking me!

[20383]

[20384](Denis Breen, whitetallhatted, with Wisdom Hely’s sandwichboards,

[20385]shuffles past them in carpet slippers, his dull beard thrust out,

[20386]muttering to right and left. Little Alf Bergan, cloaked in the pall of

[20387]the ace of spades, dogs him to left and right, doubled in laughter.)

[20388]

[20389]ALF BERGAN: (Points jeering at the sandwichboards.) U. p: up.

[20390]

[20391]MRS BREEN: (To Bloom.) High jinks below stairs. (She gives him the glad

[20392]eye.) Why didn’t you kiss the spot to make it well? You wanted to.

[20393]

[20394]BLOOM: (Shocked.) Molly’s best friend! Could you?

[20395]

[20396]MRS BREEN: (Her pulpy tongue between her lips, offers a pigeon kiss.)

[20397]Hnhn. The answer is a lemon. Have you a little present for me there?

[20398]

[20399]BLOOM: (Offhandedly.) Kosher. A snack for supper. The home without

[20400]potted meat is incomplete. I was at Leah, Mrs Bandmann Palmer. Trenchant

[20401]exponent of Shakespeare. Unfortunately threw away the programme.

[20402]Rattling good place round there for pigs’ feet. Feel.

[20403]

[20404](Richie Goulding, three ladies’ hats pinned on his head, appears

[20405]weighted to one side by the black legal bag of Collis and Ward on which

[20406]a skull and crossbones are painted in white limewash. He opens it

[20407]and shows it full of polonies, kippered herrings, Findon haddies and

[20408]tightpacked pills.)

[20409]

[20410]RICHIE: Best value in Dub.

[20411]

[20412](Bald Pat, bothered beetle, stands on the curbstone, folding his napkin,

[20413]waiting to wait.)

[20414]

[20415]PAT: (Advances with a tilted dish of spillspilling gravy.) Steak and

[20416]kidney. Bottle of lager. Hee hee hee. Wait till I wait.

[20417]

[20418]RICHIE: Goodgod. Inev erate inall...

[20419]

[20420](With hanging head he marches doggedly forward. The navvy, lurching by,

[20421]gores him with his flaming pronghorn.)

[20422]

[20423]RICHIE: (With a cry of pain, his hand to his back.) Ah! Bright’s!

[20424]Lights!

[20425]

[20426]BLOOM: (Points to the navvy.) A spy. Don’t attract attention. I hate

[20427]stupid crowds. I am not on pleasure bent. I am in a grave predicament.

[20428]

[20429]MRS BREEN: Humbugging and deluthering as per usual with your cock and

[20430]bull story.

[20431]

[20432]BLOOM: I want to tell you a little secret about how I came to be here.

[20433]But you must never tell. Not even Molly. I have a most particular

[20434]reason.

[20435]

[20436]MRS BREEN: (All agog.) O, not for worlds.

[20437]

[20438]BLOOM: Let’s walk on. Shall us?

[20439]

[20440]MRS BREEN: Let’s.

[20441]

[20442](The bawd makes an unheeded sign. Bloom walks on with Mrs Breen. The

[20443]terrier follows, whining piteously, wagging his tail.)

[20444]

[20445]THE BAWD: Jewman’s melt!

[20446]

[20447]BLOOM: (In an oatmeal sporting suit, a sprig of woodbine in the lapel,

[20448]tony buff shirt, shepherd’s plaid Saint Andrew’s cross scarftie,

[20449]white spats, fawn dustcoat on his arm, tawny red brogues, fieldglasses

[20450]in bandolier and a grey billycock hat.) Do you remember a long long

[20451]time, years and years ago, just after Milly, Marionette we called her,

[20452]was weaned when we all went together to Fairyhouse races, was it?

[20453]

[20454]MRS BREEN: (In smart Saxe tailormade, white velours hat and spider

[20455]veil.) Leopardstown.

[20456]

[20457]BLOOM: I mean, Leopardstown. And Molly won seven shillings on a three

[20458]year old named Nevertell and coming home along by Foxrock in that old

[20459]fiveseater shanderadan of a waggonette you were in your heyday then and

[20460]you had on that new hat of white velours with a surround of molefur that

[20461]Mrs Hayes advised you to buy because it was marked down to nineteen and

[20462]eleven, a bit of wire and an old rag of velveteen, and I’ll lay you

[20463]what you like she did it on purpose...

[20464]

[20465]MRS BREEN: She did, of course, the cat! Don’t tell me! Nice adviser!

[20466]

[20467]BLOOM: Because it didn’t suit you one quarter as well as the other

[20468]ducky little tammy toque with the bird of paradise wing in it that I

[20469]admired on you and you honestly looked just too fetching in it though

[20470]it was a pity to kill it, you cruel naughty creature, little mite of a

[20471]thing with a heart the size of a fullstop.

[20472]

[20473]MRS BREEN: (Squeezes his arm, simpers.) Naughty cruel I was!

[20474]

[20475]BLOOM: (Low, secretly, ever more rapidly.) And Molly was eating a

[20476]sandwich of spiced beef out of Mrs Joe Gallaher’s lunch basket.

[20477]Frankly, though she had her advisers or admirers, I never cared much for

[20478]her style. She was...

[20479]

[20480]MRS BREEN: Too...

[20481]

[20482]BLOOM: Yes. And Molly was laughing because Rogers and Maggot O’Reilly

[20483]were mimicking a cock as we passed a farmhouse and Marcus Tertius Moses,

[20484]the tea merchant, drove past us in a gig with his daughter, Dancer Moses

[20485]was her name, and the poodle in her lap bridled up and you asked me if I

[20486]ever heard or read or knew or came across...

[20487]

[20488]MRS BREEN: (Eagerly.) Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

[20489]

[20490](She fades from his side. Followed by the whining dog he walks on

[20491]towards hellsgates. In an archway a standing woman, bent forward, her

[20492]feet apart, pisses cowily. Outside a shuttered pub a bunch of loiterers

[20493]listen to a tale which their brokensnouted gaffer rasps out with raucous

[20494]humour. An armless pair of them flop wrestling, growling, in maimed

[20495]sodden playfight.)

[20496]

[20497]THE GAFFER: (Crouches, his voice twisted in his snout.) And when Cairns

[20498]came down from the scaffolding in Beaver street what was he after doing

[20499]it into only into the bucket of porter that was there waiting on the

[20500]shavings for Derwan’s plasterers.

[20501]

[20502]THE LOITERERS: (Guffaw with cleft palates.) O jays!

[20503]

[20504](Their paintspeckled hats wag. Spattered with size and lime of their

[20505]lodges they frisk limblessly about him.)

[20506]

[20507]BLOOM: Coincidence too. They think it funny. Anything but that. Broad

[20508]daylight. Trying to walk. Lucky no woman.

[20509]

[20510]THE LOITERERS: Jays, that’s a good one. Glauber salts. O jays, into

[20511]the men’s porter.

[20512]

[20513](Bloom passes. Cheap whores, singly, coupled, shawled, dishevelled, call

[20514]from lanes, doors, corners.)

[20515]

[20516]THE WHORES:

[20517]

[20518] Are you going far, queer fellow?

[20519] How’s your middle leg?

[20520] Got a match on you?

[20521] Eh, come here till I stiffen it for you.

[20522](He plodges through their sump towards the lighted street beyond. From a

[20523]bulge of window curtains a gramophone rears a battered brazen trunk. In

[20524]the shadow a shebeenkeeper haggles with the navvy and the two redcoats.)

[20525]

[20526]THE NAVVY: (Belching.) Where’s the bloody house?

[20527]

[20528]THE SHEBEENKEEPER: Purdon street. Shilling a bottle of stout.

[20529]Respectable woman.

[20530]

[20531]THE NAVVY: (Gripping the two redcoats, staggers forward with them.) Come

[20532]on, you British army!

[20533]

[20534]PRIVATE CARR: (Behind his back.) He aint half balmy.

[20535]

[20536]PRIVATE COMPTON: (Laughs.) What ho!

[20537]

[20538]PRIVATE CARR: (To the navvy.) Portobello barracks canteen. You ask for

[20539]Carr. Just Carr.

[20540]

[20541]THE NAVVY: (Shouts.)

[20542]

[20543] We are the boys. Of Wexford.

[20544]PRIVATE COMPTON: Say! What price the sergeantmajor?

[20545]

[20546]PRIVATE CARR: Bennett? He’s my pal. I love old Bennett.

[20547]

[20548]THE NAVVY: (Shouts.)

[20549]

[20550] The galling chain.

[20551] And free our native land.

[20552](He staggers forward, dragging them with him. Bloom stops, at fault. The

[20553]dog approaches, his tongue outlolling, panting.)

[20554]

[20555]BLOOM: Wildgoose chase this. Disorderly houses. Lord knows where they

[20556]are gone. Drunks cover distance double quick. Nice mixup. Scene at

[20557]Westland row. Then jump in first class with third ticket. Then too far.

[20558]Train with engine behind. Might have taken me to Malahide or a siding

[20559]for the night or collision. Second drink does it. Once is a dose.

[20560]What am I following him for? Still, he’s the best of that lot. If

[20561]I hadn’t heard about Mrs Beaufoy Purefoy I wouldn’t have gone and

[20562]wouldn’t have met. Kismet. He’ll lose that cash. Relieving office

[20563]here. Good biz for cheapjacks, organs. What do ye lack? Soon got,

[20564]soon gone. Might have lost my life too with that

[20565]mangongwheeltracktrolleyglarejuggernaut only for presence of mind.

[20566]Can’t always save you, though. If I had passed Truelock’s window

[20567]that day two minutes later would have been shot. Absence of body. Still

[20568]if bullet only went through my coat get damages for shock, five hundred

[20569]pounds. What was he? Kildare street club toff. God help his gamekeeper.

[20570]

[20571](He gazes ahead, reading on the wall a scrawled chalk legend Wet Dream

[20572]and a phallic design.) Odd! Molly drawing on the frosted carriagepane

[20573]at Kingstown. What’s that like? (Gaudy dollwomen loll in the lighted

[20574]doorways, in window embrasures, smoking birdseye cigarettes. The

[20575]odour of the sicksweet weed floats towards him in slow round ovalling

[20576]wreaths.)

[20577]

[20578]THE WREATHS: Sweet are the sweets. Sweets of sin.

[20579]

[20580]BLOOM: My spine’s a bit limp. Go or turn? And this food? Eat it and

[20581]get all pigsticky. Absurd I am. Waste of money. One and eightpence too

[20582]much. (The retriever drives a cold snivelling muzzle against his hand,

[20583]wagging his tail.) Strange how they take to me. Even that brute today.

[20584]Better speak to him first. Like women they like rencontres. Stinks like

[20585]a polecat. Chacun son goût. He might be mad. Dogdays. Uncertain in

[20586]his movements. Good fellow! Fido! Good fellow! Garryowen! (The wolfdog

[20587]sprawls on his back, wriggling obscenely with begging paws, his long

[20588]black tongue lolling out.) Influence of his surroundings. Give and have

[20589]done with it. Provided nobody. (Calling encouraging words he shambles

[20590]back with a furtive poacher’s tread, dogged by the setter into a dark

[20591]stalestunk corner. He unrolls one parcel and goes to dump the crubeen

[20592]softly but holds back and feels the trotter.) Sizeable for threepence.

[20593]But then I have it in my left hand. Calls for more effort. Why? Smaller

[20594]from want of use. O, let it slide. Two and six.

[20595]

[20596](With regret he lets the unrolled crubeen and trotter slide. The

[20597]mastiff mauls the bundle clumsily and gluts himself with growling greed,

[20598]crunching the bones. Two raincaped watch approach, silent, vigilant.

[20599]They murmur together.)

[20600]

[20601]THE WATCH: Bloom. Of Bloom. For Bloom. Bloom.

[20602]

[20603](Each lays hand on Bloom’s shoulder.)

[20604]

[20605]FIRST WATCH: Caught in the act. Commit no nuisance.

[20606]

[20607]BLOOM: (Stammers.) I am doing good to others.

[20608]

[20609](A covey of gulls, storm petrels, rises hungrily from Liffey slime with

[20610]Banbury cakes in their beaks.)

[20611]

[20612]THE GULLS: Kaw kave kankury kake.

[20613]

[20614]BLOOM: The friend of man. Trained by kindness.

[20615]

[20616](He points. Bob Doran, toppling from a high barstool, sways over the

[20617]munching spaniel.)

[20618]

[20619]BOB DORAN: Towser. Give us the paw. Give the paw.

[20620]

[20621](The bulldog growls, his scruff standing, a gobbet of pig’s knuckle

[20622]between his molars through which rabid scumspittle dribbles. Bob Doran

[20623]falls silently into an area.)

[20624]

[20625]SECOND WATCH: Prevention of cruelty to animals.

[20626]

[20627]BLOOM: (Enthusiastically.) A noble work! I scolded that tramdriver on

[20628]Harold’s cross bridge for illusing the poor horse with his harness

[20629]scab. Bad French I got for my pains. Of course it was frosty and the

[20630]last tram. All tales of circus life are highly demoralising.

[20631]

[20632](Signor Maffei, passionpale, in liontamer’s costume with diamond studs

[20633]in his shirtfront, steps forward, holding a circus paperhoop, a curling

[20634]carriagewhip and a revolver with which he covers the gorging boarhound.)

[20635]

[20636]SIGNOR MAFFEI: (With a sinister smile.) Ladies and gentlemen, my

[20637]educated greyhound. It was I broke in the bucking broncho Ajax with my

[20638]patent spiked saddle for carnivores. Lash under the belly with a knotted

[20639]thong. Block tackle and a strangling pulley will bring your lion

[20640]to heel, no matter how fractious, even Leo ferox there, the Libyan

[20641]maneater. A redhot crowbar and some liniment rubbing on the burning part

[20642]produced Fritz of Amsterdam, the thinking hyena. (He glares.) I possess

[20643]the Indian sign. The glint of my eye does it with these breastsparklers.

[20644](With a bewitching smile.) I now introduce Mademoiselle Ruby, the pride

[20645]of the ring.

[20646]

[20647]FIRST WATCH: Come. Name and address.

[20648]

[20649]BLOOM: I have forgotten for the moment. Ah, yes! (He takes off his high

[20650]grade hat, saluting.) Dr Bloom, Leopold, dental surgeon. You have heard

[20651]of von Blum Pasha. Umpteen millions. Donnerwetter! Owns half Austria.

[20652]Egypt. Cousin.

[20653]

[20654]FIRST WATCH: Proof.

[20655]

[20656](A card falls from inside the leather headband of Bloom’s hat.)

[20657]

[20658]BLOOM: (In red fez, cadi’s dress coat with broad green sash, wearing

[20659]a false badge of the Legion of Honour, picks up the card hastily and

[20660]offers it.) Allow me. My club is the Junior Army and Navy. Solicitors:

[20661]Messrs John Henry Menton, 27 Bachelor’s Walk.

[20662]

[20663]FIRST WATCH: (Reads.) Henry Flower. No fixed abode. Unlawfully watching

[20664]and besetting.

[20665]

[20666]SECOND WATCH: An alibi. You are cautioned.

[20667]

[20668]BLOOM: (Produces from his heartpocket a crumpled yellow flower.) This

[20669]is the flower in question. It was given me by a man I don’t know his

[20670]name. (Plausibly.) You know that old joke, rose of Castile. Bloom. The

[20671]change of name. Virag. (He murmurs privately and confidentially.) We

[20672]are engaged you see, sergeant. Lady in the case. Love entanglement.

[20673](He shoulders the second watch gently.) Dash it all. It’s a way we

[20674]gallants have in the navy. Uniform that does it. (He turns gravely to

[20675]the first watch.) Still, of course, you do get your Waterloo sometimes.

[20676]Drop in some evening and have a glass of old Burgundy. (To the second

[20677]watch gaily.) I’ll introduce you, inspector. She’s game. Do it in

[20678]the shake of a lamb’s tail.

[20679]

[20680](A dark mercurialised face appears, leading a veiled figure.)

[20681]

[20682]THE DARK MERCURY: The Castle is looking for him. He was drummed out of

[20683]the army.

[20684]

[20685]MARTHA: (Thickveiled, a crimson halter round her neck, a copy of the

[20686]Irish Times in her hand, in tone of reproach, pointing.) Henry! Leopold!

[20687]Lionel, thou lost one! Clear my name.

[20688]

[20689]FIRST WATCH: (Sternly.) Come to the station.

[20690]

[20691]BLOOM: (Scared, hats himself, steps back, then, plucking at his heart

[20692]and lifting his right forearm on the square, he gives the sign and

[20693]dueguard of fellowcraft.) No, no, worshipful master, light of love.

[20694]Mistaken identity. The Lyons mail. Lesurques and Dubosc. You remember

[20695]the Childs fratricide case. We medical men. By striking him dead with

[20696]a hatchet. I am wrongfully accused. Better one guilty escape than

[20697]ninetynine wrongfully condemned.

[20698]

[20699]MARTHA: (Sobbing behind her veil.) Breach of promise. My real name is

[20700]Peggy Griffin. He wrote to me that he was miserable. I’ll tell my

[20701]brother, the Bective rugger fullback, on you, heartless flirt.

[20702]

[20703]BLOOM: (Behind his hand.) She’s drunk. The woman is inebriated. (He

[20704]murmurs vaguely the pass of Ephraim.) Shitbroleeth.

[20705]

[20706]SECOND WATCH: (Tears in his eyes, to Bloom.) You ought to be thoroughly

[20707]well ashamed of yourself.

[20708]

[20709]BLOOM: Gentlemen of the jury, let me explain. A pure mare’s nest. I am

[20710]a man misunderstood. I am being made a scapegoat of. I am a respectable

[20711]married man, without a stain on my character. I live in Eccles street.

[20712]My wife, I am the daughter of a most distinguished commander, a gallant

[20713]upstanding gentleman, what do you call him, Majorgeneral Brian Tweedy,

[20714]one of Britain’s fighting men who helped to win our battles. Got his

[20715]majority for the heroic defence of Rorke’s Drift.

[20716]

[20717]FIRST WATCH: Regiment.

[20718]

[20719]BLOOM: (Turns to the gallery.) The royal Dublins, boys, the salt of the

[20720]earth, known the world over. I think I see some old comrades in arms

[20721]up there among you. The R. D. F., with our own Metropolitan police,

[20722]guardians of our homes, the pluckiest lads and the finest body of men,

[20723]as physique, in the service of our sovereign.

[20724]

[20725]A VOICE: Turncoat! Up the Boers! Who booed Joe Chamberlain?

[20726]

[20727]BLOOM: (His hand on the shoulder of the first watch.) My old dad too was

[20728]a J. P. I’m as staunch a Britisher as you are, sir. I fought with the

[20729]colours for king and country in the absentminded war under general

[20730]Gough in the park and was disabled at Spion Kop and Bloemfontein,

[20731]was mentioned in dispatches. I did all a white man could. (With quiet

[20732]feeling.) Jim Bludso. Hold her nozzle again the bank.

[20733]

[20734]FIRST WATCH: Profession or trade.

[20735]

[20736]BLOOM: Well, I follow a literary occupation, author-journalist. In fact

[20737]we are just bringing out a collection of prize stories of which I am the

[20738]inventor, something that is an entirely new departure. I am connected

[20739]with the British and Irish press. If you ring up...

[20740]

[20741](Myles Crawford strides out jerkily, a quill between his teeth. His

[20742]scarlet beak blazes within the aureole of his straw hat. He dangles

[20743]a hank of Spanish onions in one hand and holds with the other hand a

[20744]telephone receiver nozzle to his ear.)

[20745]

[20746]MYLES CRAWFORD: (His cock’s wattles wagging.) Hello, seventyseven

[20747]eightfour. Hello. Freeman’s Urinal and Weekly Arsewipe here. Paralyse

[20748]Europe. You which? Bluebags? Who writes? Is it Bloom?

[20749]

[20750](Mr Philip Beaufoy, palefaced, stands in the witnessbox, in accurate

[20751]morning dress, outbreast pocket with peak of handkerchief showing,

[20752]creased lavender trousers and patent boots. He carries a large portfolio

[20753]labelled Matcham’s Masterstrokes.)

[20754]

[20755]BEAUFOY: (Drawls.) No, you aren’t. Not by a long shot if I know it.

[20756]I don’t see it, that’s all. No born gentleman, no-one with the most

[20757]rudimentary promptings of a gentleman would stoop to such particularly

[20758]loathsome conduct. One of those, my lord. A plagiarist. A soapy sneak

[20759]masquerading as a literateur. It’s perfectly obvious that with the

[20760]most inherent baseness he has cribbed some of my bestselling copy,

[20761]really gorgeous stuff, a perfect gem, the love passages in which are

[20762]beneath suspicion. The Beaufoy books of love and great possessions,

[20763]with which your lordship is doubtless familiar, are a household word

[20764]throughout the kingdom.

[20765]

[20766]BLOOM: (Murmurs with hangdog meekness glum.) That bit about the laughing

[20767]witch hand in hand I take exception to, if I may...

[20768]

[20769]BEAUFOY: (His lip upcurled, smiles superciliously on the court.) You

[20770]funny ass, you! You’re too beastly awfully weird for words! I don’t

[20771]think you need over excessively disincommodate yourself in that regard.

[20772]My literary agent Mr J. B. Pinker is in attendance. I presume, my

[20773]lord, we shall receive the usual witnesses’ fees, shan’t we? We are

[20774]considerably out of pocket over this bally pressman johnny, this jackdaw

[20775]of Rheims, who has not even been to a university.

[20776]

[20777]BLOOM: (Indistinctly.) University of life. Bad art.

[20778]

[20779]BEAUFOY: (Shouts.) It’s a damnably foul lie, showing the moral

[20780]rottenness of the man! (He extends his portfolio.) We have here damning

[20781]evidence, the corpus delicti, my lord, a specimen of my maturer work

[20782]disfigured by the hallmark of the beast.

[20783]

[20784]A VOICE FROM THE GALLERY:

[20785]

[20786] Moses, Moses, king of the jews,

[20787] Wiped his arse in the Daily News.

[20788]BLOOM: (Bravely.) Overdrawn.

[20789]

[20790]BEAUFOY: You low cad! You ought to be ducked in the horsepond, you

[20791]rotter! (To the court.) Why, look at the man’s private life! Leading

[20792]a quadruple existence! Street angel and house devil. Not fit to be

[20793]mentioned in mixed society! The archconspirator of the age!

[20794]

[20795]BLOOM: (To the court.) And he, a bachelor, how...

[20796]

[20797]FIRST WATCH: The King versus Bloom. Call the woman Driscoll.

[20798]

[20799]THE CRIER: Mary Driscoll, scullerymaid!

[20800]

[20801](Mary Driscoll, a slipshod servant girl, approaches. She has a bucket on

[20802]the crook of her arm and a scouringbrush in her hand.)

[20803]

[20804]SECOND WATCH: Another! Are you of the unfortunate class?

[20805]

[20806]MARY DRISCOLL: (Indignantly.) I’m not a bad one. I bear a respectable

[20807]character and was four months in my last place. I was in a situation,

[20808]six pounds a year and my chances with Fridays out and I had to leave

[20809]owing to his carryings on.

[20810]

[20811]FIRST WATCH: What do you tax him with?

[20812]

[20813]MARY DRISCOLL: He made a certain suggestion but I thought more of myself

[20814]as poor as I am.

[20815]

[20816]BLOOM: (In housejacket of ripplecloth, flannel trousers, heelless

[20817]slippers, unshaven, his hair rumpled: softly.) I treated you white.

[20818]I gave you mementos, smart emerald garters far above your station.

[20819]Incautiously I took your part when you were accused of pilfering.

[20820]There’s a medium in all things. Play cricket.

[20821]

[20822]MARY DRISCOLL: (Excitedly.) As God is looking down on me this night if

[20823]ever I laid a hand to them oylsters!

[20824]

[20825]FIRST WATCH: The offence complained of? Did something happen?

[20826]

[20827]MARY DRISCOLL: He surprised me in the rere of the premises, Your honour,

[20828]when the missus was out shopping one morning with a request for a safety

[20829]pin. He held me and I was discoloured in four places as a result. And he

[20830]interfered twict with my clothing.

[20831]

[20832]BLOOM: She counterassaulted.

[20833]

[20834]MARY DRISCOLL: (Scornfully.) I had more respect for the scouringbrush,

[20835]so I had. I remonstrated with him, Your lord, and he remarked: keep it

[20836]quiet.

[20837]

[20838](General laughter.)

[20839]

[20840]GEORGE FOTTRELL: (Clerk of the crown and peace, resonantly.) Order in

[20841]court! The accused will now make a bogus statement.

[20842]

[20843](Bloom, pleading not guilty and holding a fullblown waterlily, begins a

[20844]long unintelligible speech. They would hear what counsel had to say in

[20845]his stirring address to the grand jury. He was down and out but, though

[20846]branded as a black sheep, if he might say so, he meant to reform, to

[20847]retrieve the memory of the past in a purely sisterly way and return to

[20848]nature as a purely domestic animal. A sevenmonths’ child, he had been

[20849]carefully brought up and nurtured by an aged bedridden parent. There

[20850]might have been lapses of an erring father but he wanted to turn over

[20851]a new leaf and now, when at long last in sight of the whipping post,

[20852]to lead a homely life in the evening of his days, permeated by the

[20853]affectionate surroundings of the heaving bosom of the family. An

[20854]acclimatised Britisher, he had seen that summer eve from the footplate

[20855]of an engine cab of the Loop line railway company while the rain

[20856]refrained from falling glimpses, as it were, through the windows of

[20857]loveful households in Dublin city and urban district of scenes truly

[20858]rural of happiness of the better land with Dockrell’s wallpaper at one

[20859]and ninepence a dozen, innocent Britishborn bairns lisping prayers to

[20860]the Sacred Infant, youthful scholars grappling with their pensums or

[20861]model young ladies playing on the pianoforte or anon all with fervour

[20862]reciting the family rosary round the crackling Yulelog while in the

[20863]boreens and green lanes the colleens with their swains strolled what

[20864]times the strains of the organtoned melodeon Britannia metalbound with

[20865]four acting stops and twelvefold bellows, a sacrifice, greatest bargain

[20866]ever....

[20867]

[20868](Renewed laughter. He mumbles incoherently. Reporters complain that they

[20869]cannot hear.)

[20870]

[20871]LONGHAND AND SHORTHAND: (Without looking up from their notebooks.)

[20872]Loosen his boots.

[20873]

[20874]PROFESSOR MACHUGH: (From the presstable, coughs and calls.) Cough it up,

[20875]man. Get it out in bits.

[20876]

[20877](The crossexamination proceeds re Bloom and the bucket. A large bucket.

[20878]Bloom himself. Bowel trouble. In Beaver street. Gripe, yes. Quite bad.

[20879]A plasterer’s bucket. By walking stifflegged. Suffered untold misery.

[20880]Deadly agony. About noon. Love or burgundy. Yes, some spinach. Crucial

[20881]moment. He did not look in the bucket. Nobody. Rather a mess. Not

[20882]completely. A Titbits back number.)

[20883]

[20884](Uproar and catcalls. Bloom in a torn frockcoat stained with whitewash,

[20885]dinged silk hat sideways on his head, a strip of stickingplaster across

[20886]his nose, talks inaudibly.)

[20887]

[20888]J. J. O’MOLLOY: (In barrister’s grey wig and stuffgown, speaking

[20889]with a voice of pained protest.) This is no place for indecent levity

[20890]at the expense of an erring mortal disguised in liquor. We are not in

[20891]a beargarden nor at an Oxford rag nor is this a travesty of justice. My

[20892]client is an infant, a poor foreign immigrant who started scratch as

[20893]a stowaway and is now trying to turn an honest penny. The trumped up

[20894]misdemeanour was due to a momentary aberration of heredity, brought on

[20895]by hallucination, such familiarities as the alleged guilty occurrence

[20896]being quite permitted in my client’s native place, the land of the

[20897]Pharaoh. Prima facie, I put it to you that there was no attempt at

[20898]carnally knowing. Intimacy did not occur and the offence complained of

[20899]by Driscoll, that her virtue was solicited, was not repeated. I would

[20900]deal in especial with atavism. There have been cases of shipwreck and

[20901]somnambulism in my client’s family. If the accused could speak he

[20902]could a tale unfold—one of the strangest that have ever been narrated

[20903]between the covers of a book. He himself, my lord, is a physical wreck

[20904]from cobbler’s weak chest. His submission is that he is of Mongolian

[20905]extraction and irresponsible for his actions. Not all there, in fact.

[20906]

[20907]BLOOM: (Barefoot, pigeonbreasted, in lascar’s vest and trousers,

[20908]apologetic toes turned in, opens his tiny mole’s eyes and looks about

[20909]him dazedly, passing a slow hand across his forehead. Then he hitches

[20910]his belt sailor fashion and with a shrug of oriental obeisance salutes

[20911]the court, pointing one thumb heavenward.) Him makee velly muchee fine

[20912]night. (He begins to lilt simply.)

[20913]

[20914] Li li poo lil chile

[20915] Blingee pigfoot evly night

[20916] Payee two shilly...

[20917](He is howled down.)

[20918]

[20919]J. J. O’MOLLOY: (Hotly to the populace.) This is a lonehand fight. By

[20920]Hades, I will not have any client of mine gagged and badgered in this

[20921]fashion by a pack of curs and laughing hyenas. The Mosaic code has

[20922]superseded the law of the jungle. I say it and I say it emphatically,

[20923]without wishing for one moment to defeat the ends of justice, accused

[20924]was not accessory before the act and prosecutrix has not been tampered

[20925]with. The young person was treated by defendant as if she were his very

[20926]own daughter. (Bloom takes J. J. O’Molloy’s hand and raises it to

[20927]his lips.) I shall call rebutting evidence to prove up to the hilt that

[20928]the hidden hand is again at its old game. When in doubt persecute Bloom.

[20929]My client, an innately bashful man, would be the last man in the world

[20930]to do anything ungentlemanly which injured modesty could object to or

[20931]cast a stone at a girl who took the wrong turning when some dastard,

[20932]responsible for her condition, had worked his own sweet will on her. He

[20933]wants to go straight. I regard him as the whitest man I know. He is down

[20934]on his luck at present owing to the mortgaging of his extensive property

[20935]at Agendath Netaim in faraway Asia Minor, slides of which will now be

[20936]shown. (To Bloom.) I suggest that you will do the handsome thing.

[20937]

[20938]BLOOM: A penny in the pound.

[20939]

[20940](The image of the lake of Kinnereth with blurred cattle cropping in

[20941]silver haze is projected on the wall. Moses Dlugacz, ferreteyed albino,

[20942]in blue dungarees, stands up in the gallery, holding in each hand an

[20943]orange citron and a pork kidney.)

[20944]

[20945]DLUGACZ: (Hoarsely.) Bleibtreustrasse, Berlin, W. 13.

[20946]

[20947](J. J. O’Molloy steps on to a low plinth and holds the lapel of his

[20948]coat with solemnity. His face lengthens, grows pale and bearded, with

[20949]sunken eyes, the blotches of phthisis and hectic cheekbones of John F.

[20950]Taylor. He applies his handkerchief to his mouth and scrutinises the

[20951]galloping tide of rosepink blood.)

[20952]

[20953]J. J. O’MOLLOY: (Almost voicelessly.) Excuse me. I am suffering from a

[20954]severe chill, have recently come from a sickbed. A few wellchosen words.

[20955](He assumes the avine head, foxy moustache and proboscidal eloquence of

[20956]Seymour Bushe.) When the angel’s book comes to be opened if aught

[20957]that the pensive bosom has inaugurated of soultransfigured and of

[20958]soultransfiguring deserves to live I say accord the prisoner at the bar

[20959]the sacred benefit of the doubt.

[20960]

[20961](A paper with something written on it is handed into court.)

[20962]

[20963]BLOOM: (In court dress.) Can give best references. Messrs Callan,

[20964]Coleman. Mr Wisdom Hely J. P. My old chief Joe Cuffe. Mr V. B. Dillon,

[20965]ex lord mayor of Dublin. I have moved in the charmed circle of the

[20966]highest... Queens of Dublin society. (Carelessly.) I was just chatting

[20967]this afternoon at the viceregal lodge to my old pals, sir Robert and

[20968]lady Ball, astronomer royal, at the levee. Sir Bob, I said...

[20969]

[20970]MRS YELVERTON BARRY: (In lowcorsaged opal balldress and elbowlength

[20971]ivory gloves, wearing a sabletrimmed brickquilted dolman, a comb of

[20972]brilliants and panache of osprey in her hair.) Arrest him, constable. He

[20973]wrote me an anonymous letter in prentice backhand when my husband was

[20974]in the North Riding of Tipperary on the Munster circuit, signed James

[20975]Lovebirch. He said that he had seen from the gods my peerless globes

[20976]as I sat in a box of the Theatre Royal at a command performance of La

[20977]Cigale. I deeply inflamed him, he said. He made improper overtures to me

[20978]to misconduct myself at half past four p.m. on the following Thursday,

[20979]Dunsink time. He offered to send me through the post a work of fiction

[20980]by Monsieur Paul de Kock, entitled The Girl with the Three Pairs of

[20981]Stays.

