Ulysses
stunted forms. They looked from Trinity to the blind columned porch of
the bank of Ireland where pigeons roocoocooed.
—_Anch’io ho avuto di queste idee_, Almidano Artifoni said, _quand’ ero
giovine come Lei. Eppoi mi sono convinto che il mondo è una bestia. È
peccato. Perchè la sua voce... sarebbe un cespite di rendita, via.
Invece, Lei si sacrifica._
—_Sacrifizio incruento,_ Stephen said smiling, swaying his ashplant in
slow swingswong from its midpoint, lightly.
_—Speriamo,_ the round mustachioed face said pleasantly. _Ma, dia retta
a me. Ci rifletta_.
By the stern stone hand of Grattan, bidding halt, an Inchicore tram
unloaded straggling Highland soldiers of a band.
—_Ci rifletterò,_ Stephen said, glancing down the solid trouserleg.
—_Ma, sul serio, eh?_ Almidano Artifoni said.
His heavy hand took Stephen’s firmly. Human eyes. They gazed curiously
an instant and turned quickly towards a Dalkey tram.
_—Eccolo,_ Almidano Artifoni said in friendly haste. _Venga a trovarmi
e ci pensi. Addio, caro._
—_Arrivederla, maestro,_ Stephen said, raising his hat when his hand
was freed. _E grazie._
—_Di che?_ Almidano Artifoni said. _Scusi, eh? Tante belle cose!_
Almidano Artifoni, holding up a baton of rolled music as a signal,
trotted on stout trousers after the Dalkey tram. In vain he trotted,
signalling in vain among the rout of barekneed gillies smuggling
implements of music through Trinity gates.
* * *
Miss Dunne hid the Capel street library copy of _The Woman in White_
far back in her drawer and rolled a sheet of gaudy notepaper into her
typewriter.
Too much mystery business in it. Is he in love with that one, Marion?
Change it and get another by Mary Cecil Haye.
The disk shot down the groove, wobbled a while, ceased and ogled them:
six.
Miss Dunne clicked on the keyboard:
—16 June 1904.
Five tallwhitehatted sandwichmen between Monypeny’s corner and the slab
where Wolfe Tone’s statue was not, eeled themselves turning H. E. L.
Y.’S and plodded back as they had come.
Then she stared at the large poster of Marie Kendall, charming
soubrette, and, listlessly lolling, scribbled on the jotter sixteens
and capital esses. Mustard hair and dauby cheeks. She’s not
nicelooking, is she? The way she’s holding up her bit of a skirt.
Wonder will that fellow be at the band tonight. If I could get that
dressmaker to make a concertina skirt like Susy Nagle’s. They kick out
grand. Shannon and all the boatclub swells never took his eyes off her.
Hope to goodness he won’t keep me here till seven.
The telephone rang rudely by her ear.
—Hello. Yes, sir. No, sir. Yes, sir. I’ll ring them up after five. Only
those two, sir, for Belfast and Liverpool. All right, sir. Then I can
go after six if you’re not back. A quarter after. Yes, sir. Twentyseven
and six. I’ll tell him. Yes: one, seven, six.
She scribbled three figures on an envelope.
—Mr Boylan! Hello! That gentleman from _Sport_ was in looking for you.
Mr Lenehan, yes. He said he’ll be in the Ormond at four. No, sir. Yes,
sir. I’ll ring them up after five.
* * *
Two pink faces turned in the flare of the tiny torch.
—Who’s that? Ned Lambert asked. Is that Crotty?
—Ringabella and Crosshaven, a voice replied groping for foothold.
—Hello, Jack, is that yourself? Ned Lambert said, raising in salute his
pliant lath among the flickering arches. Come on. Mind your steps
there.
The vesta in the clergyman’s uplifted hand consumed itself in a long
soft flame and was let fall. At their feet its red speck died: and
mouldy air closed round them.
—How interesting! a refined accent said in the gloom.
