Ulysses - Gabler Edition [264]
THE BOOTS
(jogging, mocks them with thumb and wriggling wormfingers) Haw haw have you the horn?
(Bronze by gold they whisper.)
ZOE
(to Florry) Whisper. (she whispers again)
(Over the well of the car Blazes Boylan leans, his boater straw set sideways, a red flower in his mouth. Lenehan in yachtsman’s cap and white shoes officiously detaches a long hair from Blazes Boylan’s coat shoulder.)
LENEHAN
Ho! What do I here behold? Were you brushing the cobwebs off a few quims?
BOYLAN
(sated, smiles) Plucking a turkey.
LENEHAN
A good night’s work.
BOYLAN
(holding up four thick bluntungulated fingers, winks) Blazes Kate! Up to sample or your money back. (he holds out a forefinger) Smell that.
LENEHAN
(smells gleefully) Ah! Lobster and mayonnaise. Ah!
ZOE AND FLORRY
(laugh together) Ha ha ha ha.
BOYLAN
(jumps surely from the car and calls loudly for all to hear) Hello, Bloom! Mrs Bloom dressed yet?
BLOOM
(in flunkey’s prune plush coat and kneebreeches, buff stockings and powdered wig) I’m afraid not, sir. The last articles .....
BOYLAN
(tosses him sixpence) Here, to buy yourself a gin and splash. (he hangs his hat smartly on a peg of Bloom’s antlered head) Show me in. I have a little private business with your wife, you understand?
BLOOM
Thank you, sir. Yes, sir. Madam Tweedy is in her bath, sir.
MARION
He ought to feel himself highly honoured. (she plops splashing out of the water) Raoul darling, come and dry me. I’m in my pelt. Only my new hat and a carriage sponge.
BOYLAN
(a merry twinkle in his eye) Topping!
BELLA
What? What is it?
(Zoe whispers to her.)
MARION
Let him look, the pishogue! Pimp! And scourge himself! I’ll write to a powerful prostitute or Bartholomona, the bearded woman, to raise weals out on him an inch thick and make him bring me back a signed and stamped receipt.
BOYLAN
(clasps himself) Here, I can’t hold this little lot much longer. (he strides off on stiff cavalry legs)
BELLA
(laughing) Ho ho ho ho.
BOYLAN
(to Bloom, over his shoulder) You can apply your eye to the keyhole and play with yourself while I just go through her a few times.
BLOOM
Thank you, sir. I will, sir. May I bring two men chums to witness the deed and take a snapshot? (he holds out an ointment jar) Vaseline, sir? Orangeflower ...? Lukewarm water ...?
KITTY
(from the sofa) Tell us, Florry. Tell us. What ...
(Florry whispers to her. Whispering lovewords murmur, liplapping loudly, poppysmic plopslop.)
MINA KENNEDY
(her eyes upturned) O, it must be like the scent of geraniums and lovely peaches! O, he simply idolises every bit of her! Stuck together! Covered with kisses!
LYDIA DOUCE
(her mouth opening) Yumyum. O, he’s carrying her round the room doing it! Ride a cockhorse. You could hear them in Paris and New York. Like mouthfuls of strawberries and cream.
KITTY
(laughing) Hee hee hee.
BOYLAN’S VOICE
(sweetly, hoarsely, in the pit of his stomach) Ah! Godblazegrukbrukarchkhrasht!
MARION’S VOICE
(hoarsely, sweetly, rising to her throat) O! Weeshwashtkissinapooisthnapoohuck?
BLOOM
(his eyes wildly dilated, clasps himself) Show! Hide! Show! Plough her! More! Shoot!
BELLA, ZOE, FLORRY, KITTY
Ho ho! Ha ha! Hee hee!
LYNCH
(points) The mirror up to nature. (he laughs) Hu hu hu hu hu!
(Stephen and Bloom gaze in the mirror. The face of William Shakespeare, beardless, appears there, rigid in facial paralysis, crowned by the reflection of the reindeer antlered hatrack in the hall.)
SHAKESPEARE
(in dignified ventriloquy) ’Tis the loud laugh bespeaks the vacant mind. (to Bloom) Thou thoughtest as how thou wastest invisible. Gaze. (he crows with a black capon’s laugh) Iagogo! How my Oldfellow chokit his Thursdaymornun. Iagogogo!
BLOOM
(smiles yellowly