[20982]

[20983]MRS BELLINGHAM: (In cap and seal coney mantle, wrapped up to the

[20984]nose, steps out of her brougham and scans through tortoiseshell

[20985]quizzing-glasses which she takes from inside her huge opossum muff.)

[20986]Also to me. Yes, I believe it is the same objectionable person. Because

[20987]he closed my carriage door outside sir Thornley Stoker’s one sleety

[20988]day during the cold snap of February ninetythree when even the grid

[20989]of the wastepipe and the ballstop in my bath cistern were frozen.

[20990]Subsequently he enclosed a bloom of edelweiss culled on the heights,

[20991]as he said, in my honour. I had it examined by a botanical expert and

[20992]elicited the information that it was a blossom of the homegrown potato

[20993]plant purloined from a forcingcase of the model farm.

[20994]

[20995]MRS YELVERTON BARRY: Shame on him!

[20996]

[20997](A crowd of sluts and ragamuffins surges forward.)

[20998]

[20999]THE SLUTS AND RAGAMUFFINS: (Screaming.) Stop thief! Hurrah there,

[21000]Bluebeard! Three cheers for Ikey Mo!

[21001]

[21002]SECOND WATCH: (Produces handcuffs.) Here are the darbies.

[21003]

[21004]MRS BELLINGHAM: He addressed me in several handwritings with fulsome

[21005]compliments as a Venus in furs and alleged profound pity for my

[21006]frostbound coachman Palmer while in the same breath he expressed himself

[21007]as envious of his earflaps and fleecy sheepskins and of his fortunate

[21008]proximity to my person, when standing behind my chair wearing my livery

[21009]and the armorial bearings of the Bellingham escutcheon garnished sable,

[21010]a buck’s head couped or. He lauded almost extravagantly my nether

[21011]extremities, my swelling calves in silk hose drawn up to the limit, and

[21012]eulogised glowingly my other hidden treasures in priceless lace which,

[21013]he said, he could conjure up. He urged me (Stating that he felt it

[21014]his mission in life to urge me.) to defile the marriage bed, to commit

[21015]adultery at the earliest possible opportunity.

[21016]

[21017]THE HONOURABLE MRS MERVYN TALBOYS: (In amazon costume, hard hat,

[21018]jackboots cockspurred, vermilion waistcoat, fawn musketeer gauntlets

[21019]with braided drums, long train held up and hunting crop with which she

[21020]strikes her welt constantly.) Also me. Because he saw me on the polo

[21021]ground of the Phoenix park at the match All Ireland versus the Rest of

[21022]Ireland. My eyes, I know, shone divinely as I watched Captain Slogger

[21023]Dennehy of the Inniskillings win the final chukkar on his darling cob

[21024]Centaur. This plebeian Don Juan observed me from behind a hackney car

[21025]and sent me in double envelopes an obscene photograph, such as are sold

[21026]after dark on Paris boulevards, insulting to any lady. I have it still.

[21027]It represents a partially nude señorita, frail and lovely (his wife,

[21028]as he solemnly assured me, taken by him from nature), practising illicit

[21029]intercourse with a muscular torero, evidently a blackguard. He urged me

[21030]to do likewise, to misbehave, to sin with officers of the garrison. He

[21031]implored me to soil his letter in an unspeakable manner, to chastise

[21032]him as he richly deserves, to bestride and ride him, to give him a most

[21033]vicious horsewhipping.

[21034]

[21035]MRS BELLINGHAM: Me too.

[21036]

[21037]MRS YELVERTON BARRY: Me too.

[21038]

[21039](Several highly respectable Dublin ladies hold up improper letters

[21040]received from Bloom.)

[21041]

[21042]THE HONOURABLE MRS MERVYN TALBOYS: (Stamps her jingling spurs in a

[21043]sudden paroxysm of fury.) I will, by the God above me. I’ll scourge

[21044]the pigeonlivered cur as long as I can stand over him. I’ll flay him

[21045]alive.

[21046]

[21047]BLOOM: (His eyes closing, quails expectantly.) Here? (He squirms.)

[21048]Again! (He pants cringing.) I love the danger.

[21049]

[21050]THE HONOURABLE MRS MERVYN TALBOYS: Very much so! I’ll make it hot for

[21051]you. I’ll make you dance Jack Latten for that.

[21052]

[21053]MRS BELLINGHAM: Tan his breech well, the upstart! Write the stars and

[21054]stripes on it!

[21055]

[21056]MRS YELVERTON BARRY: Disgraceful! There’s no excuse for him! A married

[21057]man!

[21058]

[21059]BLOOM: All these people. I meant only the spanking idea. A warm tingling

[21060]glow without effusion. Refined birching to stimulate the circulation.

[21061]

[21062]THE HONOURABLE MRS MERVYN TALBOYS: (Laughs derisively.) O, did you, my

[21063]fine fellow? Well, by the living God, you’ll get the surprise of your

[21064]life now, believe me, the most unmerciful hiding a man ever bargained

[21065]for. You have lashed the dormant tigress in my nature into fury.

[21066]

[21067]MRS BELLINGHAM: (Shakes her muff and quizzing-glasses vindictively.)

[21068]Make him smart, Hanna dear. Give him ginger. Thrash the mongrel within

[21069]an inch of his life. The cat-o’-nine-tails. Geld him. Vivisect him.

[21070]

[21071]BLOOM: (Shuddering, shrinking, joins his hands: with hangdog mien.) O

[21072]cold! O shivery! It was your ambrosial beauty. Forget, forgive. Kismet.

[21073]Let me off this once. (He offers the other cheek.)

[21074]

[21075]MRS YELVERTON BARRY: (Severely.) Don’t do so on any account, Mrs

[21076]Talboys! He should be soundly trounced!

[21077]

[21078]THE HONOURABLE MRS MERVYN TALBOYS: (Unbuttoning her gauntlet violently.)

[21079]I’ll do no such thing. Pigdog and always was ever since he was

[21080]pupped! To dare address me! I’ll flog him black and blue in the public

[21081]streets. I’ll dig my spurs in him up to the rowel. He is a wellknown

[21082]cuckold. (She swishes her huntingcrop savagely in the air.) Take down

[21083]his trousers without loss of time. Come here, sir! Quick! Ready?

[21084]

[21085]BLOOM: (Trembling, beginning to obey.) The weather has been so warm.

[21086]

[21087](Davy Stephens, ringletted, passes with a bevy of barefoot newsboys.)

[21088]

[21089]DAVY STEPHENS: Messenger of the Sacred Heart and Evening Telegraph with

[21090]Saint Patrick’s Day supplement. Containing the new addresses of all

[21091]the cuckolds in Dublin.

[21092]

[21093](The very reverend Canon O’Hanlon in cloth of gold cope elevates and

[21094]exposes a marble timepiece. Before him Father Conroy and the reverend

[21095]John Hughes S. J. bend low.)

[21096]

[21097]THE TIMEPIECE: (Unportalling.)

[21098]

[21099] Cuckoo.

[21100] Cuckoo.

[21101] Cuckoo.

[21102](The brass quoits of a bed are heard to jingle.)

[21103]

[21104]THE QUOITS: Jigjag. Jigajiga. Jigjag.

[21105]

[21106](A panel of fog rolls back rapidly, revealing rapidly in the jurybox

[21107]the faces of Martin Cunningham, foreman, silkhatted, Jack Power, Simon

[21108]Dedalus, Tom Kernan, Ned Lambert, John Henry Menton, Myles Crawford,

[21109]Lenehan, Paddy Leonard, Nosey Flynn, M’Coy and the featureless face of

[21110]a Nameless One.)

[21111]

[21112]THE NAMELESS ONE: Bareback riding. Weight for age. Gob, he organised

[21113]her.

[21114]

[21115]THE JURORS: (All their heads turned to his voice.) Really?

[21116]

[21117]THE NAMELESS ONE: (Snarls.) Arse over tip. Hundred shillings to five.

[21118]

[21119]THE JURORS: (All their heads lowered in assent.) Most of us thought as

[21120]much.

[21121]

[21122]FIRST WATCH: He is a marked man. Another girl’s plait cut. Wanted:

[21123]Jack the Ripper. A thousand pounds reward.

[21124]

[21125]SECOND WATCH: (Awed, whispers.) And in black. A mormon. Anarchist.

[21126]

[21127]THE CRIER: (Loudly.) Whereas Leopold Bloom of no fixed abode is a

[21128]wellknown dynamitard, forger, bigamist, bawd and cuckold and a public

[21129]nuisance to the citizens of Dublin and whereas at this commission of

[21130]assizes the most honourable...

[21131]

[21132](His Honour, sir Frederick Falkiner, recorder of Dublin, in judicial

[21133]garb of grey stone rises from the bench, stonebearded. He bears in his

[21134]arms an umbrella sceptre. From his forehead arise starkly the Mosaic

[21135]ramshorns.)

[21136]

[21137]THE RECORDER: I will put an end to this white slave traffic and rid

[21138]Dublin of this odious pest. Scandalous! (He dons the black cap.) Let him

[21139]be taken, Mr Subsheriff, from the dock where he now stands and detained

[21140]in custody in Mountjoy prison during His Majesty’s pleasure and there

[21141]be hanged by the neck until he is dead and therein fail not at your

[21142]peril or may the Lord have mercy on your soul. Remove him. (A black

[21143]skullcap descends upon his head.)

[21144]

[21145](The subsheriff Long John Fanning appears, smoking a pungent Henry

[21146]Clay.)

[21147]

[21148]LONG JOHN FANNING: (Scowls and calls with rich rolling utterance.)

[21149]Who’ll hang Judas Iscariot?

[21150]

[21151](H. Rumbold, master barber, in a bloodcoloured jerkin and tanner’s

[21152]apron, a rope coiled over his shoulder, mounts the block. A life

[21153]preserver and a nailstudded bludgeon are stuck in his belt. He rubs

[21154]grimly his grappling hands, knobbed with knuckledusters.)

[21155]

[21156]RUMBOLD: (To the recorder with sinister familiarity.) Hanging Harry,

[21157]your Majesty, the Mersey terror. Five guineas a jugular. Neck or

[21158]nothing.

[21159]

[21160](The bells of George’s church toll slowly, loud dark iron.)

[21161]

[21162]THE BELLS: Heigho! Heigho!

[21163]

[21164]BLOOM: (Desperately.) Wait. Stop. Gulls. Good heart. I saw. Innocence.

[21165]Girl in the monkeyhouse. Zoo. Lewd chimpanzee. (Breathlessly.) Pelvic

[21166]basin. Her artless blush unmanned me. (Overcome with emotion.) I left

[21167]the precincts. (He turns to a figure in the crowd, appealing.) Hynes,

[21168]may I speak to you? You know me. That three shillings you can keep. If

[21169]you want a little more...

[21170]

[21171]HYNES: (Coldly.) You are a perfect stranger.

[21172]

[21173]SECOND WATCH: (Points to the corner.) The bomb is here.

[21174]

[21175]FIRST WATCH: Infernal machine with a time fuse.

[21176]

[21177]BLOOM: No, no. Pig’s feet. I was at a funeral.

[21178]

[21179]FIRST WATCH: (Draws his truncheon.) Liar!

[21180]

[21181](The beagle lifts his snout, showing the grey scorbutic face of Paddy

[21182]Dignam. He has gnawed all. He exhales a putrid carcasefed breath.

[21183]He grows to human size and shape. His dachshund coat becomes a brown

[21184]mortuary habit. His green eye flashes bloodshot. Half of one ear, all

[21185]the nose and both thumbs are ghouleaten.)

[21186]

[21187]PADDY DIGNAM: (In a hollow voice.) It is true. It was my funeral. Doctor

[21188]Finucane pronounced life extinct when I succumbed to the disease from

[21189]natural causes.

[21190]

[21191](He lifts his mutilated ashen face moonwards and bays lugubriously.)

[21192]

[21193]BLOOM: (In triumph.) You hear?

[21194]

[21195]PADDY DIGNAM: Bloom, I am Paddy Dignam’s spirit. List, list, O list!

[21196]

[21197]BLOOM: The voice is the voice of Esau.

[21198]

[21199]SECOND WATCH: (Blesses himself.) How is that possible?

[21200]

[21201]FIRST WATCH: It is not in the penny catechism.

[21202]

[21203]PADDY DIGNAM: By metempsychosis. Spooks.

[21204]

[21205]A VOICE: O rocks.

[21206]

[21207]PADDY DIGNAM: (Earnestly.) Once I was in the employ of Mr J. H. Menton,

[21208]solicitor, commissioner for oaths and affidavits, of 27 Bachelor’s

[21209]Walk. Now I am defunct, the wall of the heart hypertrophied. Hard lines.

[21210]The poor wife was awfully cut up. How is she bearing it? Keep her off

[21211]that bottle of sherry. (He looks round him.) A lamp. I must satisfy an

[21212]animal need. That buttermilk didn’t agree with me.

[21213]

[21214](The portly figure of John O’Connell, caretaker, stands forth, holding

[21215]a bunch of keys tied with crape. Beside him stands Father Coffey,

[21216]chaplain, toadbellied, wrynecked, in a surplice and bandanna nightcap,

[21217]holding sleepily a staff of twisted poppies.)

[21218]

[21219]FATHER COFFEY: (Yawns, then chants with a hoarse croak.) Namine. Jacobs.

[21220]Vobiscuits. Amen.

[21221]

[21222]JOHN O’CONNELL: (Foghorns stormily through his megaphone.) Dignam,

[21223]Patrick T, deceased.

[21224]

[21225]PADDY DIGNAM: (With pricked up ears, winces.) Overtones. (He wriggles

[21226]forward and places an ear to the ground.) My master’s voice!

[21227]

[21228]JOHN O’CONNELL: Burial docket letter number U. P. eightyfive thousand.

[21229]Field seventeen. House of Keys. Plot, one hundred and one.

[21230]

[21231](Paddy Dignam listens with visible effort, thinking, his tail

[21232]stiffpointed, his ears cocked.)

[21233]

[21234]PADDY DIGNAM: Pray for the repose of his soul.

[21235]

[21236](He worms down through a coalhole, his brown habit trailing its tether

[21237]over rattling pebbles. After him toddles an obese grandfather rat on

[21238]fungus turtle paws under a grey carapace. Dignam’s voice, muffled, is

[21239]heard baying under ground: Dignam’s dead and gone below. Tom Rochford,

[21240]robinredbreasted, in cap and breeches, jumps from his twocolumned

[21241]machine.)

[21242]

[21243]TOM ROCHFORD: (A hand to his breastbone, bows.) Reuben J. A florin I

[21244]find him. (He fixes the manhole with a resolute stare.) My turn now on.

[21245]Follow me up to Carlow.

[21246]

[21247](He executes a daredevil salmon leap in the air and is engulfed in the

[21248]coalhole. Two discs on the columns wobble, eyes of nought. All recedes.

[21249]Bloom plodges forward again through the sump. Kisses chirp amid

[21250]the rifts of fog. A piano sounds. He stands before a lighted house,

[21251]listening. The kisses, winging from their bowers, fly about him,

[21252]twittering, warbling, cooing.)

[21253]

[21254]THE KISSES: (Warbling.) Leo! (Twittering.) Icky licky micky sticky for

[21255]Leo! (Cooing.) Coo coocoo! Yummyyum, Womwom! (Warbling.) Big comebig!

[21256]Pirouette! Leopopold! (Twittering.) Leeolee! (Warbling.) O Leo!

[21257]

[21258](They rustle, flutter upon his garments, alight, bright giddy flecks,

[21259]silvery sequins.)

[21260]

[21261]BLOOM: A man’s touch. Sad music. Church music. Perhaps here.

[21262]

[21263](Zoe Higgins, a young whore in a sapphire slip, closed with three bronze

[21264]buckles, a slim black velvet fillet round her throat, nods, trips down

[21265]the steps and accosts him.)

[21266]

[21267]ZOE: Are you looking for someone? He’s inside with his friend.

[21268]

[21269]BLOOM: Is this Mrs Mack’s?

[21270]

[21271]ZOE: No, eightyone. Mrs Cohen’s. You might go farther and fare worse.

[21272]Mother Slipperslapper. (Familiarly.) She’s on the job herself tonight

[21273]with the vet her tipster that gives her all the winners and pays for

[21274]her son in Oxford. Working overtime but her luck’s turned today.

[21275](Suspiciously.) You’re not his father, are you?

[21276]

[21277]BLOOM: Not I!

[21278]

[21279]ZOE: You both in black. Has little mousey any tickles tonight?

[21280]

[21281](His skin, alert, feels her fingertips approach. A hand glides over his

[21282]left thigh.)

[21283]

[21284]ZOE: How’s the nuts?

[21285]

[21286]BLOOM: Off side. Curiously they are on the right. Heavier, I suppose.

[21287]One in a million my tailor, Mesias, says.

[21288]

[21289]ZOE: (In sudden alarm.) You’ve a hard chancre.

[21290]

[21291]BLOOM: Not likely.

[21292]

[21293]ZOE: I feel it.

[21294]

[21295](Her hand slides into his left trouser pocket and brings out a hard

[21296]black shrivelled potato. She regards it and Bloom with dumb moist lips.)

[21297]

[21298]BLOOM: A talisman. Heirloom.

[21299]

[21300]ZOE: For Zoe? For keeps? For being so nice, eh?

[21301]

[21302](She puts the potato greedily into a pocket then links his arm, cuddling

[21303]him with supple warmth. He smiles uneasily. Slowly, note by note,

[21304]oriental music is played. He gazes in the tawny crystal of her eyes,

[21305]ringed with kohol. His smile softens.)

[21306]

[21307]ZOE: You’ll know me the next time.

[21308]

[21309]BLOOM: (Forlornly.) I never loved a dear gazelle but it was sure to...

[21310]

[21311](Gazelles are leaping, feeding on the mountains. Near are lakes. Round

[21312]their shores file shadows black of cedargroves. Aroma rises, a strong

[21313]hairgrowth of resin. It burns, the orient, a sky of sapphire, cleft by

[21314]the bronze flight of eagles. Under it lies the womancity, nude, white,

[21315]still, cool, in luxury. A fountain murmurs among damask roses. Mammoth

[21316]roses murmur of scarlet winegrapes. A wine of shame, lust, blood exudes,

[21317]strangely murmuring.)

[21318]

[21319]ZOE: (Murmuring singsong with the music, her odalisk lips lusciously

[21320]smeared with salve of swinefat and rosewater.) Schorach ani wenowach,

[21321]benoith Hierushaloim.

[21322]

[21323]BLOOM: (Fascinated.) I thought you were of good stock by your accent.

[21324]

[21325]ZOE: And you know what thought did?

[21326]

[21327](She bites his ear gently with little goldstopped teeth, sending on

[21328]him a cloying breath of stale garlic. The roses draw apart, disclose a

[21329]sepulchre of the gold of kings and their mouldering bones.)

[21330]

[21331]BLOOM: (Draws back, mechanically caressing her right bub with a flat

[21332]awkward hand.) Are you a Dublin girl?

[21333]

[21334]ZOE: (Catches a stray hair deftly and twists it to her coil.) No bloody

[21335]fear. I’m English. Have you a swaggerroot?

[21336]

[21337]BLOOM: (As before.) Rarely smoke, dear. Cigar now and then. Childish

[21338]device. (Lewdly.) The mouth can be better engaged than with a cylinder

[21339]of rank weed.

[21340]

[21341]ZOE: Go on. Make a stump speech out of it.

[21342]

[21343]BLOOM: (In workman’s corduroy overalls, black gansy with red floating

[21344]tie and apache cap.) Mankind is incorrigible. Sir Walter Ralegh brought

[21345]from the new world that potato and that weed, the one a killer of

[21346]pestilence by absorption, the other a poisoner of the ear, eye, heart,

[21347]memory, will, understanding, all. That is to say he brought the poison

[21348]a hundred years before another person whose name I forget brought the

[21349]food. Suicide. Lies. All our habits. Why, look at our public life!

[21350]

[21351](Midnight chimes from distant steeples.)

[21352]

[21353]THE CHIMES: Turn again, Leopold! Lord mayor of Dublin!

[21354]

[21355]BLOOM: (In alderman’s gown and chain.) Electors of Arran Quay, Inns

[21356]Quay, Rotunda, Mountjoy and North Dock, better run a tramline, I say,

[21357]from the cattlemarket to the river. That’s the music of the future.

[21358]That’s my programme. Cui bono? But our bucaneering Vanderdeckens in

[21359]their phantom ship of finance...

[21360]

[21361]AN ELECTOR: Three times three for our future chief magistrate!

[21362]

[21363](The aurora borealis of the torchlight procession leaps.)

[21364]

[21365]THE TORCHBEARERS: Hooray!

[21366]

[21367](Several wellknown burgesses, city magnates and freemen of the city

[21368]shake hands with Bloom and congratulate him. Timothy Harrington, late

[21369]thrice Lord Mayor of Dublin, imposing in mayoral scarlet, gold chain and

[21370]white silk tie, confers with councillor Lorcan Sherlock, locum tenens.

[21371]They nod vigorously in agreement.)

[21372]

[21373]LATE LORD MAYOR HARRINGTON: (In scarlet robe with mace, gold mayoral

[21374]chain and large white silk scarf.) That alderman sir Leo Bloom’s

[21375]speech be printed at the expense of the ratepayers. That the house in

[21376]which he was born be ornamented with a commemorative tablet and that the

[21377]thoroughfare hitherto known as Cow Parlour off Cork street be henceforth

[21378]designated Boulevard Bloom.

[21379]

[21380]COUNCILLOR LORCAN SHERLOCK: Carried unanimously.

[21381]

[21382]BLOOM: (Impassionedly.) These flying Dutchmen or lying Dutchmen as

[21383]they recline in their upholstered poop, casting dice, what reck they?

[21384]Machines is their cry, their chimera, their panacea. Laboursaving

[21385]apparatuses, supplanters, bugbears, manufactured monsters for mutual

[21386]murder, hideous hobgoblins produced by a horde of capitalistic lusts

[21387]upon our prostituted labour. The poor man starves while they are

[21388]grassing their royal mountain stags or shooting peasants and phartridges

[21389]in their purblind pomp of pelf and power. But their reign is rover for

[21390]rever and ever and ev...

[21391]

[21392](Prolonged applause. Venetian masts, maypoles and festal arches spring

[21393]up. A streamer bearing the legends Cead Mile Failte and Mah Ttob Melek

[21394]Israel spans the street. All the windows are thronged with sightseers,

[21395]chiefly ladies. Along the route the regiments of the Royal Dublin

[21396]Fusiliers, the King’s own Scottish Borderers, the Cameron Highlanders

[21397]and the Welsh Fusiliers, standing to attention, keep back the crowd.

[21398]Boys from High school are perched on the lampposts, telegraph poles,

[21399]windowsills, cornices, gutters, chimneypots, railings, rainspouts,

[21400]whistling and cheering. The pillar of the cloud appears. A fife and

[21401]drum band is heard in the distance playing the Kol Nidre. The beaters

[21402]approach with imperial eagles hoisted, trailing banners and waving

[21403]oriental palms. The chryselephantine papal standard rises high,

[21404]surrounded by pennons of the civic flag. The van of the procession

[21405]appears headed by John Howard Parnell, city marshal, in a chessboard

[21406]tabard, the Athlone Poursuivant and Ulster King of Arms. They are

[21407]followed by the Right Honourable Joseph Hutchinson, lord mayor of

[21408]Dublin, his lordship the lord mayor of Cork, their worships the

[21409]mayors of Limerick, Galway, Sligo and Waterford, twentyeight Irish

[21410]representative peers, sirdars, grandees and maharajahs bearing the cloth

[21411]of estate, the Dublin Metropolitan Fire Brigade, the chapter of the

[21412]saints of finance in their plutocratic order of precedence, the bishop

[21413]of Down and Connor, His Eminence Michael cardinal Logue, archbishop of

[21414]Armagh, primate of all Ireland, His Grace, the most reverend Dr William

[21415]Alexander, archbishop of Armagh, primate of all Ireland, the chief

[21416]rabbi, the presbyterian moderator, the heads of the baptist, anabaptist,

[21417]methodist and Moravian chapels and the honorary secretary of the society

[21418]of friends. After them march the guilds and trades and trainbands

[21419]with flying colours: coopers, bird fanciers, millwrights, newspaper

[21420]canvassers, law scriveners, masseurs, vintners, trussmakers,

[21421]chimneysweeps, lard refiners, tabinet and poplin weavers, farriers,

[21422]Italian warehousemen, church decorators, bootjack manufacturers,

[21423]undertakers, silk mercers, lapidaries, salesmasters, corkcutters,

[21424]assessors of fire losses, dyers and cleaners, export bottlers,

[21425]fellmongers, ticketwriters, heraldic seal engravers, horse repository

[21426]hands, bullion brokers, cricket and archery outfitters, riddlemakers,

[21427]egg and potato factors, hosiers and glovers, plumbing contractors. After

[21428]them march gentlemen of the bedchamber, Black Rod, Deputy Garter,

[21429]Gold Stick, the master of horse, the lord great chamberlain, the

[21430]earl marshal, the high constable carrying the sword of state, saint

[21431]Stephen’s iron crown, the chalice and bible. Four buglers on foot blow

[21432]a sennet. Beefeaters reply, winding clarions of welcome. Under an arch

[21433]of triumph Bloom appears, bareheaded, in a crimson velvet mantle trimmed

[21434]with ermine, bearing Saint Edward’s staff, the orb and sceptre with

[21435]the dove, the curtana. He is seated on a milkwhite horse with long

[21436]flowing crimson tail, richly caparisoned, with golden headstall. Wild

[21437]excitement. The ladies from their balconies throw down rosepetals. The

[21438]air is perfumed with essences. The men cheer. Bloom’s boys run amid

[21439]the bystanders with branches of hawthorn and wrenbushes.)

[21440]

[21441]BLOOM’S BOYS:

[21442]

[21443] The wren, the wren,

[21444] The king of all birds,

[21445] Saint Stephen’s his day

[21446] Was caught in the furze.

[21447]A BLACKSMITH: (Murmurs.) For the honour of God! And is that Bloom? He

[21448]scarcely looks thirtyone.

[21449]

[21450]A PAVIOR AND FLAGGER: That’s the famous Bloom now, the world’s

[21451]greatest reformer. Hats off!

[21452]

[21453](All uncover their heads. Women whisper eagerly.)

[21454]

[21455]A MILLIONAIRESS: (Richly.) Isn’t he simply wonderful?

[21456]

[21457]A NOBLEWOMAN: (Nobly.) All that man has seen!

[21458]

[21459]A FEMINIST: (Masculinely.) And done!

[21460]

[21461]A BELLHANGER: A classic face! He has the forehead of a thinker.

[21462]

[21463](Bloom’s weather. A sunburst appears in the northwest.)

[21464]

[21465]THE BISHOP OF DOWN AND CONNOR: I here present your undoubted

[21466]emperor-president and king-chairman, the most serene and potent and very

[21467]puissant ruler of this realm. God save Leopold the First!

[21468]

[21469]ALL: God save Leopold the First!

[21470]

[21471]BLOOM: (In dalmatic and purple mantle, to the bishop of Down and Connor,

[21472]with dignity.) Thanks, somewhat eminent sir.

[21473]

[21474]WILLIAM, ARCHBISHOP OF ARMAGH: (In purple stock and shovel hat.)

[21475]Will you to your power cause law and mercy to be executed in all your

[21476]judgments in Ireland and territories thereunto belonging?

[21477]

[21478]BLOOM: (Placing his right hand on his testicles, swears.) So may the

[21479]Creator deal with me. All this I promise to do.

[21480]

[21481]MICHAEL, ARCHBISHOP OF ARMAGH: (Pours a cruse of hairoil over Bloom’s

[21482]head.) Gaudium magnum annuntio vobis. Habemus carneficem. Leopold,

[21483]Patrick, Andrew, David, George, be thou anointed!

[21484]

[21485](Bloom assumes a mantle of cloth of gold and puts on a ruby ring. He

[21486]ascends and stands on the stone of destiny. The representative peers put

[21487]on at the same time their twentyeight crowns. Joybells ring in Christ

[21488]church, Saint Patrick’s, George’s and gay Malahide. Mirus bazaar

[21489]fireworks go up from all sides with symbolical phallopyrotechnic

[21490]designs. The peers do homage, one by one, approaching and genuflecting.)

[21491]

[21492]THE PEERS: I do become your liege man of life and limb to earthly

[21493]worship.

[21494]

[21495](Bloom holds up his right hand on which sparkles the Koh-i-Noor diamond.

[21496]His palfrey neighs. Immediate silence. Wireless intercontinental and

[21497]interplanetary transmitters are set for reception of message.)

[21498]

[21499]BLOOM: My subjects! We hereby nominate our faithful charger Copula Felix

[21500]hereditary Grand Vizier and announce that we have this day repudiated

[21501]our former spouse and have bestowed our royal hand upon the princess

[21502]Selene, the splendour of night.

[21503]

[21504](The former morganatic spouse of Bloom is hastily removed in the Black

[21505]Maria. The princess Selene, in moonblue robes, a silver crescent on her

[21506]head, descends from a Sedan chair, borne by two giants. An outburst of

[21507]cheering.)

[21508]

[21509]JOHN HOWARD PARNELL: (Raises the royal standard.) Illustrious Bloom!

[21510]Successor to my famous brother!

[21511]

[21512]BLOOM: (Embraces John Howard Parnell.) We thank you from our heart,

[21513]John, for this right royal welcome to green Erin, the promised land of

[21514]our common ancestors.

[21515]

[21516](The freedom of the city is presented to him embodied in a charter. The

[21517]keys of Dublin, crossed on a crimson cushion, are given to him. He shows

[21518]all that he is wearing green socks.)

[21519]

[21520]TOM KERNAN: You deserve it, your honour.

[21521]

[21522]BLOOM: On this day twenty years ago we overcame the hereditary enemy at

[21523]Ladysmith. Our howitzers and camel swivel guns played on his lines with

[21524]telling effect. Half a league onward! They charge! All is lost now! Do

[21525]we yield? No! We drive them headlong! Lo! We charge! Deploying to the

[21526]left our light horse swept across the heights of Plevna and, uttering

[21527]their warcry Bonafide Sabaoth, sabred the Saracen gunners to a man.

[21528]

[21529]THE CHAPEL OF FREEMAN TYPESETTERS: Hear! Hear!

[21530]

[21531]JOHN WYSE NOLAN: There’s the man that got away James Stephens.

[21532]

[21533]A BLUECOAT SCHOOLBOY: Bravo!

[21534]

[21535]AN OLD RESIDENT: You’re a credit to your country, sir, that’s what

[21536]you are.

[21537]

[21538]AN APPLEWOMAN: He’s a man like Ireland wants.

[21539]

[21540]BLOOM: My beloved subjects, a new era is about to dawn. I, Bloom, tell

[21541]you verily it is even now at hand. Yea, on the word of a Bloom, ye shall

[21542]ere long enter into the golden city which is to be, the new Bloomusalem

[21543]in the Nova Hibernia of the future.

[21544]

[21545](Thirtytwo workmen, wearing rosettes, from all the counties of Ireland,

[21546]under the guidance of Derwan the builder, construct the new Bloomusalem.

[21547]It is a colossal edifice with crystal roof, built in the shape of a

[21548]huge pork kidney, containing forty thousand rooms. In the course of its

[21549]extension several buildings and monuments are demolished. Government

[21550]offices are temporarily transferred to railway sheds. Numerous houses

[21551]are razed to the ground. The inhabitants are lodged in barrels and

[21552]boxes, all marked in red with the letters: L. B. Several paupers

[21553]fall from a ladder. A part of the walls of Dublin, crowded with loyal

[21554]sightseers, collapses.)

[21555]

[21556]THE SIGHTSEERS: (Dying.) Morituri te salutant. (They die.)

[21557]

[21558](A man in a brown macintosh springs up through a trapdoor. He points an

[21559]elongated finger at Bloom.)

[21560]

[21561]THE MAN IN THE MACINTOSH: Don’t you believe a word he says. That

[21562]man is Leopold M’Intosh, the notorious fireraiser. His real name is

[21563]Higgins.

[21564]

[21565]BLOOM: Shoot him! Dog of a christian! So much for M’Intosh!

