Ulysses

sent by that fireeater. He steps forward. A sackshouldered ragman bars his path. He steps left, ragsackman left. Bloom I beg. He swerves, sidles, stepaside, slips past and on. Bloom Keep to the right, right, right. If there is a fingerpost planted by the Touring Club at Stepaside who procured that public boon? I who lost my way and contributed to the columns of the Irish Cyclist the letter headed, In darkest Stepaside. Keep, keep, keep to the right. Rags and bones, at midnight. A fence more likely. First place murderer makes for. Wash off his sins of the world. Jacky Caffrey, hunted by Tommy Caffrey, runs full tilt against Bloom. Bloom O. Shocked, on weak hams, he halts. Tommy and Jacky vanish there, there. Bloom pats with parcelled hands watch, fobpocket, bookpocket, pursepoke, sweets of sin, potato soap. Bloom Beware of pickpockets. Old thieves dodge. Collide. Then snatch your purse. The retriever approaches sniffling, nose to the ground. A sprawled form sneezes. A stooped bearded figure appears garbed in the long caftan of an elder in Zion and a smoking cap with magenta tassels. Horned spectacles hang down at the wings of the nose. Yellow poison streaks are on the drawn face. Rudolph Second halfcrown waste money today. I told you not go with drunken goy ever. So. You catch no money. Bloom Hides the crubeen and trotter behind his back and, crestfallen, feels warm and cold feetmeat. Ja, ich weiss, papachi. Rudolph What you making down this place? Have you no soul? With feeble vulture talons he feels the silent face of Bloom. Are you not my son Leopold, the grandson of Leopold? Are you not my dear son Leopold who left the house of his father and left the god of his fathers Abraham and Jacob? Bloom With precaution. I suppose so, father. Mosenthal. All that’s left of him. Rudolph Severely. One night they bring you home drunk as dog after spend your good money. What you call them running chaps? Bloom In youth’s smart blue Oxford suit with white vestslips, narrowshouldered, in brown Alpine hat, wearing gent’s sterling silver waterbury keyless watch and double curb Albert with seal attached, one side of him coated with stiffening mud. Harriers, father. Only that once. Rudolph Once! Mud head to foot. Cut your hand open. Lockjaw. They make you kaput, Leopoldleben. You watch them chaps. Bloom Weakly. They challenged me to a sprint. It was muddy. I slipped. Rudolph With contempt. Goim nachez. Nice spectacles for your poor mother! Bloom Mamma! Ellen Bloom In pantomime dame’s stringed mobcap, crinoline and bustle, widow Twankey’s blouse with muttonleg sleeves buttoned behind, grey mittens and cameo brooch, her hair plaited in a crispine net, appears over the staircase banisters, a slanted candlestick in her hand and cries out in shrill alarm. O blessed Redeemer, what have they done to him! My smelling salts! She hauls up a reef of skirt and ransacks the pouch of her striped blay petticoat. A phial, an Agnus Dei, a shrivelled potato and a celluloid doll fall out. Sacred Heart of Mary, where were you at all, at all? Bloom, mumbling, his eyes downcast begins to bestow his parcels in his filled pockets but desists, muttering. A Voice Sharply. Poldy! Bloom Who? He ducks and wards off a blow clumsily. At your service. He looks up. Beside her mirage of datepalms a handsome woman in Turkish costume stands before him. Opulent curves fill out her scarlet trousers and jacket slashed with gold. A wide yellow cummerbund girdles her. A white yashmak violet in the night, covers her face, leaving free only her large dark eyes and raven hair. Bloom Molly! Marion Welly? Mrs Marion from this out, my dear man, when you speak to me. Satirically. Has poor little hubby cold feet waiting so long? Bloom Shifts from foot to foot. No, no. Not the least little bit. He breathes in deep agitation, swallowing gulps of air, questions, hopes, crubeens for her supper, things to tell her, excuses, desire, spellbound. A coin gleams on her forehead. On her feet are jewelled toerings. Her ankles are linked by a slender fetterchain. Beside her a camel, hooded with a turreting turban, waits. A silk ladder of innumerable rungs climbs to his bobbing howdah. He ambles near with disgruntled hindquarters. Fiercely she slaps his haunch, her goldcurb wristbangles angriling, scolding him in Moorish. Marion Nebrakada! Feminimum! The camel, lifting a foreleg, plucks from a tree a large mango fruit, offers it to his mistress, blinking, in his cloven hoof then droops his head and, grunting, with uplifted neck, fumbles to kneel. Bloom stoops his back for leapfrog. Bloom I can give you⁠ ⁠… I mean as your business menagerer⁠ ⁠… Mrs Marion⁠ ⁠… if you⁠ ⁠… Marion So you notice some change? Her hands passing slowly over her trinketed stomacher. A slow friendly mockery in her eyes. O Poldy, Poldy, you are a poor old stick in the mud! Go and see life. See the wide world. Bloom I was just going back for that lotion whitewax, orangeflower water. Shop closes early on Thursday. But the first thing in the morning. He pats divers pockets. This moving kidney. Ah! He points to the south, then to the east. A cake of new clean lemon soap arises, diffusing light and perfume. The Soap

We’re a capital couple are Bloom and I
He brightens the earth, I polish the sky.

The freckled face of Sweny, the druggist, appears in the disc of the soapsun. Sweny Three and a penny, please. Bloom Yes. For my wife, Mrs Marion. Special recipe. Marion Softly. Poldy! Bloom Yes, ma’am? Marion Ti trema un poco il cuore? In disdain she saunters away, plump as a pampered pouter pigeon, humming the duet from Don Giovanni. Bloom Are you sure about that Voglio? I mean the pronunciati⁠ ⁠… He follows, followed by the sniffing terrier. The elderly bawd seizes his sleeve, the bristles of her chinmole glittering. The Bawd Ten