MS-HRC-SB-5-10

[0596] Strange task which consists of in[p. 26r] speaking of oneself. [0597] Strange hope, turned towards silence and peace. [0598] Possessed of nothing but my voice, the voice, it may seeme natural, once the idea of obligation has been swallowed, that I should interpret it as an obligation to say something. [0598|001] But is it possible? [0599] Bereft of hands, perhaps it is my duty to clap or, striking the palms together, to call the wait^er, and of feet, to dance the Highland Fling. [0600] But let us first suppose, in order to get on a little, then we'll suppose something else, in order to get on a little further, that it is in fact required of me that I say something, something that is not to be found in all I have said up to now. [0601] That seems a reasonable assumption. [0602] But thence to infer that the something required is something about me suddenly strikes me as rather unwarranted. [0603] Might it not rather be the praises of my master, sung, in ore^der to obtain his forgiveness? [0604] Or the admission tht^at I am Mahood ad^fter all and all these stories of a being whose identity he usurps, and whose voice he prevents from being heard, all lies from beginning to end? [0605] And what if Mahood were my master? [0606] I'll leave it at that, for the moment. [0607] So many prospects in so short a time, it's too much. [0608] Decidedly it seems impossible, at this stage, that I should [si] dispense with questions, as I promised myself I would. [0609] No, I merely swore I'd stop asking them. [0610] Who knows, [0611] perhaps before long I shall light on the happy combination which will prevent them from ever arising again in my — let us not be over-nice — my mind. [0612] For what I am doing is not being done without a minimum of mind. [0613] Not mine perhaps, granted, with pleasure, but I draw on it, at least I try and look as if I did. [0614] Rich matter there, to be exploited, fatten you up, suck it to the core, keep you going for years, tasty into the bargain, I quiver at the thought, give you my word, spoken in jest, quiver and pass on, all life before me, pass on and forget, what I was saying, just now, something important, it's gone, it'll come back, no regrets, as good as new, unrecognizable, let's hope so, some day when I feel more on for expensive ^high-class nuts to crack. [0616] On. [0617] My ^The master. [0618] I never paid him[p. 27r] enough attention. [0619] No more perhaps^es either, [0620] that old trick has ^is served its time ^{worn to a thread}. [0621] I'll forbid myself everything, then proceed ^{go on} as if I hadn't. [0622] The master. [0623] A few allusions here and there, as to a satrap, with a view to enlisting sympathy. [0624] They clothee^d me anf^d gave me money, that kind of thing, the light touch. [0625] Then no more. [0626] Or Moran's boss, I forget his name. [0627] Ah t^yes, certain things, things I invented, hoping for the best, full of doubts, croaking with fatigue, I remember certain things, not always the same. [0628] But to investigate this matter seriously, I mean with as much futile ardour as that of the underling, which I hoped was mine, close to mine, the road to mine, no, that never occurred to me. [0629] And if it occurs to me now it is because I have despaired of mine. [0630] A moment of discouragement, to strike while hot. [0631] My master then,assuming he issolitary, in my image, wishes me well, por^or devil, wishes my good, and if he does not seem to do very much in order not to be disappointed it is because there is not very much to be done or, better still, because there is nothing to be done, otherwise he would have done it, my good and great master, that must be it, long ago, poor devil. [0632] Anoh^ther hypotheseⁱs:^, he has taken the necessary steps, his will is done as far as I am concerned (for perhaps he has ^{he may have} other protégés) and all is well with me without my knowing it. [0633] Cases one and two. [0634] I'll consider the former first, if I can. [0635] Then I'll admire the latter, if my eyes are still open. [0636] This sounds like one of Mahood's anecdotes. [0638] But quick, consider, before you forget. [0639] There he is then, the unfortunate devil, quite miserable because of me, for whi^om there is nothing to be done, and he so anxious to help, so used to giving orders and to being obeyed. [0640] There he is ever since I came into the world, at his instigatio possih^bly at his instigation, I wouldnt put it past him, commanding me to be well, you know, in every way, no complaints at all, with as much success as if he were talking ^shouting to ^at a piece ^lump of inanimate matter. [0641] If he is not pleased with this p[x]^anegyric I hope I may be — I nearly said hanged, but that I hope in any case, without restrictions, I nearly said con, that would cut my cackle. [0642] Unfortunately I have no ^{Ah for a} neck.^! [0643] I want all to be[p. 28r] well with you, do you hear me, that's what he keeps on dinning at me. [0644] To which I reply, in a respectful attitude, I too, your h^Highness ^Lordship. [0645] I say that to cheer him up, he sounds so unhappy. [0646] I am good-hearted, on the surface. [0647] No, we have no conversation, never a word out of him (mum of his mouth) to me. [0648] He's out of luck, that's certain, [0649] [x]^I don't suppose he chose me. [0650] What he means by good, my good, ia another problem. [0651] He is capable of wanting me to be happy, such a thing has been known, it appears. [0652] Or to serve a purpose. [0653] Or the two at once! [0654] A little more frankness on his part, soⁱnce the initiative belongs to him, might be a help, as well from his point of view as from the one he attributes to me. [0655] M^Let him explain himself and have done with it. [0656] It's not up to me ^{my business} to ask him questions, even if I knew how to reach him. [0657] Let him iⁿform ^me once and fo^r all what exactly he wants from me, for me. [0658] What he wants is my good, I know that, at least I say it, in the hope of bringing him round to a more reasonable frame of mind, assuming he exists