[21566]

[21567](A cannonshot. The man in the macintosh disappears. Bloom with his

[21568]sceptre strikes down poppies. The instantaneous deaths of many

[21569]powerful enemies, graziers, members of parliament, members of standing

[21570]committees, are reported. Bloom’s bodyguard distribute Maundy money,

[21571]commemoration medals, loaves and fishes, temperance badges, expensive

[21572]Henry Clay cigars, free cowbones for soup, rubber preservatives in

[21573]sealed envelopes tied with gold thread, butter scotch, pineapple rock,

[21574]billets doux in the form of cocked hats, readymade suits, porringers of

[21575]toad in the hole, bottles of Jeyes’ Fluid, purchase stamps, 40 days’

[21576]indulgences, spurious coins, dairyfed pork sausages, theatre passes,

[21577]season tickets available for all tramlines, coupons of the royal and

[21578]privileged Hungarian lottery, penny dinner counters, cheap reprints of

[21579]the World’s Twelve Worst Books: Froggy And Fritz (politic), Care of

[21580]the Baby (infantilic), 50 Meals for 7/6 (culinic), Was Jesus a Sun

[21581]Myth? (historic), Expel that Pain (medic), Infant’s Compendium of the

[21582]Universe (cosmic), Let’s All Chortle (hilaric), Canvasser’s Vade

[21583]Mecum (journalic), Loveletters of Mother Assistant (erotic), Who’s Who

[21584]in Space (astric), Songs that Reached Our Heart (melodic), Pennywise’s

[21585]Way to Wealth (parsimonic). A general rush and scramble. Women press

[21586]forward to touch the hem of Bloom’s robe. The lady Gwendolen Dubedat

[21587]bursts through the throng, leaps on his horse and kisses him on both

[21588]cheeks amid great acclamation. A magnesium flashlight photograph is

[21589]taken. Babes and sucklings are held up.)

[21590]

[21591]THE WOMEN: Little father! Little father!

[21592]

[21593]THE BABES AND SUCKLINGS:

[21594]

[21595] Clap clap hands till Poldy comes home,

[21596] Cakes in his pocket for Leo alone.

[21597](Bloom, bending down, pokes Baby Boardman gently in the stomach.)

[21598]

[21599]BABY BOARDMAN: (Hiccups, curdled milk flowing from his mouth.) Hajajaja.

[21600]

[21601]BLOOM: (Shaking hands with a blind stripling.) My more than Brother!

[21602](Placing his arms round the shoulders of an old couple.) Dear old

[21603]friends! (He plays pussy fourcorners with ragged boys and girls.)

[21604]Peep! Bopeep! (He wheels twins in a perambulator.) Ticktacktwo

[21605]wouldyousetashoe? (He performs juggler’s tricks, draws red, orange,

[21606]yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet silk handkerchiefs from his

[21607]mouth.) Roygbiv. 32 feet per second. (He consoles a widow.) Absence

[21608]makes the heart grow younger. (He dances the Highland fling with

[21609]grotesque antics.) Leg it, ye devils! (He kisses the bedsores of a

[21610]palsied veteran.) Honourable wounds! (He trips up a fat policeman.)

[21611]U. p: up. U. p: up. (He whispers in the ear of a blushing waitress and

[21612]laughs kindly.) Ah, naughty, naughty! (He eats a raw turnip offered

[21613]him by Maurice Butterly, farmer.) Fine! Splendid! (He refuses to accept

[21614]three shillings offered him by Joseph Hynes, journalist.) My dear

[21615]fellow, not at all! (He gives his coat to a beggar.) Please accept. (He

[21616]takes part in a stomach race with elderly male and female cripples.)

[21617]Come on, boys! Wriggle it, girls!

[21618]

[21619]THE CITIZEN: (Choked with emotion, brushes aside a tear in his emerald

[21620]muffler.) May the good God bless him!

[21621]

[21622](The rams’ horns sound for silence. The standard of Zion is hoisted.)

[21623]

[21624]BLOOM: (Uncloaks impressively, revealing obesity, unrolls a paper and

[21625]reads solemnly.) Aleph Beth Ghimel Daleth Hagadah Tephilim Kosher Yom

[21626]Kippur Hanukah Roschaschana Beni Brith Bar Mitzvah Mazzoth Askenazim

[21627]Meshuggah Talith.

[21628]

[21629](An official translation is read by Jimmy Henry, assistant town clerk.)

[21630]

[21631]JIMMY HENRY: The Court of Conscience is now open. His Most Catholic

[21632]Majesty will now administer open air justice. Free medical and legal

[21633]advice, solution of doubles and other problems. All cordially invited.

[21634]Given at this our loyal city of Dublin in the year 1 of the Paradisiacal

[21635]Era.

[21636]

[21637]PADDY LEONARD: What am I to do about my rates and taxes?

[21638]

[21639]BLOOM: Pay them, my friend.

[21640]

[21641]PADDY LEONARD: Thank you.

[21642]

[21643]NOSEY FLYNN: Can I raise a mortgage on my fire insurance?

[21644]

[21645]BLOOM: (Obdurately.) Sirs, take notice that by the law of torts you are

[21646]bound over in your own recognisances for six months in the sum of five

[21647]pounds.

[21648]

[21649]J. J. O’MOLLOY: A Daniel did I say? Nay! A Peter O’Brien!

[21650]

[21651]NOSEY FLYNN: Where do I draw the five pounds?

[21652]

[21653]PISSER BURKE: For bladder trouble?

[21654]

[21655]BLOOM:

[21656]

[21657] Acid. nit. hydrochlor. dil., 20 minims

[21658] Tinct. nux vom., 5 minims

[21659] Extr. taraxel. lig., 30 minims.

[21660] Aq. dis. ter in die.

[21661]CHRIS CALLINAN: What is the parallax of the subsolar ecliptic of

[21662]Aldebaran?

[21663]

[21664]BLOOM: Pleased to hear from you, Chris. K. 11.

[21665]

[21666]JOE HYNES: Why aren’t you in uniform?

[21667]

[21668]BLOOM: When my progenitor of sainted memory wore the uniform of the

[21669]Austrian despot in a dank prison where was yours?

[21670]

[21671]BEN DOLLARD: Pansies?

[21672]

[21673]BLOOM: Embellish (beautify) suburban gardens.

[21674]

[21675]BEN DOLLARD: When twins arrive?

[21676]

[21677]BLOOM: Father (pater, dad) starts thinking.

[21678]

[21679]LARRY O’ROURKE: An eightday licence for my new premises. You remember

[21680]me, sir Leo, when you were in number seven. I’m sending around a dozen

[21681]of stout for the missus.

[21682]

[21683]BLOOM: (Coldly.) You have the advantage of me. Lady Bloom accepts no

[21684]presents.

[21685]

[21686]CROFTON: This is indeed a festivity.

[21687]

[21688]BLOOM: (Solemnly.) You call it a festivity. I call it a sacrament.

[21689]

[21690]ALEXANDER KEYES: When will we have our own house of keys?

[21691]

[21692]BLOOM: I stand for the reform of municipal morals and the plain ten

[21693]commandments. New worlds for old. Union of all, jew, moslem and gentile.

[21694]Three acres and a cow for all children of nature. Saloon motor hearses.

[21695]Compulsory manual labour for all. All parks open to the public day and

[21696]night. Electric dishscrubbers. Tuberculosis, lunacy, war and mendicancy

[21697]must now cease. General amnesty, weekly carnival with masked licence,

[21698]bonuses for all, esperanto the universal language with universal

[21699]brotherhood. No more patriotism of barspongers and dropsical impostors.

[21700]Free money, free rent, free love and a free lay church in a free lay

[21701]state.

[21702]

[21703]O’MADDEN BURKE: Free fox in a free henroost.

[21704]

[21705]DAVY BYRNE: (Yawning.) Iiiiiiiiiaaaaaaach!

[21706]

[21707]BLOOM: Mixed races and mixed marriage.

[21708]

[21709]LENEHAN: What about mixed bathing?

[21710]

[21711](Bloom explains to those near him his schemes for social regeneration.

[21712]All agree with him. The keeper of the Kildare street museum appears,

[21713]dragging a lorry on which are the shaking statues of several naked

[21714]goddesses, Venus Callipyge, Venus Pandemos, Venus Metempsychosis, and

[21715]plaster figures, also naked, representing the new nine muses, Commerce,

[21716]Operatic Music, Amor, Publicity, Manufacture, Liberty of Speech, Plural

[21717]Voting, Gastronomy, Private Hygiene, Seaside Concert Entertainments,

[21718]Painless Obstetrics and Astronomy for the People.)

[21719]

[21720]FATHER FARLEY: He is an episcopalian, an agnostic, an anythingarian

[21721]seeking to overthrow our holy faith.

[21722]

[21723]MRS RIORDAN: (Tears up her will.) I’m disappointed in you! You bad

[21724]man!

[21725]

[21726]MOTHER GROGAN: (Removes her boot to throw it at Bloom.) You beast! You

[21727]abominable person!

[21728]

[21729]NOSEY FLYNN: Give us a tune, Bloom. One of the old sweet songs.

[21730]

[21731]BLOOM: (With rollicking humour.)

[21732]

[21733] I vowed that I never would leave her,

[21734] She turned out a cruel deceiver.

[21735] With my tooraloom tooraloom tooraloom tooraloom.

[21736]HOPPY HOLOHAN: Good old Bloom! There’s nobody like him after all.

[21737]

[21738]PADDY LEONARD: Stage Irishman!

[21739]

[21740]BLOOM: What railway opera is like a tramline in Gibraltar? The Rows of

[21741]Casteele.

[21742]

[21743](Laughter.)

[21744]

[21745]LENEHAN: Plagiarist! Down with Bloom!

[21746]

[21747]THE VEILED SIBYL: (Enthusiastically.) I’m a Bloomite and I glory in

[21748]it. I believe in him in spite of all. I’d give my life for him, the

[21749]funniest man on earth.

[21750]

[21751]BLOOM: (Winks at the bystanders.) I bet she’s a bonny lassie.

[21752]

[21753]THEODORE PUREFOY: (In fishingcap and oilskin jacket.) He employs a

[21754]mechanical device to frustrate the sacred ends of nature.

[21755]

[21756]THE VEILED SIBYL: (Stabs herself.) My hero god! (She dies.)

[21757]

[21758](Many most attractive and enthusiastic women also commit suicide by

[21759]stabbing, drowning, drinking prussic acid, aconite, arsenic, opening

[21760]their veins, refusing food, casting themselves under steamrollers,

[21761]from the top of Nelson’s Pillar, into the great vat of Guinness’s

[21762]brewery, asphyxiating themselves by placing their heads in gasovens,

[21763]hanging themselves in stylish garters, leaping from windows of different

[21764]storeys.)

[21765]

[21766]ALEXANDER J DOWIE: (Violently.) Fellowchristians and antiBloomites, the

[21767]man called Bloom is from the roots of hell, a disgrace to christian

[21768]men. A fiendish libertine from his earliest years this stinking goat

[21769]of Mendes gave precocious signs of infantile debauchery, recalling the

[21770]cities of the plain, with a dissolute granddam. This vile hypocrite,

[21771]bronzed with infamy, is the white bull mentioned in the Apocalypse.

[21772]A worshipper of the Scarlet Woman, intrigue is the very breath of his

[21773]nostrils. The stake faggots and the caldron of boiling oil are for him.

[21774]Caliban!

[21775]

[21776]THE MOB: Lynch him! Roast him! He’s as bad as Parnell was. Mr Fox!

[21777]

[21778](Mother Grogan throws her boot at Bloom. Several shopkeepers from upper

[21779]and lower Dorset street throw objects of little or no commercial

[21780]value, hambones, condensed milk tins, unsaleable cabbage, stale bread,

[21781]sheep’s tails, odd pieces of fat.)

[21782]

[21783]BLOOM: (Excitedly.) This is midsummer madness, some ghastly joke again.

[21784]By heaven, I am guiltless as the unsunned snow! It was my brother Henry.

[21785]He is my double. He lives in number 2 Dolphin’s Barn. Slander, the

[21786]viper, has wrongfully accused me. Fellowcountrymen, sgenl inn ban bata

[21787]coisde gan capall. I call on my old friend, Dr Malachi Mulligan, sex

[21788]specialist, to give medical testimony on my behalf.

[21789]

[21790]DR MULLIGAN: (In motor jerkin, green motorgoggles on his brow.) Dr Bloom

[21791]is bisexually abnormal. He has recently escaped from Dr Eustace’s

[21792]private asylum for demented gentlemen. Born out of bedlock hereditary

[21793]epilepsy is present, the consequence of unbridled lust. Traces of

[21794]elephantiasis have been discovered among his ascendants. There are

[21795]marked symptoms of chronic exhibitionism. Ambidexterity is also

[21796]latent. He is prematurely bald from selfabuse, perversely idealistic in

[21797]consequence, a reformed rake, and has metal teeth. In consequence of a

[21798]family complex he has temporarily lost his memory and I believe him

[21799]to be more sinned against than sinning. I have made a pervaginal

[21800]examination and, after application of the acid test to 5427 anal,

[21801]axillary, pectoral and pubic hairs, I declare him to be virgo intacta.

[21802]

[21803](Bloom holds his high grade hat over his genital organs.)

[21804]

[21805]DR MADDEN: Hypsospadia is also marked. In the interest of coming

[21806]generations I suggest that the parts affected should be preserved in

[21807]spirits of wine in the national teratological museum.

[21808]

[21809]DR CROTTHERS: I have examined the patient’s urine. It is albuminoid.

[21810]Salivation is insufficient, the patellar reflex intermittent.

[21811]

[21812]DR PUNCH COSTELLO: The fetor judaicus is most perceptible.

[21813]

[21814]DR DIXON: (Reads a bill of health.) Professor Bloom is a finished

[21815]example of the new womanly man. His moral nature is simple and lovable.

[21816]Many have found him a dear man, a dear person. He is a rather quaint

[21817]fellow on the whole, coy though not feebleminded in the medical sense.

[21818]He has written a really beautiful letter, a poem in itself, to the court

[21819]missionary of the Reformed Priests’ Protection Society which clears up

[21820]everything. He is practically a total abstainer and I can affirm that

[21821]he sleeps on a straw litter and eats the most Spartan food, cold dried

[21822]grocer’s peas. He wears a hairshirt of pure Irish manufacture winter

[21823]and summer and scourges himself every Saturday. He was, I understand,

[21824]at one time a firstclass misdemeanant in Glencree reformatory. Another

[21825]report states that he was a very posthumous child. I appeal for clemency

[21826]in the name of the most sacred word our vocal organs have ever been

[21827]called upon to speak. He is about to have a baby.

[21828]

[21829](General commotion and compassion. Women faint. A wealthy American makes

[21830]a street collection for Bloom. Gold and silver coins, blank cheques,

[21831]banknotes, jewels, treasury bonds, maturing bills of exchange, I. O.

[21832]U’s, wedding rings, watchchains, lockets, necklaces and bracelets are

[21833]rapidly collected.)

[21834]

[21835]BLOOM: O, I so want to be a mother.

[21836]

[21837]MRS THORNTON: (In nursetender’s gown.) Embrace me tight, dear.

[21838]You’ll be soon over it. Tight, dear.

[21839]

[21840](Bloom embraces her tightly and bears eight male yellow and white

[21841]children. They appear on a redcarpeted staircase adorned with expensive

[21842]plants. All the octuplets are handsome, with valuable metallic faces,

[21843]wellmade, respectably dressed and wellconducted, speaking five modern

[21844]languages fluently and interested in various arts and sciences. Each

[21845]has his name printed in legible letters on his shirtfront: Nasodoro,

[21846]Goldfinger, Chrysostomos, Maindorée, Silversmile, Silberselber,

[21847]Vifargent, Panargyros. They are immediately appointed to positions of

[21848]high public trust in several different countries as managing directors

[21849]of banks, traffic managers of railways, chairmen of limited liability

[21850]companies, vicechairmen of hotel syndicates.)

[21851]

[21852]A VOICE: Bloom, are you the Messiah ben Joseph or ben David?

[21853]

[21854]BLOOM: (Darkly.) You have said it.

[21855]

[21856]BROTHER BUZZ: Then perform a miracle like Father Charles.

[21857]

[21858]BANTAM LYONS: Prophesy who will win the Saint Leger.

[21859]

[21860](Bloom walks on a net, covers his left eye with his left ear, passes

[21861]through several walls, climbs Nelson’s Pillar, hangs from the top

[21862]ledge by his eyelids, eats twelve dozen oysters (shells included),

[21863]heals several sufferers from king’s evil, contracts his face so as to

[21864]resemble many historical personages, Lord Beaconsfield, Lord Byron,

[21865]Wat Tyler, Moses of Egypt, Moses Maimonides, Moses Mendelssohn, Henry

[21866]Irving, Rip van Winkle, Kossuth, Jean Jacques Rousseau, Baron Leopold

[21867]Rothschild, Robinson Crusoe, Sherlock Holmes, Pasteur, turns each

[21868]foot simultaneously in different directions, bids the tide turn back,

[21869]eclipses the sun by extending his little finger.)

[21870]

[21871]BRINI, PAPAL NUNCIO: (In papal zouave’s uniform, steel cuirasses as

[21872]breastplate, armplates, thighplates, legplates, large profane moustaches

[21873]and brown paper mitre.) Leopoldi autem generatio. Moses begat Noah and

[21874]Noah begat Eunuch and Eunuch begat O’Halloran and O’Halloran begat

[21875]Guggenheim and Guggenheim begat Agendath and Agendath begat Netaim and

[21876]Netaim begat Le Hirsch and Le Hirsch begat Jesurum and Jesurum begat

[21877]MacKay and MacKay begat Ostrolopsky and Ostrolopsky begat Smerdoz

[21878]and Smerdoz begat Weiss and Weiss begat Schwarz and Schwarz begat

[21879]Adrianopoli and Adrianopoli begat Aranjuez and Aranjuez begat Lewy

[21880]Lawson and Lewy Lawson begat Ichabudonosor and Ichabudonosor begat

[21881]O’Donnell Magnus and O’Donnell Magnus begat Christbaum and

[21882]Christbaum begat ben Maimun and ben Maimun begat Dusty Rhodes and Dusty

[21883]Rhodes begat Benamor and Benamor begat Jones-Smith and Jones-Smith begat

[21884]Savorgnanovich and Savorgnanovich begat Jasperstone and Jasperstone

[21885]begat Vingtetunieme and Vingtetunieme begat Szombathely and Szombathely

[21886]begat Virag and Virag begat Bloom et vocabitur nomen eius Emmanuel.

[21887]

[21888]A DEADHAND: (Writes on the wall.) Bloom is a cod.

[21889]

[21890]CRAB: (In bushranger’s kit.) What did you do in the cattlecreep behind

[21891]Kilbarrack?

[21892]

[21893]A FEMALE INFANT: (Shakes a rattle.) And under Ballybough bridge?

[21894]

[21895]A HOLLYBUSH: And in the devil’s glen?

[21896]

[21897]BLOOM: (Blushes furiously all over from frons to nates, three tears

[21898]falling from his left eye.) Spare my past.

[21899]

[21900]THE IRISH EVICTED TENANTS: (In bodycoats, kneebreeches, with Donnybrook

[21901]fair shillelaghs.) Sjambok him!

[21902]

[21903](Bloom with asses’ ears seats himself in the pillory with crossed

[21904]arms, his feet protruding. He whistles Don Giovanni, a cenar teco.

[21905]Artane orphans, joining hands, caper round him. Girls of the Prison Gate

[21906]Mission, joining hands, caper round in the opposite direction.)

[21907]

[21908]THE ARTANE ORPHANS:

[21909]

[21910] You hig, you hog, you dirty dog!

[21911] You think the ladies love you!

[21912]THE PRISON GATE GIRLS:

[21913]

[21914] If you see Kay

[21915] Tell him he may

[21916] See you in tea

[21917] Tell him from me.

[21918]HORNBLOWER: (In ephod and huntingcap, announces.) And he shall carry the

[21919]sins of the people to Azazel, the spirit which is in the wilderness, and

[21920]to Lilith, the nighthag. And they shall stone him and defile him, yea,

[21921]all from Agendath Netaim and from Mizraim, the land of Ham.

[21922]

[21923](All the people cast soft pantomime stones at Bloom. Many bonafide

[21924]travellers and ownerless dogs come near him and defile him. Mastiansky

[21925]and Citron approach in gaberdines, wearing long earlocks. They wag their

[21926]beards at Bloom.)

[21927]

[21928]MASTIANSKY AND CITRON: Belial! Laemlein of Istria, the false Messiah!

[21929]Abulafia! Recant!

[21930]

[21931](George R Mesias, Bloom’s tailor, appears, a tailor’s goose under

[21932]his arm, presenting a bill.)

[21933]

[21934]MESIAS: To alteration one pair trousers eleven shillings.

[21935]

[21936]BLOOM: (Rubs his hands cheerfully.) Just like old times. Poor Bloom!

[21937]

[21938](Reuben J Dodd, blackbearded Iscariot, bad shepherd, bearing on his

[21939]shoulders the drowned corpse of his son, approaches the pillory.)

[21940]

[21941]REUBEN J: (Whispers hoarsely.) The squeak is out. A split is gone for

[21942]the flatties. Nip the first rattler.

[21943]

[21944]THE FIRE BRIGADE: Pflaap!

[21945]

[21946]BROTHER BUZZ: (Invests Bloom in a yellow habit with embroidery of

[21947]painted flames and high pointed hat. He places a bag of gunpowder round

[21948]his neck and hands him over to the civil power, saying.) Forgive him his

[21949]trespasses.

[21950]

[21951](Lieutenant Myers of the Dublin Fire Brigade by general request sets

[21952]fire to Bloom. Lamentations.)

[21953]

[21954]THE CITIZEN: Thank heaven!

[21955]

[21956]BLOOM: (In a seamless garment marked I. H. S. stands upright amid

[21957]phoenix flames.) Weep not for me, O daughters of Erin.

[21958]

[21959](He exhibits to Dublin reporters traces of burning. The daughters of

[21960]Erin, in black garments, with large prayerbooks and long lighted candles

[21961]in their hands, kneel down and pray.)

[21962]

[21963]THE DAUGHTERS OF ERIN:

[21964]

[21965] Kidney of Bloom, pray for us

[21966] Flower of the Bath, pray for us

[21967] Mentor of Menton, pray for us

[21968] Canvasser for the Freeman, pray for us

[21969] Charitable Mason, pray for us

[21970] Wandering Soap, pray for us

[21971] Sweets of Sin, pray for us

[21972] Music without Words, pray for us

[21973] Reprover of the Citizen, pray for us

[21974] Friend of all Frillies, pray for us

[21975] Midwife Most Merciful, pray for us

[21976] Potato Preservative against Plague and Pestilence, pray for us.

[21977](A choir of six hundred voices, conducted by Vincent O’Brien, sings

[21978]the chorus from Handel’s Messiah Alleluia for the Lord God Omnipotent

[21979]reigneth, accompanied on the organ by Joseph Glynn. Bloom becomes mute,

[21980]shrunken, carbonised.)

[21981]

[21982]ZOE: Talk away till you’re black in the face.

[21983]

[21984]BLOOM: (In caubeen with clay pipe stuck in the band, dusty brogues, an

[21985]emigrant’s red handkerchief bundle in his hand, leading a black bogoak

[21986]pig by a sugaun, with a smile in his eye.) Let me be going now, woman

[21987]of the house, for by all the goats in Connemara I’m after having the

[21988]father and mother of a bating. (With a tear in his eye.) All insanity.

[21989]Patriotism, sorrow for the dead, music, future of the race. To be or not

[21990]to be. Life’s dream is o’er. End it peacefully. They can live on.

[21991](He gazes far away mournfully.) I am ruined. A few pastilles of aconite.

[21992]The blinds drawn. A letter. Then lie back to rest. (He breathes softly.)

[21993]No more. I have lived. Fare. Farewell.

[21994]

[21995]ZOE: (Stiffly, her finger in her neckfillet.) Honest? Till the next

[21996]time. (She sneers.) Suppose you got up the wrong side of the bed or came

[21997]too quick with your best girl. O, I can read your thoughts!

[21998]

[21999]BLOOM: (Bitterly.) Man and woman, love, what is it? A cork and bottle.

[22000]I’m sick of it. Let everything rip.

[22001]

[22002]ZOE: (In sudden sulks.) I hate a rotter that’s insincere. Give a

[22003]bleeding whore a chance.

[22004]

[22005]BLOOM: (Repentantly.) I am very disagreeable. You are a necessary evil.

[22006]Where are you from? London?

[22007]

[22008]ZOE: (Glibly.) Hog’s Norton where the pigs plays the organs. I’m

[22009]Yorkshire born. (She holds his hand which is feeling for her nipple.) I

[22010]say, Tommy Tittlemouse. Stop that and begin worse. Have you cash for a

[22011]short time? Ten shillings?

[22012]

[22013]BLOOM: (Smiles, nods slowly.) More, houri, more.

[22014]

[22015]ZOE: And more’s mother? (She pats him offhandedly with velvet paws.)

[22016]Are you coming into the musicroom to see our new pianola? Come and

[22017]I’ll peel off.

[22018]

[22019]BLOOM: (Feeling his occiput dubiously with the unparalleled

[22020]embarrassment of a harassed pedlar gauging the symmetry of her peeled

[22021]pears.) Somebody would be dreadfully jealous if she knew. The greeneyed

[22022]monster. (Earnestly.) You know how difficult it is. I needn’t tell

[22023]you.

[22024]

[22025]ZOE: (Flattered.) What the eye can’t see the heart can’t grieve for.

[22026](She pats him.) Come.

[22027]

[22028]BLOOM: Laughing witch! The hand that rocks the cradle.

[22029]

[22030]ZOE: Babby!

[22031]

[22032]BLOOM: (In babylinen and pelisse, bigheaded, with a caul of dark hair,

[22033]fixes big eyes on her fluid slip and counts its bronze buckles with a

[22034]chubby finger, his moist tongue lolling and lisping.) One two tlee: tlee

[22035]tlwo tlone.

[22036]

[22037]THE BUCKLES: Love me. Love me not. Love me.

[22038]

[22039]ZOE: Silent means consent. (With little parted talons she captures his

[22040]hand, her forefinger giving to his palm the passtouch of secret monitor,

[22041]luring him to doom.) Hot hands cold gizzard.

[22042]

[22043](He hesitates amid scents, music, temptations. She leads him towards the

[22044]steps, drawing him by the odour of her armpits, the vice of her painted

[22045]eyes, the rustle of her slip in whose sinuous folds lurks the lion reek

[22046]of all the male brutes that have possessed her.)

[22047]

[22048]THE MALE BRUTES: (Exhaling sulphur of rut and dung and ramping in their

[22049]loosebox, faintly roaring, their drugged heads swaying to and fro.)

[22050]Good!

[22051]

[22052](Zoe and Bloom reach the doorway where two sister whores are seated.

[22053]They examine him curiously from under their pencilled brows and smile to

[22054]his hasty bow. He trips awkwardly.)

[22055]

[22056]ZOE: (Her lucky hand instantly saving him.) Hoopsa! Don’t fall

[22057]upstairs.

[22058]

[22059]BLOOM: The just man falls seven times. (He stands aside at the

[22060]threshold.) After you is good manners.

[22061]

[22062]ZOE: Ladies first, gentlemen after.

[22063]

[22064](She crosses the threshold. He hesitates. She turns and, holding out her

[22065]hands, draws him over. He hops. On the antlered rack of the hall hang

[22066]a man’s hat and waterproof. Bloom uncovers himself but, seeing them,

[22067]frowns, then smiles, preoccupied. A door on the return landing is flung

[22068]open. A man in purple shirt and grey trousers, brownsocked, passes with

[22069]an ape’s gait, his bald head and goatee beard upheld, hugging a full

[22070]waterjugjar, his twotailed black braces dangling at heels. Averting his

[22071]face quickly Bloom bends to examine on the halltable the spaniel eyes

[22072]of a running fox: then, his lifted head sniffing, follows Zoe into

[22073]the musicroom. A shade of mauve tissuepaper dims the light of the

[22074]chandelier. Round and round a moth flies, colliding, escaping. The

[22075]floor is covered with an oilcloth mosaic of jade and azure and cinnabar

[22076]rhomboids. Footmarks are stamped over it in all senses, heel to heel,

[22077]heel to hollow, toe to toe, feet locked, a morris of shuffling feet

[22078]without body phantoms, all in a scrimmage higgledypiggledy. The walls

[22079]are tapestried with a paper of yewfronds and clear glades. In the grate

[22080]is spread a screen of peacock feathers. Lynch squats crosslegged on

[22081]the hearthrug of matted hair, his cap back to the front. With a wand he

[22082]beats time slowly. Kitty Ricketts, a bony pallid whore in navy costume,

[22083]doeskin gloves rolled back from a coral wristlet, a chain purse in

[22084]her hand, sits perched on the edge of the table swinging her leg and

[22085]glancing at herself in the gilt mirror over the mantelpiece. A tag

[22086]of her corsetlace hangs slightly below her jacket. Lynch indicates

[22087]mockingly the couple at the piano.)

[22088]

[22089]KITTY: (Coughs behind her hand.) She’s a bit imbecillic. (She signs

[22090]with a waggling forefinger.) Blemblem. (Lynch lifts up her skirt and

[22091]white petticoat with the wand. She settles them down quickly.) Respect

[22092]yourself. (She hiccups, then bends quickly her sailor hat under which

[22093]her hair glows, red with henna.) O, excuse!

[22094]

[22095]ZOE: More limelight, Charley. (She goes to the chandelier and turns the

[22096]gas full cock.)

[22097]

[22098]KITTY: (Peers at the gasjet.) What ails it tonight?

[22099]

[22100]LYNCH: (Deeply.) Enter a ghost and hobgoblins.

[22101]

[22102]ZOE: Clap on the back for Zoe.

[22103]

[22104](The wand in Lynch’s hand flashes: a brass poker. Stephen stands at

[22105]the pianola on which sprawl his hat and ashplant. With two fingers he

[22106]repeats once more the series of empty fifths. Florry Talbot, a blond

[22107]feeble goosefat whore in a tatterdemalion gown of mildewed strawberry,

[22108]lolls spreadeagle in the sofacorner, her limp forearm pendent over the

[22109]bolster, listening. A heavy stye droops over her sleepy eyelid.)

[22110]

[22111]KITTY: (Hiccups again with a kick of her horsed foot.) O, excuse!

[22112]

[22113]ZOE: (Promptly.) Your boy’s thinking of you. Tie a knot on your shift.

[22114]

[22115](Kitty Ricketts bends her head. Her boa uncoils, slides, glides over

[22116]her shoulder, back, arm, chair to the ground. Lynch lifts the curled

[22117]catterpillar on his wand. She snakes her neck, nestling. Stephen glances

[22118]behind at the squatted figure with its cap back to the front.)

[22119]

[22120]STEPHEN: As a matter of fact it is of no importance whether Benedetto

[22121]Marcello found it or made it. The rite is the poet’s rest. It may be

[22122]an old hymn to Demeter or also illustrate Cœla enarrant gloriam Domini.

[22123]It is susceptible of nodes or modes as far apart as hyperphrygian

[22124]and mixolydian and of texts so divergent as priests haihooping round

[22125]David’s that is Circe’s or what am I saying Ceres’ altar and

[22126]David’s tip from the stable to his chief bassoonist about the

[22127]alrightness of his almightiness. Mais nom de nom, that is another pair

[22128]of trousers. Jetez la gourme. Faut que jeunesse se passe. (He stops,

[22129]points at Lynch’s cap, smiles, laughs.) Which side is your knowledge

[22130]bump?

[22131]

[22132]THE CAP: (With saturnine spleen.) Bah! It is because it is. Woman’s

[22133]reason. Jewgreek is greekjew. Extremes meet. Death is the highest form

[22134]of life. Bah!

[22135]

[22136]STEPHEN: You remember fairly accurately all my errors, boasts, mistakes.

[22137]How long shall I continue to close my eyes to disloyalty? Whetstone!

[22138]

[22139]THE CAP: Bah!

[22140]

[22141]STEPHEN: Here’s another for you. (He frowns.) The reason is because

[22142]the fundamental and the dominant are separated by the greatest possible

[22143]interval which...

[22144]

[22145]THE CAP: Which? Finish. You can’t.

[22146]

[22147]STEPHEN: (With an effort.) Interval which. Is the greatest possible

[22148]ellipse. Consistent with. The ultimate return. The octave. Which.

[22149]

[22150]THE CAP: Which?

[22151]

[22152](Outside the gramophone begins to blare The Holy City.)

[22153]

[22154]STEPHEN: (Abruptly.) What went forth to the ends of the world to

[22155]traverse not itself, God, the sun, Shakespeare, a commercial traveller,

[22156]having itself traversed in reality itself becomes that self. Wait a

[22157]moment. Wait a second. Damn that fellow’s noise in the street. Self

[22158]which it itself was ineluctably preconditioned to become. Ecco!

[22159]

[22160]LYNCH: (With a mocking whinny of laughter grins at Bloom and Zoe

[22161]Higgins.) What a learned speech, eh?

[22162]

[22163]ZOE: (Briskly.) God help your head, he knows more than you have

[22164]forgotten.

[22165]

[22166](With obese stupidity Florry Talbot regards Stephen.)

[22167]

[22168]FLORRY: They say the last day is coming this summer.

[22169]

[22170]KITTY: No!

[22171]

[22172]ZOE: (Explodes in laughter.) Great unjust God!

[22173]

[22174]FLORRY: (Offended.) Well, it was in the papers about Antichrist. O, my

[22175]foot’s tickling.

