Digital Manuscript ProjectMalone meurt / Malone Dies

[2720] times, four times, at a pinch.
[2721] A land receding, another approach-
ing, big and little islands.
[2722] No sound save the oars, the rowlocks,
the blue sea against the keel.
[2723] In the stern-sheets Lady Pedal, sad.
[2724] What beauty! she murmured.
[2725] Alone, not understood, good, too good.
[2726] Taking off her glove she trailed in the transparent water her
sapphire-laden hand.
[2732] No, they are no more than hills, [2733] they raise themselves gently,
faintly blue, out of the confused plain.
[2734] It was there somewhere he
was born, in a fine house, of loving parents.
[2735] Their slopes are
covered with ling and furze, its hot yellow bells, better known as
gorse.
[2736] The hammers of the stone-cutters ring all day like bells.
[2737] The island.
[2738] A last effort.
[2739] The islet. The shore facing the open
sea is jagged with creeks.
[2740] One could live there, perhaps happy, if
life was a possible thing, but novbody lives there.
[2741] The deep water
comes washing into its heart, between high walls of rock.
[2742] One day
nothing will remain of it but two islands, separated by a gulf,
narrow at first, then wider and wider as the centuries slip by,
two islands, two reefs.
[2743] It is difficult to speak of man, under such
conditions.
[2744] Come, Ernest, said Lady Pedal, let us find a place to
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Malone meurt / Malone Dies © 2017 Samuel Beckett Digital Manuscript Project.
Editors: Dirk Van Hulle, Pim Verhulst and Vincent Neyt