
[2174] there on the watch for Jacques.
[2175] Coming from church he would appear on my
right, on my left if he came from the slaughter-house.
[2176] A neighbour passed.
A free-thinker.
[2177] Well well, he said, no worship today?
[2178] He knew my habits,
my Sunday habits I mean.
[2179] Everyone knew them and the chief perhaps better
than any, in spite of his remoteness.
[2180] You look as if you had seen a ghost,
said the neighbour.
[2181] Worse than that, I said, you.
[2182] I went in, at my back
the dutifully hideous smile.
[2183] I could see him running to his concubine
with the news, You know that poor bastard Moran, Y [place = overwritten] you should have heard me,
I had him lepping!
[2184] Couldn't speak!
[2185] Took to his heels!
[2186] Jacques came back soon afterwards.
[2187] No trace of frolic.
[2188] He said he
had been to church alone.
[2189] I asked him a few pertinent questions concerning
the march of the ceremony.
[2190] His answers were plausible.
[2191] I told him to
wash his hands and sit down to his lunch.
[2192] I went back t [place = overwritten] to the kitchen.
[2193] I
did nothing but go to and fro.
[2194] You may serve [place = supralinear] dish up, I said.
[2195] She had wept.
[2196] I peered into the pots.
[2197] Irish stew. [2198] A nourishing and economical dish, if
a little indigestible.
[2199] All honour to the land it [place = supralinear] [⁁]has brought before the world.
[2200] I shall sit down at four o'clock, I said.
[2201] I did not need to add sharp.
[2202] I
liked punctuality, all thos4 [place = overwritten] e whom my roof sheltered had to like it too.
[2203] I
went up to my room.
[2204] And there, stretched on my bed, the curtains drawn,
I made a first attempt to grasp the Molloy affair.
[2208] Should I set out on my autocycle?
[2209] This was the question with which I
began.
[2210] I had a methodical mind and never set out on a mission without
prolonged reflection as to the best way of setting out.
[2211] It was the first
problem to solve, at the outset of each enquiry, and I never moved until
- Segments
Molloy © 2016 Samuel Beckett Digital Manuscript Project.
Editors: Magessa O'Reilly, Dirk Van Hulle, Pim Verhulst and Vincent Neyt