[22176]

[22177](Ragged barefoot newsboys, jogging a wagtail kite, patter past,

[22178]yelling.)

[22179]

[22180]THE NEWSBOYS: Stop press edition. Result of the rockinghorse races. Sea

[22181]serpent in the royal canal. Safe arrival of Antichrist.

[22182]

[22183](Stephen turns and sees Bloom.)

[22184]

[22185]STEPHEN: A time, times and half a time.

[22186]

[22187](Reuben J Antichrist, wandering jew, a clutching hand open on his spine,

[22188]stumps forward. Across his loins is slung a pilgrim’s wallet from

[22189]which protrude promissory notes and dishonoured bills. Aloft over his

[22190]shoulder he bears a long boatpole from the hook of which the sodden

[22191]huddled mass of his only son, saved from Liffey waters, hangs from

[22192]the slack of its breeches. A hobgoblin in the image of Punch Costello,

[22193]hipshot, crookbacked, hydrocephalic, prognathic with receding forehead

[22194]and Ally Sloper nose, tumbles in somersaults through the gathering

[22195]darkness.)

[22196]

[22197]ALL: What?

[22198]

[22199]THE HOBGOBLIN: (His jaws chattering, capers to and fro, goggling his

[22200]eyes, squeaking, kangaroohopping with outstretched clutching arms, then

[22201]all at once thrusts his lipless face through the fork of his thighs.) Il

[22202]vient! C’est moi! L’homme qui rit! L’homme primigène! (He whirls

[22203]round and round with dervish howls.) Sieurs et dames, faites vos jeux!

[22204](He crouches juggling. Tiny roulette planets fly from his hands.) Les

[22205]jeux sont faits! (The planets rush together, uttering crepitant cracks.)

[22206]Rien va plus! (The planets, buoyant balloons, sail swollen up and away.

[22207]He springs off into vacuum.)

[22208]

[22209]FLORRY: (Sinking into torpor, crossing herself secretly.) The end of the

[22210]world!

[22211]

[22212](A female tepid effluvium leaks out from her. Nebulous obscurity

[22213]occupies space. Through the drifting fog without the gramophone blares

[22214]over coughs and feetshuffling.)

[22215]

[22216]THE GRAMOPHONE: Jerusalem!

[22217]

[22218]Open your gates and sing

[22219]

[22220]Hosanna...

[22221]

[22222](A rocket rushes up the sky and bursts. A white star falls from it,

[22223]proclaiming the consummation of all things and second coming of Elijah.

[22224]Along an infinite invisible tightrope taut from zenith to nadir the End

[22225]of the World, a twoheaded octopus in gillie’s kilts, busby and tartan

[22226]filibegs, whirls through the murk, head over heels, in the form of the

[22227]Three Legs of Man.)

[22228]

[22229]THE END OF THE WORLD: (With a Scotch accent.) Wha’ll dance the keel

[22230]row, the keel row, the keel row?

[22231]

[22232](Over the possing drift and choking breathcoughs, Elijah’s voice,

[22233]harsh as a corncrake’s, jars on high. Perspiring in a loose lawn

[22234]surplice with funnel sleeves he is seen, vergerfaced, above a rostrum

[22235]about which the banner of old glory is draped. He thumps the parapet.)

[22236]

[22237]ELIJAH: No yapping, if you please, in this booth. Jake Crane, Creole

[22238]Sue, Dove Campbell, Abe Kirschner, do your coughing with your mouths

[22239]shut. Say, I am operating all this trunk line. Boys, do it now. God’s

[22240]time is 12.25. Tell mother you’ll be there. Rush your order and you

[22241]play a slick ace. Join on right here. Book through to eternity junction,

[22242]the nonstop run. Just one word more. Are you a god or a doggone clod?

[22243]If the second advent came to Coney Island are we ready? Florry Christ,

[22244]Stephen Christ, Zoe Christ, Bloom Christ, Kitty Christ, Lynch Christ,

[22245]it’s up to you to sense that cosmic force. Have we cold feet about

[22246]the cosmos? No. Be on the side of the angels. Be a prism. You have that

[22247]something within, the higher self. You can rub shoulders with a Jesus, a

[22248]Gautama, an Ingersoll. Are you all in this vibration? I say you are. You

[22249]once nobble that, congregation, and a buck joyride to heaven becomes

[22250]a back number. You got me? It’s a lifebrightener, sure. The hottest

[22251]stuff ever was. It’s the whole pie with jam in. It’s just the cutest

[22252]snappiest line out. It is immense, supersumptuous. It restores. It

[22253]vibrates. I know and I am some vibrator. Joking apart and, getting down

[22254]to bedrock, A. J. Christ Dowie and the harmonial philosophy, have you

[22255]got that? O. K. Seventyseven west sixtyninth street. Got me? That’s

[22256]it. You call me up by sunphone any old time. Bumboosers, save your

[22257]stamps. (He shouts.) Now then our glory song. All join heartily in the

[22258]singing. Encore! (He sings.) Jeru...

[22259]

[22260]THE GRAMOPHONE: (Drowning his voice.) Whorusalaminyourhighhohhhh... (The

[22261]disc rasps gratingly against the needle.)

[22262]

[22263]THE THREE WHORES: (Covering their ears, squawk.) Ahhkkk!

[22264]

[22265]ELIJAH: (In rolledup shirtsleeves, black in the face, shouts at the top

[22266]of his voice, his arms uplifted.) Big Brother up there, Mr President,

[22267]you hear what I done just been saying to you. Certainly, I sort of

[22268]believe strong in you, Mr President. I certainly am thinking now Miss

[22269]Higgins and Miss Ricketts got religion way inside them. Certainly seems

[22270]to me I don’t never see no wusser scared female than the way you been,

[22271]Miss Florry, just now as I done seed you. Mr President, you come long

[22272]and help me save our sisters dear. (He winks at his audience.) Our Mr

[22273]President, he twig the whole lot and he aint saying nothing.

[22274]

[22275]KITTY-KATE: I forgot myself. In a weak moment I erred and did what I did

[22276]on Constitution hill. I was confirmed by the bishop and enrolled in the

[22277]brown scapular. My mother’s sister married a Montmorency. It was a

[22278]working plumber was my ruination when I was pure.

[22279]

[22280]ZOE-FANNY: I let him larrup it into me for the fun of it.

[22281]

[22282]FLORRY-TERESA: It was in consequence of a portwine beverage on top of

[22283]Hennessy’s three star. I was guilty with Whelan when he slipped into

[22284]the bed.

[22285]

[22286]STEPHEN: In the beginning was the word, in the end the world without

[22287]end. Blessed be the eight beatitudes.

[22288]

[22289](The beatitudes, Dixon, Madden, Crotthers, Costello, Lenehan, Bannon,

[22290]Mulligan and Lynch in white surgical students’ gowns, four abreast,

[22291]goosestepping, tramp fast past in noisy marching.)

[22292]

[22293]THE BEATITUDES: (Incoherently.) Beer beef battledog buybull businum

[22294]barnum buggerum bishop.

[22295]

[22296]LYSTER: (In quakergrey kneebreeches and broadbrimmed hat, says

[22297]discreetly.) He is our friend. I need not mention names. Seek thou the

[22298]light.

[22299]

[22300](He corantos by. Best enters in hairdresser’s attire, shinily

[22301]laundered, his locks in curlpapers. He leads John Eglinton who wears a

[22302]mandarin’s kimono of Nankeen yellow, lizardlettered, and a high pagoda

[22303]hat.)

[22304]

[22305]BEST: (Smiling, lifts the hat and displays a shaven poll from the crown

[22306]of which bristles a pigtail toupee tied with an orange topknot.) I was

[22307]just beautifying him, don’t you know. A thing of beauty, don’t you

[22308]know, Yeats says, or I mean, Keats says.

[22309]

[22310]JOHN EGLINTON: (Produces a greencapped dark lantern and flashes it

[22311]towards a corner: with carping accent.) Esthetics and cosmetics are for

[22312]the boudoir. I am out for truth. Plain truth for a plain man. Tanderagee

[22313]wants the facts and means to get them.

[22314]

[22315](In the cone of the searchlight behind the coalscuttle, ollave,

[22316]holyeyed, the bearded figure of Mananaun MacLir broods, chin on knees.

[22317]He rises slowly. A cold seawind blows from his druid mouth. About his

[22318]head writhe eels and elvers. He is encrusted with weeds and shells. His

[22319]right hand holds a bicycle pump. His left hand grasps a huge crayfish by

[22320]its two talons.)

[22321]

[22322]MANANAUN MACLIR: (With a voice of waves.) Aum! Hek! Wal! Ak! Lub! Mor!

[22323]Ma! White yoghin of the gods. Occult pimander of Hermes Trismegistos.

[22324](With a voice of whistling seawind.) Punarjanam patsypunjaub! I won’t

[22325]have my leg pulled. It has been said by one: beware the left, the cult

[22326]of Shakti. (With a cry of stormbirds.) Shakti Shiva, darkhidden Father!

[22327](He smites with his bicycle pump the crayfish in his left hand. On its

[22328]cooperative dial glow the twelve signs of the zodiac. He wails with

[22329]the vehemence of the ocean.) Aum! Baum! Pyjaum! I am the light of the

[22330]homestead! I am the dreamery creamery butter.

[22331]

[22332](A skeleton judashand strangles the light. The green light wanes to

[22333]mauve. The gasjet wails whistling.)

[22334]

[22335]THE GASJET: Pooah! Pfuiiiiiii!

[22336]

[22337](Zoe runs to the chandelier and, crooking her leg, adjusts the mantle.)

[22338]

[22339]ZOE: Who has a fag as I’m here?

[22340]

[22341]LYNCH: (Tossing a cigarette on to the table.) Here.

[22342]

[22343]ZOE: (Her head perched aside in mock pride.) Is that the way to hand the

[22344]pot to a lady? (She stretches up to light the cigarette over the flame,

[22345]twirling it slowly, showing the brown tufts of her armpits. Lynch with

[22346]his poker lifts boldly a side of her slip. Bare from her garters up her

[22347]flesh appears under the sapphire a nixie’s green. She puffs calmly at

[22348]her cigarette.) Can you see the beautyspot of my behind?

[22349]

[22350]LYNCH: I’m not looking

[22351]

[22352]ZOE: (Makes sheep’s eyes.) No? You wouldn’t do a less thing. Would

[22353]you suck a lemon?

[22354]

[22355](Squinting in mock shame she glances with sidelong meaning at Bloom,

[22356]then twists round towards him, pulling her slip free of the poker. Blue

[22357]fluid again flows over her flesh. Bloom stands, smiling desirously,

[22358]twirling his thumbs. Kitty Ricketts licks her middle finger with her

[22359]spittle and, gazing in the mirror, smooths both eyebrows. Lipoti Virag,

[22360]basilicogrammate, chutes rapidly down through the chimneyflue and struts

[22361]two steps to the left on gawky pink stilts. He is sausaged into several

[22362]overcoats and wears a brown macintosh under which he holds a roll

[22363]of parchment. In his left eye flashes the monocle of Cashel Boyle

[22364]O’Connor Fitzmaurice Tisdall Farrell. On his head is perched an

[22365]Egyptian pshent. Two quills project over his ears.)

[22366]

[22367]VIRAG: (Heels together, bows.) My name is Virag Lipoti, of Szombathely.

[22368](He coughs thoughtfully, drily.) Promiscuous nakedness is much in

[22369]evidence hereabouts, eh? Inadvertently her backview revealed the fact

[22370]that she is not wearing those rather intimate garments of which you

[22371]are a particular devotee. The injection mark on the thigh I hope you

[22372]perceived? Good.

[22373]

[22374]BLOOM: Granpapachi. But...

[22375]

[22376]VIRAG: Number two on the other hand, she of the cherry rouge and

[22377]coiffeuse white, whose hair owes not a little to our tribal elixir of

[22378]gopherwood, is in walking costume and tightly staysed by her sit, I

[22379]should opine. Backbone in front, so to say. Correct me but I always

[22380]understood that the act so performed by skittish humans with glimpses of

[22381]lingerie appealed to you in virtue of its exhibitionististicicity. In a

[22382]word. Hippogriff. Am I right?

[22383]

[22384]BLOOM: She is rather lean.

[22385]

[22386]VIRAG: (Not unpleasantly.) Absolutely! Well observed and those pannier

[22387]pockets of the skirt and slightly pegtop effect are devised to suggest

[22388]bunchiness of hip. A new purchase at some monster sale for which a gull

[22389]has been mulcted. Meretricious finery to deceive the eye. Observe the

[22390]attention to details of dustspecks. Never put on you tomorrow what you

[22391]can wear today. Parallax! (With a nervous twitch of his head.) Did you

[22392]hear my brain go snap? Pollysyllabax!

[22393]

[22394]BLOOM: (An elbow resting in a hand, a forefinger against his cheek.) She

[22395]seems sad.

[22396]

[22397]VIRAG: (Cynically, his weasel teeth bared yellow, draws down his left

[22398]eye with a finger and barks hoarsely.) Hoax! Beware of the flapper

[22399]and bogus mournful. Lily of the alley. All possess bachelor’s button

[22400]discovered by Rualdus Columbus. Tumble her. Columble her. Chameleon.

[22401](More genially.) Well then, permit me to draw your attention to item

[22402]number three. There is plenty of her visible to the naked eye. Observe

[22403]the mass of oxygenated vegetable matter on her skull. What ho, she

[22404]bumps! The ugly duckling of the party, longcasted and deep in keel.

[22405]

[22406]BLOOM: (Regretfully.) When you come out without your gun.

[22407]

[22408]VIRAG: We can do you all brands, mild, medium and strong. Pay your

[22409]money, take your choice. How happy could you be with either...

[22410]

[22411]BLOOM: With...?

[22412]

[22413]VIRAG: (His tongue upcurling.) Lyum! Look. Her beam is broad. She is

[22414]coated with quite a considerable layer of fat. Obviously mammal in

[22415]weight of bosom you remark that she has in front well to the fore two

[22416]protuberances of very respectable dimensions, inclined to fall in the

[22417]noonday soupplate, while on her rere lower down are two additional

[22418]protuberances, suggestive of potent rectum and tumescent for palpation,

[22419]which leave nothing to be desired save compactness. Such fleshy parts

[22420]are the product of careful nurture. When coopfattened their livers

[22421]reach an elephantine size. Pellets of new bread with fennygreek and

[22422]gumbenjamin swamped down by potions of green tea endow them during their

[22423]brief existence with natural pincushions of quite colossal blubber. That

[22424]suits your book, eh? Fleshhotpots of Egypt to hanker after. Wallow in

[22425]it. Lycopodium. (His throat twitches.) Slapbang! There he goes again.

[22426]

[22427]BLOOM: The stye I dislike.

[22428]

[22429]VIRAG: (Arches his eyebrows.) Contact with a goldring, they say.

[22430]Argumentum ad feminam, as we said in old Rome and ancient Greece in

[22431]the consulship of Diplodocus and Ichthyosauros. For the rest Eve’s

[22432]sovereign remedy. Not for sale. Hire only. Huguenot. (He twitches.) It

[22433]is a funny sound. (He coughs encouragingly.) But possibly it is only a

[22434]wart. I presume you shall have remembered what I will have taught you on

[22435]that head? Wheatenmeal with honey and nutmeg.

[22436]

[22437]BLOOM: (Reflecting.) Wheatenmeal with lycopodium and syllabax. This

[22438]searching ordeal. It has been an unusually fatiguing day, a chapter of

[22439]accidents. Wait. I mean, wartsblood spreads warts, you said...

[22440]

[22441]VIRAG: (Severely, his nose hardhumped, his side eye winking.) Stop

[22442]twirling your thumbs and have a good old thunk. See, you have forgotten.

[22443]Exercise your mnemotechnic. La causa è santa. Tara. Tara. (Aside.) He

[22444]will surely remember.

[22445]

[22446]BLOOM: Rosemary also did I understand you to say or willpower over

[22447]parasitic tissues. Then nay no I have an inkling. The touch of a

[22448]deadhand cures. Mnemo?

[22449]

[22450]VIRAG: (Excitedly.) I say so. I say so. E’en so. Technic. (He taps his

[22451]parchmentroll energetically.) This book tells you how to act with all

[22452]descriptive particulars. Consult index for agitated fear of aconite,

[22453]melancholy of muriatic, priapic pulsatilla. Virag is going to talk about

[22454]amputation. Our old friend caustic. They must be starved. Snip off with

[22455]horsehair under the denned neck. But, to change the venue to the Bulgar

[22456]and the Basque, have you made up your mind whether you like or dislike

[22457]women in male habiliments? (With a dry snigger.) You intended to devote

[22458]an entire year to the study of the religious problem and the summer

[22459]months of 1886 to square the circle and win that million. Pomegranate!

[22460]From the sublime to the ridiculous is but a step. Pyjamas, let us say?

[22461]Or stockingette gussetted knickers, closed? Or, put we the case,

[22462]those complicated combinations, camiknickers? (He crows derisively.)

[22463]Keekeereekee!

[22464]

[22465](Bloom surveys uncertainly the three whores then gazes at the veiled

[22466]mauve light, hearing the everflying moth.)

[22467]

[22468]BLOOM: I wanted then to have now concluded. Nightdress was never. Hence

[22469]this. But tomorrow is a new day will be. Past was is today. What now is

[22470]will then morrow as now was be past yester.

[22471]

[22472]VIRAG: (Prompts in a pig’s whisper.) Insects of the day spend their

[22473]brief existence in reiterated coition, lured by the smell of the

[22474]inferiorly pulchritudinous female possessing extendified pudendal nerve

[22475]in dorsal region. Pretty Poll! (His yellow parrotbeak gabbles nasally.)

[22476]They had a proverb in the Carpathians in or about the year five thousand

[22477]five hundred and fifty of our era. One tablespoonful of honey will

[22478]attract friend Bruin more than half a dozen barrels of first choice malt

[22479]vinegar. Bear’s buzz bothers bees. But of this apart. At another time

[22480]we may resume. We were very pleased, we others. (He coughs and, bending

[22481]his brow, rubs his nose thoughtfully with a scooping hand.) You shall

[22482]find that these night insects follow the light. An illusion for remember

[22483]their complex unadjustable eye. For all these knotty points see the

[22484]seventeenth book of my Fundamentals of Sexology or the Love Passion

[22485]which Doctor L. B. says is the book sensation of the year. Some, to

[22486]example, there are again whose movements are automatic. Perceive. That

[22487]is his appropriate sun. Nightbird nightsun nighttown. Chase me, Charley!

[22488](He blows into Bloom’s ear.) Buzz!

[22489]

[22490]BLOOM: Bee or bluebottle too other day butting shadow on wall dazed self

[22491]then me wandered dazed down shirt good job I...

[22492]

[22493]VIRAG: (His face impassive, laughs in a rich feminine key.) Splendid!

[22494]Spanish fly in his fly or mustard plaster on his dibble. (He gobbles

[22495]gluttonously with turkey wattles.) Bubbly jock! Bubbly jock! Where are

[22496]we? Open Sesame! Cometh forth! (He unrolls his parchment rapidly and

[22497]reads, his glowworm’s nose running backwards over the letters which he

[22498]claws.) Stay, good friend. I bring thee thy answer. Redbank oysters will

[22499]shortly be upon us. I’m the best o’cook. Those succulent bivalves

[22500]may help us and the truffles of Perigord, tubers dislodged through

[22501]mister omnivorous porker, were unsurpassed in cases of nervous debility

[22502]or viragitis. Though they stink yet they sting. (He wags his head

[22503]with cackling raillery.) Jocular. With my eyeglass in my ocular. (He

[22504]sneezes.) Amen!

[22505]

[22506]BLOOM: (Absently.) Ocularly woman’s bivalve case is worse. Always open

[22507]sesame. The cloven sex. Why they fear vermin, creeping things. Yet Eve

[22508]and the serpent contradicts. Not a historical fact. Obvious analogy to

[22509]my idea. Serpents too are gluttons for woman’s milk. Wind their way

[22510]through miles of omnivorous forest to sucksucculent her breast dry. Like

[22511]those bubblyjocular Roman matrons one reads of in Elephantuliasis.

[22512]

[22513]VIRAG: (His mouth projected in hard wrinkles, eyes stonily forlornly

[22514]closed, psalms in outlandish monotone.) That the cows with their those

[22515]distended udders that they have been the the known...

[22516]

[22517]BLOOM: I am going to scream. I beg your pardon. Ah? So. (He repeats.)

[22518]Spontaneously to seek out the saurian’s lair in order to entrust their

[22519]teats to his avid suction. Ant milks aphis. (Profoundly.) Instinct rules

[22520]the world. In life. In death.

[22521]

[22522]VIRAG: (Head askew, arches his back and hunched wingshoulders, peers

[22523]at the moth out of blear bulged eyes, points a horning claw and cries.)

[22524]Who’s moth moth? Who’s dear Gerald? Dear Ger, that you? O dear,

[22525]he is Gerald. O, I much fear he shall be most badly burned. Will some

[22526]pleashe pershon not now impediment so catastrophics mit agitation of

[22527]firstclass tablenumpkin? (He mews.) Puss puss puss puss! (He sighs,

[22528]draws back and stares sideways down with dropping underjaw.) Well, well.

[22529]He doth rest anon. (He snaps his jaws suddenly on the air.)

[22530]

[22531]THE MOTH:

[22532]

[22533] I’m a tiny tiny thing

[22534] Ever flying in the spring

[22535] Round and round a ringaring.

[22536] Long ago I was a king

[22537] Now I do this kind of thing

[22538] On the wing, on the wing!

[22539] Bing!

[22540](He rushes against the mauve shade, flapping noisily.) Pretty pretty

[22541]pretty pretty pretty pretty petticoats.

[22542]

[22543](From left upper entrance with two gliding steps Henry Flower comes

[22544]forward to left front centre. He wears a dark mantle and drooping plumed

[22545]sombrero. He carries a silverstringed inlaid dulcimer and a longstemmed

[22546]bamboo Jacob’s pipe, its clay bowl fashioned as a female head. He

[22547]wears dark velvet hose and silverbuckled pumps. He has the romantic

[22548]Saviour’s face with flowing locks, thin beard and moustache. His

[22549]spindlelegs and sparrow feet are those of the tenor Mario, prince of

[22550]Candia. He settles down his goffered ruffs and moistens his lips with a

[22551]passage of his amorous tongue.)

[22552]

[22553]HENRY: (In a low dulcet voice, touching the strings of his guitar.)

[22554]There is a flower that bloometh.

[22555]

[22556](Virag truculent, his jowl set, stares at the lamp. Grave Bloom regards

[22557]Zoe’s neck. Henry gallant turns with pendant dewlap to the piano.)

[22558]

[22559]STEPHEN: (To himself.) Play with your eyes shut. Imitate pa. Filling my

[22560]belly with husks of swine. Too much of this. I will arise and go to my.

[22561]Expect this is the. Steve, thou art in a parlous way. Must visit old

[22562]Deasy or telegraph. Our interview of this morning has left on me a deep

[22563]impression. Though our ages. Will write fully tomorrow. I’m partially

[22564]drunk, by the way. (He touches the keys again.) Minor chord comes now.

[22565]Yes. Not much however.

[22566]

[22567](Almidano Artifoni holds out a batonroll of music with vigorous

[22568]moustachework.)

[22569]

[22570]ARTIFONI: Ci rifletta. Lei rovina tutto.

[22571]

[22572]FLORRY: Sing us something. Love’s old sweet song.

[22573]

[22574]STEPHEN: No voice. I am a most finished artist. Lynch, did I show you

[22575]the letter about the lute?

[22576]

[22577]FLORRY: (Smirking.) The bird that can sing and won’t sing.

[22578]

[22579](The Siamese twins, Philip Drunk and Philip Sober, two Oxford dons with

[22580]lawnmowers, appear in the window embrasure. Both are masked with Matthew

[22581]Arnold’s face.)

[22582]

[22583]PHILIP SOBER: Take a fool’s advice. All is not well. Work it out with

[22584]the buttend of a pencil, like a good young idiot. Three pounds twelve

[22585]you got, two notes, one sovereign, two crowns, if youth but knew.

[22586]Mooney’s en ville, Mooney’s sur mer, the Moira, Larchet’s, Holles

[22587]street hospital, Burke’s. Eh? I am watching you.

[22588]

[22589]PHILIP DRUNK: (Impatiently.) Ah, bosh, man. Go to hell! I paid my way.

[22590]If I could only find out about octaves. Reduplication of personality.

[22591]Who was it told me his name? (His lawnmower begins to purr.) Aha, yes.

[22592]Zoe mou sas agapo. Have a notion I was here before. When was it not

[22593]Atkinson his card I have somewhere. Mac Somebody. Unmack I have it. He

[22594]told me about, hold on, Swinburne, was it, no?

[22595]

[22596]FLORRY: And the song?

[22597]

[22598]STEPHEN: Spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.

[22599]

[22600]FLORRY: Are you out of Maynooth? You’re like someone I knew once.

[22601]

[22602]STEPHEN: Out of it now. (To himself.) Clever.

[22603]

[22604]PHILIP DRUNK AND PHILIP SOBER: (Their lawnmowers purring with a rigadoon

[22605]of grasshalms.) Clever ever. Out of it out of it. By the bye have

[22606]you the book, the thing, the ashplant? Yes, there it, yes. Cleverever

[22607]outofitnow. Keep in condition. Do like us.

[22608]

[22609]ZOE: There was a priest down here two nights ago to do his bit of

[22610]business with his coat buttoned up. You needn’t try to hide, I says to

[22611]him. I know you’ve a Roman collar.

[22612]

[22613]VIRAG: Perfectly logical from his standpoint. Fall of man. (Harshly, his

[22614]pupils waxing.) To hell with the pope! Nothing new under the sun. I am

[22615]the Virag who disclosed the Sex Secrets of Monks and Maidens. Why I left

[22616]the church of Rome. Read the Priest, the Woman and the Confessional.

[22617]Penrose. Flipperty Jippert. (He wriggles.) Woman, undoing with sweet

[22618]pudor her belt of rushrope, offers her allmoist yoni to man’s lingam.

[22619]Short time after man presents woman with pieces of jungle meat. Woman

[22620]shows joy and covers herself with featherskins. Man loves her yoni

[22621]fiercely with big lingam, the stiff one. (He cries.) Coactus volui. Then

[22622]giddy woman will run about. Strong man grapses woman’s wrist. Woman

[22623]squeals, bites, spucks. Man, now fierce angry, strikes woman’s fat

[22624]yadgana. (He chases his tail.) Piffpaff! Popo! (He stops, sneezes.)

[22625]Pchp! (He worries his butt.) Prrrrrht!

[22626]

[22627]LYNCH: I hope you gave the good father a penance. Nine glorias for

[22628]shooting a bishop.

[22629]

[22630]ZOE: (Spouts walrus smoke through her nostrils.) He couldn’t get a

[22631]connection. Only, you know, sensation. A dry rush.

[22632]

[22633]BLOOM: Poor man!

[22634]

[22635]ZOE: (Lightly.) Only for what happened him.

[22636]

[22637]BLOOM: How?

[22638]

[22639]VIRAG: (A diabolic rictus of black luminosity contracting his visage,

[22640]cranes his scraggy neck forward. He lifts a mooncalf nozzle and howls.)

[22641]Verfluchte Goim! He had a father, forty fathers. He never existed. Pig

[22642]God! He had two left feet. He was Judas Iacchia, a Libyan eunuch, the

[22643]pope’s bastard. (He leans out on tortured forepaws, elbows bent rigid,

[22644]his eye agonising in his flat skullneck and yelps over the mute world.)

[22645]A son of a whore. Apocalypse.

[22646]

[22647]KITTY: And Mary Shortall that was in the lock with the pox she got

[22648]from Jimmy Pidgeon in the blue caps had a child off him that couldn’t

[22649]swallow and was smothered with the convulsions in the mattress and we

[22650]all subscribed for the funeral.

[22651]

[22652]PHILIP DRUNK: (Gravely.) Qui vous a mis dans cette fichue position,

[22653]Philippe?

[22654]

[22655]PHILIP SOBER: (Gaily.) C’était le sacré pigeon, Philippe.

[22656]

[22657](Kitty unpins her hat and sets it down calmly, patting her henna hair.

[22658]And a prettier, a daintier head of winsome curls was never seen on a

[22659]whore’s shoulders. Lynch puts on her hat. She whips it off.)

[22660]

[22661]LYNCH: (Laughs.) And to such delights has Metchnikoff inoculated

[22662]anthropoid apes.

[22663]

[22664]FLORRY: (Nods.) Locomotor ataxy.

[22665]

[22666]ZOE: (Gaily.) O, my dictionary.

[22667]

[22668]LYNCH: Three wise virgins.

[22669]

[22670]VIRAG: (Agueshaken, profuse yellow spawn foaming over his bony epileptic

[22671]lips.) She sold lovephiltres, whitewax, orangeflower. Panther, the Roman

[22672]centurion, polluted her with his genitories. (He sticks out a flickering

[22673]phosphorescent scorpion tongue, his hand on his fork.) Messiah! He burst

[22674]her tympanum. (With gibbering baboon’s cries he jerks his hips in the

[22675]cynical spasm.) Hik! Hek! Hak! Hok! Huk! Kok! Kuk!

[22676]

[22677](Ben Jumbo Dollard, rubicund, musclebound, hairynostrilled, hugebearded,

[22678]cabbageeared, shaggychested, shockmaned, fatpapped, stands forth, his

[22679]loins and genitals tightened into a pair of black bathing bagslops.)

[22680]

[22681]BEN DOLLARD: (Nakkering castanet bones in his huge padded paws, yodels

[22682]jovially in base barreltone.) When love absorbs my ardent soul.

[22683]

[22684](The virgins Nurse Callan and Nurse Quigley burst through the

[22685]ringkeepers and the ropes and mob him with open arms.)

[22686]

[22687]THE VIRGINS: (Gushingly.) Big Ben! Ben my Chree!

[22688]

[22689]A VOICE: Hold that fellow with the bad breeches.

[22690]

[22691]BEN DOLLARD: (Smites his thigh in abundant laughter.) Hold him now.

[22692]

[22693]HENRY: (Caressing on his breast a severed female head, murmurs.) Thine

[22694]heart, mine love. (He plucks his lutestrings.) When first I saw...

[22695]

[22696]VIRAG: (Sloughing his skins, his multitudinous plumage moulting.) Rats!

[22697](He yawns, showing a coalblack throat, and closes his jaws by an upward

[22698]push of his parchmentroll.) After having said which I took my departure.

[22699]Farewell. Fare thee well. Dreck!

[22700]

[22701](Henry Flower combs his moustache and beard rapidly with a pocketcomb

[22702]and gives a cow’s lick to his hair. Steered by his rapier, he glides

[22703]to the door, his wild harp slung behind him. Virag reaches the door in

[22704]two ungainly stilthops, his tail cocked, and deftly claps sideways on

[22705]the wall a pusyellow flybill, butting it with his head.)

[22706]

[22707]THE FLYBILL: K. 11. Post No Bills. Strictly confidential. Dr Hy Franks.

[22708]

[22709]HENRY: All is lost now.

[22710]

[22711](Virag unscrews his head in a trice and holds it under his arm.)

[22712]

[22713]VIRAG’S HEAD: Quack!

[22714]

[22715](Exeunt severally.)

[22716]

[22717]STEPHEN: (Over his shoulder to Zoe.) You would have preferred

[22718]the fighting parson who founded the protestant error. But beware

[22719]Antisthenes, the dog sage, and the last end of Arius Heresiarchus. The

[22720]agony in the closet.

[22721]

[22722]LYNCH: All one and the same God to her.

[22723]

[22724]STEPHEN: (Devoutly.) And sovereign Lord of all things.

[22725]

[22726]FLORRY: (To Stephen.) I’m sure you’re a spoiled priest. Or a monk.

[22727]

[22728]LYNCH: He is. A cardinal’s son.

[22729]

[22730]STEPHEN: Cardinal sin. Monks of the screw.

[22731]

[22732](His Eminence Simon Stephen Cardinal Dedalus, Primate of all Ireland,

[22733]appears in the doorway, dressed in red soutane, sandals and socks. Seven

[22734]dwarf simian acolytes, also in red, cardinal sins, uphold his train,

[22735]peeping under it. He wears a battered silk hat sideways on his head. His

[22736]thumbs are stuck in his armpits and his palms outspread. Round his

[22737]neck hangs a rosary of corks ending on his breast in a corkscrew cross.

[22738]Releasing his thumbs, he invokes grace from on high with large wave

[22739]gestures and proclaims with bloated pomp:)

[22740]

[22741]THE CARDINAL:

[22742]

[22743] Conservio lies captured

[22744] He lies in the lowest dungeon

[22745] With manacles and chains around his limbs

[22746] Weighing upwards of three tons.

