Digital Manuscript ProjectMalone meurt / Malone Dies

[1408] this coat literally sweep the ground and rustle like a train,
when he walks.
[1409] And indeed this coat terminates ina in a fringe, like
certain curtains, and the thread of the sleeves too is bare and
frayed into long waving strands that flutter in the wind.
[1410] And the
hands too are hidden. For the sleeves of this vast rag are of a
piece with its other parts.
[1411] But the collar has remained intact,
being of velvet or perhaps shag.
[1412] Now as to the colour of this
coat, for colour too is an important consideration, there is no
good denying it, all that can be said is that green predominates.
[1413] And it might safely be wagered that this coat, when new, was of
a fine plain green colour, what you might call cab green, but for there
used to be cabs and carriages rattling through the town with
panels of a handsome bottle green, I must have seen them myself,
and even driven in them, I would not put it past me.
[1414] But perhaps
I am wrong to call this coat a greatcoat and perhaps I should r
rather call it an overcoat or even cover-me-down, for that is
indeed the impression it gives, that it covers the whole body all
over, with the exception obviosuly obviously of the head which emerges,
lofty and impassive, clear of its embrace.
[1415] Yes, passion has mark-
ed the face, action too possibly, but it seems to have ceased from
suffering, for the time being.
[1416] But one never knows, does one? [1417] Now
with regard to the buttons of this coat, they are not so much
genuine buttons as little wooden cylinders two or three inches l
long, with a hole in the middle for the thread, for one hole is
ample, though two and even four are more usual, and this because
of the inordinate distension of the button-holes consequent on
wear and tear.
[1418] And cylinders is perhaps an exaggeration, for if
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Malone meurt / Malone Dies © 2017 Samuel Beckett Digital Manuscript Project.
Editors: Dirk Van Hulle, Pim Verhulst and Vincent Neyt