BELLO: What else are you good for, an
impotent
thing like you?
James Joyce - Ulysses
Cruel one!
BELLO: Ask for that every ten minutes. Beg. Pray for it as you never
prayed before. _(He thrusts out a figged fist and foul cigar)_ Here,
kiss that. Both. Kiss. _(He throws a leg astride and, pressing with
horseman's knees, calls in a hard voice)_ Gee up! A cockhorse to Banbury
cross. I'll ride him for the Eclipse stakes. _(He bends sideways and
squeezes his mount's testicles roughly, shouting)_ Ho! Off we pop! I'll
nurse you in proper fashion. _(He horserides cockhorse, leaping in the
saddle)_ The lady goes a pace a pace and the coachman goes a trot a trot
and the gentleman goes a gallop a gallop a gallop a gallop.
FLORRY: _(Pulls at Bello)_ Let me on him now. You had enough. I asked
before you.
ZOE: _(Pulling at florry)_ Me. Me. Are you not finished with him yet,
suckeress?
BLOOM: _(Stifling)_ Can't.
BELLO: Well, I'm not. Wait. _(He holds in his breath)_ Curse it. Here.
This bung's about burst. _(He uncorks himself behind: then, contorting
his features, farts loudly)_ Take that! _(He recorks himself)_ Yes, by
Jingo, sixteen three quarters.
BLOOM: _(A sweat breaking out over him)_ Not man. _(He sniffs)_ Woman.
BELLO: _(Stands up)_ No more blow hot and cold. What you longed for has
come to pass. Henceforth you are unmanned and mine in earnest, a thing
under the yoke. Now for your punishment frock. You will shed your male
garments, you understand, Ruby Cohen? and don the shot silk luxuriously
rustling over head and shoulders. And quickly too!
BLOOM: _(Shrinks)_ Silk, mistress said! O crinkly! scrapy! Must I
tiptouch it with my nails?
BELLO: _(Points to his whores)_ As they are now so will you be, wigged,
singed, perfumesprayed, ricepowdered, with smoothshaven armpits. Tape
measurements will be taken next your skin. You will be laced with cruel
force into vicelike corsets of soft dove coutille with whalebone busk to
the diamondtrimmed pelvis, the absolute outside edge, while your figure,
plumper than when at large, will be restrained in nettight frocks,
pretty two ounce petticoats and fringes and things stamped, of course,
with my houseflag, creations of lovely lingerie for Alice and nice
scent for Alice. Alice will feel the pullpull. Martha and Mary will be
a little chilly at first in such delicate thighcasing but the frilly
flimsiness of lace round your bare knees will remind you. . .
BLOOM: _(A charming soubrette with dauby cheeks, mustard hair and large
male hands and nose, leering mouth)_ I tried her things on only twice,
a small prank, in Holles street. When we were hard up I washed them to
save the laundry bill. My own shirts I turned. It was the purest thrift.
BELLO: _(Jeers)_ Little jobs that make mother pleased, eh? And showed
off coquettishly in your domino at the mirror behind closedrawn blinds
your unskirted thighs and hegoat's udders in various poses of surrender,
eh? Ho! ho! I have to laugh! That secondhand black operatop shift and
short trunkleg naughties all split up the stitches at her last rape that
Mrs Miriam Dandrade sold you from the Shelbourne hotel, eh?
BLOOM: Miriam. Black. Demimondaine.
BELLO: _(Guffaws)_ Christ Almighty it's too tickling, this! You were
a nicelooking Miriam when you clipped off your backgate hairs and
lay swooning in the thing across the bed as Mrs Dandrade about to be
violated by lieutenant Smythe-Smythe, Mr Philip Augustus Blockwell M.
P. , signor Laci Daremo, the robust tenor, blueeyed Bert, the liftboy,
Henri Fleury of Gordon Bennett fame, Sheridan, the quadroon Croesus, the
varsity wetbob eight from old Trinity, Ponto, her splendid Newfoundland
and Bobs, dowager duchess of Manorhamilton. _(He guffaws again)_ Christ,
wouldn't it make a Siamese cat laugh?
BLOOM: _(Her hands and features working)_ It was Gerald converted me to
be a true corsetlover when I was female impersonator in the High School
play _Vice Versa_. It was dear Gerald. He got that kink, fascinated by
sister's stays. Now dearest Gerald uses pinky greasepaint and gilds his
eyelids. Cult of the beautiful.
BELLO: _(With wicked glee)_ Beautiful! Give us a breather! When you
took your seat with womanish care, lifting your billowy flounces, on the
smoothworn throne.
BLOOM: Science. To compare the various joys we each enjoy. _(Earnestly)_
And really it's better the position. . . because often I used to wet. . .