[22747](He looks at all for a moment, his right eye closed tight, his left

[22748]cheek puffed out. Then, unable to repress his merriment, he rocks to and

[22749]fro, arms akimbo, and sings with broad rollicking humour:)

[22750]

[22751] O, the poor little fellow

[22752] Hihihihihis legs they were yellow

[22753] He was plump, fat and heavy and brisk as a snake

[22754] But some bloody savage

[22755] To graize his white cabbage

[22756] He murdered Nell Flaherty’s duckloving drake.

[22757](A multitude of midges swarms white over his robe. He scratches himself

[22758]with crossed arms at his ribs, grimacing, and exclaims:)

[22759]

[22760]I’m suffering the agony of the damned. By the hoky fiddle, thanks

[22761]be to Jesus those funny little chaps are not unanimous. If they were

[22762]they’d walk me off the face of the bloody globe.

[22763]

[22764](His head aslant he blesses curtly with fore and middle fingers, imparts

[22765]the Easter kiss and doubleshuffles off comically, swaying his hat from

[22766]side to side, shrinking quickly to the size of his trainbearers. The

[22767]dwarf acolytes, giggling, peeping, nudging, ogling, Easterkissing,

[22768]zigzag behind him. His voice is heard mellow from afar, merciful male,

[22769]melodious:)

[22770]

[22771] Shall carry my heart to thee,

[22772] Shall carry my heart to thee,

[22773] And the breath of the balmy night

[22774] Shall carry my heart to thee!

[22775](The trick doorhandle turns.)

[22776]

[22777]THE DOORHANDLE: Theeee!

[22778]

[22779]ZOE: The devil is in that door.

[22780]

[22781](A male form passes down the creaking staircase and is heard taking the

[22782]waterproof and hat from the rack. Bloom starts forward involuntarily

[22783]and, half closing the door as he passes, takes the chocolate from his

[22784]pocket and offers it nervously to Zoe.)

[22785]

[22786]ZOE: (Sniffs his hair briskly.) Hmmm! Thank your mother for the rabbits.

[22787]I’m very fond of what I like.

[22788]

[22789]BLOOM: (Hearing a male voice in talk with the whores on the doorstep,

[22790]pricks his ears.) If it were he? After? Or because not? Or the double

[22791]event?

[22792]

[22793]ZOE: (Tears open the silverfoil.) Fingers was made before forks. (She

[22794]breaks off and nibbles a piece, gives a piece to Kitty Ricketts and then

[22795]turns kittenishly to Lynch.) No objection to French lozenges? (He nods.

[22796]She taunts him.) Have it now or wait till you get it? (He opens his

[22797]mouth, his head cocked. She whirls the prize in left circle. His head

[22798]follows. She whirls it back in right circle. He eyes her.) Catch!

[22799]

[22800](She tosses a piece. With an adroit snap he catches it and bites it

[22801]through with a crack.)

[22802]

[22803]KITTY: (Chewing.) The engineer I was with at the bazaar does have lovely

[22804]ones. Full of the best liqueurs. And the viceroy was there with his

[22805]lady. The gas we had on the Toft’s hobbyhorses. I’m giddy still.

[22806]

[22807]BLOOM: (In Svengali’s fur overcoat, with folded arms and Napoleonic

[22808]forelock, frowns in ventriloquial exorcism with piercing eagle glance

[22809]towards the door. Then rigid with left foot advanced he makes a swift

[22810]pass with impelling fingers and gives the sign of past master, drawing

[22811]his right arm downwards from his left shoulder.) Go, go, go, I conjure

[22812]you, whoever you are!

[22813]

[22814](A male cough and tread are heard passing through the mist outside.

[22815]Bloom’s features relax. He places a hand in his waistcoat, posing

[22816]calmly. Zoe offers him chocolate.)

[22817]

[22818]BLOOM: (Solemnly.) Thanks.

[22819]

[22820]ZOE: Do as you’re bid. Here!

[22821]

[22822](A firm heelclacking tread is heard on the stairs.)

[22823]

[22824]BLOOM: (Takes the chocolate.) Aphrodisiac? Tansy and pennyroyal. But I

[22825]bought it. Vanilla calms or? Mnemo. Confused light confuses memory. Red

[22826]influences lupus. Colours affect women’s characters, any they have.

[22827]This black makes me sad. Eat and be merry for tomorrow. (He eats.)

[22828]Influence taste too, mauve. But it is so long since I. Seems new. Aphro.

[22829]That priest. Must come. Better late than never. Try truffles at Andrews.

[22830]

[22831](The door opens. Bella Cohen, a massive whoremistress, enters. She

[22832]is dressed in a threequarter ivory gown, fringed round the hem with

[22833]tasselled selvedge, and cools herself flirting a black horn fan like

[22834]Minnie Hauck in Carmen. On her left hand are wedding and keeper rings.

[22835]Her eyes are deeply carboned. She has a sprouting moustache. Her

[22836]olive face is heavy, slightly sweated and fullnosed with orangetainted

[22837]nostrils. She has large pendant beryl eardrops.)

[22838]

[22839]BELLA: My word! I’m all of a mucksweat.

[22840]

[22841](She glances round her at the couples. Then her eyes rest on Bloom with

[22842]hard insistence. Her large fan winnows wind towards her heated faceneck

[22843]and embonpoint. Her falcon eyes glitter.)

[22844]

[22845]THE FAN: (Flirting quickly, then slowly.) Married, I see.

[22846]

[22847]BLOOM: Yes. Partly, I have mislaid...

[22848]

[22849]THE FAN: (Half opening, then closing.) And the missus is master.

[22850]Petticoat government.

[22851]

[22852]BLOOM: (Looks down with a sheepish grin.) That is so.

[22853]

[22854]THE FAN: (Folding together, rests against her left eardrop.) Have you

[22855]forgotten me?

[22856]

[22857]BLOOM: Nes. Yo.

[22858]

[22859]THE FAN: (Folded akimbo against her waist.) Is me her was you dreamed

[22860]before? Was then she him you us since knew? Am all them and the same now

[22861]we?

[22862]

[22863](Bella approaches, gently tapping with the fan.)

[22864]

[22865]BLOOM: (Wincing.) Powerful being. In my eyes read that slumber which

[22866]women love.

[22867]

[22868]THE FAN: (Tapping.) We have met. You are mine. It is fate.

[22869]

[22870]BLOOM: (Cowed.) Exuberant female. Enormously I desiderate your

[22871]domination. I am exhausted, abandoned, no more young. I stand, so to

[22872]speak, with an unposted letter bearing the extra regulation fee before

[22873]the too late box of the general postoffice of human life. The door

[22874]and window open at a right angle cause a draught of thirtytwo feet per

[22875]second according to the law of falling bodies. I have felt this instant

[22876]a twinge of sciatica in my left glutear muscle. It runs in our family.

[22877]Poor dear papa, a widower, was a regular barometer from it. He believed

[22878]in animal heat. A skin of tabby lined his winter waistcoat. Near the

[22879]end, remembering king David and the Sunamite, he shared his bed with

[22880]Athos, faithful after death. A dog’s spittle as you probably... (He

[22881]winces.) Ah!

[22882]

[22883]RICHIE GOULDING: (Bagweighted, passes the door.) Mocking is catch. Best

[22884]value in Dub. Fit for a prince’s. Liver and kidney.

[22885]

[22886]THE FAN: (Tapping.) All things end. Be mine. Now.

[22887]

[22888]BLOOM: (Undecided.) All now? I should not have parted with my talisman.

[22889]Rain, exposure at dewfall on the searocks, a peccadillo at my time of

[22890]life. Every phenomenon has a natural cause.

[22891]

[22892]THE FAN: (Points downwards slowly.) You may.

[22893]

[22894]BLOOM: (Looks downwards and perceives her unfastened bootlace.) We are

[22895]observed.

[22896]

[22897]THE FAN: (Points downwards quickly.) You must.

[22898]

[22899]BLOOM: (With desire, with reluctance.) I can make a true black knot.

[22900]Learned when I served my time and worked the mail order line for

[22901]Kellett’s. Experienced hand. Every knot says a lot. Let me. In

[22902]courtesy. I knelt once before today. Ah!

[22903]

[22904](Bella raises her gown slightly and, steadying her pose, lifts to the

[22905]edge of a chair a plump buskined hoof and a full pastern, silksocked.

[22906]Bloom, stifflegged, aging, bends over her hoof and with gentle fingers

[22907]draws out and in her laces.)

[22908]

[22909]BLOOM: (Murmurs lovingly.) To be a shoefitter in Manfield’s was my

[22910]love’s young dream, the darling joys of sweet buttonhooking, to lace

[22911]up crisscrossed to kneelength the dressy kid footwear satinlined, so

[22912]incredibly impossibly small, of Clyde Road ladies. Even their wax model

[22913]Raymonde I visited daily to admire her cobweb hose and stick of rhubarb

[22914]toe, as worn in Paris.

[22915]

[22916]THE HOOF: Smell my hot goathide. Feel my royal weight.

[22917]

[22918]BLOOM: (Crosslacing.) Too tight?

[22919]

[22920]THE HOOF: If you bungle, Handy Andy, I’ll kick your football for you.

[22921]

[22922]BLOOM: Not to lace the wrong eyelet as I did the night of the bazaar

[22923]dance. Bad luck. Hook in wrong tache of her... person you mentioned.

[22924]That night she met... Now!

[22925]

[22926](He knots the lace. Bella places her foot on the floor. Bloom raises

[22927]his head. Her heavy face, her eyes strike him in midbrow. His eyes grow

[22928]dull, darker and pouched, his nose thickens.)

[22929]

[22930]BLOOM: (Mumbles.) Awaiting your further orders we remain, gentlemen,...

[22931]

[22932]BELLO: (With a hard basilisk stare, in a baritone voice.) Hound of

[22933]dishonour!

[22934]

[22935]BLOOM: (Infatuated.) Empress!

[22936]

[22937]BELLO: (His heavy cheekchops sagging.) Adorer of the adulterous rump!

[22938]

[22939]BLOOM: (Plaintively.) Hugeness!

[22940]

[22941]BELLO: Dungdevourer!

[22942]

[22943]BLOOM: (With sinews semiflexed.) Magmagnificence!

[22944]

[22945]BELLO: Down! (He taps her on the shoulder with his fan.) Incline feet

[22946]forward! Slide left foot one pace back! You will fall. You are falling.

[22947]On the hands down!

[22948]

[22949]BLOOM: (Her eyes upturned in the sign of admiration, closing, yaps.)

[22950]Truffles!

[22951]

[22952](With a piercing epileptic cry she sinks on all fours, grunting,

[22953]snuffling, rooting at his feet: then lies, shamming dead, with eyes shut

[22954]tight, trembling eyelids, bowed upon the ground in the attitude of most

[22955]excellent master.)

[22956]

[22957]BELLO: (With bobbed hair, purple gills, fat moustache rings round his

[22958]shaven mouth, in mountaineer’s puttees, green silverbuttoned coat,

[22959]sport skirt and alpine hat with moorcock’s feather, his hands stuck

[22960]deep in his breeches pockets, places his heel on her neck and grinds it

[22961]in.) Footstool! Feel my entire weight. Bow, bondslave, before the

[22962]throne of your despot’s glorious heels so glistening in their proud

[22963]erectness.

[22964]

[22965]BLOOM: (Enthralled, bleats.) I promise never to disobey.

[22966]

[22967]BELLO: (Laughs loudly.) Holy smoke! You little know what’s in store

[22968]for you. I’m the Tartar to settle your little lot and break you in!

[22969]I’ll bet Kentucky cocktails all round I shame it out of you, old

[22970]son. Cheek me, I dare you. If you do tremble in anticipation of heel

[22971]discipline to be inflicted in gym costume.

[22972]

[22973](Bloom creeps under the sofa and peers out through the fringe.)

[22974]

[22975]ZOE: (Widening her slip to screen her.) She’s not here.

[22976]

[22977]BLOOM: (Closing her eyes.) She’s not here.

[22978]

[22979]FLORRY: (Hiding her with her gown.) She didn’t mean it, Mr Bello.

[22980]She’ll be good, sir.

[22981]

[22982]KITTY: Don’t be too hard on her, Mr Bello. Sure you won’t,

[22983]ma’amsir.

[22984]

[22985]BELLO: (Coaxingly.) Come, ducky dear, I want a word with you, darling,

[22986]just to administer correction. Just a little heart to heart talk,

[22987]sweety. (Bloom puts out her timid head.) There’s a good girly now.

[22988](Bello grabs her hair violently and drags her forward.) I only want to

[22989]correct you for your own good on a soft safe spot. How’s that tender

[22990]behind? O, ever so gently, pet. Begin to get ready.

[22991]

[22992]BLOOM: (Fainting.) Don’t tear my...

[22993]

[22994]BELLO: (Savagely.) The nosering, the pliers, the bastinado, the hanging

[22995]hook, the knout I’ll make you kiss while the flutes play like the

[22996]Nubian slave of old. You’re in for it this time! I’ll make you

[22997]remember me for the balance of your natural life. (His forehead veins

[22998]swollen, his face congested.) I shall sit on your ottoman saddleback

[22999]every morning after my thumping good breakfast of Matterson’s fat

[23000]hamrashers and a bottle of Guinness’s porter. (He belches.) And

[23001]suck my thumping good Stock Exchange cigar while I read the Licensed

[23002]Victualler’s Gazette. Very possibly I shall have you slaughtered and

[23003]skewered in my stables and enjoy a slice of you with crisp crackling

[23004]from the baking tin basted and baked like sucking pig with rice and

[23005]lemon or currant sauce. It will hurt you. (He twists her arm. Bloom

[23006]squeals, turning turtle.)

[23007]

[23008]BLOOM: Don’t be cruel, nurse! Don’t!

[23009]

[23010]BELLO: (Twisting.) Another!

[23011]

[23012]BLOOM: (Screams.) O, it’s hell itself! Every nerve in my body aches

[23013]like mad!

[23014]

[23015]BELLO: (Shouts.) Good, by the rumping jumping general! That’s the best

[23016]bit of news I heard these six weeks. Here, don’t keep me waiting, damn

[23017]you! (He slaps her face.)

[23018]

[23019]BLOOM: (Whimpers.) You’re after hitting me. I’ll tell...

[23020]

[23021]BELLO: Hold him down, girls, till I squat on him.

[23022]

[23023]ZOE: Yes. Walk on him! I will.

[23024]

[23025]FLORRY: I will. Don’t be greedy.

[23026]

[23027]KITTY: No, me. Lend him to me.

[23028]

[23029](The brothel cook, Mrs Keogh, wrinkled, greybearded, in a greasy bib,

[23030]men’s grey and green socks and brogues, floursmeared, a rollingpin

[23031]stuck with raw pastry in her bare red arm and hand, appears at the

[23032]door.)

[23033]

[23034]MRS KEOGH: (Ferociously.) Can I help? (They hold and pinion Bloom.)

[23035]

[23036]BELLO: (Squats with a grunt on Bloom’s upturned face, puffing

[23037]cigarsmoke, nursing a fat leg.) I see Keating Clay is elected

[23038]vicechairman of the Richmond asylum and by the by Guinness’s

[23039]preference shares are at sixteen three quarters. Curse me for a fool

[23040]that didn’t buy that lot Craig and Gardner told me about. Just my

[23041]infernal luck, curse it. And that Goddamned outsider Throwaway at twenty

[23042]to one. (He quenches his cigar angrily on Bloom’s ear.) Where’s that

[23043]Goddamned cursed ashtray?

[23044]

[23045]BLOOM: (Goaded, buttocksmothered.) O! O! Monsters! Cruel one!

[23046]

[23047]BELLO: Ask for that every ten minutes. Beg. Pray for it as you never

[23048]prayed before. (He thrusts out a figged fist and foul cigar.) Here,

[23049]kiss that. Both. Kiss. (He throws a leg astride and, pressing with

[23050]horseman’s knees, calls in a hard voice.) Gee up! A cockhorse to

[23051]Banbury cross. I’ll ride him for the Eclipse stakes. (He bends

[23052]sideways and squeezes his mount’s testicles roughly, shouting.)

[23053]Ho! Off we pop! I’ll nurse you in proper fashion. (He horserides

[23054]cockhorse, leaping in the, in the saddle.) The lady goes a pace a pace

[23055]and the coachman goes a trot a trot and the gentleman goes a gallop a

[23056]gallop a gallop a gallop.

[23057]

[23058]FLORRY: (Pulls at Bello.) Let me on him now. You had enough. I asked

[23059]before you.

[23060]

[23061]ZOE: (Pulling at Florry.) Me. Me. Are you not finished with him yet,

[23062]suckeress?

[23063]

[23064]BLOOM: (Stifling.) Can’t.

[23065]

[23066]BELLO: Well, I’m not. Wait. (He holds in his breath.) Curse it. Here.

[23067]This bung’s about burst. (He uncorks himself behind: then, contorting

[23068]his features, farts loudly.) Take that! (He recorks himself.) Yes, by

[23069]Jingo, sixteen three quarters.

[23070]

[23071]BLOOM: (A sweat breaking out over him.) Not man. (He sniffs.) Woman.

[23072]

[23073]BELLO: (Stands up.) No more blow hot and cold. What you longed for has

[23074]come to pass. Henceforth you are unmanned and mine in earnest, a thing

[23075]under the yoke. Now for your punishment frock. You will shed your male

[23076]garments, you understand, Ruby Cohen? and don the shot silk luxuriously

[23077]rustling over head and shoulders. And quickly too!

[23078]

[23079]BLOOM: (Shrinks.) Silk, mistress said! O crinkly! scrapy! Must I

[23080]tiptouch it with my nails?

[23081]

[23082]BELLO: (Points to his whores.) As they are now so will you be, wigged,

[23083]singed, perfumesprayed, ricepowdered, with smoothshaven armpits. Tape

[23084]measurements will be taken next your skin. You will be laced with cruel

[23085]force into vicelike corsets of soft dove coutille with whalebone busk to

[23086]the diamondtrimmed pelvis, the absolute outside edge, while your figure,

[23087]plumper than when at large, will be restrained in nettight frocks,

[23088]pretty two ounce petticoats and fringes and things stamped, of course,

[23089]with my houseflag, creations of lovely lingerie for Alice and nice

[23090]scent for Alice. Alice will feel the pullpull. Martha and Mary will be

[23091]a little chilly at first in such delicate thighcasing but the frilly

[23092]flimsiness of lace round your bare knees will remind you...

[23093]

[23094]BLOOM: (A charming soubrette with dauby cheeks, mustard hair and large

[23095]male hands and nose, leering mouth.) I tried her things on only twice,

[23096]a small prank, in Holles street. When we were hard up I washed them to

[23097]save the laundry bill. My own shirts I turned. It was the purest thrift.

[23098]

[23099]BELLO: (Jeers.) Little jobs that make mother pleased, eh? And showed off

[23100]coquettishly in your domino at the mirror behind closedrawn blinds your

[23101]unskirted thighs and hegoat’s udders in various poses of surrender,

[23102]eh? Ho! ho! I have to laugh! That secondhand black operatop shift and

[23103]short trunkleg naughties all split up the stitches at her last rape that

[23104]Mrs Miriam Dandrade sold you from the Shelbourne hotel, eh?

[23105]

[23106]BLOOM: Miriam. Black. Demimondaine.

[23107]

[23108]BELLO: (Guffaws.) Christ Almighty it’s too tickling, this! You were

[23109]a nicelooking Miriam when you clipped off your backgate hairs and

[23110]lay swooning in the thing across the bed as Mrs Dandrade about to be

[23111]violated by lieutenant Smythe-Smythe, Mr Philip Augustus Blockwell M.

[23112]P., signor Laci Daremo, the robust tenor, blueeyed Bert, the liftboy,

[23113]Henri Fleury of Gordon Bennett fame, Sheridan, the quadroon Croesus, the

[23114]varsity wetbob eight from old Trinity, Ponto, her splendid Newfoundland

[23115]and Bobs, dowager duchess of Manorhamilton. (He guffaws again.) Christ,

[23116]wouldn’t it make a Siamese cat laugh?

[23117]

[23118]BLOOM: (Her hands and features working.) It was Gerald converted me to

[23119]be a true corsetlover when I was female impersonator in the High School

[23120]play Vice Versa. It was dear Gerald. He got that kink, fascinated by

[23121]sister’s stays. Now dearest Gerald uses pinky greasepaint and gilds

[23122]his eyelids. Cult of the beautiful.

[23123]

[23124]BELLO: (With wicked glee.) Beautiful! Give us a breather! When you took

[23125]your seat with womanish care, lifting your billowy flounces, on the

[23126]smoothworn throne.

[23127]

[23128]BLOOM: Science. To compare the various joys we each enjoy. (Earnestly.)

[23129]And really it’s better the position... because often I used to wet...

[23130]

[23131]BELLO: (Sternly.) No insubordination! The sawdust is there in the corner

[23132]for you. I gave you strict instructions, didn’t I? Do it standing,

[23133]sir! I’ll teach you to behave like a jinkleman! If I catch a trace

[23134]on your swaddles. Aha! By the ass of the Dorans you’ll find I’m a

[23135]martinet. The sins of your past are rising against you. Many. Hundreds.

[23136]

[23137]THE SINS OF THE PAST: (In a medley of voices.) He went through a form of

[23138]clandestine marriage with at least one woman in the shadow of the Black

[23139]church. Unspeakable messages he telephoned mentally to Miss Dunn at an

[23140]address in D’Olier street while he presented himself indecently to

[23141]the instrument in the callbox. By word and deed he frankly encouraged

[23142]a nocturnal strumpet to deposit fecal and other matter in an unsanitary

[23143]outhouse attached to empty premises. In five public conveniences

[23144]he wrote pencilled messages offering his nuptial partner to all

[23145]strongmembered males. And by the offensively smelling vitriol works did

[23146]he not pass night after night by loving courting couples to see if and

[23147]what and how much he could see? Did he not lie in bed, the gross boar,

[23148]gloating over a nauseous fragment of wellused toilet paper presented to

[23149]him by a nasty harlot, stimulated by gingerbread and a postal order?

[23150]

[23151]BELLO: (Whistles loudly.) Say! What was the most revolting piece of

[23152]obscenity in all your career of crime? Go the whole hog. Puke it out! Be

[23153]candid for once.

[23154]

[23155](Mute inhuman faces throng forward, leering, vanishing, gibbering,

[23156]Booloohoom. Poldy Kock, Bootlaces a penny, Cassidy’s hag, blind

[23157]stripling, Larry Rhinoceros, the girl, the woman, the whore, the other,

[23158]the...)

[23159]

[23160]BLOOM: Don’t ask me! Our mutual faith. Pleasants street. I only

[23161]thought the half of the... I swear on my sacred oath...

[23162]

[23163]BELLO: (Peremptorily.) Answer. Repugnant wretch! I insist on knowing.

[23164]Tell me something to amuse me, smut or a bloody good ghoststory or a

[23165]line of poetry, quick, quick, quick! Where? How? What time? With how

[23166]many? I give you just three seconds. One! Two! Thr...

[23167]

[23168]BLOOM: (Docile, gurgles.) I rererepugnosed in rerererepugnant...

[23169]

[23170]BELLO: (Imperiously.) O, get out, you skunk! Hold your tongue! Speak

[23171]when you’re spoken to.

[23172]

[23173]BLOOM: (Bows.) Master! Mistress! Mantamer!

[23174]

[23175](He lifts his arms. His bangle bracelets fall.)

[23176]

[23177]BELLO: (Satirically.) By day you will souse and bat our smelling

[23178]underclothes also when we ladies are unwell, and swab out our latrines

[23179]with dress pinned up and a dishclout tied to your tail. Won’t that be

[23180]nice? (He places a ruby ring on her finger.) And there now! With this

[23181]ring I thee own. Say, thank you, mistress.

[23182]

[23183]BLOOM: Thank you, mistress.

[23184]

[23185]BELLO: You will make the beds, get my tub ready, empty the pisspots in

[23186]the different rooms, including old Mrs Keogh’s the cook’s, a sandy

[23187]one. Ay, and rinse the seven of them well, mind, or lap it up like

[23188]champagne. Drink me piping hot. Hop! You will dance attendance or I’ll

[23189]lecture you on your misdeeds, Miss Ruby, and spank your bare bot right

[23190]well, miss, with the hairbrush. You’ll be taught the error of

[23191]your ways. At night your wellcreamed braceletted hands will wear

[23192]fortythreebutton gloves newpowdered with talc and having delicately

[23193]scented fingertips. For such favours knights of old laid down their

[23194]lives. (He chuckles.) My boys will be no end charmed to see you so

[23195]ladylike, the colonel, above all, when they come here the night before

[23196]the wedding to fondle my new attraction in gilded heels. First I’ll

[23197]have a go at you myself. A man I know on the turf named Charles Alberta

[23198]Marsh (I was in bed with him just now and another gentleman out of the

[23199]Hanaper and Petty Bag office) is on the lookout for a maid of all work

[23200]at a short knock. Swell the bust. Smile. Droop shoulders. What offers?

[23201](He points.) For that lot. Trained by owner to fetch and carry, basket

[23202]in mouth. (He bares his arm and plunges it elbowdeep in Bloom’s

[23203]vulva.) There’s fine depth for you! What, boys? That give you a

[23204]hardon? (He shoves his arm in a bidder’s face.) Here wet the deck and

[23205]wipe it round!

[23206]

[23207]A BIDDER: A florin.

[23208]

[23209](Dillon’s lacquey rings his handbell.)

[23210]

[23211]THE LACQUEY: Barang!

[23212]

[23213]A VOICE: One and eightpence too much.

[23214]

[23215]CHARLES ALBERTA MARSH: Must be virgin. Good breath. Clean.

[23216]

[23217]BELLO: (Gives a rap with his gavel.) Two bar. Rockbottom figure and

[23218]cheap at the price. Fourteen hands high. Touch and examine shis points.

[23219]Handle hrim. This downy skin, these soft muscles, this tender flesh. If

[23220]I had only my gold piercer here! And quite easy to milk. Three newlaid

[23221]gallons a day. A pure stockgetter, due to lay within the hour. His

[23222]sire’s milk record was a thousand gallons of whole milk in forty

[23223]weeks. Whoa, my jewel! Beg up! Whoa! (He brands his initial C on

[23224]Bloom’s croup.) So! Warranted Cohen! What advance on two bob,

[23225]gentlemen?

[23226]

[23227]A DARKVISAGED MAN: (In disguised accent.) Hoondert punt sterlink.

[23228]

[23229]VOICES: (Subdued.) For the Caliph. Haroun Al Raschid.

[23230]

[23231]BELLO: (Gaily.) Right. Let them all come. The scanty, daringly short

[23232]skirt, riding up at the knee to show a peep of white pantalette, is a

[23233]potent weapon and transparent stockings, emeraldgartered, with the

[23234]long straight seam trailing up beyond the knee, appeal to the better

[23235]instincts of the blasé man about town. Learn the smooth mincing walk on

[23236]four inch Louis Quinze heels, the Grecian bend with provoking croup,

[23237]the thighs fluescent, knees modestly kissing. Bring all your powers of

[23238]fascination to bear on them. Pander to their Gomorrahan vices.

[23239]

[23240]BLOOM: (Bends his blushing face into his armpit and simpers with

[23241]forefinger in mouth.) O, I know what you’re hinting at now!

[23242]

[23243]BELLO: What else are you good for, an impotent thing like you? (He

[23244]stoops and, peering, pokes with his fan rudely under the fat suet folds

[23245]of Bloom’s haunches.) Up! Up! Manx cat! What have we here? Where’s

[23246]your curly teapot gone to or who docked it on you, cockyolly? Sing,

[23247]birdy, sing. It’s as limp as a boy of six’s doing his pooly behind

[23248]a cart. Buy a bucket or sell your pump. (Loudly.) Can you do a man’s

[23249]job?

[23250]

[23251]BLOOM: Eccles street...

[23252]

[23253]BELLO: (Sarcastically.) I wouldn’t hurt your feelings for the world

[23254]but there’s a man of brawn in possession there. The tables are turned,

[23255]my gay young fellow! He is something like a fullgrown outdoor man. Well

[23256]for you, you muff, if you had that weapon with knobs and lumps and warts

[23257]all over it. He shot his bolt, I can tell you! Foot to foot, knee to

[23258]knee, belly to belly, bubs to breast! He’s no eunuch. A shock of red

[23259]hair he has sticking out of him behind like a furzebush! Wait for nine

[23260]months, my lad! Holy ginger, it’s kicking and coughing up and down in

[23261]her guts already! That makes you wild, don’t it? Touches the spot? (He

[23262]spits in contempt.) Spittoon!

[23263]

[23264]BLOOM: I was indecently treated, I... Inform the police. Hundred pounds.

[23265]Unmentionable. I...

[23266]

[23267]BELLO: Would if you could, lame duck. A downpour we want not your

[23268]drizzle.

[23269]

[23270]BLOOM: To drive me mad! Moll! I forgot! Forgive! Moll... We... Still...

[23271]

[23272]BELLO: (Ruthlessly.) No, Leopold Bloom, all is changed by woman’s will

[23273]since you slept horizontal in Sleepy Hollow your night of twenty years.

[23274]Return and see.

[23275]

[23276](Old Sleepy Hollow calls over the wold.)

[23277]

[23278]SLEEPY HOLLOW: Rip van Wink! Rip van Winkle!

[23279]

[23280]BLOOM: (In tattered mocassins with a rusty fowlingpiece, tiptoeing,

[23281]fingertipping, his haggard bony bearded face peering through the

[23282]diamond panes, cries out.) I see her! It’s she! The first night at

[23283]Mat Dillon’s! But that dress, the green! And her hair is dyed gold and

[23284]he...

[23285]

[23286]BELLO: (Laughs mockingly.) That’s your daughter, you owl, with a

[23287]Mullingar student.

[23288]

[23289](Milly Bloom, fairhaired, greenvested, slimsandalled, her blue scarf

[23290]in the seawind simply swirling, breaks from the arms of her lover and

[23291]calls, her young eyes wonderwide.)

[23292]

[23293]MILLY: My! It’s Papli! But, O Papli, how old you’ve grown!

[23294]

[23295]BELLO: Changed, eh? Our whatnot, our writingtable where we never wrote,

[23296]aunt Hegarty’s armchair, our classic reprints of old masters. A man

[23297]and his menfriends are living there in clover. The Cuckoos’ Rest!

[23298]Why not? How many women had you, eh, following them up dark streets,

[23299]flatfoot, exciting them by your smothered grunts, what, you male

[23300]prostitute? Blameless dames with parcels of groceries. Turn about. Sauce

[23301]for the goose, my gander O.

[23302]

[23303]BLOOM: They... I...

[23304]

[23305]BELLO: (Cuttingly.) Their heelmarks will stamp the Brusselette carpet

[23306]you bought at Wren’s auction. In their horseplay with Moll the romp

[23307]to find the buck flea in her breeches they will deface the little statue

[23308]you carried home in the rain for art for art’s sake. They will violate

[23309]the secrets of your bottom drawer. Pages will be torn from your handbook

[23310]of astronomy to make them pipespills. And they will spit in your ten

[23311]shilling brass fender from Hampton Leedom’s.

[23312]

[23313]BLOOM: Ten and six. The act of low scoundrels. Let me go. I will return.

[23314]I will prove...

[23315]

[23316]A VOICE: Swear!

[23317]

[23318](Bloom clenches his fists and crawls forward, a bowieknife between his

[23319]teeth.)

[23320]

[23321]BELLO: As a paying guest or a kept man? Too late. You have made your

[23322]secondbest bed and others must lie in it. Your epitaph is written. You

[23323]are down and out and don’t you forget it, old bean.

[23324]

[23325]BLOOM: Justice! All Ireland versus one! Has nobody...? (He bites his

[23326]thumb.)

[23327]

[23328]BELLO: Die and be damned to you if you have any sense of decency or

[23329]grace about you. I can give you a rare old wine that’ll send you

[23330]skipping to hell and back. Sign a will and leave us any coin you have!

[23331]If you have none see you damn well get it, steal it, rob it! We’ll

[23332]bury you in our shrubbery jakes where you’ll be dead and dirty with

[23333]old Cuck Cohen, my stepnephew I married, the bloody old gouty procurator

[23334]and sodomite with a crick in his neck, and my other ten or eleven

[23335]husbands, whatever the buggers’ names were, suffocated in the one

[23336]cesspool. (He explodes in a loud phlegmy laugh.) We’ll manure you, Mr

[23337]Flower! (He pipes scoffingly.) Byby, Poldy! Byby, Papli!

[23338]

[23339]BLOOM: (Clasps his head.) My willpower! Memory! I have sinned! I have

[23340]suff...

[23341]

[23342](He weeps tearlessly.)

[23343]

[23344]BELLO: (Sneers.) Crybabby! Crocodile tears!

[23345]

[23346](Bloom, broken, closely veiled for the sacrifice, sobs, his face to

[23347]the earth. The passing bell is heard. Darkshawled figures of the

[23348]circumcised, in sackcloth and ashes, stand by the wailing wall. M.

[23349]Shulomowitz, Joseph Goldwater, Moses Herzog, Harris Rosenberg, M.

