MS-HRC-SB-4-2-2

[0036] .

^{[0034] (briskly) [0035] Ah! [0036] (He bends over ledger, turns the pages, finds the entry he wants, reads.) [0036|001] Etc}

[p. 1r] [0037] Box...thrree... spool...five. ([0038] He turns his head and stares front. [0039] With relish.) [0040] Spool! [0041] (Pause.) [0042] Spoool! ([0044] Pause. [0045] He turns back to table, starts peering and poking at the boxes.) [0046] Box... thrree...thrree...four...two...(with surprise) nine!.. ^Jesus!...seven...ah!..the little rascal! [0047] (He separates box three from the others.) [0048] Box thrree. [0049] (He opens it, peers at the spools inside.) [0050] Spool...(he peers at ledger, finds the entry)^...five. (He peers at spools.) Five...five... [0051](He takes out a spool, straightens up, holds up spool between finger and thumb.) [0052] Spool five. [0053] (He lays it on table, closes box three and puts it back with the others. He takes up spool.) [0054] Box thrree, spool five. [0061] (He puts spool on machine, peers at ledger. Reading entry at foot of page.) [0062] Mother at rest... [0064] The black ball... ([0065] He raises his head. [0066] Puzzled.) [0067] Black ball? ([0067|001] Pause. [0068] He peers again at ledger, reads.) [0069] The dark nurse. [0070] (He raises his head, broods, peers again at ledger.) [0071] Improvement of bowel condition... [0073] Memorable...what? [0074] (He peers closer.) [0075] Equinox, memorable equinox. ([0076] He raises his head, stares front. [0077] Puzzled.) [0078] Memorable equinox? ([0079] Pause. [0080] He shrugs his shoulders, peers again at ledger.) [0081] Farewell to - (he turns the page) - love.

[0083] (strong young voice, rather pompous, obviously ^A's at a much earlier time.) [0084] Thirty-seven today^, sound - [0085] (Settling himself more comfortably ^A knocks a box off the table. He c^urses, switches off machine, sweeps boxes [p. 2r] and ledger violently from table, wind^s tape back to beginning, switches on machine, resumes pose.) [0086] Thirty-seven today, sound [↑] ^{as a whistle,} apart from the old trouble, and intellectually I have little doubt at the peak of my powers, or thereabouts. [0087] Celebrated the awful occasion, as in recent years, quietly at the Winehouse. [0088] No face there I knew. [0089] Sprawled ^{in front of} the fire with closed eyes, separating the grain from the chaff. [0090] Jotted down a few notes, on the back of an envelope. [0091] Good to be home again, in my old rags. [0097] The new light above my table is a great improvement. [0098] With all this darkness round me I feel less alone. [0099] (Pause.) [0100] In a way. [0101] (Pause.) [0102] I like to get up and move about in it, then back here to...(hesitates)...me.

[0105] Pause.

[0106] The grain, what do I mean by that, I mean...(Pause.) I suppose I mean those things worth having when all the dust has - when all ^my dust has settled. [0107] I close my eyes and try ^to imagine them.

[0108] Pause.

[0110] Extraordinary silence this evening. I strain my ears and do not hea^r a sound. [0111] Old Miss ^Hare always sings at this hour. [0113] Songs of her ^girlhood, she says. [0112] But not tonight. [0115] ^{Wonderful woman.[⁁]} [0116] ^Connaught. [0118] Shall I sing when I am her age, if I ever am? [0119] ^{No. [⁁]} [0121] Did I sing as a boy? [0122] No. [0124] Did I ever sing^? [0125] No.

[0126] Pause.

[0127] I have just listened to an old year, passages at random. [0128] I did not check in the book, but it must be at least ten or twelve years ago. [0129] At that time ^I was ^still living on and off with ^{Bianca [⁁]} in Trafalgar Street. [0130] Well out of that. [0131] Hopeless business. [0133] Not much reference to her. A queer passage about her eyes. [0135] I suddenly saw them a^gain. [0137] Matchless. [0138] (Pause.) [0139] Ah well. [0140] (Pause.) [0141] These old P.M.s a^re gruesome, but I - (A switches off, broods, switches on again) - ^always find them a help before embarking on a new...(hesitates)... conspectus. [0142] Hard to believe I was ever that young pup. [0143] ^{That voice!} [0145] ^{And the aspirations!} [0146] (Brief laugh in which A joins.) [0147] ^{And the resolutions!} [0148] (Brie^f laugh in which A joins.) [0149] To drink less, in particular. [0150] ^{(Brief laugh of A alone.)} [0151] Statistic^s. [0152] Seventeen hundred hours, out of the preceding eight thousand odd, consumed on licensed premises alone. [0153] ^{Over 20%.[⁁]} [0155] Plans for a less wearing sexual life. [0156] Last illness of his father. [0157] Flagging pur [p. 3r]suit of happiness. [0158] Unattainable laxation. [0163] Shadow of the magnum opus. [0164] Closing with - (brief laugh) - a yelp to Providence. [0165] (Prolonged laugh in which A joins.) [0166] What remains of all that misery? [0167] A girl in a shabby green coat, on a railway-station platform?