BELLO: _(Sternly)_ No insubordination! The sawdust is there in the
corner for you. I gave you strict instructions, didn't I? Do it
standing, sir! I'll teach you to behave like a jinkleman! If I catch a
trace on your swaddles. Aha! By the ass of the Dorans you'll find I'm a
martinet. The sins of your past are rising against you. Many. Hundreds.
THE SINS OF THE PAST: _(In a medley of voices)_ He went through a form
of clandestine marriage with at least one woman in the shadow of the
Black church. Unspeakable messages he telephoned mentally to Miss Dunn
at an address in D'Olier street while he presented himself indecently to
the instrument in the callbox. By word and deed he frankly encouraged
a nocturnal strumpet to deposit fecal and other matter in an unsanitary
outhouse attached to empty premises. In five public conveniences
he wrote pencilled messages offering his nuptial partner to all
strongmembered males. And by the offensively smelling vitriol works did
he not pass night after night by loving courting couples to see if and
what and how much he could see? Did he not lie in bed, the gross boar,
gloating over a nauseous fragment of wellused toilet paper presented to
him by a nasty harlot, stimulated by gingerbread and a postal order?
BELLO: _(Whistles loudly)_ Say! What was the most revolting piece of
obscenity in all your career of crime? Go the whole hog. Puke it out! Be
candid for once.
_(Mute inhuman faces throng forward, leering, vanishing, gibbering,
Booloohoom. Poldy Kock, Bootlaces a penny Cassidy's hag, blind
stripling, Larry Rhinoceros, the girl, the woman, the whore, the other,
the. . . )_
BLOOM: Don't ask me! Our mutual faith. Pleasants street. I only thought
the half of the. . . I swear on my sacred oath. . .
BELLO: _(Peremptorily)_ Answer. Repugnant wretch! I insist on knowing.
Tell me something to amuse me, smut or a bloody good ghoststory or a
line of poetry, quick, quick, quick! Where? How? What time? With how
many? I give you just three seconds. One! Two! Thr. . .
BLOOM: _(Docile, gurgles)_ I rererepugnosed in rerererepugnant
BELLO: _(Imperiously)_ O, get out, you skunk! Hold your tongue! Speak
when you're spoken to.
BLOOM: _(Bows)_ Master! Mistress! Mantamer!
_(He lifts his arms. His bangle bracelets fill. )_
BELLO: _(Satirically)_ By day you will souse and bat our smelling
underclothes also when we ladies are unwell, and swab out our latrines
with dress pinned up and a dishclout tied to your tail. Won't that be
nice? _(He places a ruby ring on her finger)_ And there now! With this
ring I thee own. Say, thank you, mistress.
BLOOM: Thank you, mistress.
BELLO: You will make the beds, get my tub ready, empty the pisspots in
the different rooms, including old Mrs Keogh's the cook's, a sandy one.
Ay, and rinse the seven of them well, mind, or lap it up like champagne.
Drink me piping hot. Hop! You will dance attendance or I'll lecture you
on your misdeeds, Miss Ruby, and spank your bare bot right well, miss,
with the hairbrush. You'll be taught the error of your ways. At night
your wellcreamed braceletted hands will wear fortythreebutton gloves
newpowdered with talc and having delicately scented fingertips. For such
favours knights of old laid down their lives. _(He chuckles)_ My boys
will be no end charmed to see you so ladylike, the colonel, above
all, when they come here the night before the wedding to fondle my new
attraction in gilded heels. First I'll have a go at you myself. A man I
know on the turf named Charles Alberta Marsh (I was in bed with him just
now and another gentleman out of the Hanaper and Petty Bag office) is
on the lookout for a maid of all work at a short knock. Swell the bust.
Smile. Droop shoulders. What offers? _(He points)_ For that lot. Trained
by owner to fetch and carry, basket in mouth. _(He bares his arm and
plunges it elbowdeep in Bloom's vulva)_ There's fine depth for you!
What, boys? That give you a hardon? _(He shoves his arm in a bidder's
face)_ Here wet the deck and wipe it round!
A BIDDER: A florin.
_(Dillon's lacquey rings his handbell. )_
THE LACQUEY: Barang!
A VOICE: One and eightpence too much.
CHARLES ALBERTA MARSH: Must be virgin. Good breath. Clean.
BELLO: _(Gives a rap with his gavel)_ Two bar. Rockbottom figure and
cheap at the price. Fourteen hands high. Touch and examine his points.
Handle him. This downy skin, these soft muscles, this tender flesh. If
I had only my gold piercer here! And quite easy to milk. Three newlaid
gallons a day. A pure stockgetter, due to lay within the hour. His
sire's milk record was a thousand gallons of whole milk in forty weeks.
Whoa my jewel! Beg up! Whoa! _(He brands his initial C on Bloom's
croup)_ So! Warranted Cohen! What advance on two bob, gentlemen?
