—­Do you wish me to tell you? he asked.

—­Yes, what is it?  Buck Mulligan answered.  I don’t remember anything.

He looked in Stephen’s face as he spoke.  A light wind passed his brow, fanning softly his fair uncombed hair and stirring silver points of anxiety in his eyes.

Stephen, depressed by his own voice, said: 

—­Do you remember the first day I went to your house after my mother’s death?

Buck Mulligan frowned quickly and said: 

—­What?  Where?  I can’t remember anything.  I remember only ideas and sensations.  Why?  What happened in the name of God?

—­You were making tea, Stephen said, and went across the landing to get more hot water.  Your mother and some visitor came out of the drawingroom.  She asked you who was in your room.

—­Yes?  Buck Mulligan said.  What did I say?  I forget.

—­You said, Stephen answered, O, it’s only Dedalus whose mother is
beastly dead.

A flush which made him seem younger and more engaging rose to Buck
Mulligan’s cheek.

—­Did I say that? he asked.  Well?  What harm is that?

He shook his constraint from him nervously.

—­And what is death, he asked, your mother’s or yours or my own?  You saw only your mother die.  I see them pop off every day in the Mater and Richmond and cut up into tripes in the dissectingroom.  It’s a beastly thing and nothing else.  It simply doesn’t matter.  You wouldn’t kneel down to pray for your mother on her deathbed when she asked you.  Why?  Because you have the cursed jesuit strain in you, only it’s injected the wrong way.  To me it’s all a mockery and beastly.  Her cerebral lobes are not functioning.  She calls the doctor sir Peter Teazle and picks buttercups off the quilt.  Humour her till it’s over.  You crossed her last wish in death and yet you sulk with me because I don’t whinge like some hired mute from Lalouette’s.  Absurd!  I suppose I did say it.  I didn’t mean to offend the memory of your mother.

He had spoken himself into boldness.  Stephen, shielding the gaping wounds which the words had left in his heart, said very coldly: 

—­I am not thinking of the offence to my mother.

—­Of what then?  Buck Mulligan asked.

—­Of the offence to me, Stephen answered.

Buck Mulligan swung round on his heel.

—­O, an impossible person! he exclaimed.

He walked off quickly round the parapet.  Stephen stood at his post, gazing over the calm sea towards the headland.  Sea and headland now grew dim.  Pulses were beating in his eyes, veiling their sight, and he felt the fever of his cheeks.

A voice within the tower called loudly: 

—­Are you up there, Mulligan?

—­I’m coming, Buck Mulligan answered.

He turned towards Stephen and said: 

—­Look at the sea.  What does it care about offences?  Chuck Loyola, Kinch, and come on down.  The Sassenach wants his morning rashers.