picture of Venus with all his belongings on show. Call that innocence?
Poor idiot! His wife has her work cut out for her. Never see them sit
on a bench marked WET PAINT. Eyes all over them. Look under the bed
for what's not there. Longing to get the fright of their lives.
Sharp as needles they are. When I said to Molly the man at the corner
of Cuffe street was goodlooking, thought she might like, twigged at
once he had a false arm. Had, too. Where do they get that? Typist
going up Roger Greene's stairs two at a time to show her understandings.
Handed down from father to, mother to daughter, I mean. Bred in the
bone. Milly for example drying her handkerchief on the mirror to
save the ironing. Best place for an ad to catch a woman's eye on a
mirror. And when I sent her for Molly's Paisley shawl to Prescott's
by the way that ad I must, carrying home the change in her stocking!
Clever little minx. I never told her. Neat way she carries parcels
too. Attract men, small thing like that. Holding up her hand, shaking it,
to let the blood flow back when it was red. Who did you learn that from?
Nobody. Something the nurse taught me. O, don't they know! Three years
old she was in front of Molly's dressingtable, just before we left Lombard
street west. Me have a nice pace. Mullingar. Who knows? Ways of the
world. Young student. Straight on her pins anyway not like the other.
Still she was game. Lord, I am wet. Devil you are. Swell of her calf.
Transparent stockings, stretched to breaking point. Not like that frump
today. A. E. Rumpled stockings. Or the one in Grafton street. White. Wow!
Beef to the heel.

A monkey puzzle rocket burst, spluttering in darting crackles. Zrads
and zrads, zrads, zrads. And Cissy and Tommy and Jacky ran out to see
and Edy after with the pushcar and then Gerty beyond the curve of the
rocks. Will she? Watch! Watch! See! Looked round. She smelt an onion.
Darling, I saw, your. I saw all.

Lord!

Did me good all the same. Off colour after Kiernan's, Dignam's. For
this relief much thanks. In HAMLET, that is. Lord! It was all things
combined. Excitement. When she leaned back, felt an ache at the butt of my
tongue. Your head it simply swirls. He's right. Might have made a worse
fool of myself however. Instead of talking about nothing. Then I will tell
you all. Still it was a kind of language between us. It couldn't be? No,
Gerty they called her. Might be false name however like my name and the
address Dolphin's barn a blind.


HER MAIDEN NAME WAS JEMINA BROWN
AND SHE LIVED WITH HER MOTHER IN IRISHTOWN.


Place made me think of that I suppose. All tarred with the same brush.
Wiping pens in their stockings. But the ball rolled down to her as if it
understood. Every bullet has its billet. Course I never could throw
anything straight at school. Crooked as a ram's horn. Sad however because
it lasts only a few years till they settle down to potwalloping and papa's
pants will soon fit Willy and fuller's earth for the baby when they hold
him out to do ah ah. No soft job. Saves them. Keeps them out of harm's
way. Nature. Washing child, washing corpse. Dignam. Children's hands
always round them. Cocoanut skulls, monkeys, not even closed at first,
sour milk in their swaddles and tainted curds. Oughtn't to have given
that child an empty teat to suck. Fill it up with wind. Mrs Beaufoy,
Purefoy. Must call to the hospital. Wonder is nurse Callan there still.
She used to look over some nights when Molly was in the Coffee Palace.
That young doctor O'Hare I noticed her brushing his coat. And Mrs Breen
and Mrs Dignam once like that too, marriageable. Worst of all at night
Mrs Duggan told me in the City Arms. Husband rolling in drunk, stink of
pub off him like a polecat. Have that in your nose in the dark,
whiff of stale boose. Then ask in the morning: was I drunk last
night? Bad policy however to fault the husband. Chickens come
home to roost. They stick by one another like glue. Maybe the
women's fault also. That's where Molly can knock spots off them. It's the
blood of the south. Moorish. Also the form, the figure. Hands felt for the
opulent. Just compare for instance those others. Wife locked up at home,
skeleton in the cupboard. Allow me to introduce my. Then they trot you out
some kind of a nondescript, wouldn't know what to call her. Always see a
fellow's weak point in his wife. Still there's destiny in it, falling in
love. Have their own secrets between them. Chaps that would go to the dogs
if some woman didn't take them in hand. Then little chits of girls,
height of a shilling in coppers, with little hubbies. As God made them he
matched them. Sometimes children turn out well enough. Twice nought makes
one. Or old rich chap of seventy and blushing bride. Marry in May and
repent in December. This wet is very unpleasant. Stuck. Well the foreskin
is not back. Better detach.

Ow!

Other hand a sixfooter with a wifey up to his watchpocket. Long and
the short of it. Big he and little she. Very strange about my watch.
Wristwatches are always going wrong. Wonder is there any magnetic
influence between the person because that was about the time he. Yes, I
suppose, at once. Cat's away, the mice will play. I remember looking in
Pill lane. Also that now is magnetism. Back of everything magnetism. Earth
for instance pulling this and being pulled. That causes movement. And
time, well that's the time the movement takes. Then if one thing stopped
the whole ghesabo would stop bit by bit. Because it's all arranged.
Magnetic needle tells you what's going on in the sun, the stars. Little
piece of steel iron. When you hold out the fork. Come. Come. Tip. Woman
and man that is. Fork and steel. Molly, he. Dress up and look and suggest
and let you see and see more and defy you if you're a man to see that and,
like a sneeze coming, legs, look, look and if you have any guts in you.
Tip. Have to let fly.

Wonder how is she feeling in that region. Shame all put on before


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