—Yes, sir, Ned Lambert said heartily. We are standing in the historic
council chamber of saint Mary’s abbey where silken Thomas proclaimed
himself a rebel in 1534. This is the most historic spot in all Dublin.
O’Madden Burke is going to write something about it one of these days.
The old bank of Ireland was over the way till the time of the union and
the original jews’ temple was here too before they built their
synagogue over in Adelaide road. You were never here before, Jack, were
you?
—No, Ned.
—He rode down through Dame walk, the refined accent said, if my memory
serves me. The mansion of the Kildares was in Thomas court.
—That’s right, Ned Lambert said. That’s quite right, sir.
—If you will be so kind then, the clergyman said, the next time to
allow me perhaps...
—Certainly, Ned Lambert said. Bring the camera whenever you like. I’ll
get those bags cleared away from the windows. You can take it from here
or from here.
In the still faint light he moved about, tapping with his lath the
piled seedbags and points of vantage on the floor.
From a long face a beard and gaze hung on a chessboard.
—I’m deeply obliged, Mr Lambert, the clergyman said. I won’t trespass
on your valuable time...
—You’re welcome, sir, Ned Lambert said. Drop in whenever you like. Next
week, say. Can you see?
—Yes, yes. Good afternoon, Mr Lambert. Very pleased to have met you.
—Pleasure is mine, sir, Ned Lambert answered.
He followed his guest to the outlet and then whirled his lath away
among the pillars. With J. J. O’Molloy he came forth slowly into Mary’s
abbey where draymen were loading floats with sacks of carob and palmnut
meal, O’Connor, Wexford.
He stood to read the card in his hand.
—The reverend Hugh C. Love, Rathcoffey. Present address: Saint
Michael’s, Sallins. Nice young chap he is. He’s writing a book about
the Fitzgeralds he told me. He’s well up in history, faith.
The young woman with slow care detached from her light skirt a clinging
twig.
—I thought you were at a new gunpowder plot, J. J. O’Molloy said.
Ned Lambert cracked his fingers in the air.
—God! he cried. I forgot to tell him that one about the earl of Kildare
after he set fire to Cashel cathedral. You know that one? _I’m bloody
sorry I did it,_ says he, _but I declare to God I thought the
archbishop was inside._ He mightn’t like it, though. What? God, I’ll
tell him anyhow. That was the great earl, the Fitzgerald Mor. Hot
members they were all of them, the Geraldines.
The horses he passed started nervously under their slack harness. He
slapped a piebald haunch quivering near him and cried:
—Woa, sonny!
He turned to J. J. O’Molloy and asked:
—Well, Jack. What is it? What’s the trouble? Wait awhile. Hold hard.
With gaping mouth and head far back he stood still and, after an
instant, sneezed loudly.
—Chow! he said. Blast you!
—The dust from those sacks, J. J. O’Molloy said politely.
—No, Ned Lambert gasped, I caught a... cold night before... blast your
soul... night before last... and there was a hell of a lot of
draught...
He held his handkerchief ready for the coming...
—I was... Glasnevin this morning... poor little... what do you call
him... Chow!... Mother of Moses!
* * *
Tom Rochford took the top disk from the pile he clasped against his
claret waistcoat.
—See? he said. Say it’s turn six. In here, see. Turn Now On.
He slid it into the left slot for them. It shot down the groove,
wobbled a while, ceased, ogling them: six.
Lawyers of the past, haughty, pleading, beheld pass from the
consolidated taxing office to Nisi Prius court Richie Goulding carrying
the costbag of Goulding, Collis and Ward and heard rustling from the
admiralty division of king’s bench to the court of appeal an elderly
female with false teeth smiling incredulously and a black silk skirt of
great amplitude.
—See? he said. See now the last one I put in is over here: Turns Over.
The impact. Leverage, see?
He showed them the rising column of disks on the right.
—Smart idea, Nosey Flynn said, snuffling. So a fellow coming in late
can see what turn is on and what turns are over.
—See? Tom Rochford said.