[23350]Moisel, J. Citron, Minnie Watchman, P. Mastiansky, The Reverend Leopold

[23351]Abramovitz, Chazen. With swaying arms they wail in pneuma over the

[23352]recreant Bloom.)

[23353]

[23354]THE CIRCUMCISED: (In dark guttural chant as they cast dead sea fruit

[23355]upon him, no flowers.) Shema Israel Adonai Elohenu Adonai Echad.

[23356]

[23357]VOICES: (Sighing.) So he’s gone. Ah yes. Yes, indeed. Bloom? Never

[23358]heard of him. No? Queer kind of chap. There’s the widow. That so? Ah,

[23359]yes.

[23360]

[23361](From the suttee pyre the flame of gum camphire ascends. The pall of

[23362]incense smoke screens and disperses. Out of her oakframe a nymph with

[23363]hair unbound, lightly clad in teabrown artcolours, descends from her

[23364]grotto and passing under interlacing yews stands over Bloom.)

[23365]

[23366]THE YEWS: (Their leaves whispering.) Sister. Our sister. Ssh!

[23367]

[23368]THE NYMPH: (Softly.) Mortal! (Kindly.) Nay, dost not weepest!

[23369]

[23370]BLOOM: (Crawls jellily forward under the boughs, streaked by sunlight,

[23371]with dignity.) This position. I felt it was expected of me. Force of

[23372]habit.

[23373]

[23374]THE NYMPH: Mortal! You found me in evil company, highkickers, coster

[23375]picnicmakers, pugilists, popular generals, immoral panto boys in

[23376]fleshtights and the nifty shimmy dancers, La Aurora and Karini, musical

[23377]act, the hit of the century. I was hidden in cheap pink paper that smelt

[23378]of rock oil. I was surrounded by the stale smut of clubmen, stories to

[23379]disturb callow youth, ads for transparencies, truedup dice and bustpads,

[23380]proprietary articles and why wear a truss with testimonial from ruptured

[23381]gentleman. Useful hints to the married.

[23382]

[23383]BLOOM: (Lifts a turtle head towards her lap.) We have met before. On

[23384]another star.

[23385]

[23386]THE NYMPH: (Sadly.) Rubber goods. Neverrip brand as supplied to the

[23387]aristocracy. Corsets for men. I cure fits or money refunded. Unsolicited

[23388]testimonials for Professor Waldmann’s wonderful chest exuber. My bust

[23389]developed four inches in three weeks, reports Mrs Gus Rublin with photo.

[23390]

[23391]BLOOM: You mean Photo Bits?

[23392]

[23393]THE NYMPH: I do. You bore me away, framed me in oak and tinsel, set me

[23394]above your marriage couch. Unseen, one summer eve, you kissed me in

[23395]four places. And with loving pencil you shaded my eyes, my bosom and my

[23396]shame.

[23397]

[23398]BLOOM: (Humbly kisses her long hair.) Your classic curves, beautiful

[23399]immortal, I was glad to look on you, to praise you, a thing of beauty,

[23400]almost to pray.

[23401]

[23402]THE NYMPH: During dark nights I heard your praise.

[23403]

[23404]BLOOM: (Quickly.) Yes, yes. You mean that I... Sleep reveals the worst

[23405]side of everyone, children perhaps excepted. I know I fell out of bed

[23406]or rather was pushed. Steel wine is said to cure snoring. For the rest

[23407]there is that English invention, pamphlet of which I received some days

[23408]ago, incorrectly addressed. It claims to afford a noiseless, inoffensive

[23409]vent. (He sighs.) ’Twas ever thus. Frailty, thy name is marriage.

[23410]

[23411]THE NYMPH: (Her fingers in her ears.) And words. They are not in my

[23412]dictionary.

[23413]

[23414]BLOOM: You understood them?

[23415]

[23416]THE YEWS: Ssh!

[23417]

[23418]THE NYMPH: (Covers her face with her hands.) What have I not seen in

[23419]that chamber? What must my eyes look down on?

[23420]

[23421]BLOOM: (Apologetically.) I know. Soiled personal linen, wrong side up

[23422]with care. The quoits are loose. From Gibraltar by long sea long ago.

[23423]

[23424]THE NYMPH: (Bends her head.) Worse, worse!

[23425]

[23426]BLOOM: (Reflects precautiously.) That antiquated commode. It wasn’t

[23427]her weight. She scaled just eleven stone nine. She put on nine pounds

[23428]after weaning. It was a crack and want of glue. Eh? And that absurd

[23429]orangekeyed utensil which has only one handle.

[23430]

[23431](The sound of a waterfall is heard in bright cascade.)

[23432]

[23433]THE WATERFALL:

[23434]

[23435] Poulaphouca Poulaphouca

[23436] Poulaphouca Poulaphouca.

[23437]THE YEWS: (Mingling their boughs.) Listen. Whisper. She is right, our

[23438]sister. We grew by Poulaphouca waterfall. We gave shade on languorous

[23439]summer days.

[23440]

[23441]JOHN WYSE NOLAN: (In the background, in Irish National Forester’s

[23442]uniform, doffs his plumed hat.) Prosper! Give shade on languorous days,

[23443]trees of Ireland!

[23444]

[23445]THE YEWS: (Murmuring.) Who came to Poulaphouca with the High School

[23446]excursion? Who left his nutquesting classmates to seek our shade?

[23447]

[23448]BLOOM: (Scared.) High School of Poula? Mnemo? Not in full possession of

[23449]faculties. Concussion. Run over by tram.

[23450]

[23451]THE ECHO: Sham!

[23452]

[23453]BLOOM: (Pigeonbreasted, bottleshouldered, padded, in nondescript

[23454]juvenile grey and black striped suit, too small for him, white tennis

[23455]shoes, bordered stockings with turnover tops and a red schoolcap with

[23456]badge.) I was in my teens, a growing boy. A little then sufficed,

[23457]a jolting car, the mingling odours of the ladies’ cloakroom and

[23458]lavatory, the throng penned tight on the old Royal stairs (for they

[23459]love crushes, instinct of the herd, and the dark sexsmelling theatre

[23460]unbridles vice), even a pricelist of their hosiery. And then the heat.

[23461]There were sunspots that summer. End of school. And tipsycake. Halcyon

[23462]days.

[23463]

[23464](Halcyon days, high school boys in blue and white football jerseys and

[23465]shorts, Master Donald Turnbull, Master Abraham Chatterton, Master Owen

[23466]Goldberg, Master Jack Meredith, Master Percy Apjohn, stand in a clearing

[23467]of the trees and shout to Master Leopold Bloom.)

[23468]

[23469]THE HALCYON DAYS: Mackerel! Live us again. Hurray! (They cheer.)

[23470]

[23471]BLOOM: (Hobbledehoy, warmgloved, mammamufflered, starred with spent

[23472]snowballs, struggles to rise.) Again! I feel sixteen! What a lark!

[23473]Let’s ring all the bells in Montague street. (He cheers feebly.)

[23474]Hurray for the High School!

[23475]

[23476]THE ECHO: Fool!

[23477]

[23478]THE YEWS: (Rustling.) She is right, our sister. Whisper. (Whispered

[23479]kisses are heard in all the wood. Faces of hamadryads peep out from

[23480]the boles and among the leaves and break, blossoming into bloom.) Who

[23481]profaned our silent shade?

[23482]

[23483]THE NYMPH: (Coyly, through parting fingers.) There? In the open air?

[23484]

[23485]THE YEWS: (Sweeping downward.) Sister, yes. And on our virgin sward.

[23486]

[23487]THE WATERFALL:

[23488]

[23489] Poulaphouca Poulaphouca

[23490] Phoucaphouca Phoucaphouca.

[23491]THE NYMPH: (With wide fingers.) O, infamy!

[23492]

[23493]BLOOM: I was precocious. Youth. The fauna. I sacrificed to the god of

[23494]the forest. The flowers that bloom in the spring. It was pairing

[23495]time. Capillary attraction is a natural phenomenon. Lotty Clarke,

[23496]flaxenhaired, I saw at her night toilette through illclosed curtains

[23497]with poor papa’s operaglasses: The wanton ate grass wildly. She rolled

[23498]downhill at Rialto bridge to tempt me with her flow of animal spirits.

[23499]She climbed their crooked tree and I... A saint couldn’t resist it.

[23500]The demon possessed me. Besides, who saw?

[23501]

[23502](Staggering Bob, a whitepolled calf, thrusts a ruminating head with

[23503]humid nostrils through the foliage.)

[23504]

[23505]STAGGERING BOB: (Large teardrops rolling from his prominent eyes,

[23506]snivels.) Me. Me see.

[23507]

[23508]BLOOM: Simply satisfying a need I... (With pathos.) No girl would when I

[23509]went girling. Too ugly. They wouldn’t play...

[23510]

[23511](High on Ben Howth through rhododendrons a nannygoat passes,

[23512]plumpuddered, buttytailed, dropping currants.)

[23513]

[23514]THE NANNYGOAT: (Bleats.) Megeggaggegg! Nannannanny!

[23515]

[23516]BLOOM: (Hatless, flushed, covered with burrs of thistledown and

[23517]gorsespine.) Regularly engaged. Circumstances alter cases. (He gazes

[23518]intently downwards on the water.) Thirtytwo head over heels per second.

[23519]Press nightmare. Giddy Elijah. Fall from cliff. Sad end of government

[23520]printer’s clerk. (Through silversilent summer air the dummy of Bloom,

[23521]rolled in a mummy, rolls roteatingly from the Lion’s Head cliff into

[23522]the purple waiting waters.)

[23523]

[23524]THE DUMMYMUMMY: Bbbbblllllblblblblobschbg!

[23525]

[23526](Far out in the bay between Bailey and Kish lights the Erin’s King

[23527]sails, sending a broadening plume of coalsmoke from her funnel towards

[23528]the land.)

[23529]

[23530]COUNCILLOR NANNETTI: (Alone on deck, in dark alpaca, yellowkitefaced,

[23531]his hand in his waistcoat opening, declaims.) When my country takes her

[23532]place among the nations of the earth, then, and not till then, let my

[23533]epitaph be written. I have...

[23534]

[23535]BLOOM: Done. Prff!

[23536]

[23537]THE NYMPH: (Loftily.) We immortals, as you saw today, have not such

[23538]a place and no hair there either. We are stonecold and pure. We eat

[23539]electric light. (She arches her body in lascivious crispation, placing

[23540]her forefinger in her mouth.) Spoke to me. Heard from behind. How then

[23541]could you...?

[23542]

[23543]BLOOM: (Pawing the heather abjectly.) O, I have been a perfect pig.

[23544]Enemas too I have administered. One third of a pint of quassia to

[23545]which add a tablespoonful of rocksalt. Up the fundament. With Hamilton

[23546]Long’s syringe, the ladies’ friend.

[23547]

[23548]THE NYMPH: In my presence. The powderpuff. (She blushes and makes a

[23549]knee.) And the rest!

[23550]

[23551]BLOOM: (Dejected.) Yes. Peccavi! I have paid homage on that living altar

[23552]where the back changes name. (With sudden fervour.) For why should the

[23553]dainty scented jewelled hand, the hand that rules...?

[23554]

[23555](Figures wind serpenting in slow woodland pattern around the treestems,

[23556]cooeeing.)

[23557]

[23558]THE VOICE OF KITTY: (In the thicket.) Show us one of them cushions.

[23559]

[23560]THE VOICE OF FLORRY: Here.

[23561]

[23562](A grouse wings clumsily through the underwood.)

[23563]

[23564]THE VOICE OF LYNCH: (In the thicket.) Whew! Piping hot!

[23565]

[23566]THE VOICE OF ZOE: (From the thicket.) Came from a hot place.

[23567]

[23568]THE VOICE OF VIRAG: (A birdchief, bluestreaked and feathered in war

[23569]panoply with his assegai, striding through a crackling canebrake over

[23570]beechmast and acorns.) Hot! Hot! Ware Sitting Bull!

[23571]

[23572]BLOOM: It overpowers me. The warm impress of her warm form. Even to sit

[23573]where a woman has sat, especially with divaricated thighs, as though to

[23574]grant the last favours, most especially with previously well uplifted

[23575]white sateen coatpans. So womanly, full. It fills me full.

[23576]

[23577]THE WATERFALL:

[23578]

[23579] Phillaphulla Poulaphouca

[23580] Poulaphouca Poulaphouca.

[23581]THE YEWS: Ssh! Sister, speak!

[23582]

[23583]THE NYMPH: (Eyeless, in nun’s white habit, coif and hugewinged wimple,

[23584]softly, with remote eyes.) Tranquilla convent. Sister Agatha. Mount

[23585]Carmel. The apparitions of Knock and Lourdes. No more desire. (She

[23586]reclines her head, sighing.) Only the ethereal. Where dreamy creamy gull

[23587]waves o’er the waters dull.

[23588]

[23589](Bloom half rises. His back trouserbutton snaps.)

[23590]

[23591]THE BUTTON: Bip!

[23592]

[23593](Two sluts of the Coombe dance rainily by, shawled, yelling flatly.)

[23594]

[23595]THE SLUTS:

[23596]

[23597] O, Leopold lost the pin of his drawers

[23598] He didn’t know what to do,

[23599] To keep it up,

[23600] To keep it up.

[23601]BLOOM: (Coldly.) You have broken the spell. The last straw. If there

[23602]were only ethereal where would you all be, postulants and novices? Shy

[23603]but willing like an ass pissing.

[23604]

[23605]THE YEWS: (Their silverfoil of leaves precipitating, their skinny arms

[23606]aging and swaying.) Deciduously!

[23607]

[23608]THE NYMPH: (Her features hardening, gropes in the folds of her habit.)

[23609]Sacrilege! To attempt my virtue! (A large moist stain appears on her

[23610]robe.) Sully my innocence! You are not fit to touch the garment of a

[23611]pure woman. (She clutches again in her robe.) Wait. Satan, you’ll sing

[23612]no more lovesongs. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. (She draws a poniard and,

[23613]clad in the sheathmail of an elected knight of nine, strikes at his

[23614]loins.) Nekum!

[23615]

[23616]BLOOM: (Starts up, seizes her hand.) Hoy! Nebrakada! Cat o’ nine

[23617]lives! Fair play, madam. No pruningknife. The fox and the grapes, is it?

[23618]What do you lack with your barbed wire? Crucifix not thick enough? (He

[23619]clutches her veil.) A holy abbot you want or Brophy, the lame gardener,

[23620]or the spoutless statue of the watercarrier, or good mother Alphonsus,

[23621]eh Reynard?

[23622]

[23623]THE NYMPH: (With a cry flees from him unveiled, her plaster cast

[23624]cracking, a cloud of stench escaping from the cracks.) Poli...!

[23625]

[23626]BLOOM: (Calls after her.) As if you didn’t get it on the double

[23627]yourselves. No jerks and multiple mucosities all over you. I tried it.

[23628]Your strength our weakness. What’s our studfee? What will you pay on

[23629]the nail? You fee mendancers on the Riviera, I read. (The fleeing nymph

[23630]raises a keen.) Eh? I have sixteen years of black slave labour behind

[23631]me. And would a jury give me five shillings alimony tomorrow, eh? Fool

[23632]someone else, not me. (He sniffs.) Rut. Onions. Stale. Sulphur. Grease.

[23633]

[23634](The figure of Bella Cohen stands before him.)

[23635]

[23636]BELLA: You’ll know me the next time.

[23637]

[23638]BLOOM: (Composed, regards her.) Passée. Mutton dressed as lamb. Long

[23639]in the tooth and superfluous hair. A raw onion the last thing at night

[23640]would benefit your complexion. And take some double chin drill. Your

[23641]eyes are as vapid as the glasseyes of your stuffed fox. They have the

[23642]dimensions of your other features, that’s all. I’m not a triple

[23643]screw propeller.

[23644]

[23645]BELLA: (Contemptuously.) You’re not game, in fact. (Her sowcunt

[23646]barks.) Fbhracht!

[23647]

[23648]BLOOM: (Contemptuously.) Clean your nailless middle finger first, your

[23649]bully’s cold spunk is dripping from your cockscomb. Take a handful of

[23650]hay and wipe yourself.

[23651]

[23652]BELLA: I know you, canvasser! Dead cod!

[23653]

[23654]BLOOM: I saw him, kipkeeper! Pox and gleet vendor!

[23655]

[23656]BELLA: (Turns to the piano.) Which of you was playing the dead march

[23657]from Saul?

[23658]

[23659]ZOE: Me. Mind your cornflowers. (She darts to the piano and bangs chords

[23660]on it with crossed arms.) The cat’s ramble through the slag. (She

[23661]glances back.) Eh? Who’s making love to my sweeties? (She darts back

[23662]to the table.) What’s yours is mine and what’s mine is my own.

[23663]

[23664](Kitty, disconcerted, coats her teeth with the silver paper. Bloom

[23665]approaches Zoe.)

[23666]

[23667]BLOOM: (Gently.) Give me back that potato, will you?

[23668]

[23669]ZOE: Forfeits, a fine thing and a superfine thing.

[23670]

[23671]BLOOM: (With feeling.) It is nothing, but still, a relic of poor mamma.

[23672]

[23673]ZOE:

[23674]

[23675] Give a thing and take it back

[23676] God’ll ask you where is that

[23677] You’ll say you don’t know

[23678] God’ll send you down below.

[23679]BLOOM: There is a memory attached to it. I should like to have it.

[23680]

[23681]STEPHEN: To have or not to have that is the question.

[23682]

[23683]ZOE: Here. (She hauls up a reef of her slip, revealing her bare thigh,

[23684]and unrolls the potato from the top of her stocking.) Those that hides

[23685]knows where to find.

[23686]

[23687]BELLA: (Frowns.) Here. This isn’t a musical peepshow. And don’t you

[23688]smash that piano. Who’s paying here?

[23689]

[23690](She goes to the pianola. Stephen fumbles in his pocket and, taking out

[23691]a banknote by its corner, hands it to her.)

[23692]

[23693]STEPHEN: (With exaggerated politeness.) This silken purse I made out of

[23694]the sow’s ear of the public. Madam, excuse me. If you allow me. (He

[23695]indicates vaguely Lynch and Bloom.) We are all in the same sweepstake,

[23696]Kinch and Lynch. Dans ce bordel où tenons nostre état.

[23697]

[23698]LYNCH: (Calls from the hearth.) Dedalus! Give her your blessing for me.

[23699]

[23700]STEPHEN: (Hands Bella a coin.) Gold. She has it.

[23701]

[23702]BELLA: (Looks at the money, then at Stephen, then at Zoe, Florry and

[23703]Kitty.) Do you want three girls? It’s ten shillings here.

[23704]

[23705]STEPHEN: (Delightedly.) A hundred thousand apologies. (He fumbles again

[23706]and takes out and hands her two crowns.) Permit, brevi manu, my sight is

[23707]somewhat troubled.

[23708]

[23709](Bella goes to the table to count the money while Stephen talks to

[23710]himself in monosyllables. Zoe bends over the table. Kitty leans over

[23711]Zoe’s neck. Lynch gets up, rights his cap and, clasping Kitty’s

[23712]waist, adds his head to the group.)

[23713]

[23714]FLORRY: (Strives heavily to rise.) Ow! My foot’s asleep. (She limps

[23715]over to the table. Bloom approaches.)

[23716]

[23717]BELLA, ZOE, KITTY, LYNCH, BLOOM: (Chattering and squabbling.) The

[23718]gentleman... ten shillings... paying for the three... allow me a

[23719]moment... this gentleman pays separate... who’s touching it?... ow!

[23720]... mind who you’re pinching... are you staying the night or a short

[23721]time?... who did?... you’re a liar, excuse me... the gentleman paid

[23722]down like a gentleman... drink... it’s long after eleven.

[23723]

[23724]STEPHEN: (At the pianola, making a gesture of abhorrence.) No bottles!

[23725]What, eleven? A riddle!

[23726]

[23727]ZOE: (Lifting up her pettigown and folding a half sovereign into the top

[23728]of her stocking.) Hard earned on the flat of my back.

[23729]

[23730]LYNCH: (Lifting Kitty from the table.) Come!

[23731]

[23732]KITTY: Wait. (She clutches the two crowns.)

[23733]

[23734]FLORRY: And me?

[23735]

[23736]LYNCH: Hoopla!

[23737]

[23738](He lifts her, carries her and bumps her down on the sofa.)

[23739]

[23740]STEPHEN:

[23741]

[23742] The fox crew, the cocks flew,

[23743] The bells in heaven

[23744] Were striking eleven.

[23745] ’Tis time for her poor soul

[23746] To get out of heaven.

[23747]BLOOM: (Quietly lays a half sovereign on the table between Bella and

[23748]Florry.) So. Allow me. (He takes up the poundnote.) Three times ten.

[23749]We’re square.

[23750]

[23751]BELLA: (Admiringly.) You’re such a slyboots, old cocky. I could kiss

[23752]you.

[23753]

[23754]ZOE: (Points.) Him? Deep as a drawwell. (Lynch bends Kitty back over the

[23755]sofa and kisses her. Bloom goes with the poundnote to Stephen.)

[23756]

[23757]BLOOM: This is yours.

[23758]

[23759]STEPHEN: How is that? Le distrait or absentminded beggar. (He fumbles

[23760]again in his pocket and draws out a handful of coins. An object falls.)

[23761]That fell.

[23762]

[23763]BLOOM: (Stooping, picks up and hands a box of matches.) This.

[23764]

[23765]STEPHEN: Lucifer. Thanks.

[23766]

[23767]BLOOM: (Quietly.) You had better hand over that cash to me to take care

[23768]of. Why pay more?

[23769]

[23770]STEPHEN: (Hands him all his coins.) Be just before you are generous.

[23771]

[23772]BLOOM: I will but is it wise? (He counts.) One, seven, eleven, and five.

[23773]Six. Eleven. I don’t answer for what you may have lost.

[23774]

[23775]STEPHEN: Why striking eleven? Proparoxyton. Moment before the next

[23776]Lessing says. Thirsty fox. (He laughs loudly.) Burying his grandmother.

[23777]Probably he killed her.

[23778]

[23779]BLOOM: That is one pound six and eleven. One pound seven, say.

[23780]

[23781]STEPHEN: Doesn’t matter a rambling damn.

[23782]

[23783]BLOOM: No, but...

[23784]

[23785]STEPHEN: (Comes to the table.) Cigarette, please. (Lynch tosses a

[23786]cigarette from the sofa to the table.) And so Georgina Johnson is dead

[23787]and married. (A cigarette appears on the table. Stephen looks at it.)

[23788]Wonder. Parlour magic. Married. Hm. (He strikes a match and proceeds to

[23789]light the cigarette with enigmatic melancholy.)

[23790]

[23791]LYNCH: (Watching him.) You would have a better chance of lighting it if

[23792]you held the match nearer.

[23793]

[23794]STEPHEN: (Brings the match near his eye.) Lynx eye. Must get glasses.

[23795]Broke them yesterday. Sixteen years ago. Distance. The eye sees all

[23796]flat. (He draws the match away. It goes out.) Brain thinks. Near: far.

[23797]Ineluctable modality of the visible. (He frowns mysteriously.) Hm.

[23798]Sphinx. The beast that has two backs at midnight. Married.

[23799]

[23800]ZOE: It was a commercial traveller married her and took her away with

[23801]him.

[23802]

[23803]FLORRY: (Nods.) Mr Lambe from London.

[23804]

[23805]STEPHEN: Lamb of London, who takest away the sins of our world.

[23806]

[23807]LYNCH: (Embracing Kitty on the sofa, chants deeply.) Dona nobis pacem.

[23808]

[23809](The cigarette slips from Stephen’s fingers. Bloom picks it up and

[23810]throws it in the grate.)

[23811]

[23812]BLOOM: Don’t smoke. You ought to eat. Cursed dog I met. (To Zoe.) You

[23813]have nothing?

[23814]

[23815]ZOE: Is he hungry?

[23816]

[23817]STEPHEN: (Extends his hand to her smiling and chants to the air of the

[23818]bloodoath in the Dusk of the Gods.)

[23819]

[23820] Hangende Hunger,

[23821] Fragende Frau,

[23822] Macht uns alle kaputt.

[23823]ZOE: (Tragically.) Hamlet, I am thy father’s gimlet! (She takes

[23824]his hand.) Blue eyes beauty I’ll read your hand. (She points to his

[23825]forehead.) No wit, no wrinkles. (She counts.) Two, three, Mars, that’s

[23826]courage. (Stephen shakes his head.) No kid.

[23827]

[23828]LYNCH: Sheet lightning courage. The youth who could not shiver and

[23829]shake. (To Zoe.) Who taught you palmistry?

[23830]

[23831]ZOE: (Turns.) Ask my ballocks that I haven’t got. (To Stephen.) I see

[23832]it in your face. The eye, like that. (She frowns with lowered head.)

[23833]

[23834]LYNCH: (Laughing, slaps Kitty behind twice.) Like that. Pandybat.

[23835]

[23836](Twice loudly a pandybat cracks, the coffin of the pianola flies open,

[23837]the bald little round jack-in-the-box head of Father Dolan springs up.)

[23838]

[23839]FATHER DOLAN: Any boy want flogging? Broke his glasses? Lazy idle little

[23840]schemer. See it in your eye.

[23841]

[23842](Mild, benign, rectorial, reproving, the head of Don John Conmee rises

[23843]from the pianola coffin.)

[23844]

[23845]DON JOHN CONMEE: Now, Father Dolan! Now. I’m sure that Stephen is a

[23846]very good little boy!

[23847]

[23848]ZOE: (Examining Stephen’s palm.) Woman’s hand.

[23849]

[23850]STEPHEN: (Murmurs.) Continue. Lie. Hold me. Caress. I never could read

[23851]His handwriting except His criminal thumbprint on the haddock.

[23852]

[23853]ZOE: What day were you born?

[23854]

[23855]STEPHEN: Thursday. Today.

[23856]

[23857]ZOE: Thursday’s child has far to go. (She traces lines on his hand.)

[23858]Line of fate. Influential friends.

[23859]

[23860]FLORRY: (Pointing.) Imagination.

[23861]

[23862]ZOE: Mount of the moon. You’ll meet with a... (She peers at his hands

[23863]abruptly.) I won’t tell you what’s not good for you. Or do you want

[23864]to know?

[23865]

[23866]BLOOM: (Detaches her fingers and offers his palm.) More harm than good.

[23867]Here. Read mine.

[23868]

[23869]BELLA: Show. (She turns up Bloom’s hand.) I thought so. Knobby

[23870]knuckles for the women.

[23871]

[23872]ZOE: (Peering at Bloom’s palm.) Gridiron. Travels beyond the sea and

[23873]marry money.

[23874]

[23875]BLOOM: Wrong.

[23876]

[23877]ZOE: (Quickly.) O, I see. Short little finger. Henpecked husband. That

[23878]wrong?

[23879]

[23880](Black Liz, a huge rooster hatching in a chalked circle, rises,

[23881]stretches her wings and clucks.)

[23882]

[23883]BLACK LIZ: Gara. Klook. Klook. Klook.

[23884]

[23885](She sidles from her newlaid egg and waddles off.)

[23886]

[23887]BLOOM: (Points to his hand.) That weal there is an accident. Fell and

[23888]cut it twentytwo years ago. I was sixteen.

[23889]

[23890]ZOE: I see, says the blind man. Tell us news.

[23891]

[23892]STEPHEN: See? Moves to one great goal. I am twentytwo. Sixteen years ago

[23893]he was twentytwo too. Sixteen years ago I twentytwo tumbled. Twentytwo

[23894]years ago he sixteen fell off his hobbyhorse. (He winces.) Hurt my hand

[23895]somewhere. Must see a dentist. Money?

[23896]

[23897](Zoe whispers to Florry. They giggle. Bloom releases his hand and writes

[23898]idly on the table in backhand, pencilling slow curves.)

[23899]

[23900]FLORRY: What?

[23901]

[23902](A hackneycar, number three hundred and twentyfour, with a

[23903]gallantbuttocked mare, driven by James Barton, Harmony Avenue,

[23904]Donnybrook, trots past. Blazes Boylan and Lenehan sprawl swaying on the

[23905]sideseats. The Ormond boots crouches behind on the axle. Sadly over the

[23906]crossblind Lydia Douce and Mina Kennedy gaze.)

[23907]

[23908]THE BOOTS: (Jogging, mocks them with thumb and wriggling wormfingers.)

[23909]Haw haw have you the horn?

[23910]

[23911](Bronze by gold they whisper.)

[23912]

[23913]ZOE: (To Florry.) Whisper.

[23914]

[23915](They whisper again.)

[23916]

[23917](Over the well of the car Blazes Boylan leans, his boater straw set

[23918]sideways, a red flower in his mouth. Lenehan in yachtsman’s cap and

[23919]white shoes officiously detaches a long hair from Blazes Boylan’s coat

[23920]shoulder.)

[23921]

[23922]LENEHAN: Ho! What do I here behold? Were you brushing the cobwebs off a

[23923]few quims?

[23924]

[23925]BOYLAN: (Sated, smiles.) Plucking a turkey.

[23926]

[23927]LENEHAN: A good night’s work.

[23928]

[23929]BOYLAN: (Holding up four thick bluntungulated fingers, winks.) Blazes

[23930]Kate! Up to sample or your money back. (He holds out a forefinger.)

[23931]Smell that.

[23932]

[23933]LENEHAN: (Smells gleefully.) Ah! Lobster and mayonnaise. Ah!

[23934]

[23935]ZOE AND FLORRY: (Laugh together.) Ha ha ha ha.

[23936]

[23937]BOYLAN: (Jumps surely from the car and calls loudly for all to hear.)

[23938]Hello, Bloom! Mrs Bloom dressed yet?

[23939]

[23940]BLOOM: (In flunkey’s prune plush coat and kneebreeches, buff stockings

[23941]and powdered wig.) I’m afraid not, sir. The last articles...

[23942]

[23943]BOYLAN: (Tosses him sixpence.) Here, to buy yourself a gin and splash.

[23944](He hangs his hat smartly on a peg of Bloom’s antlered head.) Show me

[23945]in. I have a little private business with your wife, you understand?

[23946]

[23947]BLOOM: Thank you, sir. Yes, sir. Madam Tweedy is in her bath, sir.

[23948]

[23949]MARION: He ought to feel himself highly honoured. (She plops splashing

[23950]out of the water.) Raoul darling, come and dry me. I’m in my pelt.

[23951]Only my new hat and a carriage sponge.

[23952]

[23953]BOYLAN: (A merry twinkle in his eye.) Topping!

[23954]

[23955]BELLA: What? What is it?

[23956]

[23957](Zoe whispers to her.)

[23958]

[23959]MARION: Let him look, the pishogue! Pimp! And scourge himself! I’ll

[23960]write to a powerful prostitute or Bartholomona, the bearded woman, to

[23961]raise weals out on him an inch thick and make him bring me back a signed

[23962]and stamped receipt.

[23963]

[23964]BOYLAN: (Clasps himself.) Here, I can’t hold this little lot much

[23965]longer. (He strides off on stiff cavalry legs.)

[23966]

[23967]BELLA: (Laughing.) Ho ho ho ho.

[23968]

[23969]BOYLAN: (To Bloom, over his shoulder.) You can apply your eye to the

[23970]keyhole and play with yourself while I just go through her a few times.

[23971]

[23972]BLOOM: Thank you, sir. I will, sir. May I bring two men chums to witness

[23973]the deed and take a snapshot? (He holds out an ointment jar.) Vaseline,

[23974]sir? Orangeflower...? Lukewarm water...?

[23975]

[23976]KITTY: (From the sofa.) Tell us, Florry. Tell us. What...

[23977]

[23978](Florry whispers to her. Whispering lovewords murmur, liplapping loudly,

[23979]poppysmic plopslop.)

[23980]

[23981]MINA KENNEDY: (Her eyes upturned.) O, it must be like the scent of

[23982]geraniums and lovely peaches! O, he simply idolises every bit of her!

[23983]Stuck together! Covered with kisses!

[23984]

[23985]LYDIA DOUCE: (Her mouth opening.) Yumyum. O, he’s carrying her round

[23986]the room doing it! Ride a cockhorse. You could hear them in Paris and

[23987]New York. Like mouthfuls of strawberries and cream.

[23988]

[23989]KITTY: (Laughing.) Hee hee hee.

[23990]

[23991]BOYLAN’S VOICE: (Sweetly, hoarsely, in the pit of his stomach.) Ah!

[23992]Godblazeqrukbrukarchkrasht!

[23993]

[23994]MARION’S VOICE: (Hoarsely, sweetly, rising to her throat.) O!

[23995]Weeshwashtkissinapooisthnapoohuck?

[23996]

[23997]BLOOM: (His eyes wildly dilated, clasps himself.) Show! Hide! Show!

[23998]Plough her! More! Shoot!

[23999]

[24000]BELLA, ZOE, FLORRY, KITTY: Ho ho! Ha ha! Hee hee!

[24001]

[24002]LYNCH: (Points.) The mirror up to nature. (He laughs.) Hu hu hu hu hu!

