[p. 55r]
[3539] appointed by her, it was only natural I should withdraw, out of delicacy.
[3540] I can see him still, looking after me.
[3541] I fancy he would have liked me for a friend.
[3542] I don't know what became of him.
[3543] I lost interest in my patiencts, once I had finished with them.
[3544] I may even truthfully say I never saw one of them againk, subsequently, not a single one.
[3545] No conclusions need be drawn from this.
[3546] Oh the stories I could tell you, if I were easy. [3547] What a rabble in my head, what a gallery of moribunds.
[3548] Murphy, Watt, Yerk, Mercier and all the others.
[3549] I would never have believed that — yes, I believe it willingly.
[3550] Stories, stories.
[3551] I have not been able to tell them.
[3552] I shall not be able to tell this one.
[3553] I could not determine therefore how I was to deal with Molloy, once I had foujnd him.
[3554] The directions which Gaber must certainly have given me with reference to this had gone clean out of my head.
[3555] That is what came of wasting the whole of that Sunday on stupidities.
[3556] There was no good my saying, Let me see now, what is the usual thing?
[3557] There were no usual things, in my instructions.
[3558] Admittedly there was one particular operation that recurreed from time to time, but not often enough to be, with any degree of probability, the one I was looking for.
[3559] But even if it had always figured in my instructions, except on one single occasion, then that single occasion would have been enough to tie my hands, I was so scrupulous.
[3560] I told myself I had better give it no more thought, that the first thing to do was to find Molloy, that then I wouled devise something, that there was no hurry, that the thing would come back to me when I le[⁁]ast expected it and that if, having found Molloy, I still did not know what to do with him, I could always manage to get in touch with Gaber without Youdi's knowing.
[3561] I had his address just as he had mine. [3562] I would send him a telegram, How deal with M?
[3563] To give me an explicit reply, though in terms if necessary veiled, was not beyond his powers.
[3564] But was there a telegraph
[p. 56r]
[3564] in Ballyba? [3565] But I also told myself, being only human, that the longer I took to find Molloy the greater my chances of remembering what I was to do with him. [3566] And we would have peacably pursued our way on foot, but for the following incident.
[3567] One night, having finally succeeded in falling asleep beside my son as usual, I woke with a start, feeling as if I had just been dealt a violent blow.
[3568] It's xxx all right, I am not going to tell you a dream properly so called.
[3569] It was pitch dark in the shelter.
[3570] I listened attentively without moving.
[3571] I heard nothing save the snoring and gasping of my son.
[3572] I was about to conclude as usual that it was just another bad dream when a fulgurating pain went through my knee.
[3573] This then was the explanation of my sudden awakening.
[3574] The sensation could indeed well be compared to that of a blow, such as I fancy a horse's hoof might give.
[3575] I waited anxiously for it to recur, motionless and hardly breathing, and of course sweating.
[3576] I acted in a word precisely as one does, if my information was correct, at such a juncture. [3577] And sure enough thep[₰]pain did recur a few minutes later, but not so bad as the first time, as the second rather.
[3578] Or did it only seem less bad to me because I was expecting it?
[3579] Or because I was getting used to it already?
[3580] I think not.
[3581] For it recurred again, several times, and each time less bad than the time before, and finally subsided altogether,[₰] so that I was able to go [⁁]get to sleep again more or less readssured.
[3582] But before going getting to sleep again I had time to remember that the pain in question was not altogether new to me.
[3583] For I had felt it before, in my bathroom, when giving my son his enema.
[3584] But then it had only attacked me once and never 5recurred, till now.
[3585] And I went to sleep again wondering, by way of lullaby, whether it had been the same knee then as the one which had just excruciated me, or the other.
[3586] And that is a thing I have never been able to determine.
[3587] And my son too, when asked, was incapable of telling me
[p. 57r]
[3587] which of my two knees I had rubbed in front of him, with iodex, the night we left.
[3588] And I went to sleep again a little reassured, saying, It's a touch of neuralgia brought on by all the tramping and trudging and the chill damp nights, and promising myself to procure a packet of thermogenic[⁁]e wool, with the pretty demon the on the outside, at the first opportunity.
[3589] Such is the rapidity of thought.
[3590] But there was more to come.
[3591] For waking again towards dawn, this time in consequence of a natural need, and with a mild erection, to make things more lifelike, I was unable to get up.
[3592] That is to say I did get up finally to be sure, I simply had to, but by dint of what exertions!
[3593] Unable, unable, it's easy to talk about being unable, whereas in reality nothing is more difficult.
[3594] Because of the will I suppose, which the least opposition seems to lash into a fury.
[3595] And this explains no doubt how it was I despaired at first of ever bednding my leg again and then, a little later, through sheer determination, did succeed in bending it, slightly.
[3596] The anchylosis was not total.
[3597] I am still talking about my knee.
[3598] But was it the same one that had waked me early in the night?
[3599] I w[⁁]could not have sworn it was.
[3600] It was not painful. [3601] It simply refused to bend.
[3602] The pain, having warned me several times in vain, had no more to say.