A DARKVISAGED MAN: _(In disguised accent)_ Hoondert punt sterlink.
VOICES: _(Subdued)_ For the Caliph. Haroun Al Raschid.
BELLO: _(Gaily)_ Right. Let them all come. The scanty, daringly short
skirt, riding up at the knee to show a peep of white pantalette, is a
potent weapon and transparent stockings, emeraldgartered, with the
long straight seam trailing up beyond the knee, appeal to the better
instincts of the _blase_ man about town. Learn the smooth mincing walk
on four inch Louis Quinze heels, the Grecian bend with provoking croup,
the thighs fluescent, knees modestly kissing. Bring all your powers of
fascination to bear on them. Pander to their Gomorrahan vices.
BLOOM: _(Bends his blushing face into his armpit and simpers with
forefinger in mouth)_ O, I know what you're hinting at now!
BELLO: What else are you good for, an impotent thing like you? _(He
stoops and, peering, pokes with his fan rudely under the fat suet folds
of Bloom's haunches)_ Up! Up! Manx cat! What have we here? Where's your
curly teapot gone to or who docked it on you, cockyolly? Sing, birdy,
sing. It's as limp as a boy of six's doing his pooly behind a cart. Buy
a bucket or sell your pump. _(Loudly)_ Can you do a man's job?
BLOOM: Eccles street. . .
BELLO: _(Sarcastically)_ I wouldn't hurt your feelings for the world but
there's a man of brawn in possession there. The tables are turned, my
gay young fellow! He is something like a fullgrown outdoor man. Well for
you, you muff, if you had that weapon with knobs and lumps and warts all
over it. He shot his bolt, I can tell you! Foot to foot, knee to knee,
belly to belly, bubs to breast! He's no eunuch. A shock of red hair he
has sticking out of him behind like a furzebush! Wait for nine months,
my lad! Holy ginger, it's kicking and coughing up and down in her guts
already! That makes you wild, don't it? Touches the spot? _(He spits in
contempt)_ Spittoon!
BLOOM: I was indecently treated, I. . . Inform the police. Hundred
pounds. Unmentionable. I. . .
BELLO: Would if you could, lame duck. A downpour we want not your
drizzle.
BLOOM: To drive me mad! Moll! I forgot! Forgive! Moll. . . We. . . Still. . .
BELLO: _(Ruthlessly)_ No, Leopold Bloom, all is changed by woman's will
since you slept horizontal in Sleepy Hollow your night of twenty years.
Return and see.
_(Old Sleepy Hollow calls over the wold. )_
SLEEPY HOLLOW: Rip van Wink! Rip van Winkle!
BLOOM: _(In tattered mocassins with a rusty fowlingpiece, tiptoeing,
fingertipping, his haggard bony bearded face peering through the diamond
panes, cries out)_ I see her! It's she! The first night at Mat Dillon's!
But that dress, the green! And her hair is dyed gold and he. . .
BELLO: _(Laughs mockingly)_ That's your daughter, you owl, with a
Mullingar student.
_(Milly Bloom, fairhaired, greenvested, slimsandalled, her blue scarf
in the seawind simply swirling, breaks from the arms of her lover and
calls, her young eyes wonderwide. )_
MILLY: My! It's Papli! But, O Papli, how old you've grown!
BELLO: Changed, eh? Our whatnot, our writingtable where we never wrote,
aunt Hegarty's armchair, our classic reprints of old masters. A man and
his menfriends are living there in clover. The _Cuckoos' Rest! _ Why not?
How many women had you, eh, following them up dark streets, flatfoot,
exciting them by your smothered grunts, what, you male prostitute?
Blameless dames with parcels of groceries. Turn about. Sauce for the
goose, my gander O.
BLOOM: They. . . I. . .
BELLO: _(Cuttingly)_ Their heelmarks will stamp the Brusselette carpet
you bought at Wren's auction. In their horseplay with Moll the romp to
find the buck flea in her breeches they will deface the little statue
you carried home in the rain for art for art' sake. They will violate
the secrets of your bottom drawer. Pages will be torn from your handbook
of astronomy to make them pipespills. And they will spit in your ten
shilling brass fender from Hampton Leedom's.
BLOOM: Ten and six. The act of low scoundrels. Let me go. I will return.
I will prove. . .
A VOICE: Swear!
_(Bloom clenches his fists and crawls forward, a bowieknife between his
teeth. )_
BELLO: As a paying guest or a kept man? Too late. You have made your
secondbest bed and others must lie in it. Your epitaph is written. You
are down and out and don't you forget it, old bean.
BLOOM: Justice! All Ireland versus one! Has nobody. . . ? _(He bites his
thumb)_
BELLO: Die and be damned to you if you have any sense of decency
or grace about you. I can give you a rare old wine that'll send you
skipping to hell and back. Sign a will and leave us any coin you have!