[24003]

[24004](Stephen and Bloom gaze in the mirror. The face of William Shakespeare,

[24005]beardless, appears there, rigid in facial paralysis, crowned by the

[24006]reflection of the reindeer antlered hatrack in the hall.)

[24007]

[24008]SHAKESPEARE: (In dignified ventriloquy.) ’Tis the loud laugh bespeaks

[24009]the vacant mind. (To Bloom.) Thou thoughtest as how thou wastest

[24010]invisible. Gaze. (He crows with a black capon’s laugh.) Iagogo! How my

[24011]Oldfellow chokit his Thursdaymornun. Iagogogo!

[24012]

[24013]BLOOM: (Smiles yellowly at the three whores.) When will I hear the joke?

[24014]

[24015]ZOE: Before you’re twice married and once a widower.

[24016]

[24017]BLOOM: Lapses are condoned. Even the great Napoleon when measurements

[24018]were taken next the skin after his death...

[24019]

[24020](Mrs Dignam, widow woman, her snubnose and cheeks flushed with

[24021]deathtalk, tears and Tunney’s tawny sherry, hurries by in her weeds,

[24022]her bonnet awry, rouging and powdering her cheeks, lips and nose, a

[24023]pen chivvying her brood of cygnets. Beneath her skirt appear her late

[24024]husband’s everyday trousers and turnedup boots, large eights. She

[24025]holds a Scottish widow’s insurance policy and a large marquee umbrella

[24026]under which her brood run with her, Patsy hopping on one shod foot, his

[24027]collar loose, a hank of porksteaks dangling, Freddy whimpering, Susy

[24028]with a crying cod’s mouth, Alice struggling with the baby. She cuffs

[24029]them on, her streamers flaunting aloft.)

[24030]

[24031]FREDDY: Ah, ma, you’re dragging me along!

[24032]

[24033]SUSY: Mamma, the beeftea is fizzing over!

[24034]

[24035]SHAKESPEARE: (With paralytic rage.) Weda seca whokilla farst.

[24036]

[24037](The face of Martin Cunningham, bearded, refeatures Shakespeare’s

[24038]beardless face. The marquee umbrella sways drunkenly, the children run

[24039]aside. Under the umbrella appears Mrs Cunningham in Merry Widow hat and

[24040]kimono gown. She glides sidling and bowing, twirling japanesily.)

[24041]

[24042]MRS CUNNINGHAM: (Sings.)

[24043]

[24044] And they call me the jewel of Asia!

[24045]MARTIN CUNNINGHAM: (Gazes on her, impassive.) Immense! Most bloody awful

[24046]demirep!

[24047]

[24048]STEPHEN: Et exaltabuntur cornua iusti. Queens lay with prize bulls.

[24049]Remember Pasiphae for whose lust my grandoldgrossfather made the first

[24050]confessionbox. Forget not Madam Grissel Steevens nor the suine scions

[24051]of the house of Lambert. And Noah was drunk with wine. And his ark was

[24052]open.

[24053]

[24054]BELLA: None of that here. Come to the wrong shop.

[24055]

[24056]LYNCH: Let him alone. He’s back from Paris.

[24057]

[24058]ZOE: (Runs to stephen and links him.) O go on! Give us some parleyvoo.

[24059]

[24060](Stephen claps hat on head and leaps over to the fireplace where he

[24061]stands with shrugged shoulders, finny hands outspread, a painted smile

[24062]on his face.)

[24063]

[24064]LYNCH: (Pommelling on the sofa.) Rmm Rmm Rmm Rrrrrrmmmmm.

[24065]

[24066]STEPHEN: (Gabbles with marionette jerks.) Thousand places of

[24067]entertainment to expense your evenings with lovely ladies saling gloves

[24068]and other things perhaps hers heart beerchops perfect fashionable

[24069]house very eccentric where lots cocottes beautiful dressed much about

[24070]princesses like are dancing cancan and walking there parisian clowneries

[24071]extra foolish for bachelors foreigns the same if talking a poor english

[24072]how much smart they are on things love and sensations voluptuous.

[24073]Misters very selects for is pleasure must to visit heaven and hell show

[24074]with mortuary candles and they tears silver which occur every night.

[24075]Perfectly shocking terrific of religion’s things mockery seen in

[24076]universal world. All chic womans which arrive full of modesty then

[24077]disrobe and squeal loud to see vampire man debauch nun very fresh young

[24078]with dessous troublants. (He clacks his tongue loudly.) Ho, là là! Ce

[24079]pif qu’il a!

[24080]

[24081]LYNCH: Vive le vampire!

[24082]

[24083]THE WHORES: Bravo! Parleyvoo!

[24084]

[24085]STEPHEN: (Grimacing with head back, laughs loudly, clapping himself.)

[24086]Great success of laughing. Angels much prostitutes like and holy

[24087]apostles big damn ruffians. Demimondaines nicely handsome sparkling of

[24088]diamonds very amiable costumed. Or do you are fond better what belongs

[24089]they moderns pleasure turpitude of old mans? (He points about him with

[24090]grotesque gestures which Lynch and the whores reply to.) Caoutchouc

[24091]statue woman reversible or lifesize tompeeptom of virgins nudities very

[24092]lesbic the kiss five ten times. Enter, gentleman, to see in mirror every

[24093]positions trapezes all that machine there besides also if desire act

[24094]awfully bestial butcher’s boy pollutes in warm veal liver or omlet on

[24095]the belly pièce de Shakespeare.

[24096]

[24097]BELLA: (Clapping her belly sinks back on the sofa, with a shout of

[24098]laughter.) An omelette on the... Ho! ho! ho! ho!... omelette on the...

[24099]

[24100]STEPHEN: (Mincingly.) I love you, sir darling. Speak you englishman

[24101]tongue for double entente cordiale. O yes, mon loup. How much cost?

[24102]Waterloo. Watercloset. (He ceases suddenly and holds up a forefinger.)

[24103]

[24104]BELLA: (Laughing.) Omelette...

[24105]

[24106]THE WHORES: (Laughing.) Encore! Encore!

[24107]

[24108]STEPHEN: Mark me. I dreamt of a watermelon.

[24109]

[24110]ZOE: Go abroad and love a foreign lady.

[24111]

[24112]LYNCH: Across the world for a wife.

[24113]

[24114]FLORRY: Dreams goes by contraries.

[24115]

[24116]STEPHEN: (Extends his arms.) It was here. Street of harlots. In

[24117]Serpentine avenue Beelzebub showed me her, a fubsy widow. Where’s the

[24118]red carpet spread?

[24119]

[24120]BLOOM: (Approaching Stephen.) Look...

[24121]

[24122]STEPHEN: No, I flew. My foes beneath me. And ever shall be. World

[24123]without end. (He cries.) Pater! Free!

[24124]

[24125]BLOOM: I say, look...

[24126]

[24127]STEPHEN: Break my spirit, will he? O merde alors! (He cries, his vulture

[24128]talons sharpened.) Hola! Hillyho!

[24129]

[24130](Simon Dedalus’ voice hilloes in answer, somewhat sleepy but ready.)

[24131]

[24132]SIMON: That’s all right. (He swoops uncertainly through the air,

[24133]wheeling, uttering cries of heartening, on strong ponderous buzzard

[24134]wings.) Ho, boy! Are you going to win? Hoop! Pschatt! Stable with those

[24135]halfcastes. Wouldn’t let them within the bawl of an ass. Head up!

[24136]Keep our flag flying! An eagle gules volant in a field argent displayed.

[24137]Ulster king at arms! Haihoop! (He makes the beagle’s call, giving

[24138]tongue.) Bulbul! Burblblburblbl! Hai, boy!

[24139]

[24140](The fronds and spaces of the wallpaper file rapidly across country.

[24141]A stout fox, drawn from covert, brush pointed, having buried his

[24142]grandmother, runs swift for the open, brighteyed, seeking badger earth,

[24143]under the leaves. The pack of staghounds follows, nose to the ground,

[24144]sniffing their quarry, beaglebaying, burblbrbling to be blooded. Ward

[24145]Union huntsmen and huntswomen live with them, hot for a kill. From Six

[24146]Mile Point, Flathouse, Nine Mile Stone follow the footpeople with knotty

[24147]sticks, hayforks, salmongaffs, lassos, flockmasters with stockwhips,

[24148]bearbaiters with tomtoms, toreadors with bullswords, grey negroes

[24149]waving torches. The crowd bawls of dicers, crown and anchor players,

[24150]thimbleriggers, broadsmen. Crows and touts, hoarse bookies in high

[24151]wizard hats clamour deafeningly.)

[24152]

[24153]THE CROWD:

[24154]

[24155] Card of the races. Racing card!

[24156] Ten to one the field!

[24157] Tommy on the clay here! Tommy on the clay!

[24158] Ten to one bar one! Ten to one bar one!

[24159] Try your luck on Spinning Jenny!

[24160] Ten to one bar one!

[24161] Sell the monkey, boys! Sell the monkey!

[24162] I’ll give ten to one!

[24163] Ten to one bar one!

[24164](A dark horse, riderless, bolts like a phantom past the winningpost,

[24165]his mane moonfoaming, his eyeballs stars. The field follows, a bunch of

[24166]bucking mounts. Skeleton horses, Sceptre, Maximum the Second, Zinfandel,

[24167]the Duke of Westminster’s Shotover, Repulse, the Duke of Beaufort’s

[24168]Ceylon, prix de Paris. Dwarfs ride them, rustyarmoured, leaping, leaping

[24169]in their, in their saddles. Last in a drizzle of rain on a brokenwinded

[24170]isabelle nag, Cock of the North, the favourite, honey cap, green jacket,

[24171]orange sleeves, Garrett Deasy up, gripping the reins, a hockeystick at

[24172]the ready. His nag on spavined whitegaitered feet jogs along the rocky

[24173]road.)

[24174]

[24175]THE ORANGE LODGES: (Jeering.) Get down and push, mister. Last lap!

[24176]You’ll be home the night!

[24177]

[24178]GARRETT DEASY: (Bolt upright, his nailscraped face plastered with

[24179]postagestamps, brandishes his hockeystick, his blue eyes flashing in the

[24180]prism of the chandelier as his mount lopes by at schooling gallop.)

[24181]

[24182]Per vias rectas!

[24183]

[24184](A yoke of buckets leopards all over him and his rearing nag a torrent

[24185]of mutton broth with dancing coins of carrots, barley, onions, turnips,

[24186]potatoes.)

[24187]

[24188]THE GREEN LODGES: Soft day, sir John! Soft day, your honour!

[24189]

[24190](Private Carr, Private Compton and Cissy Caffrey pass beneath the

[24191]windows, singing in discord.)

[24192]

[24193]STEPHEN: Hark! Our friend noise in the street.

[24194]

[24195]ZOE: (Holds up her hand.) Stop!

[24196]

[24197]PRIVATE CARR, PRIVATE COMPTON AND CISSY CAFFREY:

[24198]

[24199] Yet I’ve a sort of a

[24200] Yorkshire relish for...

[24201]ZOE: That’s me. (She claps her hands.) Dance! Dance! (She runs to the

[24202]pianola.) Who has twopence?

[24203]

[24204]BLOOM: Who’ll...?

[24205]

[24206]LYNCH: (Handing her coins.) Here.

[24207]

[24208]STEPHEN: (Cracking his fingers impatiently.) Quick! Quick! Where’s my

[24209]augur’s rod? (He runs to the piano and takes his ashplant, beating his

[24210]foot in tripudium.)

[24211]

[24212]ZOE: (Turns the drumhandle.) There.

[24213]

[24214](She drops two pennies in the slot. Gold, pink and violet lights

[24215]start forth. The drum turns purring in low hesitation waltz. Professor

[24216]Goodwin, in a bowknotted periwig, in court dress, wearing a stained

[24217]inverness cape, bent in two from incredible age, totters across the

[24218]room, his hands fluttering. He sits tinily on the pianostool and

[24219]lifts and beats handless sticks of arms on the keyboard, nodding with

[24220]damsel’s grace, his bowknot bobbing.)

[24221]

[24222]ZOE: (Twirls round herself, heeltapping.) Dance. Anybody here for there?

[24223]Who’ll dance? Clear the table.

[24224]

[24225](The pianola with changing lights plays in waltz time the prelude of My

[24226]Girl’s a Yorkshire Girl. Stephen throws his ashplant on the table and

[24227]seizes Zoe round the waist. Florry and Bella push the table towards the

[24228]fireplace. Stephen, arming Zoe with exaggerated grace, begins to waltz

[24229]her round the room. Bloom stands aside. Her sleeve falling from gracing

[24230]arms, reveals a white fleshflower of vaccination. Between the curtains

[24231]Professor Maginni inserts a leg on the toepoint of which spins a silk

[24232]hat. With a deft kick he sends it spinning to his crown and jauntyhatted

[24233]skates in. He wears a slate frockcoat with claret silk lapels, a gorget

[24234]of cream tulle, a green lowcut waistcoat, stock collar with white

[24235]kerchief, tight lavender trousers, patent pumps and canary gloves. In

[24236]his buttonhole is an immense dahlia. He twirls in reversed directions

[24237]a clouded cane, then wedges it tight in his oxter. He places a hand

[24238]lightly on his breastbone, bows, and fondles his flower and buttons.)

[24239]

[24240]MAGINNI: The poetry of motion, art of calisthenics. No connection with

[24241]Madam Legget Byrne’s or Levenston’s. Fancy dress balls arranged.

[24242]Deportment. The Katty Lanner step. So. Watch me! My terpsichorean

[24243]abilities. (He minuets forward three paces on tripping bee’s feet.)

[24244]Tout le monde en avant! Révérence! Tout le monde en place!

[24245]

[24246](The prelude ceases. Professor Goodwin, beating vague arms shrivels,

[24247]sinks, his live cape falling about the stool. The air in firmer waltz

[24248]time sounds. Stephen and Zoe circle freely. The lights change, glow,

[24249]fade gold rosy violet.)

[24250]

[24251]THE PIANOLA:

[24252]

[24253] Two young fellows were talking about their girls, girls, girls,

[24254] Sweethearts they’d left behind...

[24255](From a corner the morning hours run out, goldhaired, slimsandalled,

[24256]in girlish blue, waspwaisted, with innocent hands. Nimbly they dance,

[24257]twirling their skipping ropes. The hours of noon follow in amber gold.

[24258]Laughing, linked, high haircombs flashing, they catch the sun in mocking

[24259]mirrors, lifting their arms.)

[24260]

[24261]MAGINNI: (Clipclaps glovesilent hands.) Carré! Avant deux! Breathe

[24262]evenly! Balance!

[24263]

[24264](The morning and noon hours waltz in their places, turning, advancing to

[24265]each other, shaping their curves, bowing visavis. Cavaliers behind them

[24266]arch and suspend their arms, with hands descending to, touching, rising

[24267]from their shoulders.)

[24268]

[24269]HOURS: You may touch my.

[24270]

[24271]CAVALIERS: May I touch your?

[24272]

[24273]HOURS: O, but lightly!

[24274]

[24275]CAVALIERS: O, so lightly!

[24276]

[24277]THE PIANOLA:

[24278]

[24279] My little shy little lass has a waist.

[24280](Zoe and Stephen turn boldly with looser swing. The twilight hours

[24281]advance from long landshadows, dispersed, lagging, languideyed, their

[24282]cheeks delicate with cipria and false faint bloom. They are in grey

[24283]gauze with dark bat sleeves that flutter in the land breeze.)

[24284]

[24285]MAGINNI: Avant huit! Traversé! Salut! Cours de mains! Croisé!

[24286]

[24287](The night hours, one by one, steal to the last place. Morning, noon and

[24288]twilight hours retreat before them. They are masked, with daggered hair

[24289]and bracelets of dull bells. Weary they curchycurchy under veils.)

[24290]

[24291]THE BRACELETS: Heigho! Heigho!

[24292]

[24293]ZOE: (Twirling, her hand to her brow.) O!

[24294]

[24295]MAGINNI: Les tiroirs! Chaîne de dames! La corbeille! Dos à dos!

[24296]

[24297](Arabesquing wearily they weave a pattern on the floor, weaving,

[24298]unweaving, curtseying, twirling, simply swirling.)

[24299]

[24300]ZOE: I’m giddy!

[24301]

[24302](She frees herself, droops on a chair. Stephen seizes Florry and turns

[24303]with her.)

[24304]

[24305]MAGINNI: Boulangère! Les ronds! Les ponts! Chevaux de bois! Escargots!

[24306]

[24307](Twining, receding, with interchanging hands the night hours link each

[24308]each with arching arms in a mosaic of movements. Stephen and Florry turn

[24309]cumbrously.)

[24310]

[24311]MAGINNI: Dansez avec vos dames! Changez de dames! Donnez le petit

[24312]bouquet à votre dame! Remerciez!

[24313]

[24314]THE PIANOLA:

[24315]

[24316] Best, best of all,

[24317] Baraabum!

[24318]KITTY: (Jumps up.) O, they played that on the hobbyhorses at the Mirus

[24319]bazaar!

[24320]

[24321](She runs to Stephen. He leaves Florry brusquely and seizes Kitty. A

[24322]screaming bittern’s harsh high whistle shrieks. Groangrousegurgling

[24323]Toft’s cumbersome whirligig turns slowly the room right roundabout the

[24324]room.)

[24325]

[24326]THE PIANOLA:

[24327]

[24328] My girl’s a Yorkshire girl.

[24329]ZOE:

[24330]

[24331]Yorkshire through and through. Come on all!

[24332]

[24333](She seizes Florry and waltzes her.)

[24334]

[24335]STEPHEN: Pas seul!

[24336]

[24337](He wheels Kitty into Lynch’s arms, snatches up his ashplant from

[24338]the table and takes the floor. All wheel whirl waltz twirl. Bloombella

[24339]Kittylynch Florryzoe jujuby women. Stephen with hat ashplant frogsplits

[24340]in middle highkicks with skykicking mouth shut hand clasp part under

[24341]thigh. With clang tinkle boomhammer tallyho hornblower blue green yellow

[24342]flashes Toft’s cumbersome turns with hobbyhorse riders from gilded

[24343]snakes dangled, bowels fandango leaping spurn soil foot and fall again.)

[24344]

[24345]THE PIANOLA:

[24346]

[24347] Though she’s a factory lass

[24348] And wears no fancy clothes.

[24349](Closeclutched swift swifter with glareblareflare scudding they

[24350]scootlootshoot lumbering by. Baraabum!)

[24351]

[24352]TUTTI: Encore! Bis! Bravo! Encore!

[24353]

[24354]SIMON: Think of your mother’s people!

[24355]

[24356]STEPHEN: Dance of death.

[24357]

[24358](Bang fresh barang bang of lacquey’s bell, horse, nag, steer,

[24359]piglings, Conmee on Christass, lame crutch and leg sailor in cockboat

[24360]armfolded ropepulling hitching stamp hornpipe through and through.

[24361]Baraabum! On nags hogs bellhorses Gadarene swine Corny in coffin steel

[24362]shark stone onehandled Nelson two trickies Frauenzimmer plumstained from

[24363]pram falling bawling. Gum he’s a champion. Fuseblue peer from barrel

[24364]rev. evensong Love on hackney jaunt Blazes blind coddoubled bicyclers

[24365]Dilly with snowcake no fancy clothes. Then in last switchback lumbering

[24366]up and down bump mashtub sort of viceroy and reine relish for tublumber

[24367]bumpshire rose. Baraabum!)

[24368]

[24369](The couples fall aside. Stephen whirls giddily. Room whirls back. Eyes

[24370]closed he totters. Red rails fly spacewards. Stars all around suns turn

[24371]roundabout. Bright midges dance on walls. He stops dead.)

[24372]

[24373]STEPHEN: Ho!

[24374]

[24375](Stephen’s mother, emaciated, rises stark through the floor, in leper

[24376]grey with a wreath of faded orangeblossoms and a torn bridal veil, her

[24377]face worn and noseless, green with gravemould. Her hair is scant and

[24378]lank. She fixes her bluecircled hollow eyesockets on Stephen and opens

[24379]her toothless mouth uttering a silent word. A choir of virgins and

[24380]confessors sing voicelessly.)

[24381]

[24382]THE CHOIR:

[24383]

[24384] Liliata rutilantium te confessorum...

[24385] Iubilantium te virginum...

[24386](From the top of a tower Buck Mulligan, in particoloured jester’s

[24387]dress of puce and yellow and clown’s cap with curling bell, stands

[24388]gaping at her, a smoking buttered split scone in his hand.)

[24389]

[24390]BUCK MULLIGAN: She’s beastly dead. The pity of it! Mulligan meets the

[24391]afflicted mother. (He upturns his eyes.) Mercurial Malachi!

[24392]

[24393]THE MOTHER: (With the subtle smile of death’s madness.) I was once the

[24394]beautiful May Goulding. I am dead.

[24395]

[24396]STEPHEN: (Horrorstruck.) Lemur, who are you? No. What bogeyman’s trick

[24397]is this?

[24398]

[24399]BUCK MULLIGAN: (Shakes his curling capbell.) The mockery of it! Kinch

[24400]dogsbody killed her bitchbody. She kicked the bucket. (Tears of molten

[24401]butter fall from his eyes on to the scone.) Our great sweet mother! Epi

[24402]oinopa ponton.

[24403]

[24404]THE MOTHER: (Comes nearer, breathing upon him softly her breath of

[24405]wetted ashes.) All must go through it, Stephen. More women than men in

[24406]the world. You too. Time will come.

[24407]

[24408]STEPHEN: (Choking with fright, remorse and horror.) They say I killed

[24409]you, mother. He offended your memory. Cancer did it, not I. Destiny.

[24410]

[24411]THE MOTHER: (A green rill of bile trickling from a side of her mouth.)

[24412]You sang that song to me. Love’s bitter mystery.

[24413]

[24414]STEPHEN: (Eagerly.) Tell me the word, mother, if you know now. The word

[24415]known to all men.

[24416]

[24417]THE MOTHER: Who saved you the night you jumped into the train at

[24418]Dalkey with Paddy Lee? Who had pity for you when you were sad among the

[24419]strangers? Prayer is allpowerful. Prayer for the suffering souls in the

[24420]Ursuline manual and forty days’ indulgence. Repent, Stephen.

[24421]

[24422]STEPHEN: The ghoul! Hyena!

[24423]

[24424]THE MOTHER: I pray for you in my other world. Get Dilly to make you that

[24425]boiled rice every night after your brainwork. Years and years I loved

[24426]you, O, my son, my firstborn, when you lay in my womb.

[24427]

[24428]ZOE: (Fanning herself with the grate fan.) I’m melting!

[24429]

[24430]FLORRY: (Points to Stephen.) Look! He’s white.

[24431]

[24432]BLOOM: (Goes to the window to open it more.) Giddy.

[24433]

[24434]THE MOTHER: (With smouldering eyes.) Repent! O, the fire of hell!

[24435]

[24436]STEPHEN: (Panting.) His noncorrosive sublimate! The corpsechewer! Raw

[24437]head and bloody bones.

[24438]

[24439]THE MOTHER: (Her face drawing near and nearer, sending out an ashen

[24440]breath.) Beware! (She raises her blackened withered right arm slowly

[24441]towards Stephen’s breast with outstretched finger.) Beware God’s

[24442]hand! (A green crab with malignant red eyes sticks deep its grinning

[24443]claws in Stephen’s heart.)

[24444]

[24445]STEPHEN: (Strangled with rage.) Shite! (His features grow drawn and grey

[24446]and old.)

[24447]

[24448]BLOOM: (At the window.) What?

[24449]

[24450]STEPHEN: Ah non, par exemple! The intellectual imagination! With me all

[24451]or not at all. Non serviam!

[24452]

[24453]FLORRY: Give him some cold water. Wait. (She rushes out.)

[24454]

[24455]THE MOTHER: (Wrings her hands slowly, moaning desperately.) O Sacred

[24456]Heart of Jesus, have mercy on him! Save him from hell, O Divine Sacred

[24457]Heart!

[24458]

[24459]STEPHEN: No! No! No! Break my spirit, all of you, if you can! I’ll

[24460]bring you all to heel!

[24461]

[24462]THE MOTHER: (In the agony of her deathrattle.) Have mercy on Stephen,

[24463]Lord, for my sake! Inexpressible was my anguish when expiring with love,

[24464]grief and agony on Mount Calvary.

[24465]

[24466]STEPHEN: Nothung!

[24467]

[24468](He lifts his ashplant high with both hands and smashes the chandelier.

[24469]Time’s livid final flame leaps and, in the following darkness, ruin of

[24470]all space, shattered glass and toppling masonry.)

[24471]

[24472]THE GASJET: Pwfungg!

[24473]

[24474]BLOOM: Stop!

[24475]

[24476]LYNCH: (Rushes forward and seizes Stephen’s hand.) Here! Hold on!

[24477]Don’t run amok!

[24478]

[24479]BELLA: Police!

[24480]

[24481](Stephen, abandoning his ashplant, his head and arms thrown back stark,

[24482]beats the ground and flies from the room, past the whores at the door.)

[24483]

[24484]BELLA: (Screams.) After him!

[24485]

[24486](The two whores rush to the halldoor. Lynch and Kitty and Zoe stampede

[24487]from the room. They talk excitedly. Bloom follows, returns.)

[24488]

[24489]THE WHORES: (Jammed in the doorway, pointing.) Down there.

[24490]

[24491]ZOE: (Pointing.) There. There’s something up.

[24492]

[24493]BELLA: Who pays for the lamp? (She seizes Bloom’s coattail.) Here, you

[24494]were with him. The lamp’s broken.

[24495]

[24496]BLOOM: (Rushes to the hall, rushes back.) What lamp, woman?

[24497]

[24498]A WHORE: He tore his coat.

[24499]

[24500]BELLA: (Her eyes hard with anger and cupidity, points.) Who’s to pay

[24501]for that? Ten shillings. You’re a witness.

[24502]

[24503]BLOOM: (Snatches up Stephen’s ashplant.) Me? Ten shillings? Haven’t

[24504]you lifted enough off him? Didn’t he...?

[24505]

[24506]BELLA: (Loudly.) Here, none of your tall talk. This isn’t a brothel. A

[24507]ten shilling house.

[24508]

[24509]BLOOM: (His head under the lamp, pulls the chain. Pulling, the gasjet

[24510]lights up a crushed mauve purple shade. He raises the ashplant.) Only

[24511]the chimney’s broken. Here is all he...

[24512]

[24513]BELLA: (Shrinks back and screams.) Jesus! Don’t!

[24514]

[24515]BLOOM: (Warding off a blow.) To show you how he hit the paper. There’s

[24516]not sixpenceworth of damage done. Ten shillings!

[24517]

[24518]FLORRY: (With a glass of water, enters.) Where is he?

[24519]

[24520]BELLA: Do you want me to call the police?

[24521]

[24522]BLOOM: O, I know. Bulldog on the premises. But he’s a Trinity student.

[24523]Patrons of your establishment. Gentlemen that pay the rent. (He makes

[24524]a masonic sign.) Know what I mean? Nephew of the vicechancellor. You

[24525]don’t want a scandal.

[24526]

[24527]BELLA: (Angrily.) Trinity. Coming down here ragging after the boatraces

[24528]and paying nothing. Are you my commander here or? Where is he? I’ll

[24529]charge him! Disgrace him, I will! (She shouts.) Zoe! Zoe!

[24530]

[24531]BLOOM: (Urgently.) And if it were your own son in Oxford? (Warningly.) I

[24532]know.

[24533]

[24534]BELLA: (Almost speechless.) Who are. Incog!

[24535]

[24536]ZOE: (In the doorway.) There’s a row on.

[24537]

[24538]BLOOM: What? Where? (He throws a shilling on the table and starts.)

[24539]That’s for the chimney. Where? I need mountain air.

[24540]

[24541](He hurries out through the hall. The whores point. Florry follows,

[24542]spilling water from her tilted tumbler. On the doorstep all the whores

[24543]clustered talk volubly, pointing to the right where the fog has cleared

[24544]off. From the left arrives a jingling hackney car. It slows to in front

[24545]of the house. Bloom at the halldoor perceives Corny Kelleher who is

[24546]about to dismount from the car with two silent lechers. He averts

[24547]his face. Bella from within the hall urges on her whores. They blow

[24548]ickylickysticky yumyum kisses. Corny Kelleher replies with a ghastly

[24549]lewd smile. The silent lechers turn to pay the jarvey. Zoe and Kitty

[24550]still point right. Bloom, parting them swiftly, draws his caliph’s

[24551]hood and poncho and hurries down the steps with sideways face. Incog

[24552]Haroun al Raschid he flits behind the silent lechers and hastens on by

[24553]the railings with fleet step of a pard strewing the drag behind him,

[24554]torn envelopes drenched in aniseed. The ashplant marks his stride. A

[24555]pack of bloodhounds, led by Hornblower of Trinity brandishing a dogwhip

[24556]in tallyho cap and an old pair of grey trousers, follows from far,

[24557]picking up the scent, nearer, baying, panting, at fault, breaking away,

[24558]throwing their tongues, biting his heels, leaping at his tail. He

[24559]walks, runs, zigzags, gallops, lugs laid back. He is pelted with gravel,

[24560]cabbagestumps, biscuitboxes, eggs, potatoes, dead codfish, woman’s

[24561]slipperslappers. After him freshfound the hue and cry zigzag gallops

[24562]in hot pursuit of follow my leader: 65 C, 66 C, night watch, John Henry

[24563]Menton, Wisdom Hely, V. B. Dillon, Councillor Nannetti, Alexander Keyes,

[24564]Larry O’Rourke, Joe Cuffe, Mrs O’Dowd, Pisser Burke, The Nameless

[24565]One, Mrs Riordan, The Citizen, Garryowen, Whodoyoucallhim, Strangeface,

[24566]Fellowthatsolike, Sawhimbefore, Chapwithawen, Chris Callinan, sir

[24567]Charles Cameron, Benjamin Dollard, Lenehan, Bartell d’Arcy, Joe Hynes,

[24568]red Murray, editor Brayden, T. M. Healy, Mr Justice Fitzgibbon, John

[24569]Howard Parnell, the reverend Tinned Salmon, Professor Joly, Mrs

[24570]Breen, Denis Breen, Theodore Purefoy, Mina Purefoy, the Westland

[24571]Row postmistress, C. P. M’Coy, friend of Lyons, Hoppy Holohan,

[24572]maninthestreet, othermaninthestreet, Footballboots, pugnosed driver,

[24573]rich protestant lady, Davy Byrne, Mrs Ellen M’Guinness, Mrs Joe

[24574]Gallaher, George Lidwell, Jimmy Henry on corns, Superintendent Laracy,

[24575]Father Cowley, Crofton out of the Collector-general’s, Dan Dawson,

[24576]dental surgeon Bloom with tweezers, Mrs Bob Doran, Mrs Kennefick,

[24577]Mrs Wyse Nolan, John Wyse Nolan,

[24578]handsomemarriedwomanrubbedagainstwidebehindinClonskea tram, the

[24579]bookseller of Sweets of Sin, Miss Dubedatandshedidbedad, Mesdames Gerald

[24580]and Stanislaus Moran of Roebuck, the managing clerk of Drimmie’s,

[24581]Wetherup, colonel Hayes, Mastiansky, Citron, Penrose, Aaron Figatner,

[24582]Moses Herzog, Michael E Geraghty, Inspector Troy, Mrs Galbraith, the

[24583]constable off Eccles street corner, old doctor Brady with stethoscope,

[24584]the mystery man on the beach, a retriever, Mrs Miriam Dandrade and all

[24585]her lovers.)

[24586]

[24587]THE HUE AND CRY: (Helterskelterpelterwelter.) He’s Bloom! Stop Bloom!

[24588]Stopabloom! Stopperrobber! Hi! Hi! Stophim on the corner!

[24589]

[24590](At the corner of Beaver street beneath the scaffolding Bloom panting

[24591]stops on the fringe of the noisy quarrelling knot, a lot not knowing a

[24592]jot what hi! hi! row and wrangle round the whowhat brawlaltogether.)

[24593]

[24594]STEPHEN: (With elaborate gestures, breathing deeply and slowly.) You are

[24595]my guests. Uninvited. By virtue of the fifth of George and seventh of

[24596]Edward. History to blame. Fabled by mothers of memory.

[24597]

[24598]PRIVATE CARR: (To Cissy Caffrey.) Was he insulting you?

[24599]

[24600]STEPHEN: Addressed her in vocative feminine. Probably neuter.

[24601]Ungenitive.

[24602]

[24603]VOICES: No, he didn’t. I seen him. The girl there. He was in Mrs

[24604]Cohen’s. What’s up? Soldier and civilian.

[24605]

[24606]CISSY CAFFREY: I was in company with the soldiers and they left me to

[24607]do—you know, and the young man run up behind me. But I’m faithful to

[24608]the man that’s treating me though I’m only a shilling whore.

[24609]

[24610]STEPHEN: (Catches sight of Lynch’s and Kitty’s heads.) Hail,

[24611]Sisyphus. (He points to himself and the others.) Poetic. Uropoetic.

