[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 waiter, 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 oreder to obtain his
forgiveness? [0604] Or the admission thtat I am Mahood adfter 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 perhapses 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 clotheed
me anfd 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 tyes, 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, poror
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] Anohther 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 whiom 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 possihbly 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
pxanegyric 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
hHighness 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] xI 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] MLet
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 for 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 nbe more than one. [0660] The supreme perhaps. [0661] In a word let him
aenlighten 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 ecxcept 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 mahjority of one, or drawn
from an omld 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 lme 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 itx 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 cracjkling 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 anfd 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
talking 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-ecxister 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.