MS-WU-MSS008-3-49

[0328] to do m^for me. [0329] And I forgive her for having jostled me a little
in the first months and spoiled the only endurable, just endurable,
period of my enormous history. [0330] And I also give her credit for not
having done it again, thanks to me, or for having stopped in time,
when she did. [0331] [⁁]^{And if ever I'm reduced to looking for a meaning to my life, you never can tell,,}it's in that old mess I'll stick my nose to begin
with, the mess of that poor old uniparous whore and myself the
last of my foul brood, neither man nor beast.

[0332] I should add, before ^I
getting down to the facts, you'd swear they were facts, of that
distant summer afternoon, that with this deaf blind impotent mad
old woman, who called me Dan and whom I called Mag, and with her
alone, I — no, I can't say it. [0333] That is to say I could say it
but I won't say it, yes, I could say it easily, because it wouldn't
be true. [0334] What did I see of her?

[0335] A head always, the hands sometimes,
the arms rarely. [0336] A head always. [0337] Veiled with hair, wrinkles, filth,
slobber. [0338] A head that darkened the air. [0339] Not that seeing matters,
but it's something to go on with. [0340] It's I who took the key from
under the pillow, who took the money out of the drawer, who put
the key back under the pillow. [0341] But I didn't come for money.
[0342] I think there was a woman who came each week. [0343] Once I touched with
my lips, vaguely, hastily, that little grey wis^zened pear. [0344] Pah.

[0345] Did that please her? [0346] I don't know. [0347] Her babble stopped for a
second, then began again. [0349] Perhaps she said to herself, Pah. [0350] I
smelt a terrible smell. [0351] It must have come from the guts. [0352] Odour
of antiquity. [0353] Oh I'm not criticising her, I don't diffuse the
perfumes of Araby myself. [0354] Shall I describe the room? [0355] No. [0356] I
shall have occasion to do so later perhaps. [0357] When I seek refuge
there, bet, all shame drunk, my prick in my rectuj^m, who knows.