[0169] Pause.

[0170] When I look - ([0171] A switches off machine, broods, looks at watch, gets up and goes backstage into darkness. [0172] Ten seconds. [0173] Pop of cork. [0174] Ten seconds. [0175] Second cork. [0176] Ten seconds. [0177] Third cork. [0178] Ten seconds. [⁁] [0179] ^{Brief burst of raucous song.[⁁]} [0183] He comes back into light front right, sits down, switches on machine, resumes his pose.) [0184] - back ^over the year that is gone, with what I hope are [/] ^perhaps the old eyes to come, there is of course the house on the canal where mother lay a-dying, in the early autumn, after her long viduity (A givesa start), and the - [0185] (A switches off machine, winds back tape a little, bends his ear closer to machine) [0186] - a-dying, in the early autumn, after her long viduity, and the -[←]

([0187] A switches off machine, turns face front. [0187|001] Puzzled.)

[0188] Viduity? ([0189] Pause. [0190] He gets up, goes backstage into darkness, comes back with a volume of the Concise Oxford ^{or Johnson's dictionary and quotes example}, lays it on the table, sits down, looks up viduity, [0191] reads, nods, [0206] closes dictionary, switches on machine, resumes his pose.)

[0207] - b^ench by the weir from where I ^could see her window. [0208] There I sat, wishing she were gone. [0210] Quite a number of people I got to know then, oh I mean by appea^rance, nursemaids, children, ^old men, dogs. [0211] One dark young beauty I ^recollect particularly, ^{all white and starch, splendid bosom,[⁁]} with a big black hooded pram. [0212] Whenever I looked in her direction she had her eyes on me. [0213] But when I was foolish enough to speak to her she threatened to call a policeman. [0217] The face she had! [0218] Eyes [0219] like...moonstone. [0223] ^I was there when - (A switches off, broods, switches on again) - the blind went down, one of those dirty brown roller affairs, throwing a ball for a dog as ^{chance wd. have it.} [0224] I ^happened look^ed up and there it was. [0225] Over at last. [0226] I sat ^on for a ^{few moments} with the ball in my hand and the dog ba^rking and pawing at me. [0227] (Pause.) [0228] Moments. [0228|001] (Pause.) [0229] Her moments. My moments. [0230] (Pause.) [⁁] [0231] ^{The dog's moments.} [0232] ^{(Pause.)[⁁]} [0233] In the end I held it out to him and he took it in his mouth, gently. [0234] An old tennis ball, black and sodden, but unpunctured. [0235] (Pause.) [0236] I wonder will that mean something some day.

[0241] [←]^Pause.
[0242] ^{Bowels better on the whole.}

[0243] Pause.

[0244] Intellectually a year of profound gloom and indigence until that memorable night in March, at the end of the pier, in the howling wind, never to be forgotten, when suddenly I saw the whole thing. [0245] The turning-point, at last. [0246] This I imagine is what I ha^ve chiefly to set down this evening, against the day when my work will be done and perhaps no [p. 4r] place left in my memory, and no thankfulness, for the miracle that - ⁽pause) - fo^r the fire that set it alight. [0247] What I saw then was that the assumption I had been going on all my life, namely - [0248] (A switches off impatiently, winds tapes forward, switches on again) [0249] - granite rocks the foam flying up in the light of the beacon and the anemometer spinning like a propellor, clear to me at last that ^the da^rk I have ^{been fighting off all this time} is in reality my most - [0250] (A curses, switches off, wind^s tape forward, switches on again) [0251] - unshatterable association till my dying day of storm and night with the light of the understanding and - [0252] (A curses louder, switches off, winds tape ^violently forward, switches on again) [0253] - my face in her brea^sts and my hand on her. [0254] We lay there without moving. [0255] But underneath us all moved, and move^d us, ^gently, up and down, and from side to side.

[0256] Pause.

[0257] Past midnight. [0258] Never knew such a silence.

[0260] Pause.

[0261] Here I end this -

[0262] ^A switches off, winds tape back, switches on again.

[0263] - upper lake, with the punt, bathed off the bank, then pushed out into the stream and drifted. [0264] She lay stretc^hed out on the floorboards with her hands under her head and her eyes closed. [0265] Sun blazing down, bit of a breeze, and the water nice and lively. [0266] I noticed a scratch on her thigh and asked her how she got it. [0267] Picking gooseberries, she said. [0268] I said again I thought it was hopeless and no good going on, and she agreed, without opening her eyes. [0270] I asked her to look at me and after a few moments - (pause) - after a few moments she did, but the eyes just slits, because of the glare. [0271] I bent over her to get them in the shadow and they opened. ([0272] Pause. [0273] Low.) [0274] Let me in. [0275] (Pause.) [0276] We drifted in among the reeds and stuck. [0277] The way they bent, sighing, before the stem. [0279] I lay down across her with my face in her brea^sts and my hand on her. [0280] We lay without moving. [0281] But underneath us all moved, and move^d us, [⁁] ^gently, up and down, and from side to side.

