[2347] he moved away from the bed. [2348] It was then I saw he was wearing brown boots, which gave me such a shock as no words can convey. [2349] They were copiously ~~casked~~^caked with fresh mud and I said to myself, Through what sloughs has he had to toil to reach me? [2350] I wonder if he was looking for something in particular, it would be so nice to know. [2351] I shall tear a page out of my exercise-book and reproduce upon ^it, from memory, what follows, and show it to him to-morrow, or to-day, or some other day, if he ever comes back. [2352] 1. Who are u^you? [2353] 2. What do you do, for a living? [2355] 3. Are you looking for something in ~~particular? 4.~~ particular? [2356] What else? [2357] 4. Why are you so cross? [2358] 5. Have I offended you? [2359] 6. Do you know anything about me? [2360] 7. It was wrong of you to strike me. [2361] 8. Give me my stick. [2362] 9. Are you your own employer? [2363] 10. If not who sends you? [2364] 11. Put back my things where you found them. [2365] 12. Why has my soup been stopped? [2366] 13. For what reason are my pots no longer emptied? [2367] 14. Do you think I shall last much longer? [2368] 15. May I ask you a favour? [2369] 16. Your conditions are mine. [2370] 17. Why brown boots and whence the mud? [2371] 18. You couldn't by any chance let me have the butt of a pencil? [2372] 19. Number your answers. [2373] 20. Don't go, I haven't finished. [2374] Will one page suffice? [2375] There cannot be many left. [2376] I might as well ask for a rubber while I am about it. [2377] 21. Could you lend me an India rubber? [2378] When he had gone I said to myself, But surely I have seen him somewhere before. [2379] And the people I have seen have seen me too, I can guarantee that. [2380] But of whom may it not be said, I know that man? [2381] Drivel, drivel. [2382] And then at evening morning is so far away.

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[2383] I had stopped looking at him. [2384] I had got used to him. [2385] I was thinking of him, trying to understand, you can't do that and look at the same time. [2386] I did not even see him go. [2387] Oh he did not vanish, after the fashion of a ghosy^t, no, I heard him, the clank when he took out his watch, the satisfied thumb^p of the umbrella on the floor, the ~~right about~~ rightabout, the rapid steps towards the door, its soft closing and finally, I am sorry to,[₰]say, a gay and lively whistle dying away. [2388] What have I omitted? [2389] Little things, ~~nothings, which will come back to me later~~ nothings. They will come back to me later,~~and~~ make me see more clearly what has happened and say, Ah if I had only known then, now it is too late. [2390] Yes, little by little I shall see him as he just has been, or as he should have been for me to be able to say, yet again, Too late, too late. [2391] There's feeling for you. [2392] Or he is perhaps just the first of a series of visitors, all different. [2393] They are going to relay one another, and they are numerous. [2394] To-morr^ow perhaps he will be wearing leggings, riding-breeches and a check cap, with a whip in his hand to make up for the umbrella and a horse-shoe in his button-hole. [2395] All the people I have ever caught a glimpse of, at close quarters or at a distance, ~~can~~ ^may file past from now on, that is obvious. [2396] There may even be women and children, I have caught a glimpse of a ~~fe w~~ few, they will all be armed with something to lean on and rummage in ^my[⁁] things with, they will all give me a clout on the head to begin with and then spend the rest of the day glaring at me in anger and disgust. [2397] I shall have to revise my

