For Haines's chapbook. No-one here to hear. Tonight deftly amid wild
drink and talk, to pierce the polished mail of his mind. What then? A
jester at the court of his master, indulged and disesteemed, winning a
clement master's praise. Why had they chosen all that part? Not wholly
for the smooth caress. For them too history was a tale like any other too
often heard, their land a pawnshop.

Had Pyrrhus not fallen by a beldam's hand in Argos or Julius Caesar not
been knifed to death. They are not to be thought away. Time has branded
them and fettered they are lodged in the room of the infinite
possibilities they have ousted. But can those have been possible seeing
that they never were? Or was that only possible which came to pass?
Weave, weaver of the wind.

--Tell us a story, sir.

--O, do, sir. A ghoststory.

--Where do you begin in this? Stephen asked, opening another book.

--WEEP NO MORE, Comyn said.

--Go on then, Talbot.

--And the story, sir?

--After, Stephen said. Go on, Talbot.

A swarthy boy opened a book and propped it nimbly under the breastwork of
his satchel. He recited jerks of verse with odd glances at the text:


--WEEP NO MORE, WOFUL SHEPHERDS, WEEP NO MORE
FOR LYCIDAS, YOUR SORROW, IS NOT DEAD,
SUNK THOUGH HE BE BENEATH THE WATERY FLOOR ...


It must be a movement then, an actuality of the possible as possible.
Aristotle's phrase formed itself within the gabbled verses and floated
out into the studious silence of the library of Saint Genevieve where he
had read, sheltered from the sin of Paris, night by night. By his elbow a
delicate Siamese conned a handbook of strategy. Fed and feeding brains
about me: under glowlamps, impaled, with faintly beating feelers: and in
my mind's darkness a sloth of the underworld, reluctant, shy of
brightness, shifting her dragon scaly folds. Thought is the thought of
thought. Tranquil brightness. The soul is in a manner all that is: the
soul is the form of forms. Tranquility sudden, vast, candescent: form of
forms.

Talbot repeated:


--THROUGH THE DEAR MIGHT OF HIM THAT WALKED THE WAVES,
THROUGH THE DEAR MIGHT ...


--Turn over, Stephen said quietly. I don't see anything.

--What, sir? Talbot asked simply, bending forward.

His hand turned the page over. He leaned back and went on again,
having just remembered. Of him that walked the waves. Here also over
these craven hearts his shadow lies and on the scoffer's heart and lips
and on mine. It lies upon their eager faces who offered him a coin of the
tribute. To Caesar what is Caesar's, to God what is God's. A long look
from dark eyes, a riddling sentence to be woven and woven on the church's
looms. Ay.


RIDDLE ME, RIDDLE ME, RANDY RO.
MY FATHER GAVE ME SEEDS TO SOW.


Talbot slid his closed book into his satchel.

--Have I heard all? Stephen asked.

--Yes, sir. Hockey at ten, sir.

--Half day, sir. Thursday.

--Who can answer a riddle? Stephen asked.

They bundled their books away, pencils clacking, pages rustling.
Crowding together they strapped and buckled their satchels, all gabbling
gaily:

--A riddle, sir? Ask me, sir.

--O, ask me, sir.

--A hard one, sir.

--This is the riddle, Stephen said:


THE COCK CREW,
THE SKY WAS BLUE:
THE BELLS IN HEAVEN


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