If you have none see you damn well get it, steal it, rob it! We'll bury
you in our shrubbery jakes where you'll be dead and dirty with old Cuck
Cohen, my stepnephew I married, the bloody old gouty procurator and
sodomite with a crick in his neck, and my other ten or eleven husbands,
whatever the buggers' names were, suffocated in the one cesspool. _(He
explodes in a loud phlegmy laugh)_ We'll manure you, Mr Flower! _(He
pipes scoffingly)_ Byby, Poldy! Byby, Papli!
BLOOM: _(Clasps his head)_ My willpower! Memory! I have sinned! I have
suff. . .
_(He weeps tearlessly)_
BELLO: _(Sneers)_ Crybabby! Crocodile tears!
_(Bloom, broken, closely veiled for the sacrifice, sobs, his face to
the earth. The passing bell is heard. Darkshawled figures of the
circumcised, in sackcloth and ashes, stand by the wailing wall. M.
Shulomowitz, Joseph Goldwater, Moses Herzog, Harris Rosenberg, M.
Moisel, J. Citron, Minnie Watchman, P. Mastiansky, The Reverend Leopold
Abramovitz, Chazen. With swaying arms they wail in pneuma over the
recreant Bloom. )_
THE CIRCUMCISED: _(In dark guttural chant as they cast dead sea fruit
upon him, no flowers) Shema Israel Adonai Elohenu Adonai Echad. _
VOICES: _(Sighing)_ So he's gone. Ah yes. Yes, indeed. Bloom? Never
heard of him. No? Queer kind of chap. There's the widow. That so? Ah,
yes.
_(From the suttee pyre the flame of gum camphire ascends. The pall of
incense smoke screens and disperses. Out of her oakframe a nymph with
hair unbound, lightly clad in teabrown artcolours, descends from her
grotto and passing under interlacing yews stands over Bloom. )_
THE YEWS: _(Their leaves whispering)_ Sister. Our sister. Ssh!
THE NYMPH: _(Softly)_ Mortal! _(Kindly)_ Nay, dost not weepest!
BLOOM: _(Crawls jellily forward under the boughs, streaked by sunlight,
with dignity)_ This position. I felt it was expected of me. Force of
habit.
THE NYMPH: Mortal! You found me in evil company, highkickers, coster
picnicmakers, pugilists, popular generals, immoral panto boys in
fleshtights and the nifty shimmy dancers, La Aurora and Karini, musical
act, the hit of the century. I was hidden in cheap pink paper that smelt
of rock oil. I was surrounded by the stale smut of clubmen, stories to
disturb callow youth, ads for transparencies, truedup dice and bustpads,
proprietary articles and why wear a truss with testimonial from ruptured
gentleman. Useful hints to the married.
BLOOM: _(Lifts a turtle head towards her lap)_ We have met before. On
another star.
THE NYMPH: _(Sadly)_ Rubber goods. Neverrip brand as supplied to the
aristocracy. Corsets for men. I cure fits or money refunded. Unsolicited
testimonials for Professor Waldmann's wonderful chest exuber. My bust
developed four inches in three weeks, reports Mrs Gus Rublin with photo.
BLOOM: You mean _Photo Bits? _
THE NYMPH: I do. You bore me away, framed me in oak and tinsel, set me
above your marriage couch. Unseen, one summer eve, you kissed me in
four places. And with loving pencil you shaded my eyes, my bosom and my
shame.
BLOOM: _(Humbly kisses her long hair)_ Your classic curves, beautiful
immortal, I was glad to look on you, to praise you, a thing of beauty,
almost to pray.
THE NYMPH: During dark nights I heard your praise.
BLOOM: _(Quickly)_ Yes, yes. You mean that I. . . Sleep reveals the worst
side of everyone, children perhaps excepted. I know I fell out of bed
or rather was pushed. Steel wine is said to cure snoring. For the rest
there is that English invention, pamphlet of which I received some days
ago, incorrectly addressed. It claims to afford a noiseless, inoffensive
vent. _(He sighs)_ 'Twas ever thus. Frailty, thy name is marriage.
THE NYMPH: _(Her fingers in her ears)_ And words. They are not in my
dictionary.
BLOOM: You understood them?
THE YEWS: Ssh!
THE NYMPH: _(Covers her face with her hands)_ What have I not seen in
that chamber? What must my eyes look down on?
BLOOM: _(Apologetically)_ I know. Soiled personal linen, wrong side up
with care. The quoits are loose. From Gibraltar by long sea long ago.
THE NYMPH: _(Bends her head)_ Worse, worse!
BLOOM: _(Reflects precautiously)_ That antiquated commode. It wasn't her
weight. She scaled just eleven stone nine. She put on nine pounds
after weaning. It was a crack and want of glue.