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[2397] questionnaire so as to adapt it to all and sundry. [2398] Perhaps one, one day, unl^mindful of his instructions, will give me my stick. [2399] Or I might be able to catch one, a little girl for example, and half strangle her, three quarters, until she ~~consents~~ ^promises to give me my stick, give me soup, empty my pots, kiss me, fondle me, smile to me, give me my hat, stay with me, follow the hearse weeping into her handkerchief, that would be nice. [2400] I am such a good man, at ~~bott~~ bottom, such a good man, how is it nobody ever noticed it? [2401] A little girl would be into my barrow, she would undress before me, sleep beside me, have nobody but me, I would jam the bed against the door to prevent her running away, but then she would throw herself out of the window, when they got to know she was with me they would bring soup for two, I would teach her love and loathing, she would never forget me, I would die delighted, she would close my eyes and put a plug in my arse-hole, as per instructions. [2402] Easy, Malone, take it easy, you old whore. [2403] That reminds me, how long can one fast with impunity? [2404] The Lord Mayor of Cork lasted for ages, but he was young, and then he had political convictions, human ones too probably, just plain human convictions. [2405] And he allowed himself a sip of water from time to time, sweetened probably. [2406] Water, for pity's sake! [2407] How is it I am not thirsty. [2408] There must be drinking going on inside me, my secretions. [2409] Yes, let us talk a little about me, that will be a rest from all these blackguards. [2410] What ~~light!~~ ^light! [2411] ~~Foretaste~~ ^Foretaste of paradise? [2412] My head. [2413] On fire, full of boiling oil. [2414] What shall I die of, in the end? [2415] A transport of blood to the brain? [2416] That would be the last straw.

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[2417] The pain is almost unbearable, upon my soul it is. [2418] Incandescent migraine. [2419] Death must take me for someone else. [2420] It's the heart's fault, as in the bosom of the match king, Schneider, Schroeder, I forget. [2421] It too is burning, with shame, of itself, of me, of them, shame of everything except ^of beating apparently. [2422] ^{It's nothing, mere nervousness}. [2423] And who knw^ows, perhaps the first to fail will be my breath, after all. [2424] After each avowal, before and during, what swirling murmurs. [2425] The window says break of day, rack of tattered rainclouds stampeding. [2426] Have a nice time. [2427] Far from this molten gloom. [2428] Yes, my last gasps are not what they might be, the bellows won't go down, the air is choking me, perhaps it is a little lacking in oxygen. [2429] Macmann pygmy beneath the great black gesticulating pines gazes at the distant raging sea. [2430] The others are there too, or at their windows, like me, but on their feet, they must be able to move, or to be moved, no, not like me, they can't do anything for anybody, clinging to the shivering poplars, or at their windows, listening. [2431] But perhaps I should finish with myself first, in so far naturally as such a thing is possible. [2432] The speed I am turning at now makes things difficult admittedly, but it probably can only increase, that is the thing to be considered. [2433] Mem, add to the questionnaire, If you happen to have a match try and light it. [2434] How is it I heard nothing when he spoke to me and yet heard him leave, whistling? [2435] Perhaps he only feigned to speak to me, to try and make me think I had gone deaf. [2436] Do I hear anything at the present instant? [2437] Let me see. [2438] No, the answer is no. [2439] Neither the wind, nor the sea, nor the paper, nor the air I exhale with such labour. [2440] But this innumerable

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[2440] babble, like a multitude whispering? [2441] I don't understand. [2442] With my distant hand I count the pages that remain. [2443] They will do. [2444] This exercise-book is my life, this big child's exercise-book, it has taken me a long time to resighⁿ myself to that. [2445] And yet I shall not throw it away. [2446] For I want to put down in it, for the last time, those I have called to my help, but ill, so that they did not understand, so that they may cease with me. [2447] Now rest.

[2448] Wearing over his long shirt a great stroⁱped cloak reaching down to his ankles,[₰] Macmann took the air in all weathers, from morning to night. [2449] And more than once they had been obliged to go out looking for him with lanterns, to bring him back to his cell, for he had remained deaf to the ~~call,~~ call of the bell and to the shouts and threats first of Lemuel, then of the other keepers. [2450] Then the keepers, in their white clothes, armed with sticks and lanterns, spread out from the buildings and beat the thickets, the copses and the fern-brakes, calling the fugitive m^by name and threatening him with the direst reprisals if he did not surrender immediately. [2451] But they finally remarked that he d^hid, when he did, always in the same place and that such a deployment of force was unnecessary. [2452] From then on it was Lemuel who went out alone, in silence, as always when he knew wj^hat he had to do, straight to the bush in which Macmann had made his lair, whenever this was necessary. [2453] My God. [2454] And often the two of them remained there for some time, in the bush, before going in, huddled together, for the lair was small, saying nothing, perhaps listening to the noises of the night, the owls, the wind in the leaves, the sea when it was high enough to