[0282] Pause.

[0283] Past midnight. [0284] Never knew -

[0293] Just been listening to that stupid bastard I was thirty years ago, find it hard to believe I was ever as bad as that. [0295] ^(Pause) [0296] The eyes she had! ([0297] Broods, realizes he is recording ^silence, switches off, broods.) [0299] Everythin^g there, everything, all the - [0300] (Realizes this is not being recorded, switches on.) [0301] Everything there, everything on earth, all the light and dark and ^{hunger & crapulence} of...(hesitates)...the ages! [0302] [0303] [0303|001] [0304] (Pause.) [0305] Let that go! [0306] Jesus! [0307] Take his mind off his homework! [0308] Jesus! ([0309] Pause. [0310] Weary.) [0311] Ah well, maybe he was right. [0312] (Pause.) [0313] Maybe he was right. ([0314] Broods. [0315] Realizes. [0316] Switches off. [0317] Consults envelope. [0319] Crumples it ^and throws it away. [0320] Broods. [0321] Switches on.) [0322] Nothing to say, nothing. [0323] What's a year now? [0324] Reverie and irreversible constipation. [0326] Revelled in the word spool. [0327] (With relish.) [0328] Spoool! [0329] ^{Happiest moment} of the year. [0330] (Pause.) DOODLE 1 [0331] Seventeen copies sold, of which eleven ^overseas. [0332] Getting known. [0334] One pound six and something, eight no doubt. [0336] Crawled out once or twice, before the summer was over. [0337] Sat in the park in the middle of the brats and skivvies, dreaming and wishing I were gone. [0340] Last fancies. [0342] Swore to fight them off. [0342|001] Aspirations. [0342|002] Resolutions. [0344] ^Scalded the eyes out of me reading Effie again, a page a day, with tears again. [0345] Effie... [0346] (Pause.) [0347] Could have been happy wⁱth her, up there on the cold sea, and the pines, and the dunes. [0348] (Pause.) [0355] Fanny came in a couple of times. [0356] ^Bony old whore. [0357] Couldn't do much, but better than nothing. [0358] The last time wasn't so bad. [0359] ^How do you manage it, she said, at your age? [0360] I told her I'd been saving up for her all my life. [0361] (Pause.) [0362] Went to Vespers ^once, like when I was a child. [0367] [⁁] [⁁]

([0364] ^Sings.)
[0365] ^{Now the day is over
Night is drawing nigh-igh,
Shadows of the evening,
Steal across the sky.}

[0367] ^{Went to sleep and fell off the pew.} [0368] (Pause.) [0369] Sometimes wondered in the night if a last effort mightn't - [0370] (Pause.) [0371] Empty the bottle now and get to your bed. [0372] Finish this puk^e tomorrow. [0373] Or leave it at that. [0374] (Pause.) [0375] Leave it at that. [0376] (Pause.) [0377] Lie propped up on my back in the dark - and wander. [0377|001] (Pause.) [0378] Be again in the dingle on a Christmas Eve, picking ^gathering ho^lly. [0379] (Pause.) [0380] Be again on Croghan on a Sunday morning, in the ^haze, with the bitch, stop and listen to the bells. [0381] (Pause.) [0382] And so on. [0383] (Pause.) [0384] Be again. [0387] (Pause.) [0386] All that old misery. [0385] ⁽Pause.) [0388] Once wasn't enough. [0389] (Pause.) [0390] Lie down across he^r. ([0391] Long pause. [0392] He suddenly bends to the machine, switches off, wrenches off tape, throws it away, puts on the other, winds it to the passage he wants, switches on, listens staring front.)

[0393] - gooseberries, she said. [0394] I said again I thought it was hopeless and no good going on, and she agreed, without opening her eyes. [0396] I asked her to l^ook at me and after a few moments - (pause) - after a few moments she did, but the eyes just slits, because of the glare. [0397] I bent over her [p. 6r] to get them in the shadow and they opened. ([0398] Pause. [0399] Low.) [0400] ^Let me in. [0401] (Pause.) [0402] We drifted in among the reeds and stuck. [0403] The way they bent, sighing, before the stem. [0405] I lay down across her with my face in her breasts and my hand on her. [0406] We lay without moving. [0407] But underneath us all moved, and moved us, ^gently, up and down, and from side to side.

[0408] Pause. [0409] A's lips move. [0410] No sound.

[0411] Past midnihgt. [0412] Never knew such silence.

[0414] Pause.

[0415] Here I end this...(hesitates)... ^spool, [0416] ^box - (pause) - thrree, ^number - (pause) - five. [0417] (Pause.) [0418] Perhaps my best years are ^gone. [0419] When there was a chance of happiness. [0419|001] [0420] But I wouldn't want them ^{over again}. [0421] Not with the fire in me now. [0422] No, I wouldn't want them ^{over again.}