BELLO: Ask for that every ten minutes. Beg. Pray for it as you never
prayed before. _(He thrusts out a figged fist and foul cigar)_ Here,
kiss that. Both. Kiss. _(He throws a leg astride and, pressing with
horseman's knees, calls in a hard voice)_ Gee up! A cockhorse to Banbury
cross. I'll ride him for the Eclipse stakes. _(He bends sideways and
squeezes his mount's testicles roughly, shouting)_ Ho! Off we pop! I'll
nurse you in proper fashion. _(He horserides cockhorse, leaping in the
saddle)_ The lady goes a pace a pace and the coachman goes a trot a trot
and the gentleman goes a gallop a gallop a gallop a gallop.
FLORRY: _(Pulls at Bello)_ Let me on him now. You had enough. I asked
before you.
ZOE: _(Pulling at florry)_ Me. Me. Are you not finished with him yet,
suckeress?
BLOOM: _(Stifling)_ Can't.
BELLO: Well, I'm not. Wait. _(He holds in his breath)_ Curse it. Here.
This bung's about burst. _(He uncorks himself behind: then, contorting
his features, farts loudly)_ Take that! _(He recorks himself)_ Yes, by
Jingo, sixteen three quarters.
BLOOM: _(A sweat breaking out over him)_ Not man. _(He sniffs)_ Woman.
BELLO: _(Stands up)_ No more blow hot and cold. What you longed for has
come to pass. Henceforth you are unmanned and mine in earnest, a thing
under the yoke. Now for your punishment frock. You will shed your male
garments, you understand, Ruby Cohen? and don the shot silk luxuriously
rustling over head and shoulders. And quickly too!
BLOOM: _(Shrinks)_ Silk, mistress said! O crinkly! scrapy! Must I
tiptouch it with my nails?
BELLO: _(Points to his whores)_ As they are now so will you be, wigged,
singed, perfumesprayed, ricepowdered, with smoothshaven armpits. Tape
measurements will be taken next your skin. You will be laced with cruel
force into vicelike corsets of soft dove coutille with whalebone busk to
the diamondtrimmed pelvis, the absolute outside edge, while your figure,
plumper than when at large, will be restrained in nettight frocks,
pretty two ounce petticoats and fringes and things stamped, of course,
with my houseflag, creations of lovely lingerie for Alice and nice
scent for Alice. Alice will feel the pullpull. Martha and Mary will be
a little chilly at first in such delicate thighcasing but the frilly
flimsiness of lace round your bare knees will remind you. . .
BLOOM: _(A charming soubrette with dauby cheeks, mustard hair and large
male hands and nose, leering mouth)_ I tried her things on only twice,
a small prank, in Holles street. When we were hard up I washed them to
save the laundry bill. My own shirts I turned. It was the purest thrift.
BELLO: _(Jeers)_ Little jobs that make mother pleased, eh? And showed
off coquettishly in your domino at the mirror behind closedrawn blinds
your unskirted thighs and hegoat's udders in various poses of surrender,
eh? Ho! ho! I have to laugh! That secondhand black operatop shift and
short trunkleg naughties all split up the stitches at her last rape that
Mrs Miriam Dandrade sold you from the Shelbourne hotel, eh?
BLOOM: Miriam. Black. Demimondaine.
BELLO: _(Guffaws)_ Christ Almighty it's too tickling, this! You were
a nicelooking Miriam when you clipped off your backgate hairs and
lay swooning in the thing across the bed as Mrs Dandrade about to be
violated by lieutenant Smythe-Smythe, Mr Philip Augustus Blockwell M.
P. , signor Laci Daremo, the robust tenor, blueeyed Bert, the liftboy,
Henri Fleury of Gordon Bennett fame, Sheridan, the quadroon Croesus, the
varsity wetbob eight from old Trinity, Ponto, her splendid Newfoundland
and Bobs, dowager duchess of Manorhamilton. _(He guffaws again)_ Christ,
wouldn't it make a Siamese cat laugh?
BLOOM: _(Her hands and features working)_ It was Gerald converted me to
be a true corsetlover when I was female impersonator in the High School
play _Vice Versa_. It was dear Gerald. He got that kink, fascinated by
sister's stays. Now dearest Gerald uses pinky greasepaint and gilds his
eyelids. Cult of the beautiful.
BELLO: _(With wicked glee)_ Beautiful! Give us a breather! When you
took your seat with womanish care, lifting your billowy flounces, on the
smoothworn throne.
BLOOM: Science. To compare the various joys we each enjoy. _(Earnestly)_
And really it's better the position. . . because often I used to wet. . .