[3603] That is how I saw it.
[3604] It would have been impossible for me to kneel, for example, for no matter how you kneel you must always bend both knees, unless you adopt an attitude frankly grotevsque and impossible to maintain for more than a few seconds, I mean with the bad leg stretched out before you, like a Caucasian dancer.
[3605] I examined the bad knee in the light of my torch.
[3606] It was neither red nor swollen.
[3607] I fiddled with the knee-cap.
[3608] It felt like a clitoris.
[3609] All this time my son was puffing like a grampus.
[3610] He had no suspicion of what life could do to you.
[3611] I too was innocent.
[3612] But I knew it.
[3613] The sky was that horrible colour which heralds dawn. [3614] Things steal
[p. 58r]
[3614] back into position for the day, take their stand, sham dead.
[3615] I sat down cautiously, and I must say with a certain curiosity, on the ground.
[3616] Anyone else would have tried to sit down as usual, off-handedly.
[3617] Not I.
[3618] New as this new cross was I at once found the most comfortable way of being crushed.
[3619] But when you sit down on the ground you must sit down tailor-wise, or like a foetus, these are so to speak the only possible positions, for a beginner.
[3620] So that I was not long in letting myself fall back flat on my back.
[3621] And I was not long either in making the following addition to the sum of my knowledge, that when of the innumerable attitudes adopted unthinkingly by the normal man all are precluded but two or three, then these are enhanced.
[3622] I would have sworn just the opposite, but for this experience.
[3623] Yes, when you can neither stand nor sit with comfort, you take refuge in the horizontal, like a child in its mother's lap.
[3624] You explore it as never before and find it possessed of unseuspected delights.
[3625] In short it becomes infintite.
[3626] And if in spite of all you come to tire of it in the end, you have only to stand up, or indeed sit up, for a few seconds.
[3627] Such are the advantages of a local and painless paralysis.
[3628] And it would not surprise me if the great classical paralyses were to offer analogous and perhaps even still more unspeakable satisfactions.
[3629] To be literally incapable of motion at last, that must be something!
[3630] My mind swoons when I think of it.
[3631] And mute into the bargain!
[3632] And perhaps as deaf as a post!
[3633] And who knows as blind as a bat!
[3634] And as likely as not your memory a blank!
[3635] And just enough brain intact to allow you to exult!
[3636] And to dread death like a regeneration.
[3637] I considered the problem of what I should do if my leg did not get better or got worse.
[3638] I wqa[⁁]atched, through the branches, the sky sinking.
[3639] The sky sinks in the morning, this fact has been insufficiently observed.
[3640] It stoops, as if to get a better look.
[3641] Unless it is the earth that lifts itself up, to be approved, before it sets out.
[p. 59r]
[3642] I shall not expound my reasoning.
[3643] I could do so easily, so easily.
[3644] Its conclusion made horrible [⁁]possible the composition of the following passage.
[3645] Did you have a good night? I said, as soon as my son opened his eyes.
[3646] I could have waked him, but no, I let him wake naturally.
[3647] Finally he told me he did not feel well.
[3648] My son's replies were often beside the point.
[3649] Where are we, I said, and what is the nearest village?
[3650] He named it.
[3651] I knew it, I had been there, it was a small town, luck was on our side.
[3652] I even had a few acquaintances, among its inhabitants.
[3653] What day is it? I said.
[3654] He specified the day without a moment's hesitation.
[3655] And he had only just regained consciousness!
[3656] I told you he had a genius for history and geography.
[3657] It was from him I learned that Condom is on the Baise.
[3658] Good, I said, off you go now to Hole, it'll take you — I worked it out — at the most three hours.
[3659] He stared at me in astonishment.
[3660] There, I said, buy a bicycle to fit you, second-hand for preference.
[3661] You can go up to five pounds.
[3662] I gave him five pounds, in ten-shilling notes.
[3663] It must have a very strong carrier, I said, if it isn't very strong get it changed, for a very strong one.
[3664] I was trying to be clear.
[3665] I asked him if he was pleased.
[3666] He did not look pleased.
[3667] I repeated these instructions and asked him again if he was pleased.
[3668] He looked if anything stupefied. [3669] A consequence perhaps of the great joy he felt.
[3670] Perhaps he could not pbelieve his h[₰]ears.
[3671] Do you understand if nothing else? I said.
[3672] What a boon it is from time to time, a little real conversation.
[3673] Tell me what you are to do, I said.
[3674] It was the only way of knowing if he understood.
[3675] Go to Hole, he said, fifteen miles away.
[3676] Fifteen miles! I cried.
[3677] Yes, he said. [3678] All right, I said, go on.
[3679] And buy a bicycle, he said.
[3680] I waited.
[3681] Silence.
[3682] A bicycle! I cried.
[3683] But there are millions of bicycles in Hole!
[3684] What kind of bicycle?
[3685] He reflected.
[3686] Second-hand, he said, at a venture.
[3687] And if you can't find one second-hand? I said.
[3688] You told me second-hand, he said.
[3689] I remained