He slid in a disk for himself: and watched it shoot, wobble, ogle,
stop: four. Turn Now On.
—I’ll see him now in the Ormond, Lenehan said, and sound him. One good
turn deserves another.
—Do, Tom Rochford said. Tell him I’m Boylan with impatience.
—Goodnight, M’Coy said abruptly. When you two begin...
Nosey Flynn stooped towards the lever, snuffling at it.
—But how does it work here, Tommy? he asked.
—Tooraloo, Lenehan said. See you later.
He followed M’Coy out across the tiny square of Crampton court.
—He’s a hero, he said simply.
—I know, M’Coy said. The drain, you mean.
—Drain? Lenehan said. It was down a manhole.
They passed Dan Lowry’s musichall where Marie Kendall, charming
soubrette, smiled on them from a poster a dauby smile.
Going down the path of Sycamore street beside the Empire musichall
Lenehan showed M’Coy how the whole thing was. One of those manholes
like a bloody gaspipe and there was the poor devil stuck down in it,
half choked with sewer gas. Down went Tom Rochford anyhow, booky’s vest
and all, with the rope round him. And be damned but he got the rope
round the poor devil and the two were hauled up.
—The act of a hero, he said.
At the Dolphin they halted to allow the ambulance car to gallop past
them for Jervis street.
—This way, he said, walking to the right. I want to pop into Lynam’s to
see Sceptre’s starting price. What’s the time by your gold watch and
chain?
M’Coy peered into Marcus Tertius Moses’ sombre office, then at
O’Neill’s clock.
—After three, he said. Who’s riding her?
—O. Madden, Lenehan said. And a game filly she is.
While he waited in Temple bar M’Coy dodged a banana peel with gentle
pushes of his toe from the path to the gutter. Fellow might damn easy
get a nasty fall there coming along tight in the dark.
The gates of the drive opened wide to give egress to the viceregal
cavalcade.
—Even money, Lenehan said returning. I knocked against Bantam Lyons in
there going to back a bloody horse someone gave him that hasn’t an
earthly. Through here.
They went up the steps and under Merchants’ arch. A darkbacked figure
scanned books on the hawker’s cart.
—There he is, Lenehan said.
—Wonder what he’s buying, M’Coy said, glancing behind.
—_Leopoldo or the Bloom is on the Rye,_ Lenehan said.
—He’s dead nuts on sales, M’Coy said. I was with him one day and he
bought a book from an old one in Liffey street for two bob. There were
fine plates in it worth double the money, the stars and the moon and
comets with long tails. Astronomy it was about.
Lenehan laughed.
—I’ll tell you a damn good one about comets’ tails, he said. Come over
in the sun.
They crossed to the metal bridge and went along Wellington quay by the
riverwall.
Master Patrick Aloysius Dignam came out of Mangan’s, late Fehrenbach’s,
carrying a pound and a half of porksteaks.
—There was a long spread out at Glencree reformatory, Lenehan said
eagerly. The annual dinner, you know. Boiled shirt affair. The lord
mayor was there, Val Dillon it was, and sir Charles Cameron and Dan
Dawson spoke and there was music. Bartell d’Arcy sang and Benjamin
Dollard...
—I know, M’Coy broke in. My missus sang there once.
—Did she? Lenehan said.
A card _Unfurnished Apartments_ reappeared on the windowsash of number
7 Eccles street.
He checked his tale a moment but broke out in a wheezy laugh.
—But wait till I tell you, he said. Delahunt of Camden street had the
catering and yours truly was chief bottlewasher. Bloom and the wife
were there. Lashings of stuff we put up: port wine and sherry and
curacoa to which we did ample justice. Fast and furious it was. After
liquids came solids. Cold joints galore and mince pies...
—I know, M’Coy said. The year the missus was there...
Lenehan linked his arm warmly.
—But wait till I tell you, he said. We had a midnight lunch too after
all the jollification and when we sallied forth it was blue o’clock the