BELLO: _(Sternly)_ No insubordination! The sawdust is there in the
corner for you. I gave you strict instructions, didn't I? Do it
standing, sir! I'll teach you to behave like a jinkleman! If I catch a
trace on your swaddles. Aha! By the ass of the Dorans you'll find I'm a
martinet. The sins of your past are rising against you. Many. Hundreds.
THE SINS OF THE PAST: _(In a medley of voices)_ He went through a form
of clandestine marriage with at least one woman in the shadow of the
Black church. Unspeakable messages he telephoned mentally to Miss Dunn
at an address in D'Olier street while he presented himself indecently to
the instrument in the callbox. By word and deed he frankly encouraged
a nocturnal strumpet to deposit fecal and other matter in an unsanitary
outhouse attached to empty premises. In five public conveniences
he wrote pencilled messages offering his nuptial partner to all
strongmembered males. And by the offensively smelling vitriol works did
he not pass night after night by loving courting couples to see if and
what and how much he could see? Did he not lie in bed, the gross boar,
gloating over a nauseous fragment of wellused toilet paper presented to
him by a nasty harlot, stimulated by gingerbread and a postal order?
BELLO: _(Whistles loudly)_ Say! What was the most revolting piece of
obscenity in all your career of crime? Go the whole hog. Puke it out! Be
candid for once.
_(Mute inhuman faces throng forward, leering, vanishing, gibbering,
Booloohoom. Poldy Kock, Bootlaces a penny Cassidy's hag, blind
stripling, Larry Rhinoceros, the girl, the woman, the whore, the other,
the. . . )_
BLOOM: Don't ask me! Our mutual faith. Pleasants street. I only thought
the half of the. . . I swear on my sacred oath. . .
BELLO: _(Peremptorily)_ Answer. Repugnant wretch! I insist on knowing.
Tell me something to amuse me, smut or a bloody good ghoststory or a
line of poetry, quick, quick, quick! Where? How? What time? With how
many? I give you just three seconds. One! Two! Thr. . .
BLOOM: _(Docile, gurgles)_ I rererepugnosed in rerererepugnant
BELLO: _(Imperiously)_ O, get out, you skunk! Hold your tongue! Speak
when you're spoken to.
BLOOM: _(Bows)_ Master! Mistress! Mantamer!
_(He lifts his arms. His bangle bracelets fill. )_
BELLO: _(Satirically)_ By day you will souse and bat our smelling
underclothes also when we ladies are unwell, and swab out our latrines
with dress pinned up and a dishclout tied to your tail. Won't that be
nice? _(He places a ruby ring on her finger)_ And there now! With this
ring I thee own. Say, thank you, mistress.
BLOOM: Thank you, mistress.
BELLO: You will make the beds, get my tub ready, empty the pisspots in
the different rooms, including old Mrs Keogh's the cook's, a sandy one.
Ay, and rinse the seven of them well, mind, or lap it up like champagne.
Drink me piping hot. Hop! You will dance attendance or I'll lecture you
on your misdeeds, Miss Ruby, and spank your bare bot right well, miss,
with the hairbrush. You'll be taught the error of your ways. At night
your wellcreamed braceletted hands will wear fortythreebutton gloves
newpowdered with talc and having delicately scented fingertips. For such
favours knights of old laid down their lives. _(He chuckles)_ My boys
will be no end charmed to see you so ladylike, the colonel, above
all, when they come here the night before the wedding to fondle my new
attraction in gilded heels. First I'll have a go at you myself. A man I
know on the turf named Charles Alberta Marsh (I was in bed with him just
now and another gentleman out of the Hanaper and Petty Bag office) is
on the lookout for a maid of all work at a short knock. Swell the bust.
Smile. Droop shoulders. What offers? _(He points)_ For that lot. Trained
by owner to fetch and carry, basket in mouth. _(He bares his arm and
plunges it elbowdeep in Bloom's vulva)_ There's fine depth for you!
What, boys? That give you a hardon? _(He shoves his arm in a bidder's
face)_ Here wet the deck and wipe it round!
A BIDDER: A florin.
_(Dillon's lacquey rings his handbell. )_
THE LACQUEY: Barang!
A VOICE: One and eightpence too much.
CHARLES ALBERTA MARSH: Must be virgin. Good breath. Clean.
BELLO: _(Gives a rap with his gavel)_ Two bar. Rockbottom figure and
cheap at the price. Fourteen hands high. Touch and examine his points.
Handle him. This downy skin, these soft muscles, this tender flesh. If
I had only my gold piercer here! And quite easy to milk. Three newlaid
gallons a day. A pure stockgetter, due to lay within the hour. His
sire's milk record was a thousand gallons of whole milk in forty weeks.
Whoa my jewel! Beg up! Whoa! _(He brands his initial C on Bloom's
croup)_ So! Warranted Cohen! What advance on two bob, gentlemen?