[24612]

[24613]VOICES: Shes faithfultheman.

[24614]

[24615]CISSY CAFFREY: Yes, to go with him. And me with a soldier friend.

[24616]

[24617]PRIVATE COMPTON: He doesn’t half want a thick ear, the blighter. Biff

[24618]him one, Harry.

[24619]

[24620]PRIVATE CARR: (To Cissy.) Was he insulting you while me and him was

[24621]having a piss?

[24622]

[24623]LORD TENNYSON: (Gentleman poet in Union Jack blazer and cricket

[24624]flannels, bareheaded, flowingbearded.) Theirs not to reason why.

[24625]

[24626]PRIVATE COMPTON: Biff him, Harry.

[24627]

[24628]STEPHEN: (To Private Compton.) I don’t know your name but you are

[24629]quite right. Doctor Swift says one man in armour will beat ten men in

[24630]their shirts. Shirt is synechdoche. Part for the whole.

[24631]

[24632]CISSY CAFFREY: (To the crowd.) No, I was with the privates.

[24633]

[24634]STEPHEN: (Amiably.) Why not? The bold soldier boy. In my opinion every

[24635]lady for example...

[24636]

[24637]PRIVATE CARR: (His cap awry, advances to Stephen.) Say, how would it be,

[24638]governor, if I was to bash in your jaw?

[24639]

[24640]STEPHEN: (Looks up to the sky.) How? Very unpleasant. Noble art of

[24641]selfpretence. Personally, I detest action. (He waves his hand.) Hand

[24642]hurts me slightly. Enfin ce sont vos oignons. (To Cissy Caffrey.) Some

[24643]trouble is on here. What is it precisely?

[24644]

[24645]DOLLY GRAY: (From her balcony waves her handkerchief, giving the sign

[24646]of the heroine of Jericho.) Rahab. Cook’s son, goodbye. Safe home to

[24647]Dolly. Dream of the girl you left behind and she will dream of you.

[24648]

[24649](The soldiers turn their swimming eyes.)

[24650]

[24651]BLOOM: (Elbowing through the crowd, plucks Stephen’s sleeve

[24652]vigorously.) Come now, professor, that carman is waiting.

[24653]

[24654]STEPHEN: (Turns.) Eh? (He disengages himself.) Why should I not speak to

[24655]him or to any human being who walks upright upon this oblate orange? (He

[24656]points his finger.) I’m not afraid of what I can talk to if I see his

[24657]eye. Retaining the perpendicular.

[24658]

[24659](He staggers a pace back.)

[24660]

[24661]BLOOM: (Propping him.) Retain your own.

[24662]

[24663]STEPHEN: (Laughs emptily.) My centre of gravity is displaced. I have

[24664]forgotten the trick. Let us sit down somewhere and discuss. Struggle

[24665]for life is the law of existence but but human philirenists, notably the

[24666]tsar and the king of England, have invented arbitration. (He taps his

[24667]brow.) But in here it is I must kill the priest and the king.

[24668]

[24669]BIDDY THE CLAP: Did you hear what the professor said? He’s a professor

[24670]out of the college.

[24671]

[24672]CUNTY KATE: I did. I heard that.

[24673]

[24674]BIDDY THE CLAP: He expresses himself with such marked refinement of

[24675]phraseology.

[24676]

[24677]CUNTY KATE: Indeed, yes. And at the same time with such apposite

[24678]trenchancy.

[24679]

[24680]PRIVATE CARR: (Pulls himself free and comes forward.) What’s that

[24681]you’re saying about my king?

[24682]

[24683](Edward the Seventh appears in an archway. He wears a white jersey on

[24684]which an image of the Sacred Heart is stitched with the insignia of

[24685]Garter and Thistle, Golden Fleece, Elephant of Denmark, Skinner’s and

[24686]Probyn’s horse, Lincoln’s Inn bencher and ancient and honourable

[24687]artillery company of Massachusetts. He sucks a red jujube. He is robed

[24688]as a grand elect perfect and sublime mason with trowel and apron, marked

[24689]made in Germany. In his left hand he holds a plasterer’s bucket on

[24690]which is printed Défense d’uriner. A roar of welcome greets him.)

[24691]

[24692]EDWARD THE SEVENTH: (Slowly, solemnly but indistinctly.) Peace, perfect

[24693]peace. For identification, bucket in my hand. Cheerio, boys. (He turns

[24694]to his subjects.) We have come here to witness a clean straight fight

[24695]and we heartily wish both men the best of good luck. Mahak makar a bak.

[24696]

[24697](He shakes hands with Private Carr, Private Compton, Stephen, Bloom and

[24698]Lynch. General applause. Edward the Seventh lifts his bucket graciously

[24699]in acknowledgment.)

[24700]

[24701]PRIVATE CARR: (To Stephen.) Say it again.

[24702]

[24703]STEPHEN: (Nervous, friendly, pulls himself up.) I understand your point

[24704]of view though I have no king myself for the moment. This is the age of

[24705]patent medicines. A discussion is difficult down here. But this is the

[24706]point. You die for your country. Suppose. (He places his arm on Private

[24707]Carr’s sleeve.) Not that I wish it for you. But I say: Let my country

[24708]die for me. Up to the present it has done so. I didn’t want it to die.

[24709]Damn death. Long live life!

[24710]

[24711]EDWARD THE SEVENTH: (Levitates over heaps of slain, in the garb and with

[24712]the halo of Joking Jesus, a white jujube in his phosphorescent face.)

[24713]

[24714] My methods are new and are causing surprise.

[24715] To make the blind see I throw dust in their eyes.

[24716]STEPHEN: Kings and unicorns! (He falls back a pace.) Come somewhere and

[24717]we’ll... What was that girl saying?...

[24718]

[24719]PRIVATE COMPTON: Eh, Harry, give him a kick in the knackers. Stick one

[24720]into Jerry.

[24721]

[24722]BLOOM: (To the privates, softly.) He doesn’t know what he’s saying.

[24723]Taken a little more than is good for him. Absinthe. Greeneyed monster. I

[24724]know him. He’s a gentleman, a poet. It’s all right.

[24725]

[24726]STEPHEN: (Nods, smiling and laughing.) Gentleman, patriot, scholar and

[24727]judge of impostors.

[24728]

[24729]PRIVATE CARR: I don’t give a bugger who he is.

[24730]

[24731]PRIVATE COMPTON: We don’t give a bugger who he is.

[24732]

[24733]STEPHEN: I seem to annoy them. Green rag to a bull.

[24734]

[24735](Kevin Egan of Paris in black Spanish tasselled shirt and peep-o’-day

[24736]boy’s hat signs to Stephen.)

[24737]

[24738]KEVIN EGAN: H’lo! Bonjour! The vieille ogresse with the dents jaunes.

[24739]

[24740](Patrice Egan peeps from behind, his rabbitface nibbling a quince leaf.)

[24741]

[24742]PATRICE: Socialiste!

[24743]

[24744]DON EMILE PATRIZIO FRANZ RUPERT POPE HENNESSY: (In medieval hauberk, two

[24745]wild geese volant on his helm, with noble indignation points a mailed

[24746]hand against the privates.) Werf those eykes to footboden, big grand

[24747]porcos of johnyellows todos covered of gravy!

[24748]

[24749]BLOOM: (To Stephen.) Come home. You’ll get into trouble.

[24750]

[24751]STEPHEN: (Swaying.) I don’t avoid it. He provokes my intelligence.

[24752]

[24753]BIDDY THE CLAP: One immediately observes that he is of patrician

[24754]lineage.

[24755]

[24756]THE VIRAGO: Green above the red, says he. Wolfe Tone.

[24757]

[24758]THE BAWD: The red’s as good as the green. And better. Up the soldiers!

[24759]Up King Edward!

[24760]

[24761]A ROUGH: (Laughs.) Ay! Hands up to De Wet.

[24762]

[24763]THE CITIZEN: (With a huge emerald muffler and shillelagh, calls.)

[24764]

[24765] May the God above

[24766] Send down a dove

[24767] With teeth as sharp as razors

[24768] To slit the throats

[24769] Of the English dogs

[24770] That hanged our Irish leaders.

[24771]THE CROPPY BOY: (The ropenoose round his neck, gripes in his issuing

[24772]bowels with both hands.)

[24773]

[24774] I bear no hate to a living thing,

[24775] But I love my country beyond the king.

[24776]RUMBOLD, DEMON BARBER: (Accompanied by two blackmasked assistants,

[24777]advances with gladstone bag which he opens.) Ladies and gents,

[24778]cleaver purchased by Mrs Pearcy to slay Mogg. Knife with which Voisin

[24779]dismembered the wife of a compatriot and hid remains in a sheet in the

[24780]cellar, the unfortunate female’s throat being cut from ear to ear.

[24781]Phial containing arsenic retrieved from body of Miss Barron which sent

[24782]Seddon to the gallows.

[24783]

[24784](He jerks the rope. The assistants leap at the victim’s legs and drag

[24785]him downward, grunting: the croppy boy’s tongue protrudes violently.)

[24786]

[24787]THE CROPPY BOY:

[24788]

[24789] Horhot ho hray hor hother’s hest.

[24790](He gives up the ghost. A violent erection of the hanged sends gouts

[24791]of sperm spouting through his deathclothes on to the cobblestones. Mrs

[24792]Bellingham, Mrs Yelverton Barry and the Honourable Mrs Mervyn Talboys

[24793]rush forward with their handkerchiefs to sop it up.)

[24794]

[24795]RUMBOLD: I’m near it myself. (He undoes the noose.) Rope which hanged

[24796]the awful rebel. Ten shillings a time. As applied to Her Royal Highness.

[24797](He plunges his head into the gaping belly of the hanged and draws out

[24798]his head again clotted with coiled and smoking entrails.) My painful

[24799]duty has now been done. God save the king!

[24800]

[24801]EDWARD THE SEVENTH: (Dances slowly, solemnly, rattling his bucket, and

[24802]sings with soft contentment.)

[24803]

[24804] On coronation day, on coronation day,

[24805] O, won’t we have a merry time,

[24806] Drinking whisky, beer and wine!

[24807]PRIVATE CARR: Here. What are you saying about my king?

[24808]

[24809]STEPHEN: (Throws up his hands.) O, this is too monotonous! Nothing. He

[24810]wants my money and my life, though want must be his master, for some

[24811]brutish empire of his. Money I haven’t. (He searches his pockets

[24812]vaguely.) Gave it to someone.

[24813]

[24814]PRIVATE CARR: Who wants your bleeding money?

[24815]

[24816]STEPHEN: (Tries to move off.) Will someone tell me where I am least

[24817]likely to meet these necessary evils? Ça se voit aussi à Paris. Not

[24818]that I... But, by Saint Patrick...!

[24819]

[24820](The women’s heads coalesce. Old Gummy Granny in sugarloaf hat appears

[24821]seated on a toadstool, the deathflower of the potato blight on her

[24822]breast.)

[24823]

[24824]STEPHEN: Aha! I know you, gammer! Hamlet, revenge! The old sow that eats

[24825]her farrow!

[24826]

[24827]OLD GUMMY GRANNY: (Rocking to and fro.) Ireland’s sweetheart, the king

[24828]of Spain’s daughter, alanna. Strangers in my house, bad manners to

[24829]them! (She keens with banshee woe.) Ochone! Ochone! Silk of the kine!

[24830](She wails.) You met with poor old Ireland and how does she stand?

[24831]

[24832]STEPHEN: How do I stand you? The hat trick! Where’s the third person

[24833]of the Blessed Trinity? Soggarth Aroon? The reverend Carrion Crow.

[24834]

[24835]CISSY CAFFREY: (Shrill.) Stop them from fighting!

[24836]

[24837]A ROUGH: Our men retreated.

[24838]

[24839]PRIVATE CARR: (Tugging at his belt.) I’ll wring the neck of any fucker

[24840]says a word against my fucking king.

[24841]

[24842]BLOOM: (Terrified.) He said nothing. Not a word. A pure

[24843]misunderstanding.

[24844]

[24845]THE CITIZEN: Erin go bragh!

[24846]

[24847](Major Tweedy and the Citizen exhibit to each other medals, decorations,

[24848]trophies of war, wounds. Both salute with fierce hostility.)

[24849]

[24850]PRIVATE COMPTON: Go it, Harry. Do him one in the eye. He’s a proboer.

[24851]

[24852]STEPHEN: Did I? When?

[24853]

[24854]BLOOM: (To the redcoats.) We fought for you in South Africa, Irish

[24855]missile troops. Isn’t that history? Royal Dublin Fusiliers. Honoured

[24856]by our monarch.

[24857]

[24858]THE NAVVY: (Staggering past.) O, yes! O God, yes! O, make the kwawr a

[24859]krowawr! O! Bo!

[24860]

[24861](Casqued halberdiers in armour thrust forward a pentice of gutted

[24862]spearpoints. Major Tweedy, moustached like Turko the terrible, in

[24863]bearskin cap with hackleplume and accoutrements, with epaulettes, gilt

[24864]chevrons and sabretaches, his breast bright with medals, toes the line.

[24865]He gives the pilgrim warrior’s sign of the knights templars.)

[24866]

[24867]MAJOR TWEEDY: (Growls gruffly.) Rorke’s Drift! Up, guards, and at

[24868]them! Mahar shalal hashbaz.

[24869]

[24870]PRIVATE CARR: I’ll do him in.

[24871]

[24872]PRIVATE COMPTON: (Waves the crowd back.) Fair play, here. Make a

[24873]bleeding butcher’s shop of the bugger.

[24874]

[24875](Massed bands blare Garryowen and God save the King.)

[24876]

[24877]CISSY CAFFREY: They’re going to fight. For me!

[24878]

[24879]CUNTY KATE: The brave and the fair.

[24880]

[24881]BIDDY THE CLAP: Methinks yon sable knight will joust it with the best.

[24882]

[24883]CUNTY KATE: (Blushing deeply.) Nay, madam. The gules doublet and merry

[24884]saint George for me!

[24885]

[24886]STEPHEN:

[24887]

[24888] The harlot’s cry from street to street

[24889] Shall weave Old Ireland’s windingsheet.

[24890]PRIVATE CARR: (Loosening his belt, shouts.) I’ll wring the neck of any

[24891]fucking bastard says a word against my bleeding fucking king.

[24892]

[24893]BLOOM: (Shakes Cissy Caffrey’s shoulders.) Speak, you! Are you struck

[24894]dumb? You are the link between nations and generations. Speak, woman,

[24895]sacred lifegiver!

[24896]

[24897]CISSY CAFFREY: (Alarmed, seizes Private Carr’s sleeve.) Amn’t I with

[24898]you? Amn’t I your girl? Cissy’s your girl. (She cries.) Police!

[24899]

[24900]STEPHEN: (Ecstatically, to Cissy Caffrey.)

[24901]

[24902] White thy fambles, red thy gan

[24903] And thy quarrons dainty is.

[24904]VOICES: Police!

[24905]

[24906]DISTANT VOICES: Dublin’s burning! Dublin’s burning! On fire, on

[24907]fire!

[24908]

[24909](Brimstone fires spring up. Dense clouds roll past. Heavy Gatling guns

[24910]boom. Pandemonium. Troops deploy. Gallop of hoofs. Artillery. Hoarse

[24911]commands. Bells clang. Backers shout. Drunkards bawl. Whores screech.

[24912]Foghorns hoot. Cries of valour. Shrieks of dying. Pikes clash on

[24913]cuirasses. Thieves rob the slain. Birds of prey, winging from the sea,

[24914]rising from marshlands, swooping from eyries, hover screaming, gannets,

[24915]cormorants, vultures, goshawks, climbing woodcocks, peregrines, merlins,

[24916]blackgrouse, sea eagles, gulls, albatrosses, barnacle geese. The

[24917]midnight sun is darkened. The earth trembles. The dead of Dublin

[24918]from Prospect and Mount Jerome in white sheepskin overcoats and black

[24919]goatfell cloaks arise and appear to many. A chasm opens with a noiseless

[24920]yawn. Tom Rochford, winner, in athlete’s singlet and breeches, arrives

[24921]at the head of the national hurdle handicap and leaps into the void.

[24922]He is followed by a race of runners and leapers. In wild attitudes they

[24923]spring from the brink. Their bodies plunge. Factory lasses with fancy

[24924]clothes toss redhot Yorkshire baraabombs. Society ladies lift their

[24925]skirts above their heads to protect themselves. Laughing witches in red

[24926]cutty sarks ride through the air on broomsticks. Quakerlyster plasters

[24927]blisters. It rains dragons’ teeth. Armed heroes spring up from

[24928]furrows. They exchange in amity the pass of knights of the red cross and

[24929]fight duels with cavalry sabres: Wolfe Tone against Henry Grattan, Smith

[24930]O’Brien against Daniel O’Connell, Michael Davitt against Isaac Butt,

[24931]Justin M’Carthy against Parnell, Arthur Griffith against John Redmond,

[24932]John O’Leary against Lear O’Johnny, Lord Edward Fitzgerald against

[24933]Lord Gerald Fitzedward, The O’Donoghue of the Glens against The Glens

[24934]of The O’Donoghue. On an eminence, the centre of the earth, rises

[24935]the fieldaltar of Saint Barbara. Black candles rise from its gospel and

[24936]epistle horns. From the high barbacans of the tower two shafts of light

[24937]fall on the smokepalled altarstone. On the altarstone Mrs Mina Purefoy,

[24938]goddess of unreason, lies, naked, fettered, a chalice resting on her

[24939]swollen belly. Father Malachi O’Flynn in a lace petticoat and reversed

[24940]chasuble, his two left feet back to the front, celebrates camp mass. The

[24941]Reverend Mr Hugh C Haines Love M. A. in a plain cassock and mortarboard,

[24942]his head and collar back to the front, holds over the celebrant’s head

[24943]an open umbrella.)

[24944]

[24945]FATHER MALACHI O’FLYNN: Introibo ad altare diaboli.

[24946]

[24947]THE REVEREND MR HAINES LOVE: To the devil which hath made glad my young

[24948]days.

[24949]

[24950]FATHER MALACHI O’FLYNN: (Takes from the chalice and elevates a

[24951]blooddripping host.) Corpus meum.

[24952]

[24953]THE REVEREND MR HAINES LOVE: (Raises high behind the celebrant’s

[24954]petticoat, revealing his grey bare hairy buttocks between which a carrot

[24955]is stuck.) My body.

[24956]

[24957]THE VOICE OF ALL THE DAMNED: Htengier Tnetopinmo Dog Drol eht rof,

[24958]Aiulella!

[24959]

[24960](From on high the voice of Adonai calls.)

[24961]

[24962]ADONAI: Dooooooooooog!

[24963]

[24964]THE VOICE OF ALL THE BLESSED: Alleluia, for the Lord God Omnipotent

[24965]reigneth!

[24966]

[24967](From on high the voice of Adonai calls.)

[24968]

[24969]ADONAI: Goooooooooood!

[24970]

[24971](In strident discord peasants and townsmen of Orange and Green factions

[24972]sing Kick the Pope and Daily, daily sing to Mary.)

[24973]

[24974]PRIVATE CARR: (With ferocious articulation.) I’ll do him in, so help

[24975]me fucking Christ! I’ll wring the bastard fucker’s bleeding blasted

[24976]fucking windpipe!

[24977]

[24978](The retriever, nosing on the fringe of the crowd, barks noisily.)

[24979]

[24980]OLD GUMMY GRANNY: (Thrusts a dagger towards Stephen’s hand.) Remove

[24981]him, acushla. At 8.35 a.m. you will be in heaven and Ireland will be

[24982]free. (She prays.) O good God, take him!

[24983]

[24984]BLOOM: (Runs to Lynch.) Can’t you get him away?

[24985]

[24986]LYNCH: He likes dialectic, the universal language. Kitty! (To Bloom.)

[24987]Get him away, you. He won’t listen to me.

[24988]

[24989](He drags Kitty away.)

[24990]

[24991]STEPHEN: (Points.) Exit Judas. Et laqueo se suspendit.

[24992]

[24993]BLOOM: (Runs to Stephen.) Come along with me now before worse happens.

[24994]Here’s your stick.

[24995]

[24996]STEPHEN: Stick, no. Reason. This feast of pure reason.

[24997]

[24998]CISSY CAFFREY: (Pulling Private Carr.) Come on, you’re boosed. He

[24999]insulted me but I forgive him. (Shouting in his ear.) I forgive him for

[25000]insulting me.

[25001]

[25002]BLOOM: (Over Stephen’s shoulder.) Yes, go. You see he’s incapable.

[25003]

[25004]PRIVATE CARR: (Breaks loose.) I’ll insult him.

[25005]

[25006](He rushes towards Stephen, fist outstretched, and strikes him in the

[25007]face. Stephen totters, collapses, falls, stunned. He lies prone, his

[25008]face to the sky, his hat rolling to the wall. Bloom follows and picks it

[25009]up.)

[25010]

[25011]MAJOR TWEEDY: (Loudly.) Carbine in bucket! Cease fire! Salute!

[25012]

[25013]THE RETRIEVER: (Barking furiously.) Ute ute ute ute ute ute ute ute.

[25014]

[25015]THE CROWD: Let him up! Don’t strike him when he’s down! Air! Who?

[25016]The soldier hit him. He’s a professor. Is he hurted? Don’t manhandle

[25017]him! He’s fainted!

[25018]

[25019]A HAG: What call had the redcoat to strike the gentleman and he under

[25020]the influence. Let them go and fight the Boers!

[25021]

[25022]THE BAWD: Listen to who’s talking! Hasn’t the soldier a right to go

[25023]with his girl? He gave him the coward’s blow.

[25024]

[25025](They grab at each other’s hair, claw at each other and spit.)

[25026]

[25027]THE RETRIEVER: (Barking.) Wow wow wow.

[25028]

[25029]BLOOM: (Shoves them back, loudly.) Get back, stand back!

[25030]

[25031]PRIVATE COMPTON: (Tugging his comrade.) Here. Bugger off, Harry.

[25032]Here’s the cops! (Two raincaped watch, tall, stand in the group.)

[25033]

[25034]FIRST WATCH: What’s wrong here?

[25035]

[25036]PRIVATE COMPTON: We were with this lady. And he insulted us. And

[25037]assaulted my chum. (The retriever barks.) Who owns the bleeding tyke?

[25038]

[25039]CISSY CAFFREY: (With expectation.) Is he bleeding!

[25040]

[25041]A MAN: (Rising from his knees.) No. Gone off. He’ll come to all right.

[25042]

[25043]BLOOM: (Glances sharply at the man.) Leave him to me. I can easily...

[25044]

[25045]SECOND WATCH: Who are you? Do you know him?

[25046]

[25047]PRIVATE CARR: (Lurches towards the watch.) He insulted my lady friend.

[25048]

[25049]BLOOM: (Angrily.) You hit him without provocation. I’m a witness.

[25050]Constable, take his regimental number.

[25051]

[25052]SECOND WATCH: I don’t want your instructions in the discharge of my

[25053]duty.

[25054]

[25055]PRIVATE COMPTON: (Pulling his comrade.) Here, bugger off Harry. Or

[25056]Bennett’ll shove you in the lockup.

[25057]

[25058]PRIVATE CARR: (Staggering as he is pulled away.) God fuck old Bennett.

[25059]He’s a whitearsed bugger. I don’t give a shit for him.

[25060]

[25061]FIRST WATCH: (Takes out his notebook.) What’s his name?

[25062]

[25063]BLOOM: (Peering over the crowd.) I just see a car there. If you give me

[25064]a hand a second, sergeant...

[25065]

[25066]FIRST WATCH: Name and address.

[25067]

[25068](Corny Kelleher, weepers round his hat, a death wreath in his hand,

[25069]appears among the bystanders.)

[25070]

[25071]BLOOM: (Quickly.) O, the very man! (He whispers.) Simon Dedalus’ son.

[25072]A bit sprung. Get those policemen to move those loafers back.

[25073]

[25074]SECOND WATCH: Night, Mr Kelleher.

[25075]

[25076]CORNY KELLEHER: (To the watch, with drawling eye.) That’s all right.

[25077]I know him. Won a bit on the races. Gold cup. Throwaway. (He laughs.)

[25078]Twenty to one. Do you follow me?

[25079]

[25080]FIRST WATCH: (Turns to the crowd.) Here, what are you all gaping at?

[25081]Move on out of that.

[25082]

[25083](The crowd disperses slowly, muttering, down the lane.)

[25084]

[25085]CORNY KELLEHER: Leave it to me, sergeant. That’ll be all right. (He

[25086]laughs, shaking his head.) We were often as bad ourselves, ay or worse.

[25087]What? Eh, what?

[25088]

[25089]FIRST WATCH: (Laughs.) I suppose so.

[25090]

[25091]CORNY KELLEHER: (Nudges the second watch.) Come and wipe your name off

[25092]the slate. (He lilts, wagging his head.) With my tooraloom tooraloom

[25093]tooraloom tooraloom. What, eh, do you follow me?

[25094]

[25095]SECOND WATCH: (Genially.) Ah, sure we were too.

[25096]

[25097]CORNY KELLEHER: (Winking.) Boys will be boys. I’ve a car round there.

[25098]

[25099]SECOND WATCH: All right, Mr Kelleher. Good night.

[25100]

[25101]CORNY KELLEHER: I’ll see to that.

[25102]

[25103]BLOOM: (Shakes hands with both of the watch in turn.) Thank you very

[25104]much, gentlemen. Thank you. (He mumbles confidentially.) We don’t

[25105]want any scandal, you understand. Father is a wellknown highly respected

[25106]citizen. Just a little wild oats, you understand.

[25107]

[25108]FIRST WATCH: O. I understand, sir.

[25109]

[25110]SECOND WATCH: That’s all right, sir.

[25111]

[25112]FIRST WATCH: It was only in case of corporal injuries I’d have to

[25113]report it at the station.

[25114]

[25115]BLOOM: (Nods rapidly.) Naturally. Quite right. Only your bounden duty.

[25116]

[25117]SECOND WATCH: It’s our duty.

[25118]

[25119]CORNY KELLEHER: Good night, men.

[25120]

[25121]THE WATCH: (Saluting together.) Night, gentlemen. (They move off with

[25122]slow heavy tread.)

[25123]

[25124]BLOOM: (Blows.) Providential you came on the scene. You have a car?...

[25125]

[25126]CORNY KELLEHER: (Laughs, pointing his thumb over his right shoulder to

[25127]the car brought up against the scaffolding.) Two commercials that were

[25128]standing fizz in Jammet’s. Like princes, faith. One of them lost two

[25129]quid on the race. Drowning his grief. And were on for a go with the

[25130]jolly girls. So I landed them up on Behan’s car and down to nighttown.

[25131]

[25132]BLOOM: I was just going home by Gardiner street when I happened to...

[25133]

[25134]CORNY KELLEHER: (Laughs.) Sure they wanted me to join in with the mots.

[25135]No, by God, says I. Not for old stagers like myself and yourself. (He

[25136]laughs again and leers with lacklustre eye.) Thanks be to God we have it

[25137]in the house, what, eh, do you follow me? Hah, hah, hah!

[25138]

[25139]BLOOM: (Tries to laugh.) He, he, he! Yes. Matter of fact I was just

[25140]visiting an old friend of mine there, Virag, you don’t know him (poor

[25141]fellow, he’s laid up for the past week) and we had a liquor together

[25142]and I was just making my way home...

[25143]

[25144](The horse neighs.)

[25145]

[25146]THE HORSE: Hohohohohohoh! Hohohohome!

[25147]

[25148]CORNY KELLEHER: Sure it was Behan our jarvey there that told me after we

[25149]left the two commercials in Mrs Cohen’s and I told him to pull up and

[25150]got off to see. (He laughs.) Sober hearsedrivers a speciality. Will I

[25151]give him a lift home? Where does he hang out? Somewhere in Cabra, what?

[25152]

[25153]BLOOM: No, in Sandycove, I believe, from what he let drop.

[25154]

[25155](Stephen, prone, breathes to the stars. Corny Kelleher, asquint, drawls

[25156]at the horse. Bloom, in gloom, looms down.)

[25157]

[25158]CORNY KELLEHER: (Scratches his nape.) Sandycove! (He bends down and

[25159]calls to Stephen.) Eh! (He calls again.) Eh! He’s covered with

[25160]shavings anyhow. Take care they didn’t lift anything off him.

[25161]

[25162]BLOOM: No, no, no. I have his money and his hat here and stick.

[25163]

[25164]CORNY KELLEHER: Ah, well, he’ll get over it. No bones broken. Well,

[25165]I’ll shove along. (He laughs.) I’ve a rendezvous in the morning.

[25166]Burying the dead. Safe home!

[25167]

[25168]THE HORSE: (Neighs.) Hohohohohome.

[25169]

[25170]BLOOM: Good night. I’ll just wait and take him along in a few...

[25171]

[25172](Corny Kelleher returns to the outside car and mounts it. The horse

[25173]harness jingles.)

[25174]

[25175]CORNY KELLEHER: (From the car, standing.) Night.

[25176]

[25177]BLOOM: Night.

[25178]

[25179](The jarvey chucks the reins and raises his whip encouragingly. The

[25180]car and horse back slowly, awkwardly, and turn. Corny Kelleher on the

[25181]sideseat sways his head to and fro in sign of mirth at Bloom’s plight.

[25182]The jarvey joins in the mute pantomimic merriment nodding from the

[25183]farther seat. Bloom shakes his head in mute mirthful reply. With thumb

[25184]and palm Corny Kelleher reassures that the two bobbies will allow the

[25185]sleep to continue for what else is to be done. With a slow nod Bloom

[25186]conveys his gratitude as that is exactly what Stephen needs. The car

[25187]jingles tooraloom round the corner of the tooraloom lane. Corny Kelleher

[25188]again reassuralooms with his hand. Bloom with his hand assuralooms Corny

[25189]Kelleher that he is reassuraloomtay. The tinkling hoofs and jingling

[25190]harness grow fainter with their tooralooloo looloo lay. Bloom, holding

[25191]in his hand Stephen’s hat, festooned with shavings, and ashplant,

[25192]stands irresolute. Then he bends to him and shakes him by the shoulder.)

[25193]

[25194]BLOOM: Eh! Ho! (There is no answer; he bends again.) Mr Dedalus! (There

[25195]is no answer.) The name if you call. Somnambulist. (He bends again

[25196]and, hesitating, brings his mouth near the face of the prostrate form.)

[25197]Stephen! (There is no answer. He calls again.) Stephen!

[25198]

[25199]STEPHEN: (Groans.) Who? Black panther. Vampire. (He sighs and stretches

[25200]himself, then murmurs thickly with prolonged vowels.)

[25201]

[25202] Who... drive... Fergus now

[25203] And pierce... wood’s woven shade?...

[25204](He turns on his left side, sighing, doubling himself together.)

[25205]

[25206]BLOOM: Poetry. Well educated. Pity. (He bends again and undoes

[25207]the buttons of Stephen’s waistcoat.) To breathe. (He brushes the

[25208]woodshavings from Stephen’s clothes with light hand and fingers.) One

[25209]pound seven. Not hurt anyhow. (He listens.) What?

[25210]

[25211]STEPHEN: (Murmurs.)

[25212]

[25213] ... shadows... the woods

[25214] ... white breast... dim sea.

[25215](He stretches out his arms, sighs again and curls his body. Bloom,

[25216]holding the hat and ashplant, stands erect. A dog barks in the distance.

[25217]Bloom tightens and loosens his grip on the ashplant. He looks down on

[25218]Stephen’s face and form.)

[25219]

[25220]BLOOM: (Communes with the night.) Face reminds me of his poor mother.

[25221]In the shady wood. The deep white breast. Ferguson, I think I caught.

[25222]A girl. Some girl. Best thing could happen him. (He murmurs.)... swear

[25223]that I will always hail, ever conceal, never reveal, any part or parts,

[25224]art or arts... (He murmurs.)... in the rough sands of the sea... a

[25225]cabletow’s length from the shore... where the tide ebbs... and flows

[25226]...

[25227]

[25228](Silent, thoughtful, alert he stands on guard, his fingers at his lips

[25229]in the attitude of secret master. Against the dark wall a figure appears

[25230]slowly, a fairy boy of eleven, a changeling, kidnapped, dressed in an

[25231]Eton suit with glass shoes and a little bronze helmet, holding a book

[25232]in his hand. He reads from right to left inaudibly, smiling, kissing the

[25233]page.)

[25234]

[25235]BLOOM: (Wonderstruck, calls inaudibly.) Rudy!

[25236]

[25237]RUDY: (Gazes, unseeing, into Bloom’s eyes and goes on reading,

[25238]kissing, smiling. He has a delicate mauve face. On his suit he has

[25239]diamond and ruby buttons. In his free left hand he holds a slim ivory

[25240]cane with a violet bowknot. A white lambkin peeps out of his waistcoat

[25241]pocket.)

[25242]

[25243]

[25244]

[25245]

[25246]

[25247]

[25248]— III —

[25249]

[25250]

[25251]

[25252]

[25253]

[25254]

Joyce's Ulysses Concordance

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15. Circe