Part 131 (2/2)

Ulysses James Joyce 24760K 2022-07-22

STEPHEN: _(Strangled with rage)_ s.h.i.+te! _(His features grow drawn grey and old)_

BLOOM: _(At the window)_ What?

STEPHEN: _Ah non, par exemple!_ The intellectual imagination! With me all or not at all. _Non serviam!_

FLORRY: Give him some cold water. Wait. _(She rushes out)_

THE MOTHER: _(Wrings her hands slowly, moaning desperately)_ O Sacred Heart of Jesus, have mercy on him! Save him from h.e.l.l, O Divine Sacred Heart!

STEPHEN: No! No! No! Break my spirit, all of you, if you can! I'll bring you all to heel!

THE MOTHER: _(In the agony of her deathrattle)_ Have mercy on Stephen, Lord, for my sake! Inexpressible was my anguish when expiring with love, grief and agony on Mount Calvary.

STEPHEN: _Nothung_!

_(He lifts his ashplant high with both hands and smashes the chandelier.

Time's livid final flame leaps and, in the following darkness, ruin of all s.p.a.ce, shattered gla.s.s and toppling masonry.)_

THE GASJET: Pwfungg!

BLOOM: Stop!

LYNCH: _(Rushes forward and seizes Stephen's hand)_ Here! Hold on! Don't run amok!

BELLA: Police!

_(Stephen, abandoning his ashplant, his head and arms thrown back stark, beats the ground and flies from the room, past the wh.o.r.es at the door.)_

BELLA: _(Screams)_ After him!

_(The two wh.o.r.es rush to the halldoor. Lynch and Kitty and Zoe stampede from the room. They talk excitedly. Bloom follows, returns.)_

THE Wh.o.r.eS: _(Jammed in the doorway, pointing)_ Down there.

ZOE: _(Pointing)_ There. There's something up.

BELLA: Who pays for the lamp? _(She seizes Bloom's coattail)_ Here, you were with him. The lamp's broken.

BLOOM: _(Rushes to the hall, rushes back)_ What lamp, woman?

A Wh.o.r.e: He tore his coat.

BELLA: _(Her eyes hard with anger and cupidity, points)_ Who's to pay for that? Ten s.h.i.+llings. You're a witness.

BLOOM: _(s.n.a.t.c.hes up Stephen's ashplant)_ Me? Ten s.h.i.+llings? Haven't you lifted enough off him? Didn't he...?

BELLA: _(Loudly)_ Here, none of your tall talk. This isn't a brothel. A ten s.h.i.+lling house.

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