A DARKVISAGED MAN: _(In disguised accent)_ Hoondert punt sterlink.
VOICES: _(Subdued)_ For the Caliph. Haroun Al Raschid.
BELLO: _(Gaily)_ Right. Let them all come. The scanty, daringly short
skirt, riding up at the knee to show a peep of white pantalette, is a
potent weapon and transparent stockings, emeraldgartered, with the
long straight seam trailing up beyond the knee, appeal to the better
instincts of the _blase_ man about town. Learn the smooth mincing walk
on four inch Louis Quinze heels, the Grecian bend with provoking croup,
the thighs fluescent, knees modestly kissing. Bring all your powers of
fascination to bear on them. Pander to their Gomorrahan vices.
BLOOM: _(Bends his blushing face into his armpit and simpers with
forefinger in mouth)_ O, I know what you're hinting at now!
BELLO: What else are you good for, an impotent thing like you? _(He
stoops and, peering, pokes with his fan rudely under the fat suet folds
of Bloom's haunches)_ Up! Up! Manx cat! What have we here? Where's your
curly teapot gone to or who docked it on you, cockyolly? Sing, birdy,
sing. It's as limp as a boy of six's doing his pooly behind a cart. Buy
a bucket or sell your pump. _(Loudly)_ Can you do a man's job?
BLOOM: Eccles street. . .
BELLO: _(Sarcastically)_ I wouldn't hurt your feelings for the world but
there's a man of brawn in possession there. The tables are turned, my
gay young fellow! He is something like a fullgrown outdoor man. Well for
you, you muff, if you had that weapon with knobs and lumps and warts all
over it. He shot his bolt, I can tell you! Foot to foot, knee to knee,
belly to belly, bubs to breast! He's no eunuch. A shock of red hair he
has sticking out of him behind like a furzebush! Wait for nine months,
my lad! Holy ginger, it's kicking and coughing up and down in her guts
already! That makes you wild, don't it? Touches the spot? _(He spits in
contempt)_ Spittoon!
BLOOM: I was indecently treated, I. . . Inform the police. Hundred
pounds. Unmentionable. I. . .
BELLO: Would if you could, lame duck. A downpour we want not your
drizzle.
BLOOM: To drive me mad! Moll! I forgot! Forgive! Moll. . . We. . . Still. . .
BELLO: _(Ruthlessly)_ No, Leopold Bloom, all is changed by woman's will
since you slept horizontal in Sleepy Hollow your night of twenty years.
Return and see.
_(Old Sleepy Hollow calls over the wold. )_
SLEEPY HOLLOW: Rip van Wink! Rip van Winkle!
BLOOM: _(In tattered mocassins with a rusty fowlingpiece, tiptoeing,
fingertipping, his haggard bony bearded face peering through the diamond
panes, cries out)_ I see her! It's she! The first night at Mat Dillon's!
But that dress, the green! And her hair is dyed gold and he. . .
BELLO: _(Laughs mockingly)_ That's your daughter, you owl, with a
Mullingar student.
_(Milly Bloom, fairhaired, greenvested, slimsandalled, her blue scarf
in the seawind simply swirling, breaks from the arms of her lover and
calls, her young eyes wonderwide. )_
MILLY: My! It's Papli! But, O Papli, how old you've grown!
BELLO: Changed, eh? Our whatnot, our writingtable where we never wrote,
aunt Hegarty's armchair, our classic reprints of old masters. A man and
his menfriends are living there in clover. The _Cuckoos' Rest! _ Why not?
How many women had you, eh, following them up dark streets, flatfoot,
exciting them by your smothered grunts, what, you male prostitute?
Blameless dames with parcels of groceries. Turn about. Sauce for the
goose, my gander O.
BLOOM: They. . . I. . .
BELLO: _(Cuttingly)_ Their heelmarks will stamp the Brusselette carpet
you bought at Wren's auction. In their horseplay with Moll the romp to
find the buck flea in her breeches they will deface the little statue
you carried home in the rain for art for art' sake. They will violate
the secrets of your bottom drawer. Pages will be torn from your handbook
of astronomy to make them pipespills. And they will spit in your ten
shilling brass fender from Hampton Leedom's.
BLOOM: Ten and six. The act of low scoundrels. Let me go. I will return.
I will prove. . .
A VOICE: Swear!
_(Bloom clenches his fists and crawls forward, a bowieknife between his
teeth. )_
BELLO: As a paying guest or a kept man? Too late. You have made your
secondbest bed and others must lie in it. Your epitaph is written. You
are down and out and don't you forget it, old bean.
BLOOM: Justice! All Ireland versus one! Has nobody. . . ? _(He bites his
thumb)_
BELLO: Die and be damned to you if you have any sense of decency
or grace about you. I can give you a rare old wine that'll send you
skipping to hell and back. Sign a will and leave us any coin you have!