and, existing, hears me. [0659] But what good, there must n^be more than one. [0660] The supreme perhaps. [0661] In a word let him a^enlighten me, that's all I ask, so that I may at least have the satisfaction of knowing in what sense I leave to be desired. [0662] If he wants me to say something, for my good naturally, let him tell me exactly what and I'll trumpet it forth ^{let it out with a roar} straight away. [0663] It's true he may have already told me a hundred times. [0664] Well, let him make it a hundred and one, this time I'll pay attention. [0665] But perhaps I arraign ^blacken him unjustly, my good master, perhaps he is not solitary like me, not free like me, but associated with others, equally good, equally concerbⁿed with my welfare, but differeing as to its nature. [0666] Every day, up above, I mean above me, from one set hour to another set hour, everything there being set and settled ec^xcept what to do with me, they assemble to discuss me. [0667] Or perhaps it's a meeting of substitude substitutes ^deputies, with instructions to elaborate a temporary ^tentative agreement. [0668] The fact of my continuing, while they are thus engaged, to being what I have always been[p. 29r] to be what I have always been is naturally preferable to a botched decision, voted perhaps by a mah^jority of one, or drawn from an om^ld hat. [0669] They too are unhappy, all this time, each one to the best of his capacity, because all is not well with me. [0670] And now enough about ^of that. [0671] If that doesn't mollify them so much the worse for me, I can still conceive of such a thing. [0672] But one last suggestion before I forget and go on to more serious matters. [0673] Why don't they give it ^me nup as a bad job and set me free ^{let me go}? [Stet] [0674] That might do me good. [0675] I don't know. [0676] Perhaps then I could go silent, for good and all. [0677] Idle talk, idle talk, I am free, abandoned. [0678] All for nothing again.[?] [0679] Mahood himself has left me, I'm alone. DOODLE 4 [0680] All this business of a task ^labour to accomplish, before I can end, of of words to say, a truth to recover, in order to say it, before I can end, of an imposed task, once known, long neglected, finally forgotten, to perform, before I can be done with speaking, done with listening, I invented it all, in the hope it would console me, help me to go on, enable l^me to think of myslef as myself as somewhere on a road, ^moving, between a beginning and an end, gaining ground, losing ground, getting lost, but somehow in the long run making headway. [0681] All lies. [0682] I have nothing to do, that is to say nothing in particular. [0683] I have to speak, whatever that means. [0684] Having nothing to say, no words but the words of others, I have to speak. [0686] No one forces ^compels me to, there is no one, it's an accident, a fact. [0687] Nothing can ever exempt me from it, there is nothing, nothing to discover, nothing to recover, nothing that can lessen what I have to there remains to say, I have the ocean to drink, there is an ocean then. [0688] Not to have been a dupe, that will have been my best possession, my best deed, to have been a dupe, wishing I wasn't, thinking I wasn't, knowing I was, not being a dupe of not being a dupe. [0689] For any old thing (no matter what), that doesn't work, that should work, but it[x] doesn't. [0690] Labyrinthine torment that can't be grasped, or limited, or felt, or suffered, no, not even suffered, I suffer all wrong too, even that I do all wrong too, like an old turkey-hen dying on her feet, her back[p. 30r] covered with chickens, and the rats watching her. [0691] Next instalment, quick. [0692] Above all no cries, be urbane, a credit to the code and art of dying, while the others chuckles ^cackle, I can hear them from here, like the cracj^kling of thorns, no, I forgot, it's impossible, it's myself I hear, howling behind my dissertation. [0693] So not no matter what. [0694] Even Magood's stories are not no matter what, though just as foreign, to what, to my native land that ^unfamiliar native land of mine, which ^with which I am not familiar unfamiliar, as unfamiliar as with that other where men come anf^d go, and feel at home, on tracks they have made themselves, in order to visit one another with the maximum of convenience and dispatch, in the light of a choice of luminaries pissing on the darkness turn about, so that it is never dark, never deserted, that must be terrible. [0695] So be it. [0696] Not no matter what, but as near as no matter. [0697] Mahood. [0698] Before him there were others tal^king themselves for me, [0699] it ^that must be a sinecure handed down from father to son, to judge by their family air. [0700] Mahood is no worse than his predecessors. [0701] But before executing his portrait, full length on his surviving leg, let me note that my next vice-ec^xister will be a billy in the bowl, that's final, with his bowl on his head and his arse in the dust, plump down on thousand-breasted Tellus, it'll be softer for him. [0702] Faith that's an idea, yet another, mutilate, mutilate, and perhaps some day, fifteen generations henec hence, you'll succeed in looking like yourself ^{[⁁]bearing / having a faint resemblance to} passing ^{looking a little like} for yourself, among the passers-by. [0703] In the meantime it's Mahood, this caricature is he. [0704] What was I going to say? [0705] I forget, no matter, I'll say something else, it's all one. [0706] Mahood. [0707] What if we were one and the same, after all, as he affirms,and I deny? [0708] And I been there where he says I have been, instead of having stayed on here, trying to take advantage of his abesnce to unravel my tangle? [0709] Here, in my country, what is Mahood doing in my country, and how does he get here? [0710] There I am launched again on the same old hopeless business, there we are face to face, Mahood and I, if we are twain, as I say we are. [0711] I never saw him, I don't see him, [0712] he has told me what he is like, what I am like, they have all told[p. 31r] me that, it must be one of their main functions.