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He took the hilt of his ashplant, lunging with it softly,
dallying still. Yes, evening will find itself in me, without
me. All days make their end. By the way next when is it
Tuesday will be the longest day. Of all the glad new year,
mother, the rum tum tiddledy tum. Lawn Tennyson,
gentleman poet. Già. For the old hag with the yellow
teeth. And Monsieur Drumont, gentleman journalist. Già.
My teeth are very bad. Why, I wonder. Feel. That one is
going too. Shells. Ought I go to a dentist, I wonder, with
that money? That one. This. Toothless Kinch, the
superman. Why is that, I wonder, or does it mean
something perhaps?
My handkerchief. He threw it. I remember. Did I not
take it up?
His hand groped vainly in his pockets. No, I didn’t.
Better buy one.
He laid the dry snot picked from his nostril on a ledge
of rock, carefully. For the rest let look who will.
Behind. Perhaps there is someone.
He turned his face over a shoulder, rere regardant.
Moving through the air high spars of a threemaster, her
sails brailed up on the crosstrees, homing, upstream,
silently moving, a silent ship.
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II
Mr Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of
beasts and fowls. He liked thick giblet soup, nutty gizzards,
a stuffed roast heart, liverslices fried with crustcrumbs,
fried hencods’ roes. Most of all he liked grilled mutton
kidneys which gave to his palate a fine tang of faintly
scented urine.
Kidneys were in his mind as he moved about the
kitchen softly, righting her breakfast things on the humpy
tray. Gelid light and air were in the kitchen but out of
doors gentle summer morning everywhere. Made him feel
a bit peckish.
The coals were reddening.
Another slice of bread and butter: three, four: right.
She didn’t like her plate full. Right. He turned from the
tray, lifted the kettle off the hob and set it sideways on the
fire. It sat there, dull and squat, its spout stuck out. Cup of
tea soon. Good. Mouth dry. The cat walked stiffly round a
leg of the table with tail on high.
—Mkgnao!
—O, there you are, Mr Bloom said, turning from the
fire.
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The cat mewed in answer and stalked again stiffly
round a leg of the table, mewing. Just how she stalks over
my writingtable. Prr. Scratch my head. Prr.
Mr Bloom watched curiously, kindly the lithe black
form. Clean to see: the gloss of her sleek hide, the white
button under the butt of her tail, the green flashing eyes.
He bent down to her, his hands on his knees.
—Milk for the pussens, he said.
—Mrkgnao! the cat cried.
They call them stupid. They understand what we say
better than we understand them. She understands all she
wants to. Vindictive too. Cruel. Her nature. Curious mice
never squeal. Seem to like it. Wonder what I look like to
her. Height of a tower? No, she can jump me.
—Afraid of the chickens she is, he said mockingly.
Afraid of the chookchooks. I never saw such a stupid
pussens as the pussens.
Cruel. Her nature. Curious mice never squeal. Seem to
like it.
—Mrkrgnao! the cat said loudly.
She blinked up out of her avid shameclosing eyes,
mewing plaintively and long, showing him her milkwhite
teeth. He watched the dark eyeslits narrowing with greed
till her eyes were green stones. Then he went to the
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dresser, took the jug Hanlon’s milkman had just filled for
him, poured warmbubbled milk on a saucer and set it
slowly on the floor.
—Gurrhr! she cried, running to lap.
He watched the bristles shining wirily in the weak light
as she tipped three times and licked lightly. Wonder is it
true if you clip them they can’t mouse after. Why? They
shine in the dark, perhaps, the tips. Or kind of feelers in
the dark, perhaps.
He listened to her licking lap. Ham and eggs, no. No
good eggs with this drouth. Want pure fresh water.
Thursday: not a good day either for a mutton kidney at
Buckley’s. Fried with butter, a shake of pepper. Better a
pork kidney at Dlugacz’s. While the kettle is boiling. She
lapped slower, then licking the saucer clean. Why are their
tongues so rough? To lap better, all porous holes. Nothing
she can eat? He glanced round him. No.
On quietly creaky boots he went up the staircase to the
hall, paused by the bedroom door. She might like
something tasty. Thin bread and butter she likes in the
morning. Still perhaps: once in a way.
He said softly in the bare hall:
—I’m going round the corner. Be back in a minute.
And when he had heard his voice say it he added:
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—You don’t want anything for breakfast?
A sleepy soft grunt answered:
—Mn.
No. She didn’t want anything. He heard then a warm
heavy sigh, softer, as she turned over and the loose brass
quoits of the bedstead jingled. Must get those settled
really. Pity. All the way from Gibraltar. Forgotten any
little Spanish she knew. Wonder what her father gave for
it. Old style. Ah yes! of course. Bought it at the governor’s
auction. Got a short knock. Hard as nails at a bargain, old
Tweedy. Yes, sir. At Plevna that was. I rose from the
ranks, sir, and I’m proud of it. Still he had brains enough
to make that corner in stamps. Now that was farseeing.
His hand took his hat from the peg over his initialled
heavy overcoat and his lost property office secondhand
waterproof. Stamps: stickyback pictures. Daresay lots of
officers are in the swim too. Course they do. The sweated
legend in the crown of his hat told him mutely: Plasto’s
high grade ha. He peeped quickly inside the leather
headband. White slip of paper. Quite safe.
On the doorstep he felt in his hip pocket for the
latchkey. Not there. In the trousers I left off. Must get it.
Potato I have. Creaky wardrobe. No use disturbing her.
She turned over sleepily that time. He pulled the halldoor
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