Samuel Beckett
Digital Manuscript Project
Molloy

MS-WU-MSS008-3-50-2

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Segment 1

[4793] good results. [4794] A little hot tea, I implored, without sugar or milk, to
revive me.
[4795] To grant such a small favour to a pilgrim on the rocks was
frankly a temptation difficult to resist.
[4796] Oh all right, he said, come
back to the house, you can dry yourself, before the fire.
[4797] But I cannot,
I cannot, I cried, I have sworn to make a bee-line to her.
[4798] And to efface
the bad impression created by these words I took a florin from my pocket
and gave it to him.
[4799] For your poor-box, I said.

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Segment 2

[4800] And I added, because of
the dark, A florin for your poor-box.
[4801] It's a long way, he said. [4802] God
will go with you, I said.
[4803] He thought it over. [4804] Well he might. [4805] Above
all nothing to eat, I said, no really, I must not eat.
[4806] Ah Moran, wily
as a serpent, there was never the like of old Moran.
[4807] Of course I would
have preferred violence, but I dared not take the risk.

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Segment 3

[4808] Finally he took
himself off telling me to stay where I was.
[4809] I do not know what was in
his mind.
[4810] When I judged him at a safe remove I closed the umbrella and
set off in the opposite direction, at right angles to the way I was going,
in the driving rain.
[4811] That was how I spent a florin.

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Segment 4

[4812] Now I may make an end.

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Segment 5

[4813] I skirted the graveyard. [4814] It was night. [4815] Midnight perhaps. [4816] The lane
is steep, I laboured.
[4817] A little wind was chasing the clouds over the
faint sky.
[4818] It is a great thing to own a plot in perpetuity, [4819] a very great
thing indeed.
[4820] If only that were the only perpetuity. [4821] I came to the
wicket.
[4822] It was locked. [4823] Very properly. [4824] But I could not open it. [4825] The
key went into the hole, but would not turn.
[4826] Long disuse? [4827] A new lock?

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Segment 6

[4828] I burst it open. [4829] I drew back to the other side of the lane and hurled
myself at it.
[4830] I had come home, as Youdi had commanded.me. [4831] In the end
I got to my feet.
[4832] What smelt so sweet? [4833] The lilacs? [4834] The primroses
perhaps.
[4835] I went towards my hives. [4836] They were there, as I feared. [4837] I
lifted the top off one and laid it on the ground.
[4838] It was a little roof,

Transcription
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