If you have none see you damn well get it, steal it, rob it! We'll bury
you in our shrubbery jakes where you'll be dead and dirty with old Cuck
Cohen, my stepnephew I married, the bloody old gouty procurator and
sodomite with a crick in his neck, and my other ten or eleven husbands,
whatever the buggers' names were, suffocated in the one cesspool. _(He
explodes in a loud phlegmy laugh)_ We'll manure you, Mr Flower! _(He
pipes scoffingly)_ Byby, Poldy! Byby, Papli!
BLOOM: _(Clasps his head)_ My willpower! Memory! I have sinned! I have
suff. . .
_(He weeps tearlessly)_
BELLO: _(Sneers)_ Crybabby! Crocodile tears!
_(Bloom, broken, closely veiled for the sacrifice, sobs, his face to
the earth. The passing bell is heard. Darkshawled figures of the
circumcised, in sackcloth and ashes, stand by the wailing wall. M.
Shulomowitz, Joseph Goldwater, Moses Herzog, Harris Rosenberg, M.
Moisel, J. Citron, Minnie Watchman, P. Mastiansky, The Reverend Leopold
Abramovitz, Chazen. With swaying arms they wail in pneuma over the
recreant Bloom. )_
THE CIRCUMCISED: _(In dark guttural chant as they cast dead sea fruit
upon him, no flowers) Shema Israel Adonai Elohenu Adonai Echad. _
VOICES: _(Sighing)_ So he's gone. Ah yes. Yes, indeed. Bloom? Never
heard of him. No? Queer kind of chap. There's the widow. That so? Ah,
yes.
_(From the suttee pyre the flame of gum camphire ascends. The pall of
incense smoke screens and disperses. Out of her oakframe a nymph with
hair unbound, lightly clad in teabrown artcolours, descends from her
grotto and passing under interlacing yews stands over Bloom. )_
THE YEWS: _(Their leaves whispering)_ Sister. Our sister. Ssh!
THE NYMPH: _(Softly)_ Mortal! _(Kindly)_ Nay, dost not weepest!
BLOOM: _(Crawls jellily forward under the boughs, streaked by sunlight,
with dignity)_ This position. I felt it was expected of me. Force of
habit.
THE NYMPH: Mortal! You found me in evil company, highkickers, coster
picnicmakers, pugilists, popular generals, immoral panto boys in
fleshtights and the nifty shimmy dancers, La Aurora and Karini, musical
act, the hit of the century. I was hidden in cheap pink paper that smelt
of rock oil. I was surrounded by the stale smut of clubmen, stories to
disturb callow youth, ads for transparencies, truedup dice and bustpads,
proprietary articles and why wear a truss with testimonial from ruptured
gentleman. Useful hints to the married.
BLOOM: _(Lifts a turtle head towards her lap)_ We have met before. On
another star.
THE NYMPH: _(Sadly)_ Rubber goods. Neverrip brand as supplied to the
aristocracy. Corsets for men. I cure fits or money refunded. Unsolicited
testimonials for Professor Waldmann's wonderful chest exuber. My bust
developed four inches in three weeks, reports Mrs Gus Rublin with photo.
BLOOM: You mean _Photo Bits? _
THE NYMPH: I do. You bore me away, framed me in oak and tinsel, set me
above your marriage couch. Unseen, one summer eve, you kissed me in
four places. And with loving pencil you shaded my eyes, my bosom and my
shame.
BLOOM: _(Humbly kisses her long hair)_ Your classic curves, beautiful
immortal, I was glad to look on you, to praise you, a thing of beauty,
almost to pray.
THE NYMPH: During dark nights I heard your praise.
BLOOM: _(Quickly)_ Yes, yes. You mean that I. . . Sleep reveals the worst
side of everyone, children perhaps excepted. I know I fell out of bed
or rather was pushed. Steel wine is said to cure snoring. For the rest
there is that English invention, pamphlet of which I received some days
ago, incorrectly addressed. It claims to afford a noiseless, inoffensive
vent. _(He sighs)_ 'Twas ever thus. Frailty, thy name is marriage.
THE NYMPH: _(Her fingers in her ears)_ And words. They are not in my
dictionary.
BLOOM: You understood them?
THE YEWS: Ssh!
THE NYMPH: _(Covers her face with her hands)_ What have I not seen in
that chamber? What must my eyes look down on?
BLOOM: _(Apologetically)_ I know. Soiled personal linen, wrong side up
with care. The quoits are loose. From Gibraltar by long sea long ago.
THE NYMPH: _(Bends her head)_ Worse, worse!
BLOOM: _(Reflects precautiously)_ That antiquated commode. It wasn't her
weight. She scaled just eleven stone nine. She put on nine pounds
after weaning. It was a crack and want of glue.
