STEPHEN: (Tries to move off) Will someone tell me where I am least likely to meet these necessary evils? Ça se voit aussi à paris. Not that I… But, by Saint Patrick…!
(The women’s heads coalesce. Old Gummy Granny in sugarloaf hat appears seated on a toadstool, the deathflower of the potato blight on her breast.)
STEPHEN: Aha! I know you, gammer! Hamlet, revenge! The old sow that eats her farrow!
OLD GUMMY GRANNY: (Rocking to and fro) Ireland’s sweetheart, the king of Spain’s daughter, alanna. Strangers in my house, bad manners to them! (She keens with banshee woe) Ochone! Ochone! Silk of the kine! (She wails) You met with poor old Ireland and how does she stand?
STEPHEN: How do I stand you? The hat trick! Where’s the third person of the Blessed Trinity? Soggarth Aroon? The reverend Carrion Crow.
CISSY CAFFREY: (Shrill) Stop them from fighting!
A ROUGH: Our men retreated.
PRIVATE CARR: (Tugging at his belt) I’ll wring the neck of any fucker says a word against my fucking king.
BLOOM: (Terrified) He said nothing. Not a word. A pure misunderstanding.
THE CITIZEN: Erin go bragh!
(Major Tweedy and the Citizen exhibit to each other medals, decorations, trophies of war, wounds. Both salute with fierce hostility.)
PRIVATE COMPTON: Go it, Harry. Do him one in the eye. He’s a proboer.
STEPHEN: Did I? When?
BLOOM: (To the redcoats) We fought for you in South Africa, Irish missile troops. Isn’t that history? Royal Dublin Fusiliers. Honoured by our monarch.
THE NAVVY: (Staggering past) O, yes! O God, yes! O, make the kwawr a krowawr! O! Bo!
(Casqued halberdiers in armour thrust forward a pentice of gutted spearpoints. Major Tweedy, moustached like Turko the terrible, in bearskin cap with hackleplume and accoutrements, with epaulettes, gilt chevrons and sabretaches, his breast bright with medals, toes the line. He gives the pilgrim warrior’s sign of the knights templars.)
MAJOR TWEEDY: (Growls gruffly) Rorke’s Drift! Up, guards, and at them! Mahar shalal hashbaz.
PRIVATE CARR: I’ll do him in.
PRIVATE COMPTON: (Waves the crowd back) Fair play, here. Make a bleeding butcher’s shop of the bugger.
(Massed bands blare Garryowen and God save the King.)
CISSY CAFFREY: They’re going to fight. For me!
CUNTY KATE: The brave and the fair.
BIDDY THE CLAP: Methinks yon sable knight will joust it with the best.
CUNTY KATE: (Blushing deeply) Nay, madam. The gules doublet and merry saint George for me!
STEPHEN:
The harlot’s cry from street to street Shall weave Old Ireland’s windingsheet.
PRIVATE CARR: (Loosening his belt, shouts) I’ll wring the neck of any fucking bastard says a word against my bleeding fucking king.
BLOOM: (Shakes Cissy Caffrey’s shoulders) Speak, you! Are you struck dumb? You are the link between nations and generations. Speak, woman, sacred lifegiver!
CISSY CAFFREY: (Alarmed, seizes Private Carr’s sleeve) Amn’t I with you? Amn’t I your girl? Cissy’s your girl. (She cries) Police!
STEPHEN: (Ecstatically, to Cissy Caffrey)
White thy fambles, red thy gan
And thy quarrons dainty is.
VOICES: Police!
DISTANT VOICES: Dublin’s burning! Dublin’s burning! On fire, on fire!
